These are things that bug me constantly, bouncing around in my head and torturing me incessantly. I hope that writing them down will help get them out of there, because some days I just want to whack them out!

1. My son has no sibling. I never thought I would raise a child without a sibling, but that's how it's worked out. I grieve for the sibling he has never had. I am constantly envious of anyone I know who has more than one child -- even strangers on the street. I spend a lot of my time thinking about how it sucks to be "fertility challenged" and getting too old to even see the reproductive endocrinologist. I am consumed with self-hatred for bringing a child into the world without any workable plan to give him a sibling (such as doing IVF instead back then and freezing some embryos to save for a sibling). I spend much of my time researching (fruitlessly so far) a cure for PCOS. I am simply miserable that I've had no luck (and had a miscarriage recently to boot).

2. My son will never know his maternal grandparents, and I do not have my mom to help out, talk to, back me up. I feel incredibly lonely and abandoned without her here. I am insanely envious of people who have their parents, and especially resent them complaining about them when they have no idea how hard it is to parent your child with no parents of your own to turn to (even if they may interfere too much, it's still something, love or whatever, for the child). I was recently at a birthday party where the birthday child had not only both his grandmothers there, but also two of his great-grandmothers. I was again, so consumed with envy, and angry for my son. My son will never ever have that. He's met his paternal grandmother, who is quite ill, once in his life, for a few days, which he barely remembers, and she is really quite out of it at this point. She hasn't even sent him so much as a frigging birthday card since he was a baby. I hate it that it angers me to see grandmothers doting on their grandchildren. I'm not angry at them, I'm angry at myself for having a kid knowing he'd never have that. And angry for him, and sad for him, that he won't have that extra love in his life. And angry at my mom for dying. And angry at myself for not doing more for her when she was alive so that maybe she would have lived. I feel overwhelmed that he's only got one generation, not two or three, to love him. Nobody who has their parents still alive can possibly understand how crappy it is. And I don't actually know anyone else who is in this position.

3. We live in an apartment. There are good things about it, like lots of other kids (although some of them are mean), but mostly it sucks. I hate it that we can't walk out our door and still feel at home. I hate it that we have nowhere to grow things. I'm so jealous of all the moms I meet who have homes. I hate myself for being jealous. I never expected to raise a child in such a place. It feels very wrong to me. But housing here is too expensive for any other options. Unless I go to work and put my son in daycare and full day kindergarten, which I hear is a nightmare. I feel trapped.

4. My son has terrible teeth. I don't even know how many fillings he's had now, there are so many. I hate that. And I have no idea what to do about it. I hate that.

I hope to be able to learn to live without another child, because right now, it just tears me up inside every day that I have only one and that he has no siblings.

I like other people's houses because I don't have to clean them, and because I don't have a house.

Friends have made me feel welcome by allowing me to share myself with them, and by feeding me. It's pretty easy, really. Although it's next to impossible for me to do the same for them -- I'm a crappy homemaker and and even crappier host. I hate it, which makes it that much harder.

I have no idea. I try to help, but it doesn't always work unless they both want it to.

Have or adopt about six kids, live on a farm or in a city, and read a ton of books. Not all at the same time, of course. I'd live in the city and take the bus everywhere again like when I was younger, that was fun in a lot of ways.

Get over it and accept it.

Being able to get what you really need. Being born with it would be nice too.

I have no idea, and nobody is left who remembers. And my baby book was stolen from me. So I can't even look it up.

Mostly by ignoring them. Trouble is, I'm one of them!

I think activism, for the most part, is just a bandaid, and in many cases, is just an ego booster for those involved.

No hugs, no cups of tea, no warmth.

Time. Most people are too glued to their TVs (and computers) to do anything other than go to work, the store, and maybe on vacation if they are well off enough. Yesterday there was a power outage, and people came out of their homes (because it was hot all day and it was cooler outside at that point), and all of a sudden the place seemed alive. Usually, there are only a few kids and fewer moms or dads outside in the summer (and in winter, nobody is outside). Imagine the community if people weren't all watching TV or whatever all the time.

Lots of kids for my son to play with, when he feels like it. Although mostly he just wants to play with the girl downstairs (she's more gentle than most of the boys that hang around the playground near our apartment). It's walking distance to two grocery stores. You can also walk to Target if you so choose.

My friends, my knowledge that my death would hurt some of them, and my family. And my unwillingness to find out what happens when we die.

I usally think about how much I've hurt other people in the past, the mistakes I've made, the choices I've made that put me where I am now. Lots of regrets that I focus on too much. I have a hard time trying to move my mind off certain things that cause me pain, and seem to get stuck on feeling helpless.