Perfect Moment

I Capture

Perfect Moments.

As babylost Mommas on the road through child loss, it is so easy to miss the good moments as they are happening, because our bodies and minds are busy at work dealing with our grief. That is why I like the idea of this meme, it forces me to focus on something good from the day.

Today my perfect moment happened when I came down to the kitchen to find my husband Dru making the most delicious dinner. Usually his idea of a meal is Ramen noodles with a side of mac and cheese, but tonight he treated me to a grilled sea bass filet, brown and wild rice pilaf, and fresh corn on the cob. For dessert he gave me an oreo stuffed with cookies and cream ice cream. It was heaven.

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August 23rd

Peyton,

Today was your due date, a date that, while it did not mark your birth, is one that I will always associate with you. I repeated this date over and over during the months that I carried you, to friends, family and strangers alike. They would ask, "when are you due?" and I would smile and tell them this date and inevitably there was always some small talk about timing and the fact that I was having you at the very end of the summer.

A year ago, life was still "normal". We waited in hopeful anticipation of your arrival, and looked forward to counting your fingers and toes. We sat up at night debating your sex, what names to choose (you were nearly a Finnian or Scarlet), and it was this week last year that we finally set up your nursery. We never could have imagined, a year later, that this house would still only be home to the two of us, or that the room that signified so much hope and happiness, would become a neglected reminder of all that we have lost with you. It is so hard baby girl, knowing what never can be with you. We had hoped for so much for you, you deserved so much more than this world and life offered. None of this will ever make sense to me.

Today Daddy and I spent the day with you on our minds. We went to church, and I tried my best to think of your life and doing something to honor it, rather than flashing back to images of your funeral in that very place. After church Daddy and I came home for a bit, then went to get our hair cut. Our friend was doing a cut-a-thon for charity, and I took this as the boost I needed to take care of my neglected appearance. This was my first hair cut since a few weeks prior to your birth. I think of that, and realize just how backwards my priorities were then. I went to the salon to get my hair cut so that I would look nice in the pictures of us together. The idea of that happy moment not arriving never even crossed my mind. I took for granted that you would be born healthy, that I would have you in my arms in those pictures, and the moment would be a beautiful one full of smiles. I feel so foolish when I think of that now, of how I could have wasted any energy at all on my appearance, when I should have been focusing on every second you were with me. Forgive me baby girl, I had no idea how little time we would have together.

After our haircut we went to visit you at the cemetery. Could you feel us there? There are some days that I swear, I feel so connected to you. Today I hoped for that feeling on our visit, but it didn't come. I miss you so very much, and losing that feeling of connection hurts more than I can write here.

So much has changed since we expected your arrival, so many of the people we love most are welcoming more children into their lives, and we sit still. It is in realizing the changes in the lives of others that the reality of this last year hits, of the way the world still turns even when it feels like it stopped when you left.

These next two weeks leading up to your birthday are the last two weeks where I can say "at this time last year, life was normal." I don't know what these upcoming dates are going to bring for us emotionally, just that it's time for me to realize that there is no more "normal." That life. That innocense. They're never coming back. There is no more "normal" to return to, only life after losing you. Please baby girl, help us to find peace with the loss of what once was, and to find hope in what still may be.

Missing you today and always,

Mommy

Messages & Signs Mel's 66th Show & Tell

Since Peyton's passing there have been a few little, we will call them "incidents", where I thought that she was sending me some sort of a sign; a gust of wind during a visit to her grave after posing a very important question; walking into my bedroom to find a flashlight flashing across her picture; a light in our dining room hutch (an area of the house that has been ignored) being switched on and illuminating her box of things from the hospital - her handprints, a lock of her hair, etc. I have never really believed in 'ghost stories' per say, but you pepper in a few of these incidences after losing someone so close, and you begin to wonder. I imagine that by the end of this post you might wonder too.

This past week has been hard for me (and, yes, I do know how much of a broken record that makes me sound like) but it has. I have felt panicked and anxious about all of the dates of importance that seem to be running together. This Sunday was the date that she was originally due to arrive, so it is a date that I will always associate with her. September 4th is her birthday (I went two weeks overdue in the end of the summer. This was a fact that I had planned on reminding her of many many times during her life.) And then, of course, there is October 2nd, the day that we conceded to the Cancer and said our goodbyes. I'm very bitter towards Cancer now, and especially the way that when you lose your child to it, every conceivable Cancer organization bombards your mailbox with solicitations. Don't get me wrong, of course I want there to be a cure for Peyton's Cancer, and I give to just about everyone that asks, but it's still hard to have it in your face when you are grieving. I can only liken it to having someone mail you the mug shot of your child's killer. So like I said, I am bitter towards Cancer, but in an effort to avoid going completely off topic, as I do from time to time, I will save my feelings on that for another post.

Now, back to my showing and telling. When I am really low, really really low, my friend Chrissi is the one that usually gets the call. I tend to isolate myself alot these days, not wanting to burden anyone with my grief, so to be pushed to the point of dialing means its a really shitty day. I couldn't call Chrissi last week, she was on vacation in Rhode Island, and I missed her. As soon as she returned, she called me to see how my week had gone, and to tell me that she "had to tell me the cutest story ever!"

What follows here is the story she shared with me, the arc to this post, and I promise, the area where I will do the actual showing.

Chrissi said that she had gone to the beach every day, always hanging out in the same area. She told me that they had chosen that particular area of the beach because there was never anyone walking through and disturbing them, and they were left pretty much to enjoy the beach on their own. On one of the last days of her vacation, they set up in their usual spot, and started to enjoy their day by the ocean. Laying on her back, looking up at the sky, she heard her friend Megan saying "Oh my God Chrissi look!" "What?" Chrissi asked, tilting her head back. She saw a little leather bracelet sitting perched atop the sand and sort of brushed it off with a "yeah, it's a bracelet, so what?" "Look at what it says Chrissi," Megan said pointing, and in realizing what the bracelet said, Chrissi burst into tears. This photo below is of the bracelet that Chrissi found perched right behind her.

And here is where Chrissi tried to recreate the photo that we took here.

So this brings me back to my belief that sometimes Peyton sends funny little signs and messages when she feels they are really needed. This one has me even more convinced (as crazy as that makes me sound) because I can honestly say that I have never in my life randomly come across anything that said Peyton on it. If her name was more common, maybe I would chock it up to coincidence, but it's not, so I will just go on believing that this was Peyton sending a message that she knew her Mommy & Daddy needed to get through the hurt that these dates of her birthday and angelversary bring... a message of peace.

To see what others are sharing today go here.

I have fallen out of love with Fall

Fall has always been my favorite season. In the past, any hints at Autumn's approach: talk of pre-season football, the return of school buses, a few red leaves on the trees, would each bring a smile to my face and a flurry of excitement to my heart with the promise of visits to pumpkin patches, apple picking, and refreshingly cool days.

I had so many plans for us baby girl. I created so many images in my mind during the pregnancy of what last year, our first Fall as a family, was going to be like. I imagined us walking the paths along the river beneath arbors of changing leaves, and dressing you in the pumpkin costume that still hangs in your closet for your first Halloween. I imagined how wonderfully thankful Daddy and I would feel at Thanksgiving, to be home with our child, starting our new family life together.

You were due August 23rd.
You were born September 4th.
You died October 2nd.

Fall is fast approaching, and instead of flurried excitement, I am feeling so incredibly overwhelmed by these looming dates. At night I wake to panic about how quickly the time since we last held you is passing, and the fact that your gravestone hasn't yet been finished. I hate the fact that three seasons have passed without you, and I still feel unable to get over how surreal it can all feel. I feel trapped on pause, like groundhog's day, playing out the same day over and over.

I miss the simplicity of life before losing you. I miss the excitement that Fall used to bring. I miss all of the dreams that I had for you, and what it was like to expect you would be here. I miss you Peyton.

Fall will never be the same.

Yet another hurdle. Mel's 65th show and tell

Let me start by saying that I have a really bad tendency to write utterly appropriate Show and Tell posts on the wrong day, usually a Monday, which is what happened yet again this week here. Lots of showing, lots of telling, wrong day. Oh well.

So in an effort to come up with another sharing post for today, I have decided to show and tell about my pregnancies, past and future.

In the months since Peyton's death many people have offered their opinions about what a future pregnancy would mean to/for me, and I have realized that most of these words, while offered out of love and concern, are somewhat based in misconception about what it is that I find so scary about trying again. I wish it was as simple as lightning doesn't strike twice, but seeing as I have been pregnant twice, and I have no living children, my faith in that belief system is pretty much shot to hell.

When Dru and I decided to start a family, we got pregnant (to both of our surprise) with very little effort. Believe me when I say that this blessing was not taken for granted. I never expected an easy road to motherhood. As a teen I was hospitalized for ovarian cysts, and told by doctors that childbearing would most likely be difficult. Not impossible, just difficult. This came as no big surprise to me, both my mother and sister endured long struggles of their own to have children, and I sort of accepted it as one of those things that runs in the family, like heart disease or slow metabolisms. Learning I was pregnant brought utter elation, and I couldn't wait to share the news of my pregnancy with Dru. We had decided to start trying, fully expecting it would take several months to years, and celebrated and cried and laughed about how completely unprepared we were for it to have happened so quickly. Sitting in my living room, watching my husband's eyes well with this news remains in my heart as one of the most beautiful moments we have ever shared in our married life, the beauty of it making it that much more painful for me, just a short while later, to tell him that I was bleeding, that it wouldn't stop, and that on September 11th, 2007, a day that already held so much emotional charge, my miscarriage had been confirmed.

On Christmas Eve, I found out I was pregnant again. The news of this, our second pregnancy came with more apprehension. It was sad, to lose that naive excitement that we had with the first pregnancy. We were happy of course, but also scared. Scared to feel the pain and disappointment of miscarriage again. We had lost our innocence in the arena of getting pregnant and had learned that this was a prospect that could bring pain. Cautiously optimistic, we forged ahead and hoped for the best, reminding ourselves repeatedly that lightning wouldn't strike us twice. I rarely talk about the miscarriage, about the affect it had on me and my feelings, of all things, of self worth. In my heart, as that first baby's mother, I had failed to carry him/her, to bring my child safely into this world. The lack of answers from the doctors didn't help to ease these feelings any.

So this brings me back to people and why they think I haven't yet tried again. Some think it is a fear of an unsuccessful pregnancy/miscarriage. Ironically, it is not at all. That fear left with Peyton. I carried her not only to term, but two weeks beyond. To say that I loved being pregnant is so inadequate, it was in reality the happiest time of my life. It's true, I was once a very happy person. Smiling, upbeat, nauseatingly optimistic in my expectations. I even have the pictures to prove it.

I am at the point now, having lost faith in most things through this, where I need to be shown that something is possible, not told. The experience of carrying Peyton to term showed me that I could carry a baby to term, and therefore I can now believe it. I know the joy of pregnancy is possible. I know that my body can tolerate a growing child. I know that I can maintain a healthy lifestyle and eat well and exercise. I know these things, so they no longer cause me fear. What I don't know is whether I can create a child that upon entering this world, will not be condemned to die.

Infant Leukemia laughs in the face of my grief and taunts me with its rarity, playing on my feelings of inadequecy for once again failing to bring a healthy child into the world; feelings that come when there are no other explanations. I have no answers. My child is dead and I have no answers. There were absolutely no indications when I was carrying Peyton that anything was wrong. No signs. No symptoms. Nothing. What's even more frustrating is living in a world where modern medicine can do the impossible; clone sheep, change one's gender, transplant the organs of animals into humans; and yet cannot offer a single test to determine whether or not my next child too, will be taken from me by this awful disease. How can I try again if I don't know when to stop worrying that Leukemia will take another child from me? When can I rule it out? At birth? After infancy? Puberty? Unfortunately no expert can give me an answer, just some bullshit about the probabilities of lightning striking twice.

I wish the prospect of trying again was as simple as the judgments others have placed on me

"Have another, you'll feel better."
"And what if I have to bury that one too?"
"What are the odds of it happening again?"
"About the same as they were the first time."
"Why aren't you trying?"
"The grief has made trying impossible at the moment."

All along I have hoped that we wouldn't have to try again, in terms of actually trying. I know how I feel. I know how terrified I am of losing another child, or breaking to the point of no return. I know that my fears can keep me from ever taking that leap of faith. I prayed that when the time came, God would help me out by making that decision for me. Oh how welcome an "oops" moment would be. I want a healthy family. I want to move past this pain, to say "okay, it has happened and I am going to do my best to put my fears aside and make this baby healthy." This was my hope, to leave this decision to God and nature, but even this has become too much to ask for. In yet another smack in the face, my grief over the child I have lost has made the prospect of easily getting pregnant improbable. I haven't talked about this here before, but an apparent side effect of watching your baby die, is having your remaining eggs retreat in fear of meeting a similar fate. I don't know that I would want to take the risk either if I were my eggs. My track record of 0 healthy children for 2 pregnancies is not very encouraging. Somewhere between my anger and bitterness at this new development, the situation is almost laughable. Here Krissy, how about some secondary IF after the death of your only child? Really?

My doctor has started me on hormones to try to get my body back on track, not because we are trying, but because I can't let this go. She says its not time to worry... yet, which is good because I think I have enough on my plate in that department. I was going to take pictures of the hormones for show and tell, but figured you would find very little interest in seeing a photo of little white pills. These hormones have made me even more of an emotional mess these past few weeks, as I am sure my husband would attest to, and will give me some indication by this weekend as to whether or not I am jumping over this hurdle, or standing at the doorstep of another uphill battle towards motherhood. Either way, I think I need a new lightning rod.

See what the others are sharing for this week's show and tell here.