11 more sleeps.
Today I took my husband (who happens to be a doctor) out for lunch. He has delivered 3 babies this week. All good results.
He says to me "you know it must be hard eh?"
I say "what?"
He says "when you are a first time mom and you go into labour you have no idea how much it is going to hurt."
I say "ya so?"
He says "well you have 11 more days until you are induced and you know what the pain of labour feels like with an epidural and without one."
I say "ya so?"
Anyway the conversation continues about the merits of epidural vs no epidural. Whatever, I'll figure it out in 11 days.
The physical pain is something I can say that I am dreading a little. BUT the bigger fear is the potential emotional pain. Ya second time moms dread the labour pain but dead-baby-mommas dread something that will never go away. A type of pain that never completely heals.
My third baby will probably live. However having had my second die I have become aware of a type of pain that feels like emotional drowning. Like a meat tenderizer has your heart and smashes it.
Right now talking about labour, imagining having a new baby, people asking "you are so close are you getting excited?" Hurts like HELL.
I just did this.
Guess what? I was 39.5 weeks when my son died. I went through a whole effing pregnancy and labour for nothing. All I gained from that 9 months was a lifetime of regret, pain and fear for future pregnancies.
SO for those who care. NO i am not excited. I am scared. Those who have lost a baby will understand. If you haven't I hope you never do, because it is the worst kind of hell that I have ever experienced.
Friday, 24 August 2012
Sunday, 5 August 2012
emotional hailstorm
Today I feel as unsettled as the weather of late. We seem to be have nice a run of hot days and then evening thunder storms.
I am excited because each day that goes by brings me closer to meeting this little baby. I have so many hopes for him and I am feeling very maternal. However I can feel building pressure and anxiety that is harder and harder to keep in check. We seem to be having a "run" of babies in our church community. There were two in the last couple of weeks and my husband has a lady in labour as I write this. He has two more before I am to be induced in 4 weeks. I was also told about someone very close to me who has just found out that she is expecting.
I am very scared right now that I am going have to go through the compounding grief and agony of losing this baby after having already lost a baby. I am sick with fear that I am going to watch other women I am close to continue to have healthy living babies for the rest of my life and I am going to feel only pain.
I have no faith that things are going to work out just because they should.
I am excited because each day that goes by brings me closer to meeting this little baby. I have so many hopes for him and I am feeling very maternal. However I can feel building pressure and anxiety that is harder and harder to keep in check. We seem to be having a "run" of babies in our church community. There were two in the last couple of weeks and my husband has a lady in labour as I write this. He has two more before I am to be induced in 4 weeks. I was also told about someone very close to me who has just found out that she is expecting.
I am very scared right now that I am going have to go through the compounding grief and agony of losing this baby after having already lost a baby. I am sick with fear that I am going to watch other women I am close to continue to have healthy living babies for the rest of my life and I am going to feel only pain.
I have no faith that things are going to work out just because they should.
Friday, 3 August 2012
Today
This morning I had my fourth ultrasound for this baby. I have one more at 36 weeks and then if everything looks okay, I will be induced at 38 weeks.
The tech was very happy with this baby today. He scored very well on the bio-phyiscal ratings and according to her, he weighs about 4.5 pounds.
I feel a little bit like a child waiting for Christmas morning. But this child is not sure what will be found under the tree.
At my 20 week ultrasound I was told that my son has a echogenic focus (bright spot) on his heart. This is considered a soft sign for Downs Syndrome or Trysomy 21. But my doctor said not to worry because it was an isolated sign.
At my 28 week ultrasound I was told that my son was not showing "breathing movements." My doctor said not to worry because he is still pretty small to be showing these type of movements.
Today it seems like everything was as it should be but I will wait until my doctors appointment on August 13 for the full report.
Clothes...
I try hard not to think about the future. I have hopes for the future but instead of seeing it with the clarity that I possessed a year and a half ago it's pretty fuzzy. I was putting away some baby boy clothes that I bought from a friend and it struck me that at this time in my last pregnancy I was doing the same thing. The feelings around the task had changed. I was giddy last time and I bubbled over with excitement about how cute the clothes were. This time I felt numb. The clothes are cute but they are just clothes and will be completely meaningless unless there is a little boy to fill them up and wear them out. I was showing my husband some of the clothes because he was giving me a hard time about getting second hand stuff. He wants to buy this baby some new cute clothes of his own. The hand-me-downs from his older brother who died are from a different season and many will not be worn. Baby Steve was a spring/summer baby, this baby will be born in the early fall. I will save them anyway. Somebody will wear them eventually.
Putting Baby Steve's Stuff Away...
I have two children's bedrooms upstairs. One is pink and one is green. Baby Steve was going to sleep in the green room. My husband and I have been referring to the "green room" as baby Steve's room until about a week ago when I said that we have to stop that. On the dresser was a scrapbook of baby Steve's short time with us. It is filled with pictures of Baby Steve, my husband and I at the hospital, funeral stuff, cards and all of baby Steve's ultrasound photos. There was a orange giraffe and a blue bunny that I knitted for him. There were three jellyfish that were part of a mobile for his crib and there was a candle given to us at his funeral. There was the white fluffy teddy bear that we were given at the hospital. On Wednesday I carefully picked up all of those things and set them in the bottom drawer of the six drawer dresser in the green room. As I closed the drawer I felt like someone had punched me in the chest as hard as they could. It was the raw aching pain that is ever present in the first few months after loss. I was floored by how powerful it was. I cried.
How many times throughout the rest of my life am I going to be saying good bye to Baby Steve? Goodbye is all I ever got to say to him.
This morning I had my fourth ultrasound for this baby. I have one more at 36 weeks and then if everything looks okay, I will be induced at 38 weeks.
The tech was very happy with this baby today. He scored very well on the bio-phyiscal ratings and according to her, he weighs about 4.5 pounds.
I feel a little bit like a child waiting for Christmas morning. But this child is not sure what will be found under the tree.
At my 20 week ultrasound I was told that my son has a echogenic focus (bright spot) on his heart. This is considered a soft sign for Downs Syndrome or Trysomy 21. But my doctor said not to worry because it was an isolated sign.
At my 28 week ultrasound I was told that my son was not showing "breathing movements." My doctor said not to worry because he is still pretty small to be showing these type of movements.
Today it seems like everything was as it should be but I will wait until my doctors appointment on August 13 for the full report.
Clothes...
I try hard not to think about the future. I have hopes for the future but instead of seeing it with the clarity that I possessed a year and a half ago it's pretty fuzzy. I was putting away some baby boy clothes that I bought from a friend and it struck me that at this time in my last pregnancy I was doing the same thing. The feelings around the task had changed. I was giddy last time and I bubbled over with excitement about how cute the clothes were. This time I felt numb. The clothes are cute but they are just clothes and will be completely meaningless unless there is a little boy to fill them up and wear them out. I was showing my husband some of the clothes because he was giving me a hard time about getting second hand stuff. He wants to buy this baby some new cute clothes of his own. The hand-me-downs from his older brother who died are from a different season and many will not be worn. Baby Steve was a spring/summer baby, this baby will be born in the early fall. I will save them anyway. Somebody will wear them eventually.
Putting Baby Steve's Stuff Away...
I have two children's bedrooms upstairs. One is pink and one is green. Baby Steve was going to sleep in the green room. My husband and I have been referring to the "green room" as baby Steve's room until about a week ago when I said that we have to stop that. On the dresser was a scrapbook of baby Steve's short time with us. It is filled with pictures of Baby Steve, my husband and I at the hospital, funeral stuff, cards and all of baby Steve's ultrasound photos. There was a orange giraffe and a blue bunny that I knitted for him. There were three jellyfish that were part of a mobile for his crib and there was a candle given to us at his funeral. There was the white fluffy teddy bear that we were given at the hospital. On Wednesday I carefully picked up all of those things and set them in the bottom drawer of the six drawer dresser in the green room. As I closed the drawer I felt like someone had punched me in the chest as hard as they could. It was the raw aching pain that is ever present in the first few months after loss. I was floored by how powerful it was. I cried.
How many times throughout the rest of my life am I going to be saying good bye to Baby Steve? Goodbye is all I ever got to say to him.
Monday, 30 July 2012
why this trial? my very personal spiritual thoughts
I was talking to someone today about trials. I don't make habit to talk about spiritual beliefs on this blog but I feel the need to work through my thoughts. I don't expect everyone to agree with how I make sense of the world but if you are interested please read on.
I am a Mormon. We believe that families are forever. You can be with your spouse and children etc for eternity. We believe that the purpose of life is essentially to gain a body and to be tested. We believe that there was life before this earth life and there is life after this earth life. Before we were spirits with no bodies, we are born and receive a body and we die and at the eventual resurrection we will rejoin our bodies and our bodies will be made perfect.
The second purpose - to be tested is what I am working through right now. Why do certain trials come to certain people? I cannot answer this. I was told in a blessing once that "devastating things happen in life but in the end they will all be for [my] ultimate good." This begs the question "how can losing a baby be for my ultimate good?" It only brings pain to my heart. If I really push myself I can see that losing my baby has expanded my emotional empathy. It has forced me to work through grief. Grief was something I had no understanding of before and now it feels like a familiar companion (unwanted in most instances but not so strange).
Most Christian religions agree that humans are imperfect and Jesus Christ died to atone or "make up the difference" between our personal best and the perfection which is required for us to rejoin our Heavenly Father. Some of you might not agree with that but it is essential to my next points. I think that I have trials to push me to rely on the Saviour. This is a challenge for me; I am a self reliant person. I work through my emotions by using logic and reasoning. I don't like relying on others for anything - especially my emotional well being.
My beliefs encourage me to rely on the Saviour. I think AA programs work the same way. Addicts are encouraged to give themselves over to a higher power during their 12 steps. They have to admit they are powerless to their addiction and thus need a "higher power" to make up the difference. To compare to my situation I am powerless to my saddness/grief/anger/post-traumatic-stress around the death of my son. I am easily overwhelmed when certain triggers present themselves in my life (i.e. not knowing where my husband is and if he is safe, other baby's successful births, my baby's anniversaries, comments about this pregnancy like "Is this your second baby?" etc). My fear, anger and hurt flares and I feel momentarily out of control. I can usually logic my way back down or de-escalate quickly but I often find that triggers seem to come in waves. In these instances by the end of the day I am emotionally shot. I have a lot of tools to hide this part of myself. My tools are my creative outlets, talking to my husband or my mom, books, journaling - all things that feed my emotional energy. But sometimes they are not enough - this is where my spirituality comes in. Prayer helps. Thinking only about today my utterances of prayer are multiple. The utterances are not usually a formal on my knees plea, they are mostly quick and are almost always in regards to blessing members of my family with safety in their travels. Mostly - "please Heavenly Father bless that my husband will live and be safe or please bless that my babies will outlive me."All the prayers end with "in the name of Jesus Christ Amen."
So why these trials? I don't know. I do know that my trials push me to rely on my higher power. I know that if I don't allow myself to have faith that my higher power will make up the difference between my personal best and perfection (not just "judgement day perfection" but daily "perfection" - or my ability to be calm and peaceful in daily life); I spiral into a state of overwhelming grief, anger and fear. The future holds no guarantees but I believe I can live with my husband, my daughter, my stillborn son and all my children to come forever because of my higher power and that is all that really matters.
So I get it, life is not a vacation, crap happens and it is everyone's prerogative to figure out their own way through it. Find your higher power - what ever it is - and continue to endure to the end because really when dealing with overwhelming trials what else can we do?
I am a Mormon. We believe that families are forever. You can be with your spouse and children etc for eternity. We believe that the purpose of life is essentially to gain a body and to be tested. We believe that there was life before this earth life and there is life after this earth life. Before we were spirits with no bodies, we are born and receive a body and we die and at the eventual resurrection we will rejoin our bodies and our bodies will be made perfect.
The second purpose - to be tested is what I am working through right now. Why do certain trials come to certain people? I cannot answer this. I was told in a blessing once that "devastating things happen in life but in the end they will all be for [my] ultimate good." This begs the question "how can losing a baby be for my ultimate good?" It only brings pain to my heart. If I really push myself I can see that losing my baby has expanded my emotional empathy. It has forced me to work through grief. Grief was something I had no understanding of before and now it feels like a familiar companion (unwanted in most instances but not so strange).
Most Christian religions agree that humans are imperfect and Jesus Christ died to atone or "make up the difference" between our personal best and the perfection which is required for us to rejoin our Heavenly Father. Some of you might not agree with that but it is essential to my next points. I think that I have trials to push me to rely on the Saviour. This is a challenge for me; I am a self reliant person. I work through my emotions by using logic and reasoning. I don't like relying on others for anything - especially my emotional well being.
My beliefs encourage me to rely on the Saviour. I think AA programs work the same way. Addicts are encouraged to give themselves over to a higher power during their 12 steps. They have to admit they are powerless to their addiction and thus need a "higher power" to make up the difference. To compare to my situation I am powerless to my saddness/grief/anger/post-traumatic-stress around the death of my son. I am easily overwhelmed when certain triggers present themselves in my life (i.e. not knowing where my husband is and if he is safe, other baby's successful births, my baby's anniversaries, comments about this pregnancy like "Is this your second baby?" etc). My fear, anger and hurt flares and I feel momentarily out of control. I can usually logic my way back down or de-escalate quickly but I often find that triggers seem to come in waves. In these instances by the end of the day I am emotionally shot. I have a lot of tools to hide this part of myself. My tools are my creative outlets, talking to my husband or my mom, books, journaling - all things that feed my emotional energy. But sometimes they are not enough - this is where my spirituality comes in. Prayer helps. Thinking only about today my utterances of prayer are multiple. The utterances are not usually a formal on my knees plea, they are mostly quick and are almost always in regards to blessing members of my family with safety in their travels. Mostly - "please Heavenly Father bless that my husband will live and be safe or please bless that my babies will outlive me."All the prayers end with "in the name of Jesus Christ Amen."
So why these trials? I don't know. I do know that my trials push me to rely on my higher power. I know that if I don't allow myself to have faith that my higher power will make up the difference between my personal best and perfection (not just "judgement day perfection" but daily "perfection" - or my ability to be calm and peaceful in daily life); I spiral into a state of overwhelming grief, anger and fear. The future holds no guarantees but I believe I can live with my husband, my daughter, my stillborn son and all my children to come forever because of my higher power and that is all that really matters.
So I get it, life is not a vacation, crap happens and it is everyone's prerogative to figure out their own way through it. Find your higher power - what ever it is - and continue to endure to the end because really when dealing with overwhelming trials what else can we do?
Monday, 16 July 2012
31 weeks the day after tomorrow
What do I hope for...
I used to hope you would be born in the spring.
I used to hope your hair would be brown.
I used to hope your eyes would be gray.
I used to hope that you would be smart.
Now,
I hope your eyes will open.
I hope you take a breath and cry.
I hope that you are born in the fall.
I hope that you are born alive.
I had a doctors appointment today. I am 31 weeks pregnant on July 18. During my first appointment with the doctor for this pregancy I asked for guarantees. I asked that I would not have to have another dead baby. The more times I go to the doctor the more I realise that there are no guarantees. Most likely things are going to be fine. 1/1000.
I have extra ultrasounds but they cannot predict abruption. I have a specialist but he cannot predict or prevent abruption.
My anixety is rising. 7 more weeks tomorrow until my induction. Can I keep you alive until then? My attachement to you, a family of 4, a future together is getting stronger. I try to fight the attachment with thoughts like:
- dont count your chickens before they hatch
- if everything goes as planned...
- at least I have already bought enough burial plots.
You move a lot. You seem to read my mind. As soon as I think you may have died and I start dreading dealing with compounding grief and loss you wiggle or kick.
Please don't stop.
Thursday, 21 June 2012
On your birthday...
Last year.
630 - 11pm June 20 -felt rhythmic cramping that we thought was the beginnings of labour. They started and stopped a few times so we just waited and went to bed.
330am felt a strong labour contraction and a strange "rushing" sensation but nothing else happened
530am my husband rolls over and looks at me and asks "any more contractions?" I answer "no"
I check for Baby Steve's heartbeat with the stethoscope
I cant find it
My husband says "lets go to the clinic and see if we can find it with the doppler"
I poke baby and have a drink of juice to wake him up.
no response
I get up to go pee and my water breaks.
the toilet is full of blood.
My husband yells at me to get in the car we have to go to the hospital now.
I grab a towel to protect the car as blood is gushing out of me.
We drive 160km to the hospital and all I can think of is I just left my 19 month old in her crib in our house by herself. Thank goodness she is asleep
We leave the car outside of the hospital entrance
We walk as quickly as possible to Unit 25. Blood is still gushing
The nurse puts me in the assessment room on a cot.
She puts the monitor on my belly.
There is no heartbeat. She looks in my face and says "let me try the Doppler"
No heartbeat
They stick an internal monitor inside and poke baby Steve in the head. They get my heart beat.
I ask my husband if my baby is dead. He says "don't say that"
The OB on call comes in with a bedside ultrasound.
She says "i am sorry your baby has passed away."
I can see on the ultrasound that his placenta has pulled away from the wall of my uterus
I hear my husband's grandfather come in and hear the OB. He put his hand on his face and started to cry.
I ask my husband if I am going to die too. He just looks at me.
The doctor and nurses prepare for a post-pardum hemorrhage.
My contractions that began after my water broke are getting stronger.
They wheel me to a labour room.
my baby is born at 837am
He is dead. He looks like me
He has dark hair and long skinny finger nails.
He is 7 pounds even.
I give him to his daddy and say "you name him, i can't."
The rest of the day passes in a blur for me.
The hospital volunteer took photos
Friends visited
His family came and held him.
His older sister gave him a kiss and said "brother."
I cried
a lot
I held him
we left him
at 9pm I went home without my baby.
630 - 11pm June 20 -felt rhythmic cramping that we thought was the beginnings of labour. They started and stopped a few times so we just waited and went to bed.
330am felt a strong labour contraction and a strange "rushing" sensation but nothing else happened
530am my husband rolls over and looks at me and asks "any more contractions?" I answer "no"
I check for Baby Steve's heartbeat with the stethoscope
I cant find it
My husband says "lets go to the clinic and see if we can find it with the doppler"
I poke baby and have a drink of juice to wake him up.
no response
I get up to go pee and my water breaks.
the toilet is full of blood.
My husband yells at me to get in the car we have to go to the hospital now.
I grab a towel to protect the car as blood is gushing out of me.
We drive 160km to the hospital and all I can think of is I just left my 19 month old in her crib in our house by herself. Thank goodness she is asleep
We leave the car outside of the hospital entrance
We walk as quickly as possible to Unit 25. Blood is still gushing
The nurse puts me in the assessment room on a cot.
She puts the monitor on my belly.
There is no heartbeat. She looks in my face and says "let me try the Doppler"
No heartbeat
They stick an internal monitor inside and poke baby Steve in the head. They get my heart beat.
I ask my husband if my baby is dead. He says "don't say that"
The OB on call comes in with a bedside ultrasound.
She says "i am sorry your baby has passed away."
I can see on the ultrasound that his placenta has pulled away from the wall of my uterus
I hear my husband's grandfather come in and hear the OB. He put his hand on his face and started to cry.
I ask my husband if I am going to die too. He just looks at me.
The doctor and nurses prepare for a post-pardum hemorrhage.
My contractions that began after my water broke are getting stronger.
They wheel me to a labour room.
my baby is born at 837am
He is dead. He looks like me
He has dark hair and long skinny finger nails.
He is 7 pounds even.
I give him to his daddy and say "you name him, i can't."
The rest of the day passes in a blur for me.
The hospital volunteer took photos
Friends visited
His family came and held him.
His older sister gave him a kiss and said "brother."
I cried
a lot
I held him
we left him
at 9pm I went home without my baby.
Thursday, 14 June 2012
Creating Meaning
So if you read my last post you'll know what I am talking about. I bought the sweater. It is so stinking cute and I figure if this babe does not make it, eventually I will give it to a living baby boy. Anyway I am on two count downs right now. One week until the year anniversary of my son's stillbirth and 12 weeks until i will be induced. Also going through my head is a count of the number of months (3) since my friend passed away in a tragic accident. A strange comparison of sorts creeps into my mind. I am thinking about where I was at on the 3 month anniversary of my son dying. I think I had just about hit the bottom of my grief. It would have been September 21, 2011. I cried everyday. I woke up every morning feeling like I had been hit by a emotional truck load of crap that I had to sort through before I could move on with the day. My husband and I had also began using Clomid again to try to conceive another baby. (It took 4 rounds to be successful). That had its own bundle of emotional junk. I have been trying to pin point the time in which I started to feel better. I guess between 6 and 8 month passed.
I think what helped me most was having things to look forward to again. Nothing made the loss go away but even small things that were interesting to me helped me continue to function. Anne and my husband and I went on a short trip to Tofino in Sept, we went to Cranbrook in December for a baptism and April for my niece and nephew's birthdays, we went to Victoria in May for mother's day. Making small daily plans with friends and family helped too. Anyway I guess I am saying all this because I remember at 3 months thinking I would never feel normal or better. Well, I do feel better but I have found a new normal. A normal that sometimes includes grief and sadness but not the crippling kind. I still think about my lost baby everyday. I wonder what he would be like now, how it would be to have two living children and expecting a third. Its a completely different path that is gone now.
So back to my initial purpose of this post. Creating meaning. My therapist and a few other people have asked what my plans for my son's anniversary are. I have been thinking really hard about it. I have had thoughts around releasing balloons and lighting candles but I want to create a legacy. I want to be able to give what I should have given to him to someone else. So I think I am going to "sponsor a child" in baby Steve's memory. I have some research to do on which agency to use but I would like it to be a boy. Age is not super important. Hopefully when Anne is old enough to understand she will capture the importance of giving instead of taking. I believe that when we* are ready, so much personal healing happens when we give to others and see them benefiting from our efforts. It moves us from a self-centered focus to a focus on others and helps us be grateful for what we do have and helps us acknowledge it really could "always be worse." So that is where I am at today.
*we being anyone bereaved or dealing with trials
I think what helped me most was having things to look forward to again. Nothing made the loss go away but even small things that were interesting to me helped me continue to function. Anne and my husband and I went on a short trip to Tofino in Sept, we went to Cranbrook in December for a baptism and April for my niece and nephew's birthdays, we went to Victoria in May for mother's day. Making small daily plans with friends and family helped too. Anyway I guess I am saying all this because I remember at 3 months thinking I would never feel normal or better. Well, I do feel better but I have found a new normal. A normal that sometimes includes grief and sadness but not the crippling kind. I still think about my lost baby everyday. I wonder what he would be like now, how it would be to have two living children and expecting a third. Its a completely different path that is gone now.
So back to my initial purpose of this post. Creating meaning. My therapist and a few other people have asked what my plans for my son's anniversary are. I have been thinking really hard about it. I have had thoughts around releasing balloons and lighting candles but I want to create a legacy. I want to be able to give what I should have given to him to someone else. So I think I am going to "sponsor a child" in baby Steve's memory. I have some research to do on which agency to use but I would like it to be a boy. Age is not super important. Hopefully when Anne is old enough to understand she will capture the importance of giving instead of taking. I believe that when we* are ready, so much personal healing happens when we give to others and see them benefiting from our efforts. It moves us from a self-centered focus to a focus on others and helps us be grateful for what we do have and helps us acknowledge it really could "always be worse." So that is where I am at today.
*we being anyone bereaved or dealing with trials
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)