Needing to feel sad AND wanting to

The other day I did something that I've been wanting to do for awhile now. I felt that I needed to be closer to my lost baby. I needed to feel sad, even if it was just for a few moments in my busy day.  Does this make sense?  I've been so busy since the holidays as I'm sure so many of you have been also.  We returned home a week ago, quickly unpacked and then just went out of town for a few more days.  Then we should be back home for a bit.  Busy, busy, busy.

So, laundry, unpacking, re-packing, cleaning, dishes, pouring through 3 weeks of mail, bills, etc.  It was all on the list.  But what hadn't been on the list for awhile and something that I felt was missing was thinking of my son who left us almost three months ago.  Laundry--check.  Unpack--check.  Re-pack--check.  I even have taken time to fret about getting pregnant again.  How can I not find time for that?  Buy pregnancy tests--check.  Buy ovulation tests--check.  Track everything on the calendar--check.  Cry when the pregnancy tests come back negative--check.  Try to be positive and optimistic again--check.  But where is Jacob in all of this?

Even though he was just a 13 week old little fetus in my belly, he was still my baby and a part of me.  For that reason I spent some time late at night two days ago meandering on the Internet.  I pulled up my favorite song...it's a new song I heard the night of my D&C.  I won't post the link now but I will closer to the 25th--the anniversary of Jacob's passing.  After watching that video and crying for a bit, I skipped around to other YouTube videos that grieving parents had posted.  I cried for these parents too.  They shared their stories of hope, of loss and of love.  They shared their photos.  They shared their grief.

Needless to say it was a night of tears as I remembered my loss.  It almost felt fresh again.  I thought of my pregnancy. I thought of my ultrasounds as I looked at the pictures of other babies including one poor little baby who died an hour after his ultrasound.  I thought of my Baby Jacob. I cried for him.

I find myself in new waters once again.  These have me treading guilt a little more often than I'd like and I'm trying to understand how to deal with these feelings.  Follow me for a moment.  When a couple miscarries they experience a horrific amount of grief.  But the simple act of trying again and hoping for another child helps to settle that grief just a bit.  I've been so focused on this.  Our first three months following my D&C have had me very focused on trying again to conceive.  We were given only three months before returning to the doctor.  And then only three more months until seeing a specialist.  Good grief, it makes my stomach fill with knots to just think about it. 

But then this is where my guilt comes into play.  Is my desire for another child overshadowing the feelings I have for losing Jacob?  I don't know if this is making sense.  Suffice it to say that I think I have felt guilty over focusing so much on 'trying again' and not on Jacob.  Now I don't think I should be sitting in a cloud of sorrow every day, please understand that.  I just...I don't know.  I just missed my son and wanted to grieve for him again.  I think I will periodically.  All of my tasks and to do lists, all of my hopes for getting pregnant again will be there definitely.  But I think I will feel better and heal better long-term when I allow myself to feel sad from time to time.  And not just sad when I see only one stupid pink line on a pregnancy test either. I want to feel sad for my lost child--for my baby who I know is laughing amongst the angels. I want to think about him and to dream about him.  I think it helps.

This is uncharted territory for me and I feel like I'm chopping a path through it as best as I can.  That means that sometimes I'll be happily distracted with the day-to-day busyness of life.  I might be making a snowman with my family and teaching my hubby how best to construct our jolly fellow of snow (he's a first time winter resident!).  I might be playing Lego's with my boys.  I might be pursuing my writing hobby and trying to take it to some sort of freelance career status.  And of course I'll be tracking the days to spot our 'windows'.  Then I"ll be fretting the closer the time frame gets to 'the end'.  I have nicknamed it as 'the end' because in some ways that's how it feels to me but more on that later.  How to afford fertility help should we need it?  Ugh.  Definitely don't want to think about that right now. 

But somewhere through all of that I will work to keep Jacob nestled actively in my thoughts, not just in my heart.  I've got lots of memorial projects planned to help me do this as well.  I can't wait to get started on them. 

For now I give myself permission to be sad and to cry for him when I need to.  Or better yet, when I want to.  Wow.  That almost feels liberating.  To know that I have a right to feel how I need to and when I need to I hope will lessen some of the guilt that I've been feeling.  There is no prescription for how to handle a miscarriage.  How wonderful it is to know this. 

I truly believe that each of us makes our own path through pain, challenges and trials...especially through times of sorrow.  My journey continues with my precious Baby Jacob in my heart.  Oh, how I wish I could see him...just once.  I still pray that God will give me a glimpse of him in my dreams.  Sometimes I think I see a fuzzy picture of him in my mind.  I hope that's a picture God is sending me.  If it is, I hope that it becomes more clear.  And boy, I hope that Jacob can see his mama smiling up at him.

I am thinking about pulling Jacob's ultrasound pictures out.  I haven't looked at them since early November.  Yup, I might just need to do that.  As I drift off to sleep tonight, you can bet I'll pray again to see my son...and if a few tears escape and land on my pillow, that's okay.  I might just go to bed with a smile on my face.

Until next time my friends, I hope you have good days ahead.  But if there are some days full of tears, trust yourself to cry when you need to and for as long as you need to.  Who knows, it might just help in the long run.

Kim

My boys' laughter...a momma's joy

I thought I'd follow up my solemn frustrating post from the other day with a happy, "hopeful" post.  I don't like to be frustrated...I'd much rather be happy!

I wanted to post a quick note to say how much my two boys put joy into my heart.  Despite the frustration I feel when I see a negative pregnancy test and despite the stress and worry that pummels me sometimes, Sammy and Benny give me such joy.  I am so thankful for them.

I mentioned having a rough start to the New Year. I had taken a pregnancy test on New Year's Eve.  Even though it was an early test that came back negative, it was the 'big blow' telling me that my chances were pretty much over...for this month. 

Well, thankfully I had Sammy & Benny there to make me laugh and smile when the tears had run their course.  We had our own New Year's Eve Party at my mom's house.  Normally Alex & I and the boys head to my brother's for New Year's.  We spend the night there and have a great time visiting with my brother and sister-in-law.  Since they were out of town this year, we spent the evening with my mom, step-dad and grandma. 

At some point in the evening, the boys decided they wanted to dance and have a party.  They really got in to the music on Dick Clark's Rockin' Eve!  Wearing their New Year's hats (that I paid too much for) they jumped, spun and boogied the night away.  My mom & I joined in the fun while Alex laughed at our antics.  Sammy's comments, "Mommy, I love our New Year's Party!" still echo in my head.  Benny's 'butt shaking' moves still crack me up.  He bends over and puts his hands on the floor.  He then shakes his rear.  Don't ask me how he came up with that move!

I'm so thankful for my boys.  They are my joy every day and whenever I feel myself sinking into sorrow, they are there to give me hugs and have me hug them right back. 

Just today, Sammy and Benny both asked me when God would put another baby into my tummy.   I told them I didn't know and that we needed to continue to pray about it.  Benny reminded me of his order..."for a baby sister" and Sammy added, "I want a baby sister and a baby brother."  Then Benny asked if he could have a baby in his tummy.  Well, leave it to my three-year-old to crack us all up while Sammy explained that only Mommy's could have babies in their tummies.  I finished with, "But Benny has lots and lots of love in his tummy!  And so does Sammy!"

My boys have so much love in them.  I thank God for them every day.  I know Baby Jacob would have been just as loving. 

I hope Jacob saw us dancing on New Year's.   I hope he was dancing in Heaven along with us.  I also hope he knows that I'm trying hard to be hopeful...for all three of my boys. 

And so I'm dancing in my heart today.  I hope your heart is dancing too.

Kim

It's hard to back up your talk

Funny how after I wrote my posts from a week ago, I was feeling optimistic, joyful.  I was full of hope, just like I wrote about in my Christmas stories this year. 

And then.

Crash.  Plummet. 

I took an early pregnancy test on New Year's Eve.  It was negative.  Another test two days later was negative too.  And then all was confirmed when my period started.  I was so hopeful that maybe...just maybe something worked this time.  I called it, "round two", following my D&C.  Well, round two failed.   And I was pretty down about it--right on New Year's too.  Guess that wasn't such a good idea to take a test on that date.

When you think of 'hope', isn't it much easier to think about it when you feel there is a chance?  I think women who are trying to conceive feel a bit more hopeful at certain times in the month.  There's even a time when you try not to watch each day tick closer and closer to the day when you find out...but you do and because you hope that perhaps "it" worked.  And while you're hoping you try to battle the fears and doubts that sneak in.  For me, I've found that it helps to distract myself during this time.  And then as soon as it's okay to take an early test, I grab it and do it.  For me it's better to get an idea early on rather than to drive myself nuts waiting and waiting.  If the test comes back negative, it helps me in some bizarre way to decrease the hope that I was feeling.  To face reality.  Or rather to let it smack me in the face. 

It is such a tug of war.  Hope, no hope.  While it's easier sometimes to not want to be hopeful (as I do when I take an early test), it's not what I want in the long run.  I want to hope.  I need to hope that if it didn't work this time, maybe it will work next time.  But does hoping then make it more painful for me when things don't work? 

So I took the test on New Year's Eve and felt my emotions just plummet to the ground.  The tears started again and they weren't the 'light' tears that I wrote about earlier.  These were big, fat, heavy tears full of sorrow over not conceiving yet and thinking that just two and a half months ago I was indeed carrying a child.  These were gloomy tears that wondered if I would ever get pregnant again.  These were the tears that reminded me how far into my pregnancy I would have been.  How I would have been feeling my little Jacob kick and box at me...and how I would have griped, but loved every minute of it!

This is where I think my struggle will be hardest.  Every month there will come a time when I'll be very optimistic about things.  And then it could all sink around me.  How do I deal with 'hope' during these times?  How do I lift myself up?  It's hard.  All I could do on New Year's was to let myself wallow, feel the pain and to cry... a lot. I had to then wait for my self-pity to lessen so I could try to bounce back.

The other part of hope that I am struggling with is how much hope I should hold on to long term.  My doctor was giving us three months.  We go to see her again on February 2.  We're two months into her time frame.  At my appointment, I think she will put me on some medication and then give us three more months.  That's all.  After that, we'd have to be referred to a specialist.

So out of six attempts before seeing a specialist, we're already down two.  Boy, that's depressing. 

How can someone not panic at this timeline?  Talk about my clock ticking.  It's one thing when you're just laughing about it on your own but it's another when you have medical personnel reminding you that the alarm bell is going off.  So, you're not supposed to panic and be stressed.  Just relax, right?  Sure.  Easier said than done.  You hope that things will work and then you find out they didn't.  And then you see how close you're getting to your final chances.  I don't know much about specialists but I don't think we will be able to afford any of that.  So to me, my chances are slim and becoming slimmer.

As you can tell, I'm engaged in a mental battle right now--where do I put my head?  Hopeful?  Realistic?  Maybe?  Maybe not?  Do I just start adjusting my head to say that I will not be having another baby?  Or do I keep focused on the positive...on hope and say, "I will have another baby, I just don't know when."  As I wrote about when I first described learning of my Jacob's diagnosis, I don't do well with uncertainty.  It's a huge weakness in me.  If I knew for sure that I would indeed get pregnant again but just not know when, then I'd have that to work with.  But I just don't know if it will happen at all.  How do I deal with this?

I still wonder why this all happened.  Why did it take longer to get pregnant with Jacob only to then lose him?  If I wasn't to have a third child, why did I get pregnant at all?  Wouldn't you think that if someone wasn't meant to have any more children, they wouldn't conceive only to lose that child?  Why did my baby make it so long--for 13 weeks--before leaving me?

I feel awful even asking these questions.  I know God has a plan. I just wish he'd let me know what that plan is. 

Well, I obviously have a lot that I need to pray about and to think about.  My head is cluttered with feelings of hope and despair clashing and slamming into one another. 

I guess I'll just keep living my life by the calendar right now and see what happens.  I look forward to learning more at my doctor appointment in a few weeks.  Hopefully that will help to answer more of my questions.  In the meantime I'll also need to keep myself very distracted.  I know I can't dwell on this.  Such a struggle.

Thanks friends for reading my ramblings.  If anyone has gone through something similar and has suggestions for how to get through each month waiting for the test days only to have a single line stare you in the face, please let me know.  I'd appreciate your thoughts.

I hope all of you are off to a great start to your 2011!

Kim