Self-Portrait, college photography class, 1991

I started blogging in February 2007. I didn’t set out to write a blog, at least not one that would become public. It began as a log of my second pregnancy, and I wrote mostly for myself and eventually to share with family and friends. I don’t remember blogs existing when I was first pregnant with my oldest daughter in 2001. Pregnancy and motherhood blogs were not yet everywhere, nor was Buzzfeed or Twitter or Instagram, even in 2007. I didn’t have a Facebook account until sometime in 2009, still hesitant about my online presence.

That second pregnancy ended in miscarriage at 10 weeks in April 2007, and my writing took an unexpected turn. I found myself in shock to be among the 1 in 5 (likely more like 1 in 4) women who have miscarried. I found myself publicly grieving what could have been. I wrote a lot that month, and then I slowed down, less attached to my online space until I got pregnant again in September 2007. We were living overseas by then, far from family and home, and this was a way I stayed connected to my people.

I was thrilled to be pregnant again, hopeful. In spite of my previous loss, I trusted my body and my baby. The only time in early pregnancy when I remember worrying was when I first suspected I might be pregnant and had some cramping, likely from the fertilized egg implanting into the lining of my uterus. But after that, after that pregnancy test that was so vividly positive, I was full steam ahead. Positive and happy in spite of the morning sickness. Confident.

I spent 6 weeks of that pregnancy in agony on the couch with a horrible case of shingles. I didn’t take antivirals or pain medicine because I didn’t want to endanger my baby. I made it through what was by far the most physically painful 6 weeks of my life straight into a 10 day sinus infection. But still I was undaunted. I was pregnant  and I could feel my baby kicking inside me. I had no reason to think anything would go wrong.

And then it did. At my unborn baby’s 21 week ultrasound, the doctor told us there was a problem. And I found myself relating to my online space differently. It became my lifeline to those who loved us who were far away, across the ocean. As I journeyed through the second half of my now-high risk pregnancy, my online space grew as my circle of support grew. We returned home from overseas to navigate uncharted waters with support and familiarity, and to do so in English. When Tikva was born and for the 58 days she lived, I shared our powerful story together at Growing Inside. I shared our love. And the love that surrounded us – the love that held us – that love grew.

After Tikva died, I kept writing. I wrote for my survival. I wrote also at Glow in the Woods, a website created by and for parents who had also lost babies. I wrote – again – about the loss of all that was possible, the loss of my dreams, the loss of my child. I connected, via my blog, with other babylost parents, with women who held me and whom I was able to hold through their grief and rebuilding. I wrote 471 posts at Growing Inside, and at the end of December 2009, almost a year and a half after my daughter had died, I felt it was time to stop.

I started a new space, at the time a more private space, a few months later. I called it Clearing Space and Settling In and I wrote in it sporadically, but without the momentum I’d had writing at Growing Inside. The internet is like that, you can exist somewhere, then you recreate yourself and exist somewhere else. It’s still you, still your story, but the space feels fresh, new, and I think I was hopeful it would inspire movement within me. Inspiration. Maybe it did. I’m not sure.

Then in late 2010, again with news to share, I created another new space, A Radiant Beam of Light. With some help, I had gotten pregnant again, this time with twins. Here in this new place, I wrote about the ups and I wrote about the downs. I wrote about sharing the news with our older daughter, her joy, my joy. When one of the twins died just after we had told our daughter she was going to be a big sister again, I wrote again about loss and grief and sorrow, and this time I wrote about anger. I wrote about fear. I shared my prayers that I wouldn’t lose the second baby. I held the loss of Tikva and I held my breath. I could not drop into this pregnancy with ease. This time pregnancy was scary.

That post I’d written about telling our daughter we were expecting twins breaks my heart to read now. What do you do with hope that existed – hope that was put into words – and then was lost? Does its energy still exist in the history of all that has been?

And then I could no longer feel the second twin moving inside me, and on Valentine’s Day I found out he had died. A few days later, I delivered my almost-babies. Again, I said goodbye to my dreams, to what might have been. Again I grieved. This time it was angry, hopeless grieving. I wrote sporadically at A Radiant Beam of Light and then I stopped in April 2013, two years after losing the twins.

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The desire to write – at certain times the need to write – hasn’t left me since I discovered it almost 35 years ago. I have always written and I have always wanted to write. I have always had the desire to share my stories. I’ve filled countless journals since I was 10 years old. I’ve submitted stories and won prizes. I’ve written long letters and postcards in tiny print to and from countries all over the world. I’ve kept lengthy computer diaries on my DOS word processor. I’ve written down a piece of my family history that grew into my college honors thesis. I’ve written pages-long emails over years of correspondence with friends – all of which I’ve kept and some of which I’ve dreamt of editing and publishing in some form because they are so heartfelt and true. I’ve taken creative writing classes and participated in writing workshops for women. I’ve written fiction. I’ve written almost-fiction that comes from my experiences. I’ve written professionally. I’ve been published in the media a few times and had so many ideas for other pieces I want to write.  I have written down story ideas on tiny scraps of paper and begun stories and even finished some. I have dreamed of writing books. And I have blogged.

There have been times when my writing has surprised me, as if I were a channel for something that simply needed to come through me, but not responsible for the words themselves. As if the words came from a place other than my mind. My soul? It’s not a religious thing and I am by no means any kind of sage. I think it is what writers – or artists of any kind – refer to as being in the flow. For me, it is creating while connecting to something bigger – or connecting to something bigger by writing. At times writing at Growing Inside, I felt this so deeply. I would sit down to write at the kitchen table or, after we moved, at my desk in the sunroom, and it would just come out, and out, and out. And then I would read what had just come through me and say, Yes. It was cathartic and healing, and I learned later that it was sometimes healing, or nurturing, or validating for those who read my words, too. To me, that was the greatest gift my writing gave me – knowing that it could help others in some small way to know they are not alone. I thought of the books I’ve read, the ones that have touched me most deeply – the way they have spoken to me, the way they made me feel understood.

Isn’t the purpose of bravely sharing our truest selves to be able to resonate with each other?

My whole life I’ve written to make sense of my world and myself. I’ve shared my stories because I suspect – I hope – they are in some way universal stories. We are all on our hero’s journey, with its losses and triumphs, its lessons and its incredible potential for growth and for love. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve become braver about sharing my thoughts, my beliefs, my personal philosophy as it becomes concrete. I’ve been bolder about being authentic, and as a result I’ve discovered that it is the only way I truly want to be in the world. It is the only way I can be and now, at 44, it hurts to be anything else.

So I started writing here, in this new space, just 8 months ago. I thought of the words that make my heart sing and the energy I want to put out into the world and Love, Beauty & Abundance became its name. I thought of how much of myself I want to share, and confronted the fears that came up about being too public in an online universe that can be crazy and unforgiving. I think each time I write about the people closest to me and their privacy, their own personal stories that are theirs, wanting to respect them while respecting my need to share my own experience. I think of how I can honor them with my words. That’s not always easy to navigate – I think for any writer – but I can tell you that my intentions are good.

I don’t lie in this space. I’m not here to pretend I am something I’m not. I try to be humble and I let myself be confident – because I think we (especially women) are quicker to play down our strengths than to share and celebrate them. I am not a competitive person – I believe in abundance, that there is room for all of us to share our gifts, to share our stories. I am inspired by so many people around me – those I know and others I know only by name, or by their words. What inspires me is connection.

Thank you for joining me here, in this space. And for sharing this piece of my story.