No fun

TBO and I have been discussing adding a third (or fourth, if you count Amber-the-smartest-cat-in-the-world-who-acts-like-a-dog) member to our family for some time now. I've been frustratingly ambivalent in TBO's eyes; almost every girlfriend I've had for the last 20 years or so has been either unwilling or unable to have kids, so any natural urges I might have had have long been successfully suppressed. I recall a time when I wanted kids, but I have erased the emotional context for that feeling. When TBO announced she had taken multiple pregnancy tests with all conclusive tests returning positive results, therefore, I didn't jump/down for joy in response, but I was certainly made happy by the news.
Over the last month or so, I have been remembering what it was in that long ago past that I felt about being a father. I remembered things I enjoyed that I had done with my father, like playing catch (with all manner of balls, gloves, mitts, and even lacrosse sticks), or watching sports events, or playing chess or other games. I remembered my desire to help make the world better by helping to create a better person than I have been. I remembered all the things I wanted to pass on to a child, like my extensive comic book collection, or my love of Hot Wheels, or boardgames, or billiards, or any of the rest of my hobbies for which I no longer have time. I remembered that I wanted to do all the things for my child that Dad didn't do for me while also doing those things I liked that he did do. (If that makes any sense.) I was just getting back to that long-forgotten mindset where I was excited and expectant, when TBO then announced that she felt "wrong".
I make no claims to understanding the bond between a mother and a growing person inside the womb. I do know that TBO was so distraught over the prospect of not being able to have kids, whether due to my potentially chemo-damaged swimmers or what she terms her "old eggs", and so relieved/overjoyed when those tests came back positive, that when the reality of having all of that taken away by a miscarriage hit, it hit with a brutal force I can't even begin to comprehend. For my own part, the irony abounds, as it does so often for me. Just as I was beginning to feel that parental desire once again, I mean, the very weekend I started taking actual delight in the notion of becoming a father, it was lost to me.
Life is cruel often enough, but these past couple of weeks since the miscarriage started have been unforgiving for TBO and me. For those of you out there that didn't know about any of this, please forgive me for not calling or writing, but I guess this is the very reason nobody says anything until more than a couple of months have passed since the woman's last period. I don't know what a miscarriage actually means--is it a good thing in our case, since now we know we can have a child, or is it a horribly bad thing because it means we can't? For most things, I'm not exactly what most would call a "glass half-full" kind of guy, but in this case, the stakes are too high for me to be anything but optimistic. I mean, how much wrong have I (or TBO, of course) done in this life or any other to have this sort of thing happen again, right? Right?