Send me a Lifeboat

For my friend

2011-04-25T15:34:00.003-04:00

I recently received news that a friend of mine lost her baby, a little girl, at 39 weeks. I don't have the details but I can only imagine the pain that she's feeling. I haven't stopped thinking about her since receiving the news and I just keep replaying the thoughts that I had when I lost Zach. I thought I would write some of those thoughts out and maybe try and work through those thoughts in writing so that maybe someday these musing might help someone whose heart is bleeding, as hers is now.

I remember wondering how life could go on, how the sun could shine, how people could go about their day when my baby was dead. At the time I thought I was the only one feeling that pain, living it, barely breathing because the pain was too much to bear. Now I realize that whether or not I knew it at the time, someone was thinking of me, and my son, just as I am thinking of my friend now.

I asked a lot of questions, what if's, why's and especially why me? I felt alone and I felt like I had gotten the shaft in the lottery of life. Why did my baby have to die while everyone else I knew got to leave the hospital with a healthy baby? I have learned that although I may not know the reason why my son died, I just have to accept it. I have to go on living. My son would not want his Mommy to be sad so I have to move forward for him. I don't know why it happened to me, I don't know why it had to happen to you, or to anyone else for that matter. To be honest I have often thought to myself "chances are this will never happen to anyone else who I know personally"... but I was wrong...

You will never look at statistics the same waya again. You will begin to see a 1 in 100 chance as a HUGE risk. You have been on the wrong side of those statistics and you'll be terrified to have it happen again. You will hold on to your loved ones tighter... or you might pull away. I think I did a little bit of both. I was so afraid to love someone because it hurt so much to lose them.

The day that Zach was born I made a decision. I made the decision to go on living. I knew that it was going to be hard but I knew that I had to get out of bed each day, I had to move forward no matter how much it hurt to breathe. SOme days I couldn't do it and I let myself have those days. I remember feeling angry. I was angry at everyone else who had a baby that summer, especially those who had boys, I even hated those people. Sometimes I still do.

It's been about 21 1/2 months since I held and kissed and loved my little boy... and some days it still hurts that he's not here with me. Sometimes I relive that day, I relive the moment the doctor told me that he was gone, I hear her say "You'll have to go to the hospital to confirm it but the outcome won't be any different". I remember the ultrasound when she was looking for his heart beat. I remember the image of him on the screen, floating, lifeless... These images and memories pop into my head sometimes, mostly when I'm driving. They haunt me when I try to fall asleep at night. But they don't hurt nearly as much as they used to.

I celebrate my son, I love my son, I include my son. I celebrate his brithday, we have cake and send him messages in Heaven. We talk about him and tell our children about him. We wonder what he would've been like, we love him. We compare our other children to him... Noah looks like him sometimes when he sleeps... He had the same feet as our other two children and their father. He was beautiful.

People are ignorant and forgetful at times. People will say stupid things, they will forget your child and it will hurt. To this day I still have bad days. They have become few and far between but certain things will trigger the heartache. Usually seeing a little boy (or hearing about a little boy) who would've been the same age as Zach. People that should remember your child will act completely oblivious at times and others will surprise you with their kindness. People cannot possibly complrehend the pain that you are feeling or the love that you have for your baby unless they themselves have experienced such a loss.

I remember that early on I realized that I was not really mourning the loss of a person, but rather the loss of a dream. The dreams I had for my son, the memories I had planned to make with him the relationships I had envisioned for him with his sister and grand-parents and father... When he died I didn't know if I would ever get to have a son. I mourned the loss of an idea... but it was so much more than that.

Some days the pain will knowck the wind right out of you. Some days it will come out of nowhere and some days you might feel almost normal.

I'm sure there are so many more thoughts and feelings that I have had along the way and I'm sure that as I walk through this journey with her (if she'll let me walk with her) I will come across so many others along the way... I hope I can help her to feel less alone, less isolated. I hope that she will know that someone is thinking of her, even in her darkest hour and wishing her pain away.

Update

2011-03-21T08:38:00.005-04:00

I abandoned this blog during my pregnancy because I think I just wanted to be happy... It was a tough 9 months. Not because there were any complications or anything, just because I had a hard time convinvcing myself that at the end of it all I would have a living breathing baby. Thankfully that Little Bug moved a lot right up until delivery. I could feel that little one kicking up a storm while moving down the birth canal during my induction.
At 4:13pm on July 14th, 2010 Noah Ashton made his way into the world. At first he didn't make a sound, he seemed like he was just shocked but then he started to wail and I took a deep breath for the first time since finding out I was expecting him. he weighed 7lbs 9oz and was 19 3/4 inches long (same length as DD), despite being 3 weeks early.
The next few weeks were a bit of a whirlwind. Noah was released on time 2 days later but the following day we noticed that he had a yellowish tinge to his skin. We took him back to the hospital to be tested for jaundice. It came back positive so he spent 24 hours in luminotherapy so I could only hold him to feed him. That was tough! Then we got to take him home but had to take him back the following day for a control test. His levels were rising again so he had to stay 24 hours again. This happened three times when finally a nurse noticed that his breathing seemed laboured and his skin was turning greyish. The pedicatrician ordered a whole bunch of tests and it was found that his heart was enlarged and he had very low oxygen saturation.
That day, at 12 days old, Noah was transferred to the ICU of a local children's hospital. He was diagnosed with Coarctation of the Aorta, basically a narrowing of the aorta. You see, babies have a little flap in their hearts which is called a truncus, which helps blood flow while in the womb. It closes shortly after birth.When Noah's flap closed it caused pressure to build up in his little heart because with the narrowing in his aorta, there was nowhere for the blood to go. is heart was working overtime so it became enlarged (since the heart is a muscle). They gave him some medication to reopen the truncus in order to relieve some of the pressure and he stabilized within a couple of hours. The following day we met with a pediatric cardiac surgeon and discussed what would happen with Noah. We were told that he needed surgery to repair the coarctation... The scariest news I could possibly imagine. I've never prayed so hard in all my life.
When Noah was 14 days old he underwent surgery to repair his coarctation. He came out of it in just under 4 hours (the LONGEST 4 hours of my life) and was released from the hospital 4 days later. Here is a picture of him 2 days post-op. Already feeling better :)

He goes in to see his cardiologist every 6 weeks or so and in October he was sleeping a little more than usual but I didn't really think anything of it since he was about to hit 3 months and I figured he was just going through a little growth spurt. So I took him in for a regular check-up with the cardiologist and sure enough the coarctation had returned (recoarctation). This time, though, he would have a catheter dilatation, which is a fairly straightforward procedure in which they put a catheter in his groin which threads up to his aorta and they inflate a balloon to reopen the narrowed passage. That was a Thursday, he had the procedure done the following Monday and got to go home on Tuesday.
Since then he's been doing great. He's a happy, energetic 8 month old and you would never know that he had been through so much in his little life.

How???

2010-03-05T08:49:00.002-05:00

How does anyone get through this? How does anyone go for nine months not knowing with each passing day whether their baby is going to be born alive???
I don't know how much more anxiety I can take. I can't sleep, I have no appetite, I can't concentrate. I just worry 24/7... and then I feel a kick and am reassured for that moment... but it never lasts.
I haven't seen my baby in 7 weeks. The last time I saw my baby it was essentially a blob with arms... For 3 weeks I felt my baby move all the time, day after day I was reassured by punches and kicks and nudges and then nothing 3 days... then reasssurance but never as strong as it had been... now nothing again... we had some flutters yesterday but was it the baby or gas... how can I really be sure?
I just sit here and cry my eyes out... I just want to KNOW that everything is going to be okay. I want to KNOW that my baby is not going to die. I want to know that my daughter is not going to have to cry herself to sleep for months again because she misses her baby brother or sister...
I want to know that my body is not going to fail me again.
I want to have faith that everything is going to be just fine and that all of this is worth it because at the end of it all I'll be bringing home a beautiful healthy baby.
One more week until my next appointment.
One more week until I know for sure whether my baby is alive.
11 more days until the anatomy scan.
11 more days until I know whether my baby is healthy.
11 more days until I can see my baby on that screen.
If we make it that far.
I never had these fears with my son. I had confidence. I had never lost something that meant so much to me. Now all I have is fear. Fear of losing a baby all over again. Fear of that shelf in the corner having two tiny little urns on it...
I try to be calm, I try to hold it together and some days I succeed. Others, like today, I fail miserably... and while I should be getting ready for work I sit here with tears streaming down my face trying to will my baby to give me a sign that he or she is still alive in there.
I always have a hard time around the 8th of the month... mostly leading up to it. Being pregnant has only intensified those emotions in me. I'm a wreck usually from the 5th until the 7th and generally the 8th comes and goes without incident. It's not like it's different that any other day... I mean, aside from the fact that my son was born sleeping 8 months ago on the 8th of July... It's not like I think of him more or miss him more I cry for him more... How could I? I do those things every day of my life.
The 8th of this month is a little different. The 8th of this month marks the halfway point in this pregnancy. On the 8th I will be starting the second half of this pregnancy. I will be 18 weeks and 5 days of a 37 week pregnancy. It will be the second leg of this LONG journey and hopefully it will all be worth it in the end.

Thank you

2010-02-25T16:18:00.006-05:00

Mabel's Labels is having a contest in which you can win a trip to BlogHer '10 and a one year gig blogging for them. How could I pass up that opportunity? For more information on the contest go to www.blogcontest.mabel.ca. Here's the topic:

"Electrical storms are going to wipe out the Internet (perhaps forever). You have one day left to write about your passions: what do you want to say to the blogosphere in 300 words or less?"

I'd like to start by saying that over the last few months I've had the opportunity to "meet" so many wonderful people and to share my story and to feel like I wasn't alone through the darkest of days. The support system that I have built on the Internet through Message Boards, Twitter, Facebook and blogs have been my lifeline and have saved my sanity.

As much as the Internet is convenient and easy, we need to make that extra effort to keep in touch with all of the people who have touched our lives, and who have brought sunshine to our rainy days. We may not have the Internet but we still have Word! Write a letter, buy a stamp, send it off and let those people know how much they mean to you! You could even invest in some Return Address Labels from Mabel's Labels to ensure that you'll get a letter in return!

Life is too short and losing touch with those who have been your rock is not worth it! Pick up a phone, come out from behind this curtain of anonymity and show the world who you really are and let your friends know who they are too!

Leave your contact info in the comments section and I’ll be sure to keep in touch. Take care Internet Family and thank you for always being there!

Baby of the Year

2010-01-21T10:52:00.002-05:00

This time of the year is tough... this time of year is when every talk show and local newspaper decides to run their "Baby of the Year" contest bull-shit. It's a lovely reminder of just how many babies made it in to this world alive while mine is in an urn on a shelf in my TV room... It just doesn't seem fair. I used to love that section of the paper when I was younger... I would read every name and look at every little baby face and smile. Now I want to set the newspaper on fire and shove it up the editor's ass for being so insensitive without even knowing he's being insensitive. Same for Regis and Kelly. I'm sick and tired of seeing all your stupid Tweets about your beautiful baby contest! Maybe I should send you a picture of my stillborn son so you can see what a beautiful baby really looks like!!! It's all just a frustrating reminder of what my family lives without every single day of our lives. If only the world realized that these little things that bring so much joy to most people (mostly the winners, the losers never feel that great) brings so much pain to Mommies like me who have to live without their beautiful babies... Not for anything they did wrong, just for having drawn the short straw in the game of life...

Sacrifice

2010-01-09T21:17:00.004-05:00

I sometimes revert to old feelings when faced with babies. Not all babies... just some babies... or rather when I am faced with numerous babies. For example, in a shopping mall, when every stroller is a reminder of what I am living without.
Sometimes I can't help but believe that my son was taken so that those babies could live, because if their baby had been stillborn then maybe mine would've been spared. I know logically that that is probably not the case. I have been through, in my mind, several times why mine was taken and not other people's. I probably know of at least a dozen women who have given birth to healthy babies since mine was stillborn. Each time I thought to myself "why mine and not hers?". Each time I was able to say "well, she had a rough time when..." so she's probably been through enough. Maybe their struggles will take place in the future and I will think back and say "Imagine having to endure a stillbirth AND that?"... Maybe I can bring the taboo issue of stillbirth to the forefront while she will keep quiet. Maybe I conceive easily while she struggles. I don't know the reason I was chosen. I probably won't ever know why, but I have accepted it. It's just that once in awhile I have to wonder. I look at all those strollers and I can't help but think about what should have been.
My life hasn't been all roses but I am thankful for what I have. I believe that every struggle that I have faced throughout my life has helped to build my character, has made me who I am today. I may at times be bitter and thin-skinned but I also believe that I am entitled to those feelings every so often.
I try with all my heart to take a positive approach to life. I try to see the silver lining in every situation, I try not to use my loss as an excuse, I try to believe that the future will bring me happiness.
I used to think that family pictures would never be complete and family gatherings would always be missing somebody but I know now that that couldn't be further from the truth. The truth is that, though my son may not be here with us on Earth, he is always in our hearts. He is in every family picture and present at every family gathering. I see him in my reflection in the mirror and in my daughter's eyes. He is with us when we play outside, when we're eating dinner and when I'm driving to work. He is always with us and he will always be.
I may sometimes waver from my belief that everything happens for a reason but I always come back to it at the end of the day. I have to believe that I was chosen because I will persevere. I will move forward and make the most out of these cards that I've been dealt. It's what my beautiful Zachary would want me to do.

6 months

2010-01-08T13:50:00.003-05:00

I thought I would wait and see if anyone remembered that today is the 6 month anniversary of my son's stillbirth. I thought I would see if those who love me and who loved him would offer their support today without me having to ask for it. I even nonchalantly reminded some of those closest to me... my mother, my sister, a close friend... Nobody has said a word to me. Are they waiting for me to bring it up? They don't want to chance upsetting me on what might be a good day? I don't know...
I have learned one thing in the last 6 months, though. Actually I have learned many things. One of the things that I have learned, though, is that people would rather wait for you to bring up your tragedy than chance bringing it up and upsetting you on a good day.
The other thing that I have learned is that the build up and the anticipation of these horrible milestones are much worse than the actual milestones. Thinking about the months that have passed or the holidays that have been missed are much more painful than the anniversaries and holidays themselves.
I miss my son every day. I think of him constantly but I am not sad anymore. I may never feel complete, I will never forget but I can no longer be sad. I will not allow my son's life to be a sad part of my life. I loved him too much to be sad. He wouldn't want his Mommy to be sad forever. He would want me to move forward and smile and laugh and enjoy life, even if it is without him. He would want me to enjoy his big sister and embrace his little sister or brother who is on the way. He would want me to live the best life I can posibly live... and I know he is watching us and he knows how much we love him and miss him and how much we think about him. We don't need to be sad in order to grieve him.
I miss my son but I am not sad. He is with me in everything I do every single day of my life. I carry him in my heart and in my mind. I love him with everything that I have and he will always be a part of our family.

A New Year

2010-01-01T21:17:00.002-05:00

I won't pretend that I'm sad to say goodbye to 2009.
Though 2009 had some bright spots... It was the year in which my son lived... if only just inside of me. It wwo children and as the year that he was born. It was also the year that we had to say goodbye to him. For that reason I am not sad to see this year come to a close.
I expected 2009 to bring joy and happiness and a completed family. I imagined having two living children anderness a brand new home. As many people know, life doesn't always turn out the way that we expect it to.
Though I miss my son, I have come to accept that he will never be with us. No amount of sadness or anger or bitterness will bring him back. 2009 was the most challenging year of my life. It turned my world and my family's life upside down. I often wondered throughout this year whether or not I would make it to this day.
Here I sit on the first day of 2010 looking forward to a new year, new hopes and new dreams. I look forward to a year of changes, a year of happiness and love. I look forward to welcoming the new addition to our family and I am prepared for the roller-coaster of emotions that come along with that journey.
I am not sad to see 2009 come to an end. I look forward to moving in to 2010.

I Survived

2009-12-29T09:55:00.002-05:00

Last year on December 23rd we announced to our then 5 year old daughter that she would no longer be an only child. Unfortunately here we are a year later and she remains, in her words, a "lonely" child.

When I was pregnant with Zach I imagined what the future would be like with two children. I imagined walking my daughter to school with him in his stroller. I imagined picking her up and her little head popping into the stroller to greet him and I imagined him giggling with delight at the sight of her. I imagined that she would be the center of her baby brother's Universe. I imagined our first Christmas as a "real" family. We decided to have everyone to our house so that he wouldn't have to go out in the cold.

I imagined life with two children for many milestones that have passed over the last couple of months. My daughter's birthday, my best friend's wedding, Thanksgiving, Halloween and Christmas. I looked forward to sharing all of those events with my children. When those events came and went I was proud of myself for having survived each one. Not always with grace and dignity and sometimes with tears and pain but I made it through. With each one I realized my stregth and ability to overcome just about anything. I wondered if Christmas would be the same.

In the end, having survived this first Christmas without our baby boy I can honestly say that the anticipation was worse than the actual event. I survived. We survived. Hopefully this next year will bring happiness and health and a healthy baby brother or sister for our little girl.

I am not sad to say goodbye to 2009. Bring on 2010 and all it has to offer!

5 months ago today

2009-12-08T10:08:00.003-05:00

5 months ago today I held your angel body.
I looked at your angel face and kissed your angel skin.
5 months ago today you came into this world without a sound...
Without a breath...
I unwrapped you and looked at your tiny body, I counted your fingers and toes and kissed your hands...
I held my hand to your chest and longed for your heart to beat...
I touched your soft hair and your tiny ears.
We compared your looks to those of your big sister on the day that she was born.
We talked about what colour your eyes would be, if only they would open.
I sang to you and rocked you and loved you as much as any Mommy could in the short period that I had with you.
No amount of time could have ever been enough.
But your body was growing tired and I knew we had to say goodbye.
I miss you every single day.
Every day I wonder what you would be like today.
I wonder what milestones you would be reaching and what kind of baby you would be.
You are always in my thoughts
You are always in my heart
You will forever be my baby boy.
Mommy loves you, Zach.
xoxoxoxo

2009-12-04T13:03:00.003-05:00

I am entering a new phase in my grieving process. I met with a Grief Counselor for lunch yesterday. We talked for about an hour and discussed my personal situation and what I have done to pass the time. We discussed my daughter and S and how they have been coping and other family members. At the end of the meeting she said to me "What do you want from me? I mean, what do you hope to get out of meeting with me?" So I told her that I want to make sure that I am coping as well as I feel that I have been coping... To make sure that I'm not fooling myself into believing that I have delt with my grief, only to have it knock me on my ass a few months down the road. That's when she told me that I have done all the grief work and have taken an extremely healthy approach to healing and that there doesn't seem to be anything more that she can do to help me. She does, however, want to keep in touch and may recruit me to be an ambassador for this cause.
It's funny... I never imagined myself being such a fighter. I never thought that I could overcome something as life-altering as losing a baby. I always pictured myself as more of a curl up and die kind of person... but if I were to do that, then what would that say about my son's life? How could I let that be his legacy? I refuse to let my son's death be in vain. I need to feel like his death was for a purpose, even if the wisdom I have gained from losing him helps to save just one other baby, this pain that I have endured will have been worth it.
I can't imagine allowing this tragedy to define me. I need to emerge from this a better person, a better wife, a better mother. I want to remember my son in a positive way. I want to think of him and smile and know that he made a difference. I can't be sad forever. I can't be angry. I have to believe that I was chosen, that my family was chosen to travel this path for a reason. I have to believe that my baby was taken because I am a person who can make a difference. I am a person who can stand up for a change. I will dig for answers and look for solutions in order for other families to avoid having to go through what we've been through. I need to show my daughter that holding your head up high when all you want to do is fade into the darkness is the right way to overcome adversity. She needs to know that nobody is exempt from pain but how you get through it is what makes you stand apart from the crowd.

Thoughts

2009-11-24T10:50:00.002-05:00

It's funny how sometimes your thought process is so far removed from what other people are thinking. I came to a realisation last night that what I see as a recovery process, others see as an issue. I had a conversation with S last night which made me realise that a lot of my actions or inactions have been taken completely out of context. It seems as though while I take positive steps towards moving forward with my life he thinks I am "not dealing".
When a mother loses her child it is a traumatic event. No matter how or when it happens, the loss of a child chages a person. I believe that this event has probably caused me to develop a degree of post-traumatic stress disorder. There are certain things that I cannot do, places I cannot go, people I cannot see.
Let me begin by saying that I was always a person who has a certain amount of anxiety in social situations. I am not witty or sociable, I tell it as I see it and I can sometimes be misinterpreted. WIthin my group of friends, however I am known to be funny, compassionate and understanding. I am, however, an onion. Sometimes you have to peel back the layers to get to know the person inside. I am not a huge fan of parties or big social get-togethers, I don't like birthday parties, I'm a sucky hostess, I need a few drinks in me in order to feel comfortable.
Anyway, when I lost Zach I did not leave the house for a while. I think that's understandable. I changed my routines to make sure that I could avoid certain places during daylight (that's when the babies are out) and would always make sure I had a distraction with me (in the form of my daughter) so that should I run in to someone I didn't want to see, I could pretend that I was in the middle of a crisis with her and couldn't look up to greet the person. I admit that I avoid babies. I avoid babies because it physically pains me to see them. It makes me ask myself why this world decided that mine should be taken. Mine and not the one in the cart ahead of me in line at the grocery store. Then I feel guilty and angry and frustrated and my day is ruined. I have made a conscious decision to move forward positively with my life. I make choices that make my days good, rather than bad. That is my coping mechanism. I avoid dinner parties which babies will attend, I avert my eyes when I see them in stores, I want nothing to do with them. That is my choice. The one thing baby-related that I do have an interest in is having another one of my own.
S, on the other hand, has taken all my conscious efforts as a sign that I am not ready to have another baby. He thinks that my avoidance will spill over into my ability to parent another baby and fears that I will fall apart.
What S doesn't understand is that I truly believe that the only way that I am going to claw myself out of this pit of darkness is to know that I am going to have a baby of my own. To believe that my next baby is going to be born healthy and screaming and live a long and happy life with me as his or her mother. I need to know that my daughter is going to have the sibling that she so desperately wants. I need to know that life goes on and even though I have been beaten down, I can get back up and I can love again. I know that I can move forward, I know that it takes baby steps and that some days are better than others. I know that my life will go on. Though I will never stop loving my baby and I will never forget him, I need to move forward. I need to stop grieving anf feel happy. I don't like the negative feelings that I have. I consciously push them aside and try to focus on the things in life that make me happy. I don't want my son's life to be a sad topic of conversation. I loved him, the thought of him warms my heart and makes me smile. I don't want to cry anymore. Being around other babies makes the negative feelings come out in me, makes me think of all of the things that I am missing out on! I can not let my son's life be a tragedy. What's the point? I want to make sure that his life was a positive force in mine.
S thinks that I am not dealing with any of my grief, he thinks I am just pushing it aside. He thinks that my need for another child is a desire to replace the one I lost. He couldn't be more wrong. I need to move forward and go on with my life. I don't want to forget him but I don't want to be sad anymore. If anything I have more love to give now. I realize the value of life, the preciousness of the nine months a baby spends in the womb. I want to connect to another baby and love another baby. It won't make me love my other children any less, if anything it makes me appreciate them that much more.

Struggle

2009-11-23T21:30:00.000-05:00

2009-11-23

I feel like life has always been a struggle for me. I remember being a little kid and feeling like I had to work in order for my father to love me. We fought constantly. I always felt like he loved my sister more and was disappointed that I was not a boy. I tried so hard to get him to accept me. I tried to get him to do "boy" things with me so that he would enjoy spending time with me... It was always a struggle...Then I got older and I never really had any friends. I was never a bad person or a mean person but I was shy and had low self-esteem. It was a struggle to get people to want to be with me. Maybe I was a little coddled... My sister always let me get my way so I could be a bit of a whiner but what pre-teen girl isn't?
In my teens and early twenties I was never asked out. I had to pursue the guys, they never pursued me. Though my relationships were long term I always felt like I was more invested. Even now with my boy-friend of seven years. We've been through so much together but I feel like I have to constantly beg for his attention and his affection.
When I was 22 I got pregnant with my daughter. I was never upset or scared. I knew that I was going to be a great mom. My boy-friend had a good job and we were moving in together
and starting a family. Two weeks after we moved in together he lost his job. He quickly started a new one but it was hard to make ends meet for a long time. Then our daughter came along. Our beautiful perfect little girl who means the world to us. One month and one day after her birth I fell down the stairs and broke my ankle in three places. I needed surgery to rebuild the ankle and was hospitalised for 5 days. After that I had to move back in with my parents for two months because I was in a wheel chair and our apartment wasn't wheelchair accessible. Our baby's first Christmas couldn't be spent at home. We continued to struggle for another year or so until my boy-friend got a better job. When I say struggle I don't mean we couldn't afford vacations and new cars. I mean we had to live on Kraft dinner and hot dogs for weeks on end. We had to stretch the diaper budget, we suffered.
Things gradually got better and we moved into a bigger place with a backyard and we bought new cars and things were looking up. I decided that my job was not doing it for me anymore so I moved on and got a new job which turned out to be a nightmare. I'm pretty resilient, though so I moved on and found something better where I was able to climb the corporate ladder to where I am now. That's when we decided to buy a house. We finally settled on building a house. We
met with the builder, we signed the contracts, we were looking forward to a new house the following summer, when all of a sudden construction halted. No new house for at least another year.
We waited patiently and decided to have a go at having another baby. The first month of trying we discovered that I was pregnant with our son.
On July 1st we moved in to our beautiful brand new house and were expecting our son just a few weeks later.
On July 7th I went in for a routine exam only to find out that he had no heartbeat. Our precious baby who was supposed to complete our perfect little family had died 3 weeks before he was suuposed to join us. Our dreams were dashed and we were crushed.
I just don't understand how one person can be expected to struggle financially, emotionally and physically all before the age of 30 and not come out of it feeling bitter and angry. How can a person watch her daughter suffer through such a tremendous loss at such a young age and not feel jipped. How is it fair that one person has to endure all of this heartache while others float through life never having to fight for anything. They say it builds character but I think I have enough. I don't want any more character. I want to float for awhile. I've swam long enough, I've been treading water for years, I think it's time for someone to hand me a life boat.

Still

2009-11-23T21:25:00.000-05:00

2009-10-16

Why do I torture myself like this?
Why do I scour the message boards for other mothers who feel the way that I do and then feel sorry for myself?
Why do I allow myself to think that everyone is looking at me, wondering "where is her baby?" "why isn't she at work?" "why does she look so sad?"?
Why do I let other people's thoughts dictate the way that I react without ever really knowing what they're thinking?
Never knowing what they're thinking because they're afraid to speak to me... afraid to reach out, afraid to broach the subject.
My baby died and I am alone.
I don't want to cry anymore. I don't want to bear this burden anymore. I want to move on and feel normal.
I want to be able to find a receipt in my pocket and look at the date and not think "that's from when I was happily expecting Zachary... Will I ever be happy again?"
I want to be able to look at pictures of my family and not feel that someone is missing.
I want to be able to go to my parent's house and not feel like I should be holding my baby in that rocking chair instead of sitting alone...
3 months have gone by and though the pain is less raw, it's no more real than the day that his heart stopped beating.
I am expected to move on and get back to my normal routine but how can I when my idea of "normal" has been compromised so badly?
I know that one day I will feel happiness again and perhaps one day every smile won't be followed by immediate sadness and emptiness. One day my life will feel normal again but
it will never go back to the normal that it was before I lost my son.

Alone

2009-11-23T21:19:00.000-05:00

2009-08-31 10:19:30

I've been thinking about starting a blog for awhile now but sometimes I think that my thoughts are better left inside my head. Sometimes letting them out hurts more than thinking them...
It's been 54 days since I delivered my beautiful baby boy. My beatiful baby boy who's cry I never got to hear, who's eyes never opened, who's breath I never felt. My little 5 pound 8 ounce angel who I'll never get to know.
Every day goes by and I'm expected to get a little better. I'm expected to hold it all together and move on but on days like this I just can't...
When I imagined my daughter's first day of school I imagined walking there with my beautiful little girl and her gorgeous baby brother. This morning I dropped her off and walked back home alone. No stroller, no baby... just alone. It felt awful. It felt lonely and painful and empty.
Sometimes I feel like I'm going to implode because the pain is so deep that it cause me to dry heave. I can't breathe, I get dizzy, I feel my legs melting into the floor.
Things are not supposed to happen this way. I wasn't supposed to wait nine months and instead of having that moment of extreme pride and happiness I got the opposite. I got "I can't find the heartbeat, nope, he's gone". And just like that my dreams were crushed. The baby boy that I had been waiting for was gone. Out of my life but forever a part of me.
One day I'll go back and write out the story of that fateful day. Not today though... today I need to focus on my current feelings. I knew this day would come. I knew I couldn't keep coasting... there had to be a breaking point. I've had my daughter to keep me busy and upbeat for the last 7 weeks but now that she's back at school I am left alone with my thoughts.
Don't get me wrong I have good days and bad... I probably always will... but there are certain triggers that determine what kind of day it will be and though a bad day may spill over into several days a good day can come and go with one simple little trigger...
Saturday, for example, was a decent day... but my mother went to a baby shower. A baby shower for a distant cousin who is expecting a baby boy... I can't help myself and though, I know that I don't want to hear the answer but I still asked... "wasn't it hard?". And so began my bad
day... and it spilled over into Sunday morning and then I managed to get through Sunday relatively well but the sadness resurfaced on Sunday night... It was the news that yet another person had delivered, you guessed it, a healthy baby boy.
How is that fair? How is it fair that while about a dozen people that I know have been fortunate enough to deliver healthy babies in the last 8 weeks, I have been left to suffer alone? How can people tell me to stop feeling sorry for myself when I have never felt so empty in all my
life... when I look at pictures of our family and wonder if we will ever be that happy again, if we can ever truly be complete without our son...?
I do feel sorry for myself, I do feel sad, I do feel betrayed! I feel betrayed by the higher power that makes these shitty decisions, I feel betrayed by myself for daring to be happy and most of all I feel betrayed by my body for letting this happen... and sometimes I feel betrayed by my baby for leaving me this way.
And now I can add to that list that I feel betrayed by my family for expecting me to move on. I'm angry at S for making me leave the hospital that night before I was ready. I'm angry that he doesn't want to be sad anymore and therefor doesn't want to know that I'm sad. I'm angry that
I'm the only one who has trouble getting out and doing normal every day things... I'm angry that everyone else cried for a week and then moved on with their lives. I'm angry that people pretend not to know when I know damn well that they do. I'm angry at all the idiots who think that ignoring it or pretending that it didn't happen will make it go away. I'm not ready for it to go away. I want to acknowledge that I have a son who died. For me the pain is still real and raw and right there on the surface, ready to escape at any moment. I am not happy when people have babies. I am angry and bitter and jealous... and I hate myself for it. I hope that one day that will change. I hope that one day I will be able to see baby boys and think that they're cute, but for now I just feel like they're a slap in the face. Nature's cruel joke
against me.
I want to be myself again but I just don't think I'm ready yet. I miss my son too much.