What Baby?

WARNING:  this post has some slightly adult theme and content. All those who are squeamish or underage should find something better to read.  Or go watch videos on wimp.com. 

Herself was slightly amused to find a particular message in her e-mail this morning.  It began:

Your baby is finally here! The Fisher-Price^® Family extends our congratulations and warmest wishes to your new—or growing—family. We hope the prenatal e-mails we sent over the last nine months or so were interesting and informative as your pregnancy progressed.

On the one hand, it is quite entertaining that a woman who acquired a medically-necessary divorce from her uterus just over a year ago would receive this advertisement.   "A medical miracle!"  Herself quips.  "Call Oprah!  I can sell my story and retire a wealthy woman!"

On the other hand, it's really not funny to her at all.

Herself still has not come to terms with the fact that she can no longer bear children.  Not that she would want another baby.  There is just something that pains her deeply about knowing that door is permanently closed.  

Is it a sense of somehow not being as much of a woman, now that she is incapable of pregnancy?   Is it a reminder that she has reached the age when men do not look at her as an attractive woman, but only as a mother of nearly-adult children?  Is it the loss of the heart-opening vulnerability when lovemaking might result in a baby?  Is it nostalgia for days when a colorful cloth diaper covered a sleeping infant's behind, or for times when a comfortable toddler curled up to her in the baby sling? 

All this, and more.  Is this some kind of mid-life crisis?  I think not; it is more of a time of evolution of the spirit.  It is quite painful.  I know, though, that she will bring herself through in time.

We must embrace pain and burn it as fuel for our journey. - Kenji Miyazawa