Yesterday, I started a daily distraction activity to get me through this next week of waiting to hear how my embryos are doing and whether any of them are viable after PGD. The first distraction activity was decorating our Christmas Tree. Above is a picture of my special memory ornaments for my angels. The three snowflakes are the same ones A Calm Persistence blogged about finding at Kohl’s in her post It was just one of those days…. She purchased them for her angel babies and was extremely generous in sharing where she found them so others could get them too. I absolutely loved them and went out a few days later and got them for my own angel babies. The three snowflakes are for each of my miscarriages with the birth stone for each due date: April 18th for my first miscarriage, December 20th for my second miscarriage and January 5th for my most recent miscarriage. The two angel ornaments are for my son, my angel Holdon. One angel holds his birthstone for April 6th and the blue angel above it was a gift from my mother, and it holds his picture. These 5 ornaments are my most cherished ornaments and they have a special spot all together up front and center on our tree. I pray next year, we’ll be able to add another birthstone ornament for our Rainbow Baby, and it won’t be to remember his or her loss, but to celebrate his or her first Christmas.

Day 2 Distraction Activity: Finishing My Christmas Cards

Ever since I was a little girl, I always got excited when all the Christmas Greetings would start arriving in the mail from my aunts and uncles, and my parents friends. I’m not really sure why I loved them so much, but I think it’s all part of my love of this holiday. It’s the time of year when we all take a moment to stop focusing on ourselves and take time to think of others. However, in recent years I’ve grown to have mixed feelings about them. Four years ago, My husband and I sent out our first photo card. It was of the two of us sitting in front of our fireplace with our two kitties, and I was 13 weeks pregnant. I remember grinning for the camera and thinking how special the following year would be because we would get to send out a photo card of our new baby. But then everything went wrong and our son didn’t survive, and following year when all the photo cards began to arrive of all the new babies of our friends and family that had been born around the same time as our son, it really made me feel our loss even more. Don’t get me wrong, I love our nieces and nephews and all our friends kids, and I love to get pictures of them, but that year, it was incredibly difficult. It still is. Every year since then, it has been a bit of a chore to send them out. I still love giving and receiving holiday wishes, but now I send generic cards that I buy at the store instead of the personalized family picture cards I want to send. We could send another picture of just the two of us and the kitties, but let’s face it, no one wants to keep getting pictures of our cats every year. So with another Christmas upon us and still no living children, and 2 would-have-been due dates upon us, I was really procrastinating getting my cards done this year. However, with half my cards going to Canada, they really have to get in the mail this week if I want them to get there by Christmas. So today, I put on some Christmas music to get me in the mood and I finally finished all my cards! Now I just have to tackle the post office tomorrow for Canadian postage and they’ll be done!

I’m not sure if this was the best distraction activity to do right now as it didn’t really take my mind off things. If anything, it probably made me think about it more, but I also thought about our loved ones for several hours this evening and that is always a good distraction.