When I wrote this post, the end of my book was in sight. I needed reassurance to follow my original plan which called for the heroine to suffer a miscarriage close to the end of the book as means to her personal growth and completion of her character's journey. The response I got was overwhelmingly positive--torture away, as long we get our happy ending! No problem there--I don't write books without happy endings. And I hate to read books with ambiguous endings.
Then, a mere few days later, something ELSE was positive. And suddenly, I just couldn't write that ending. Even touching the ending seemed to tempt fate. After all, when I conceived of the book, my own journey with PCOS and adoption were at the forefront, and I wanted to write a book where life didn't go according to plan, but the characters still got a really happy--unexpectedly--ending. The fictional miscarriage felt true to where I was right then, and I felt too bitter to write a happy-mommy-daddy-bio baby ending.
But, then my world shifted and NOT writing the happy-mommy-daddy-bio baby ending seemed disloyal to my new reality, and then there was the whole tempting fate part of the original . . . And so I sat, mired in block with a few passes a new ending, for THREE freaking months. This after swearing that I would never repeat the loooooooooooooooong never-ending block of 2006. This after doing all the work in counseling (and at the pharmacy) to deal with depression and finally, after so many years, get to a stable point. Pregnancy hormones undid all of that in a matter of weeks, but conflict over the ending didn't help any, either.
Now I'm 16 weeks, and while the pregnancy hormones are still knocking me up one side and down the other, my reality seems to have shifted again to let me re-read the original ending with less-freaked-out eyes. Last night, I dreamed that I was at our writer's retreat--the same retreat where I began the book in November--but instead, I was finishing the book. I was using the original ending, and the sun was shining. I felt the love and support of my fellow writer's as I typed the final words. I felt my excitement to begin editing, and it was the kind of dream that I hate to wake up from. I'm also pretty sure that Beta was there too.
There are no guarantees either with this pregnancy or with this book. Many bad things could still happen to both. Or both could be fine. I chatted with my amazing CP today about the dream and the ending direction. Luckily, she's as woo-woo as I am these days, and she totally saw a message in the dream. In talking with her, I saw the significance and beauty in the original version--an emotional resonance that was lost when I tried to keep everything light and silly. The character had no room to grow.
I'm going to finish this thing. True to my original vision. I'll save the alternative ending for feedback from them-that-might-publish, but I'm going to finish this thing. I've updated my word meter with where the original now stands and I am so freaking close. It's down to scenes, mere scenes. I've got several projects waiting in the wings, waiting for me to grow them as well. It's time.

