Family dynamics

I haven't written for a while.  I have slept.  First trimester was a doozy this time-lots of sickness, lots of sleeping. I think it was great though (how often do you hear that about someone hanging over the toilet bowl?!)-It was so nice to know everything was okay with baby.  Sickness=strong hormones=strong baby.

The two to three weeks between sickness and feeling baby move were nerve racking, but are, luckily, over!  Baby is kicking away!

So, that is the physical up date.  Now on to the good stuff-emotions!

I recently told my mom I was pregnant.  I was terrified to tell her.  I felt like I was thirteen again, telling my mom I was getting back together with an ex-boyfriend.  "Yes, the one who broke my heart-who then kicked it and spit on it and rolled it to the gutter like a piece of trash...but, he's changed!  This will be different!  I LOVE HIM!!!"  I am not sure why I felt like this.  Maybe because I am giving my heart away again to something I was so burned by last time.  Or maybe it is because a small part of me wanted her to be worried about ME-about how I was feeling and whether I was emotionally ok.  Maybe that part of me wants everyone to know that or at least to ask.

Maybe it is like this-the joy part of me is the older sister who does everything right and gets all the glory.  That part of me is bigger and more noticeable, and, let's face it, easier to understand, relate to and deal with.  Everyone loves her!  But there is this little sister vying for some attention too.  She dresses in all black and is just different.  She is the unknown.  It is hard to relate to her, she's volatile and emotional and unpredictable and, unless you have a little sister just like her, it is hard to know what to say.  She sits and stews, wishing someone would notice her and ask how she is.

After the big sister got most of the glory, my mom finally did ask how the little sister was doing-in a vague, "please don't go into too many details" kind of way.  I appreciated the gesture.

The little sister is doing ok.  She is there.  She does need to be noticed, but the big sister wins out most of the time, and in this case, I am glad.

Lately

So, lately I have been torn.  For a while I felt like these flowers:

Unfortunately, I felt like the roses: these was life all around me, and even in me, but my head was hung.  Micah due date came and went and no baby was born no new life began; at least not in our family.  It was hard.  Other people had babies.  That was hard too.  Birth announcements came in the mail.  I had no reason to send any.

But, there IS life all around, and, happily, in, me.  A new little peanut showed us his or her heartbeat the doctor's last week.  Honestly, in the days leading up to the appointment, I did not think seeing the heartbeat would make me feel better or more confident in this pregnancy-I mean, why would it, I say a heartbeat before, right?  But, oh man, the moment that little flutter appeared on the screen, I cried.  "There is my baby, my child," I thought.  Since then, I have been sleeping more soundly and feeling better than I had in weeks.

Earlier this weekend I went for a swim alone in the pool.  This feeling of calm came over me; it just felt right.  I have to say, it also felt like everything was going to be alright.  I am terrified of letting myself imagine holding this baby, playing with him or her, seeing Zach play with his sibling, but I just have this feeling that everything will be fine and I am resting in that. Not just resting, but going with that.  Telling people I don't HAVE to tell that I am pregnant because I want to and I am excited.

Speaking of telling people, that has been kind of a strange experience too.  Telling people you are pregnant after such a late term loss feels a bit like telling your mom you are back together with that guy that broke your heart just a few months or weeks ago; you know the one? The real asshole that you told your mom about; you revealed to her the awful things he said and did and how he treated you, but now you decided to get back together and risk it all again, because, well you love him and are sure this time will be different. Any way, telling people again has kind of felt like that to me.  They know how destroyed I was for a time-it was such a public and painful loss.  Now I am telling them I am risking it all again.  And putting them at risk too.  I know our friends' hearts broke with us and I know they would again.  But, the power to love and hope is so much stronger than the power of fear.  I am working every day to let the love and hope win and I really feel like they are-I cannot wait to hold this little rainbow baby in my arms.

Arm Chair Philosophers

I remember when a friend of found out her baby had spina bifida, one of the things she said was difficult was that people you never would normally discuss philosophy with were all of a sudden sharing their life and death thoughts with you.  It is funny because I remembered her saying this almost right after we found out about Micah.  I knew the onslaught of arm chair philosophers was coming.

And so they came with their platitudes mostly:

"Don't worry, God will never give you more than you can handle."  Really?  Then why do people shoot up shopping malls after a break up or drown their children because of postpartum?  Apparently their lives were more than they could handle.

"It is just God's way, there must have been something wrong with the baby."  Really?  God kills children who have physical or mental disabilities?  Because I have met children (and adults) who have those and they look very much alive.

"It will get better with time."  You're right.  I should just solider through; the death of a child is no big deal; inert time will heal all.

I know these people meant well, but I wonder if they have ever really been tested in their lives.  I just don't think that someone who has been through extreme pain or loss would say something like that.  At least not someone who has really thought about what they are going through instead of burying the pain in sayings that sound good but don't really make logical sense.

Luckily, the people closest to me, the ones I would and have talked philosophy with, are old souls-if they have not experienced such pain in this life, they must have in past ones-or they just understand somehow.  They get it.  I am so glad I have them as my friends.

The memory hole

Sometimes I come across these memories of Micah in my mind.  I remember good things (and some bad too) and I am not always sure what to do with them.  I think our minds categorize memories into little pockets: good ones and bad ones, or maybe more accurately happy ones and sad ones.  We put the happy ones at the front of the pile and protect ourselves by putting sad ones in the back-more hidden away in a place we really have to think to access.  The hard part about losing someone (I think) is that the memory storage gets messed up.  I have happy memories with Micah (seeing him on the first ultrasound, finding out he was a boy, etc...) so these memories are on the top of the memory pile, but the problem is, they still hurt.   It is human nature to run from pain, but it is not necessarily bad for us to experience that pain, I know that...it is still difficult.  My natural reaction is still to try to put those memories at the bottom of the pile-to tuck them away and not experience them any more-but I don't want to do that.  I miss Micah and I want those happy memories to be happy.  So, I work every day to let myself experience the happy parts of each memory and feel happy while thinking of those times.

The more difficult and actually sad memories (finding out he no longer had a heartbeat and...well, everything that happened after that) are still hard to experience.  Sometimes I slip them from the bottom of the pile and feel them just a little before I put them back under.  I am not sure what a healthy leave of experience is for these memories.  I know I cannot live in them.  They cannot be at the top of the pile. All I know is I do with them what I think is best: acknowledge without letting them control and that feels right for now.

The list I could not complete....

For the first time in a long time (well, since April 15th to be exact) I feel happy.  It is not that I don't miss Micah or that I don't grieve every day for the baby I will never hold in my physical arms-it is not at all that. It is, in fact, that I am happy for what I do have now in my life.  I have realized I cannot change the past.  For a while, I played the "What If" game.  There is nothing but fear regret when one plays that game.  It is a dangerous game with no winner.

I think we have a choice.  It is not only a choice to fight like hell for what we want our lives to be, it is also a choice to embrace the beautiful things in our lives.  I have many beautiful things-I am blessed.  I remember a journal entry from about a month after we found out Micah had died. I tried to "look on the bright side" and list my blessings.  The list is blank.  I couldn't do it.  No matter how I tried, my grief was so big that it overshadowed the positives.  It is not that my grief is not longer a part of my life, I am pretty sure it will always be with me, but I now feel like I have wrestled the grief dragon and put it in a cage.  It no longer controls me.  I am not afraid of it.  It does not spew fire onto everything around me.  Sure, the dragon sometimes rears its head when I least expect it, but I know I can wrestle it in and win.

Here is the journal entry I could not complete before:

I am grateful for the following things (in no particular order and this is not all of the things that are beautiful in my life):
-Todd-all the time and for all he is and does for me
-Zach-such an amazing little man-smart and kind and funny
-Family
-Girlfriends who have chosen to be my sisters
-All of my friends
-My home
-My garden
-The circle of people who have surrounded and loved me over the last 4 months
-Exercise-the kind that feels good from the top of my body to the bottom
-Coffee (both hot and iced)
-Wine (mostly red)
-Hope


These are certainly not all of the things, but are the ones that rolled right off the top of my head.  I am sure I could sit here all day and list more (but alas nap time is almost over).  I am so glad I have fought my way to a place where I can list these things that make me so happy.  It has not been an easy journey and it certainly is not over (is it ever), but I see progress and I want to keep going. I have not done it alone, and if you are reading this, you are probably a part of my journey, so I just want to say "Thank you." I cannot imagine life without you.

We are stronger than we think...

I remember first getting a call from my doctor when I was about four months pregnant telling me that some blood tests I had done showed high levels indicating Micah might have Spina Bifida.  I thought, "I am not strong enough to handle this..." Little did I know what the next month would bring.

When we first found out Micah had died, I was crushed.  I felt a weight so heavy pushing me down, I thought I would never be able to lift it.  Like any workout (physical or emotional), it was so tempting to give up, to say I am not strong enough and let myself be crushed.  It would have been so much easier to give in to the blackening world around me and sleep and sleep and sleep.

Nine weeks ago I started a workout program called Body Back.  The owner (Breanne) offered me the class for free (a huge, sweet gift).  Like many other things that had come my way at the time, I just wanted to say no.  There were huge risks involved: It was a workout program for moms, what if I met other women with babies? I didn't want to know happy families. What if I made friends?  I didn't want more friends. What if I found out I actually was not strong enough to do this?

I rallied and said yes any way and I am so glad I did.  Looking at my physical before and after pictures, I wish that I could have taken mental before and after.  When I first started going to the biweekly workouts, I would cry every time the quiet cool down part would come.  The other women in class would offer support, having no idea why the strange blonde one cried every day.  By the end of the program, cool downs became a time to reflect on my growth and progress and hope.  The weight was easier to lift, the load got lighter, I got stronger.

Here are the physical pictures.... before is on the left and after on the right.

Testing

It is funny how things come up once and then right away, there they are again.  Yesterday morning I was at breakfast with two dear friends (and Zach, my 1.5 year old) and we (well, the girls and I, Zach was not really involved in the conversation) were talking about our blogs.  We all want to blog more and were sort of analyzing the things that deter us from doing so.  One thing I have been hesitant about is sharing my real name and information on my blog-what if someone I know reads it and is offended?!  Maybe I will just keep everything anonymous that way no one will be offended.  The problem with that is that getting to know people and working through emotions together as humans journeying down a path is the exact reason I started I Measure Every Grief.  So, it was decided: I will post my real name just as I will post my real thoughts in hope that others will do the same.  Offense be damned.

Then, last night something was said that I really want to blog about.  The problem? Blogging it will put my real feelings out there.  It is not really that I am afraid to show those feelings: they are real and mine and I am not ashamed of them.  What I am afraid of it hurting the feelings of the person who said something that I want to blog about.  What if she reads it and is crushed that she hurt me in the way she did?  Do I even have the right to blog it if I didn't say anything to her at the time?  Is it like a train that left the station: it is too late now to get on, so keep quiet and move on.

Well, all that to say that I don't think it is any small coincidence that the girls and I were just talking about this very thing and then the opportunity presented itself that very day.  I know I need to let my thoughts be known because I want to be real and, in real life, people say things without thinking and sometimes those things hurt.  And sometimes we can decide how to react. And sometimes we can't.  This is a time I could and I think it shows progress.

So, here it goes.  In order to understand what happened, you have to know more of my story than you currently do from my one beginning post.  You may remember I was five months pregnant this past April (2011) and, at a 20 week routine ultrasound, we found out our dear baby Micah had died.  There is so much more to the story, but what you need to know now is that we had two choices: deliver Micah in the hospital (on the maternity ward with all the living babies) or go to Planned Parenthood and have a dilation and evacuation (basically it is what a later term abortion is only our baby was already dead).  Neither choice seemed real.  Neither was pleasant or good or beautiful.  We made the choice to go to Planned Parenthood and we traveled a path neither my husband or I ever thought we'd go down.  We saw and heard and learned things that will never leave our minds, things that changed us forever.  Sometimes I look at our choice and think we chose wrong, but then I realize there is no right in the situation we were in and I think we choice the least wrong possible for us.

I won't go into more details than that for now, but it was the most difficult experiences of my life.  Even now I sometimes can't stop my mind from thinking about that choice: What happened to Micah when they "evacuated" him?  What happened to his little body after? How is it even possible a sane woman would choose to do something like that to her living child? Did I make the wrong choice even though my child was dead?  Did I honor his memory or take the easy way out?

Any way, last night I was together with some dear friends celebrating a birthday.  These ladies have been amazing-they have journeyed beside me through my grief and insanity, they have laughed with me, cried with me, listened to me and supported me no matter what is going on in their lives (including one gal who is pregnant with her first baby-how hard to e traveling that path while your friend travels the one of loss).

Somehow the topic of Planned Parenthood protesters came up and one friend went into graphic detail about a sign a protester held of an aborted baby, describing the horror of what happened to the dear angel's body as he (or she) was pulled from the womb too soon.  It felt like time froze and I could see the two roads that Robert Frost refers to diverging in the woods: I could let my mind be sucked into the sadness and unhealthiness of thinking about poor Micah and his little body and what must have happened to him or I could be strong and I know I made the choice I made with the information at the time, I did what I thought was best for me and my family and that he was not with me any more-his body was just the shell he inhabited for all too short a time.

I could feel myself drifting away from the group of women, my mind disengaging with the present and going into the past, into a world imagining what might have been.  I am not sure how long I let myself go into the unhealthy place, but I know it was not as long as it used to be.  I chose to come back.  I chose to reengage with my friends, to be present and enjoy their company.  And I am glad I did.