grief: three years later

We visited the city she was born last weekend.  I never have a problem with the city itself, but there are so many memories that float to the surface when I know we are near the hospital.

Last weekend, we visited the mall that was the last place I visited before the hospital.  The nurse had called and told me our room was ready, hours ahead of schedule, and I panicked, asking for just a few more hours.  I needed to find something for her to wear.  A completely ridiculous task, in retrospect, since she never wore the little yellow dress we bought for her.  They don't make dresses for babies that small, for babies who don't live.  But still, I had to buy her something, for whatever reason.

We ate lunch at a table overlooking the ice rink.  I remember that last meal with my rounded belly in the outside world so clearly.  Below us, a tiny little girl in a tutu clung to her mother as they slid around and around the ice.  It was one of so many hundreds of things I hoped to do with my baby girl, and I remember sitting there, chewing, in this numb disbelief that it would never be, not with this baby. 

When we were there last weekend, this tiny little memory that I hadn't thought of for years came rushing back.  And Orrin was cranky and throwing a fit and I was so tired and I just couldn't shake the sadness.  I felt a little crazy, but I just couldn't stop thinking of that old me, sitting there eating lunch, about to do the hardest thing I have ever done.

It's still making me cry, to be honest, and I'm not even sure why.  The things that stir up the grief these days take me by surprise.  Little moments that have been tucked away to make room for the larger ones that have become commonplace in my consciousness.

There is one other moment that I always think of in Portland. 

We left the hospital and I was a complete mess.  I remember sitting in the car, zombie-like, feeling every inch of distance stretching between me and that brown brick building where I had left my baby.  And then, as we merged onto 405, Jesse and I started singing.
Misguided by the 405 'cause it lead me to an alcoholic summer. I missed the exit to you parents' house hours ago. Red wine and the cigarettes: hide your bad habits underneath the patio, patio. (obviously the lyrics were not relevant, but it was a song that has been in our lives from the very beginning)

I think it was that moment that I knew we would survive.

a little bird

My dad told me yesterday that when he goes out to shoot pictures in the wee hours of the morning, there is a bird that separates itself from a crowd and watches him. He said he knows it is Layla Wren.

I am not the only one who remembers. ♥

I always think the holidays will not be hard for me, until they actually arrive and everyone is assembling and there is always someone missing. I miss her a lot today.

the 9th

I noticed it was the ninth today, for the first time in I don't know how long. It hit me than next month it will be three years. THREE. I'm not sure where this year has gone. The flashbacks are starting again, without my control as usual. I don't know if it is the light, the cold, that triggers them? Either way, I am feeling that heaviness in my heart again and missing her more than usual. I realized the other day how strange it is that all of it has become normal, part of my past, something that is no longer all-consuming, it just is. My heart has been nagging me with longing for another baby lately. But I still wonder if it is just missing her, still waiting. Three years seems like such a very long time.

tis the season?

What is it with August? It seems, now, that it is the beginning of my grief season. This is the month it all began, a tiny spark and a flutter of excitement in my heart. In the last few days I have felt the memories sort of crowding in around the edges of my consciousness. They have never really left, but they seem heavier, a little bit harder to bear right now. Maybe it is something about the light at this time of year, or that feeling of being at the tail end of summer, that makes me yearn a little harder for that magical button that would transport me back three years. Back to being that 22 year old whose dreams of a surprise baby (because it was completely impractical to have one on purpose) were about to come true. Sometimes I wish we had just been more careful. Twenty-two is so young to have your life fall apart. Or maybe my magical button would even allow me to change the course of history, to take the vitamins and deliver a healthy girl in May. But would I really choose to change it, knowing what I know now? I don't know. Probably not, now that I have this incredible boy who is so clearly meant to be in my life.

And then there is the fact that my cycles are suddenly lining up within days of those in 2008. After two pregnancies, 18 months of breastfeeding, and a whole range of irregular cycles in between, my cycles have regulated and the calendars are matching up almost to the day. Which means I am feeling dangerously close to throwing caution to the wind and trying it all again at the end of this month. I don't even know why there is a pull to have another pregnancy that would line up with all the dates. In the early days of my grief it would have been the last thing I ever wanted. And, in reality, it would be completely impractical for us to get pregnant again right now (although that would also be much like Layla's pregnancy). But I can't seem to stop thinking about it, imagining being taken by surprise again, announcing it to the world, seeing healthy a healthy spine and feeling tiny feet in my ribs.

I think there is a part of me that feels like I know what to do now, like I can fix it, make it work this time, if I only had the chance. I feel crazy, like that instinctual mother has taken over again and all logic is lost to that deep desire to nurture another little being.

I should probably stay far, far away from my husband for awhile. ;)

babies, babies, everywhere

I have a baby bug today. I think it's because I am about to ovulate, and suddenly tiny babies are everywhere and bringing up that unmistakable pull of longing that I started feeling years ago. This time, however, I have two feet firmly planted in the reality of parenthood and know that I am definitely not ready for another just yet. A newborn, maybe, but not so much the stages that follow. I am just enjoying the return of full nights of sleep too much right now.

I do dream sometimes of another surprise pregnancy, conceived at the end of August of course. With a due date in May. And it will be a girl and she will be healthy this time. And maybe some part of me believes that this will bring her back, like I can hit the reset button and do it all over again and this time she will come home with me. I can't believe that these little bits of craziness still linger, two and half years later, but they do. There is still a part of me that feels unfinished. The truth is that no matter how many babies I go on to have, that feeling will probably still be present. It reminds me of the term that was used in genetic counseling: "interrupting the pregnancy." Not ending it. It's like my body/heart/whatever didn't get the message. It still wants to go back and finish what it started.

I do feel another baby waiting to join us, but I am letting her wait awhile (yes, I feel that it will be a girl, just like I knew Orrin would be a boy!). I have a few things to do before I can think about inviting another soul to share my body again, including giving my heart the space to continue healing so that I can just maybe enjoy pregnancy a little bit the next time around.

Orrin noticed Layla's picture for the first time the other day. He pointed and said "baby." Eventually I will have to tell him about his sister. I can't wait to hear what he has to say, being the closest to that other side where I imagine her to be.

right where I am : two years, (almost) five months

Thank you to Angie for giving me a reason to write again. Sometimes I do feel a pull to this place, but I feel as if I have written myself in circles about the same feelings, the same grief, the same tiny girl who came and went so quickly.

I still have her ultrasound picture on the fridge. I keep the ones from the ultrasound on display in the open, because they are the only proof that, at one point, she was alive. I still stare at it sometimes, my heart twisting in on itself sometimes, agonizing over the "hi mom" inscription, but only sometimes.

The grief is different now. The load is so much lighter.

We talk a lot about how much it has changed us. I feel more withdrawn than ever. I don't relate to most people anymore. I still wonder what it would have been like to be one of the normal ones, to have been able to take my first baby home. I still feel a little winded when someone announces they are having a girl. I worry about everyone's ultrasounds, and then I have twinges of bitterness when they go well. I still get mad when people smoke/drink/don't take their vitamins and still get healthy babies.

I still think of Layla all the time. It is not usually with such crushing sadness though. It seems she floats into my mind most often while I am in the bathroom (maybe because this is one of the only times I am alone these days). I wonder wonder wonder if I did the right thing, and usually come to the same conclusion. I feel so deeply that she was not meant for this world, and yet I wish she would have been.

Sometimes I have intense flashbacks of her birth, of holding her tiny little body, and they shake me back down to that place. I don't ever want to forget, and yet I try to avoid going too far into those corners these days. I still have this big fragile wound on my heart--the injury is healing, but when I bump into it, the pain is searing again. This wound governs my life more than I realize I think.

We have sort of unintentionally turned one of the blankets from her birth into Orrin's go-to blanket. It was the one we passed around, each of us holding it, putting our energy into it. In the end, we didn't wrap her in it, but I remember it on the bed with me as I labored. It has always been in a large rotation of blankets, but lately it has been the one we pull out at bed time.

I sometimes struggle with being the only one who remembers these kinds of things. Sometimes I feel like I am the only one who remembers that she existed at all. It's frustrating that people forget. Not many people in my immediate circle really understand the gravity of her life and death for us. It was a long time ago now, but it is still rippling into every aspect of our lives. I think we finally have two feet in the new normal, but the world looks different from here.

Lately I have been wishing I could have one more day in the fall of 2008, when I was just pregnant, before the ultrasounds and diagnosis, when everything felt so sure and right and exciting. All I can think is, I was so young. I never could have imagined how much I would change in two and a half years.

In general though, I have reached that point that I once thought was unattainable, where the loss is integrated into my life and I...maybe...almost...know myself again.

So, here we are on the other side of two years. You would think I would be over the little things, the surprises that cause the wound to flare up again, but I'm not.

A little girl on TV, about the age you would have been, named Layla. Spending time with a cousin that was born on your due date.

My mother in law and I were going through fabric weeks ago, and she held up a little unfinished dress and told me she thought it would fit an 18 month old girl. My heart twisted in on itself, and that instinctual mother in me, the one who has still not quite reconciled with the fact that I don't actually have an 18 month old daughter, was confused for just a split second before it all settled in again. No little girl to put in dresses.

She is here in my heart, but she is not here. It still feels wrong, sometimes. I still wish I could have both my babies.