I Woke Up a Mother

Three years ago I woke up a mother. With a carefree four year old and a healthy daughter on the way. Three years ago I believed that the miscarriage we had suffered 11 months before was the worst thing that could happen to us. I believed good things were to come.

Three years ago the nursery was all set. The sheets were on the crib, the tiny clothes folded and in the drawers. The car seat installed.

I was excited about the future then. I believed that good things happen to good people (or people who try their best to be good anyway). I believed that our future was blessed. I believed in God and mercy and the power of positivity and prayer.

Three years ago, I woke up excited about the future. Then the rug was pulled out from underneath me.

My world was shattered and while we've managed to haphazardly glue the pieces back together the cracks still show. The tears seep through them now and again. The fissures and breaking points are always there, just underneath the surface. You can see them when you look closely enough, they are there in the extra wrinkles and gray hair. In the haunted eyes that don't quire smile the way they used to. They are there in laughter cut short out of guilt, in walls surrounding our fragile hearts. Like a phantom friend, always tagging along.

Three years ago I woke up as a mother. By nightfall I was a grieving mother.



** Side note** There is no word for a parent that lost a child. That's how against nature it is to bury your daughter or son. If you lose a spouse you are a widow/widower. If you lose your parents you are an orphan. If you lose a child you are without description.

When the Rainbow Fades

We should have looked at our two little boys and just felt grateful. We should have looked at them and just counted our blessings. We should have just been thankful to have these wonderful, smart, sweet, adorable boys in our lives.

But we got greedy.

"One more!" we said. "Look how great these boys are. Lets just try for one more!" "What if we have a girl this time! A daughter would be amazing!" "What if we have a third boy! We make the best boys!"

2 months later, 2 positive pregnancy tests confirmed the newest addition was on the way. Due in May! A spring baby. The best time to have a baby. Good weather, I'll be home with Charlie all summer. It will be perfect. Everything will be perfect. Of course, it never ends that way. It's never just that easy.

First came the blood. Then the pain. The frantic, middle of the night call to the Doctor. And then it's over. Just like that. After 9 weeks of hoping and praying and pleading with fate, we are left once again to pick up the pieces and figure out our next move.

It's never just that easy.

The Hardest Lesson

I've learned so much in the last few years. I've learned to lean on my village, I've learned that grief is messy and ugly and natural, I've learned that friends aren't always friends, I've learned that I am stronger than I ever imagined. I've experienced a desperate search for answers that don't exist and I've experienced arms so empty they ache. Most importantly, I've learned to deal with my own emotions.

I've never been a person that is comfortable with "feelings." Especially the negative ones. Growing up my dad always acted like my highs were too high and my lows were too low so I learned to hold all emotion in and mask how I was feeling. I never had a bad day. I was fine. I was always fine. Then Hannah died and nothing was fine. I was falling apart and I couldn't deal with that. Not at all. So I began my quest for the answers that I was sure would bring closure.

And quite the quest it was. I blew through therapist after therapist. I spoke with ministers (PS: My God doesn't kill babies so telling me this was His plan was less than helpful). I looked to Buddhism (What do you mean nothing is permanent? Not helpful Mr. Monk). I even spoke with a Medium (actually pretty comforting). Ironically what was the most helpful came from the person I liked the least. A therapist that I had zero connection with. I couldn't stand my time with her. But something she said did stick with me. She told me sometimes people just aren't ready to heal. That we can't rush the process. We have to be in the right space emotionally. Your head and your heart have to be ready and she didn't think I was there yet.

Pfffft, I was ready. I was so ready. I walked out of her office needing to be ready. I needed to fix it, I needed to fix it now! I had to heal so I could get pregnant again so we could get past this. I needed to move on.

So much was wrong with this thought process. A) You don't move on from the death of your child. Moving on is not a thing in this situation. You learn to pull yourself together. You learn to move forward. But you never move on. B) You can't fix this type of situation. You slowly learn to live with it and carry it forward, but you never "fix" it.

So months after that fateful and uncomfortable session in the therapists office (and a year after saying goodbye to Hannah) it dawned on me that she was right. I wasn't ready to heal. I was ready to cry, I was ready to grieve. But I was not ready to heal. And so I changed my course of action and I learned to just sit with my emotion. I learned how to exist with my grief, without trying to change it or alter it or fix it. I learned to just be.

It was not something that I was comfortable with at all. It was almost an impossible lesson but it's a lesson I am grateful to have learned. Now when emotional issues pop up, I am able to process and react more calmly. But most importantly it's helped me hold Hannah close. She is not a part of my heart to avoid any longer. She is a part of my heart that I hold dear, that I love and cherish and grieve and celebrate. And this is how I learned to put one foot in front of the other and continue to live.

Critics and Critiques

It's been almost a year since I published "An Open Letter to My Critic" and so much has happened in that time. I'd like to say fences were mended and bridges weren't burned, but that's not the reality of the situation. The reality is that the situation got much uglier than I originally knew and certainly more than I thought possible. That's why I have been as quiet as possible.

It turns out that it wasn't one "friend" tired of my grief and ready for it to be over. Out of four women in that conversation that night, after many drinks and of course, after I had left, only one said this isn't right. Only one said the conversation needs to stop. The other three continued.

No one will tell me exactly what has said. Either too much time has passed to remember exactly or maybe they are ashamed. It's probably better if I don't know anyway. What I do know is it broke my heart all over again. And now friendships that I thought would last until we were old and gray are shaky now at best and it makes me sick to think of it.

I'm trying to forgive. I'm trying to move forward. But it's hard, its just so hard.

The cold truth of the situation now is that all have apologized - and almost all were sincere. But the blame now lies with me. They see it as my inability to automatically drop their betrayal and act like nothing ever happened as what is truly damaging the group. I see their inability to understand the level of hurt they caused as culprit. As you can see, this leaves a wide chasm that some how needs to be gapped. But can it?

That's what I don't know and I am trying to figure out. Meanwhile the silence, as they say, is deafening. They don't seem to be in a hurry for answers. Maybe they are over this too. Or maybe they are giving me a wide berth to figure all this out. I just don't know. I do know they are frustrated. They have asked once or twice, "How can I be your friend? I don't know how to be your friend anymore. Tell me how to be your friend." And the only answer I have "Just don't be an asshole" isn't giving enough direction. Maybe I should say, "Start by not putting the entire future of our friendship solely on my shoulders. It's a lot to carry alone." Because it is a lot to carry alone. Not only do I have to get myself and my husband and my two young children through this, now I have to get our friendship through this too? It's somehow my job and my job alone? That doesn't seem fair.

Then again, there was nothing fair about this situation from the very start.