Capture Your Grief Day 9: Family

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Since starting preschool when I was newly pregnant with Sam, Owen has been asked to bring in a family picture three times.  I never know what to send.  There is no complete family picture.  The closest I can get is one like this, that includes Noah’s Molly Bear.  

Owen was asked to decorate this lead with his family picture.  So he wrote everyone’s names, including Noah’s.  He always includes Noah.  

When we were on a trip this summer, Owen met a lot of new people, or people he hadn’t seen in awhile.  They would inevitably ask him “How do you like being a big brother?”  Owen developed a standard response – “Our first baby died.  Noah died.”  

Not something anyone was expecting.  But I think that was the 3 year old way of saying that he was a big brother before Sam.  Of insisting that Noah counted too.  

Noah is always a part of our family.  You may not be able to see him, but he is with us, in our thoughts and our hearts always.  

Capture Your Grief Day 8: Wishlist

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 Image What do I want to get out of this month?   

1) I want people to recognize that I have 3 boys, not 2.  

2) I want to spend this difficult month remembering and celebrating Noah.  

3) I want to share him with the world and help other families going through loss.  

Capture Your Grief Day 7: Memory

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Image With Owen, Noah, and Sam we got the joy of telling friends and family that I was pregnant.  It is such a happy thing.  You are excited, they are excited for you.  It feels like the first real celebration in that baby’s life.  

In April of last year, I had my first IUI.  Two weeks later, I took a test.  It said Pregnant.  I quickly sent a picture of it to two close friends, and called Dan to tell him the amazing news.  That night, I got to see my friends at a potluck.  They were so excited, and we were all so happy.  

The next day, I got the call that my blood test numbers were not what they should be, and it didn’t look good.  Just like that the celebrating was done.  It was another week before we lost Baby M.  We never got to see him, we barely knew he was there.  But he brought us so much happiness, even if it was just for one day.  

Capture Your Grief Day 6: Books

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 Image Last year I shared the books that we read with our Sunshine Owen to help explain the death of his brother.  

This year I wanted to share the book we have for my Rainbow Sam.   We have the book “Someone Came Before You” it is the companion to “We were going to have a baby, but we had an angel instead“. It helps explain the loss of a baby before the one you are reading to.  Sam doesn’t understand yet, but someday he will, and this book will help.  

#Capture Your Grief Day 5: Empathy

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I can’t get my picture to upload.  You can check out my FB for it if you want.  
Image Image  There are a lot of “what not to say” lists.  And I think I’ve heard them all and then some.  People don’t know what to say.  I think the best advice I can give is to validate their grief.  One of my favorite loss quotes is “It hurts because it matters.”  

A month after Noah was born I had two friends tell me exactly the same thing, almost word for word.  It still sticks out in my mind as the single best thing anyone said.  They said “You are my family, so he is my family.  And I am so sad that I didn’t get to meet him.”  That one thing said so much.  It allowed space for my grief.  It said that Noah, that his life, that he as a person mattered.  

At a time when so many people said nothing, never mentioned his name, never included him in a count of my children.  Their grandchildren, nephews, what have you.  They said he mattered.  And that they were grieving with me.  And isn’t that what empathy is?

Capture Your Grief Day 4: Light and Dark

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Light and Dark.  Grief and Joy.  We grieve because we love.  One picture shows one of our darkest moments and the light and joy we felt when Sam was born safely. And the other the heartache we felt, missing Noah even in our joy.  

I recently read back over some things I wrote in the months after Noah was born.  My grief was so dark.  So raw.  I said things like “How can I ever be happy again?”  Of course that rawness fades.  You do feel happy again.  When Sam was born we were of course happy.  There was light.  But there was grief there too.  It’s unexpected.   But every happy memory you make is shadowed by the thought that they should be here.  When you have a baby after loss, it shows you, in great detail exactly what you missed.  What you should have had.

After loss, there is light again.  You do smile, you do have happy memories.  But the shadow of loss is always there.  With light comes dark.

Capture Your Grief Day 3: In Honor

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 Image He was supposed to be my miracle baby.  After needing fertility drugs with Owen, he was happily conceived with minimal assistance. My initial beta numbers were great.  

I was so afraid when I got sick.  Afraid that my body would choose me over him.  As I lost 4lbs a week and needed daily IV fluids, I was afraid.  But we made it past 8 weeks, then 12, then 16.  I started to get a little better.  We were going to beat HG.  My strong, healthy miracle baby.  

It wasn’t until later we learned.  He had a cyst in his brain that was slowly killing him.  It had formed early on.  Through all our fighting, we didn’t know that the end was inevitable.  

Our miracle baby, beating fertility and HG.  We said goodbye on 10/19/13 at 20w. Today and every day, we remember him.  Honor him with our memories, our words, with love.  

Sunrise: Capture your grief day 1

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 Image The sun rises on another October.  Capture Your Grief Month.  Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness month.  And the anniversary of losing Noah.    It’s a hard month for me. Filled with memories each day.  

Two years ago I woke up 17w pregnant, anxious to see our baby again, and find out if we were having a boy or girl.  A friend watched O while we went get or ultrasound.  Today, I am watching her son while she, 17w pregnant, goes to the same office for her ultrasound.  The sun rises again, and will hopefully set in a different story.  

Two years ago today we had a beautiful ultrasound. A bright spot in my sickness, we got to see our little boy. We shared our excitement over having another boy with our friends and family. It wasn’t until the next day that we got the call that the doctor had concerns and wanted us to come back. The start of the fear, panic and grief that would cover the rest of the month, and the grief that lasts forever.  

Microblog Monday: Perspective

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Today, someone apologized to my for not being as supportive as the wishes they could have been “when I was grieving.”  

I knew what they meant, but it struck me as odd.  What do you mean “when I was grieving?”  I am grieving.  No past tense here.  And I realized, I still consider my grief fresh.  New.  I see myself as “newly-bereaved.” 

Obviously not compared to someone for whom it has been only a few hours, days, weeks, months.  But new.  An open wound.  

In three weeks in will have been two years.  This week will be two years since the first bad news.  But it still seems so raw.  

Does that ever go away?