subtitled: And somedays, it really, really, REALLY doesn't.
Most people who get knocked up at 19, don't really consider themselves lucky. Unless they're *me*, who has a tattoo to remind herself (literally) of it.
I've been ridiculously fertile, to the point where NOT getting pregnant, is more of an issue, that getting that way in the first place. Which is, in and of itself, pure awesomeness, having read and known women that have struggled, desperately, with conceiving.
My cousin, L, is the youngest of us that live on the upper East Coast. In fact, I live across the street from her parents, my aunt and uncle. She was always odd-(wo)man-out, with her two older siblings, whereas my brother straight-UP didn't like me. She's 6 years younger than I am.
Do the math and I'll cyber-smack you, lovey.
Three years ago, she got *whoops* pregnant. I was the first person she trusted enough to tell. She eventually told the whole family, and settled in to await the coming spawn. She miscarried, very tramuamatically, at 13 weeks.
In the last few years, she's dropped out of college, which is not as bad as it sounds. She just didn't have a passion for anything. She wants to be a wife and mother. She claims this makes her feel very un-PC, but I think it's just something that she says, to cover up for the fact, that to her, that choice seems so right.
She met a man who loves her, and makes her happy.
They bought a house.
They got pregnant. Well, really just L got pregnant.
They had their baby last weekend. Cord wrapped around his neck, double-knotted.
He recovered.
He went home.
He's back in the hospital with what appears to be an exceedingly rare, genetic, metabolic disorder, that will kill him. Probably in the neonatal unit. If he survives the hospital, he'll be profoundly retarded, and only survive a few years.
No, I don't have the name of the disorder. If I did, I wouldn't be blogging, I'd be looking it up using every search engine available.
Once you have a child with this, you have a 2 in 4 (someone, please explain how that is different from a 1 in 2? I mean, I'm no math whiz, I have trouble balancing my check book, which only requires addition and subtraction skills, but really? ) chance of subsequent children having it. There is no way to test for it, in utero.
So today, if you've got some squishy littles, who smear their boogies on the wall, or worse, eat them, demand that you "Wipe my BUTT, mama!", and generally make you want to drink heavily, squish them into a big old, messy, boogie-filled hug.
Just don't take them up on their offer to share their snotty snack.
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