curiosity

There is something I have been wondering about for a while now, so I am going to go ahead and come out and ask about it. I am wondering how *you* found *me.*

I will start by telling *you* how I found *you*...

Of course there will be some ample back-story, as I am so fond of the back story...

I am an obsessive researcher. When Mr. C told me in September of 2005 that he wanted to start our family, and I let him talk me into it, I immediately headed to the book store and got online. As it all turned out we got pregnant the first month of trying. So either all of that research paid off, or we really didn't need it, it's hard to know for sure. At any rate, that is how I found one of those online places where you can set up a pregnancy calendar and get weekly updates on how the zygote-embryo-fetus-baby is growing and all that. And they also have message boards. I didn't visit my "expecting club" much because I didn't relate to most of what was being talked about, but I checked in on it every now and then to compare my pregnancy experience with others. I threw my 2 cents in every now and then. Like the time this woman was going to opt out of her 20 week ultrasound because she thought she could just save herself some money (she didn't have insurance) by going to the mall and getting one of those 3D ultrasounds so she could "find out if it was a girl or a boy." I very politely explained to her why a level II ultrasound was for a lot more than identifying gender and she seemed very grateful for the information. After we lost William I had the sad task of unsubscribing from all of the online updates. I don't really remember when I stumbled across the message boards that are devoted to Stillbirth/infant loss, but my obsessive researching was a big part of my early grief process as well.

Fast forward several months and I decided to start a blog. The blog was in a round-about way an off-shoot of my time on various message boards, as some mothers include links to their blogs in their signatures. I visited preemie blogs every now and then. As we started to get closer to our agreed-upon time to TTC again I thought that a blog might be a good thing to help me through the process of getting ready to try, trying, a stressful high-risk pregnancy, and beyond.

Move forward another month or so into my blogging when I found *you.* I was reading the preemie message board and there was a woman who I had been checking in on. She was pregnant with twins and had a hole in one of the amniotic sacks that developed fairly early in the second trimester. The hole was apparently in a spot where the two sacks were touching, which made for a slow leak. The doctors told her she would lose both babies if nothing was done. Long story (relatively) short--she couldn't give up on this baby to "spare" the other (there was no guarantee that this wouldn't result in the loss of both babies) and continued to carry both babies until early in the third trimester. She ended up on hospital bedrest and constant monitoring with both babies continuing to grow--but the one baby was much smaller. When she finally did give birth the smaller twin only lived for a few hours, while the other twin was in NICU for a while but was healthy. In her grief this mother turned to the preemie message board and it is there that one of the compassionate women attached a link to msfitzita's blog.

So after I read her blog I started clicking on her links. I would stay up extremely late reading into the archives of blogs, crying and laughing...I was hooked. I had no idea how all of this blog stuff worked. I wondered how people found each other. Now I pretty much understand in a general way how it all works. But I am wondering how each of you found your way to your own blog and to this network of bloggers and yes, specifically how you found me.

This is a good opportunity for lurkers to come out, too, I suppose.