Transitions

I'm going to be an aunty this year. I am quite excited by this thought because I never expected to be a 'real' aunty.  This fact, and the arrival of a number of new babies for some colleagues and acquaintances makes me realise I have reached that liminal time in my life where I am in between states.

I am no longer in a position where pregnancy would be welcomed. My age and stage in my work life are against me. Physically and biologically it would be possible but would be a strain on every kind of resource - me, mentally, financially, physically, the family.  In some ways this saddens me.  I see my sister passing milestones in her pregnancy that I remember reaching with joy. I remember those first flutters of quickening, like secret messages between the baby and I shared with no one else. Then the languorous rolls and stretches that happen towards the end of gestation - thoughtful and experimental pushes as though testing the boundaries their interior world.  I remember even the feeling of intense stretching of giving birth and the euphoria afterwards. These things I will never experience again.

Yet, while I will allow myself to get clucky I am happy to be reaching out into the next stages.  New experiences await.  Transitional times can be uncomfortable - releasing one for another, acknowledging the passing of things that were valued and looking for new things to embrace.  I am curious to see what is ahead.