The end is nigh

The due date is near.  It's no longer mother's day but May 16th.  Three more days +14 before they induce.  I cannot imagine what it must be like.

Recently, my friend said, "He's definitely running out of space in there, so we'll see how long he stays."  I wanted to just break down.  What a tension she must be wrestling with: The clash of wanting every minute with this life, no matter how doomed, and the desire to be delivered (a word that never seemed more appropriate).  The day of his birth will be the day of his death, so she wants as much time with him as she can get.  But the discomfort grows daily, the burden of bringing a death into the world, as Cordelia said in Barrayar (only more literally in this case). 

The pain won't end, though, with the birth-and-death.  And the mourning won't begin at that moment.  It began long ago when they heard the truth about their baby.  Oh, friends, I weep for you, but there's nothing I can really do to easy your suffering.

There are kids outside riding bikes in the rain, and my heart breaks again along the same fault lines.  Oh, God.