Eilis has been reminding us for days that “The Happy Day” is almost here! Of course, to Eilis, that means her 10th birthday, which falls just 2 hours and 36 minutes after Valentine’s Day.
She has no real idea how much it hits me when she says “The Happy Day”. I don’t believe a woman with an epidural headache, recovering from 36 hours of labor and a c-section, could have been more deliriously happy than I was on February 15th, 2001.
There had been tremendous heartache in my road to being a mom. Brighid was a surprise pregnancy, after we had been told conceiving would be terribly difficult for me due to an issue known as Polycystic Ovarian Syndrome (PCOS). As overjoyed as we were to be having Brighid, the pregnancy was difficult, and ended at 31 weeks, when we were faced with the real possibility of a premature infant that would fail to thrive. Not an easy baptism into the sisterhood.
For 9 years after Brighid, we struggled with infertility. It was during this time that we lost three of the five babies I would eventually miscarry, and it seemed that there would be no more children for us.
So after a month long trek across the country, from Florida to New Jersey, and then on to Washington state, when it seemed I wasn’t going to ever be un-tired again, I took a pregnancy test.
Positive. Not yet a happy day.
After the losses we suffered, a positive sign on a pregnancy test meant nothing more than another $10 down the drain on a home test. But in working with the doctor who I credit with saving not only Eilis’s life, but my dreams to be a mother – Dr. Mark Denker from the Palm Beach Fertility Center – this time, we’d have our happy day.
The minute Eilis was born, 2:36 AM on Thursday, February 15th, 2001, U2 was playing on the CD player in the operating room. “It’s a Beautiful Day”. Forget that they lyrics sing about doom and gloom in some places. The chorus could not have rung more true. Not only was it a beautiful day, it was a happy day.
And Eilis, you have given me 10 years of happy days to celebrate. So when you ask, “How many more days until the Happy Day?”, I’m already there.
