The first Tuesday

Usual Tuesdays are especially bad for me, since Jacob was born on a Tuesday at 9am. I usually watch the clock until just after 9am, reliving what was happening during that time on the day he was born (and usually on the verge of tears or actually crying).

I just looked at the clock and realized that it is almost 10:30am and I didn't do it today, I didn't even think about doing it. I just got to work and started working. I never thought that I would have another Tuesday where I didn't go through the ritual of watching the clock and reliving everything. I still have flashbacks all the time, but I'm just really amazed about the change today.

I'm going to call my doctor this afternoon if her office doesn't call me. At my 6 week post-partum appointment, she said to call in 2 weeks if they haven't called with the autopsy results. I feel a little nervous. I think I'll just be disappointed if they don't have them (haven't I waited long enough already? It has been 8 weeks). She said she'd call the hospital if they haven't been received yet and see if she can speed things up.

A friend sent me this video today of a dog and a deer playing. It is so cute.

Another butterfly sighting

Yesterday was a really nice day here so Ted and I went to Cherry Beach. We decided to go at the last minute, when we were already out, so we didn't have any beach stuff with us, but we had fun watching the boats, windsurfers and the dogs. 

And one of the best things? I didn't see one single pregnant woman. I finally found somewhere to go where pregnant women are few and far between. I probably wouldn't have gone either if I was still pregnant since it was so warm and I would have been pretty big now.

We walked around and saw a lot of butterflies of all colours. We sat on a bench for about 30 minutes and saw the same large monarch butterfly fly around us and over us 3 times. Out of all the butterflies there, only this one kept flying near us. I especially associate monarch butterflies with Jacob. On the one month anniversary of his birth, we were at the garden where his ashes are buried and a monarch butterfly appeared about 5 minutes after I said to myself that I would love it if a butterfly came. It flew around, landing on the hedge that is around his burial place, on the tree that he is buried under and twice more on the hedge coming in the direction of where we were sitting. That was my first big sign from him. So seeing this monarch fly around us so much was special.

Tomorrow is the 8th Tuesday since he was born, but officially 2 months is really August 1. Today wasn't as bad as past Mondays have been. I went out with a friend for lunch and she surprised me with a necklace that she and her husband had bought for me in Scotland. It was totally unexpected and so appreciated. She started out as my Mom's friend, but I have gotten to know her and her husband well and they were really upset when they found out that we had lost Jacob. 

The new necklace

In other news, I didn't cry on Friday, the first day since we found out he died. I don't know how I feel about that. I should be glad, but I also felt kind of bad. 

I had an ultrasound this morning of my kidneys. The thing is that I had to go back to the same place where I had my first ultrasound with Jacob at 13 weeks because I had a previous one of my kidneys done there so they had the previous scan to compare this one too. I was in the same room, with the same technician, so I thought it might be hard. It wasn't too bad though. I was actually so tired that I was wishing I could just have a little nap on the table during the scan. I did think about how happy I had been the last time I was there, seeing my baby for the very first time. 

I couldn't sleep last night, so I got up as usual around midnight, cried for 1.5 hours and then went to bed. I was exhausted today. I really need to start sleeping better. 

What is "Normal"?

Melissa, Laken's Mom, posted this and it is exactly how my life is now. I've changed it a little to suit my situation.

What is "Normal"?

Author Unknown

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  Normal is having tears waiting behind every smile when you realize someone important is missing from all the important events in your family's life.

• Normal for me is trying to decide what to take to the cemetery for Birthdays, Christmas, Thanksgiving, New Years, Valentine's Day, July 1st and Easter.

• Normal is feeling like you can't sit another minute without getting up and screaming, because you just don't like to sit through anything.
• Normal is not sleeping very well because a thousand what if's & why didn't I's go through your head constantly.

• Normal is reliving that day continuously through your eyes and mind, holding your head to make it go away.

• Normal is having the TV on the minute I walk into the house to have noise, because the silence is deafening.

• Normal is staring at every baby who looks like he is my baby's age. And then thinking of the age he would be now and not being able to imagine it. Then wondering why it is even important to imagine it, because it will never happen.

• Normal is every happy event in my life always being backed up with sadness lurking close behind, because of the hole in my heart.

• Normal is telling the story of your child's death as if it were an everyday, commonplace activity, and then seeing the horror in someone's eyes at how awful it sounds. And yet realizing it has become a part of my "normal".

• Normal is each year coming up with the difficult task of how to honor your child's memory and his birthday and survive these days. And trying to find the balloon or flag that fits the occasion. Happy Birthday? Not really.

• Normal is my heart warming and yet sinking at the sight of something special my baby would have loved. Thinking how he would love it, but how he is not here to enjoy it.
• Normal is having some people afraid to mention my baby.

• Normal is making sure that others remember him. Normal is after the funeral is over everyone else goes on with their lives, but we continue to grieve our loss forever.

• Normal is weeks, months, and years after the initial shock, the grieving gets worse sometimes, not better.

• Normal is not listening to people compare anything in their life to this loss, unless they too have lost a child. NOTHING. Even if your child is in the remotest part of the earth away from you - it doesn't compare. Losing a parent is horrible, but having to bury your own child is unnatural.

• Normal is trying not to cry all day

• Normal is realizing I do cry everyday.

• Normal is disliking jokes about death or funerals, bodies being referred to as cadavers, when you know they were once someone's loved one.

• Normal is being impatient with everything and everyone, but someone stricken with grief over the loss of your child.

• Normal is sitting at the computer crying, sharing how you feel with chat buddies who have also lost a child.

• Normal is feeling a common bond with friends on the computer in England, Australia, Canada, the Netherlands and all over the USA, but yet never having met any of them face to face.

• Normal is a new friendship with another grieving mother, talking and crying together over our children and our new lives.

• Normal is not listening to people make excuses for God. "God may have done this because..." I love God, I know that my baby is in Heaven, but hearing people trying to think up excuses as to why healthy babies were taken from this earth is not appreciated and makes absolutely no sense to this grieving mother.

• Normal is being too tired to care if you paid the bills, cleaned the house, did laundry or if there is any food.

• Normal is wondering this time whether you are going to say you have any children when asked, because you will never see this person again and it is not worth explaining that my baby is in heaven. And yet when you say you don't have any children to avoid that problem, you feel horrible as if you have betrayed your baby.
• Normal is avoiding McDonalds and Burger King playgrounds because of small, happy children that break your heart when you see them.

• Normal is feeling like you know how to act and are more comfortable with a funeral than a wedding or birthday party...yet feeling a stab of pain in your heart when you smell the flowers and see the casket.

• Normal is asking God why he took your child's life instead of yours and asking if there even is a God.
• Normal is knowing I will never get over this loss, in a day or a million years.

• And last of all, Normal is hiding all the things that have become "normal" for you to feel, so that everyone around you will think that you are "normal".

Oh grief, you are exhausting

I have been so tired since losing Jacob. I didn’t sleep well for about 3 weeks after he was born, but it has almost gone back to normal…now I just go to sleep about an hour or 2 later then I used to, which wouldn’t be bad if it only happened once in a while, but it happens almost every night. I just feel tired all the time. I have been crying when I go to bed for the last few days. Crying usually makes me even more exhausted, but it doesn’t help me go to sleep.

Other bad side effects of grief:

• Obviously, just feeling sad all the time. Will I ever feel truly happy again?

• Not being able to concentrate on things. I couldn’t watch a movie, a TV show or even a commercial and have any idea what was going on for about 3 weeks after we lost him. I would drift off into my thoughts during conversations, unless the conversation was about Jacob or about the Monday or the Tuesday when we found out he died and when he was born. Reading a regular book was out of the question. I could only read things about baby loss, grief, etc.

• Feeling more fragile in general. Nothing will ever disappoint me more than Jacob dying, and I thought that would make the everyday disappointments in life not even register with me anymore. But I actually find some things more upsetting than I would have in the past. Something that doesn’t even matter that much in the grand scheme of things, but I will think about it for days. Maybe my mind just needs to think of something other than my baby dying, although I am always thinking about that underneath it all.

• Anxiety – I haven’t had an anxiety attack yet, but on Wednesday night I was making dinner and suddenly I felt really nervous, like something bad was about to happen. Nothing did of course, my heart was just racing and I felt a little bit nauseous. It passed after a few minutes. I’ve never felt like that before unless I was waiting to write an exam or go for an interview or something like that.

• Appetite – mine has returned to normal mostly, but the first 2 weeks I didn’t eat unless food was put in front of me. Then I ignored my hunger because I was so mad at my body, I wanted to punish it for letting my baby die.

• Crying, of course. The constant crying for the first week, then the crying every hour or so the second week and a gradual decline since then. The crying could be a few tears or, most of the time, it was a huge one. Sometimes I would just sit on the floor wherever I was and cry my eyes out, I didn’t even have the strength to get to the couch or bed. The past few days I lie in bed with Jacob’s blanket and cry while looking at his ultrasound picture. Seeing myself in a mirror, with no belly, also sets me off most of the time.

• The guilt, oh the overwhelming guilt.

I’m sure there are more things to add here.

Jacob, I miss you especially bad this morning. I realized last night while trying to go to sleep that I would have been 28 weeks pregnant yesterday. Our lives could have been so different.

A shift?

Dear Jacob,

I think there may have been a small shift in my grief, at least there was this morning. I think it may have shifted back now.

Today was the first day at work when I have really felt productive, when I have had the motivation to get things done. That rain cloud that I have been walking around with over my head seems to be letting a little ray of sunshine through. It is an interesting feeling.

I have been back at work for almost 5 weeks, although I didn’t work the entire week for a few of them, and I feel like I have just been getting by. I have done the things that absolutely needed to get done, but I just didn’t have the energy or motivation to do anything else. All I could think about was you, all I could feel was my sadness. I still think about you all the time, I still feel sad, but I seem to be able to do that now and really apply myself to something else at the same time. I didn’t even know it was possible to feel like that again. I know there is a long, long way to go, but this is a start.

That being said, I still spend more time on the internet looking at baby lost mama blogs then I should while at work – and I am writing this at work.

I am also starting to feel like I can just write in this blog without it being a letter to you. I have written a few entries that way, but then I went back and changed them. We’ll see if a shift comes to this blog too.

I can’t help feeling guilty about all of this though. I know that I shouldn’t feel guilty about feeling a little bit better, but it isn’t easy to stop.

I also feel like I need to reassure you that just because I don’t feel as horrible as I used to, I’m not forgetting you and I don’t love you any less. Trust me, that will never happen.

Love,

Mom

No too bad, for a Tuesday

Dear Jacob,

Today wasn't too bad for a Tuesday, the 7th Tuesday since you were born. I didn't wake up with the feeling of an adult elephant sitting on my chest, just a baby one.

I think it helped that I was working on our story for most of the day for website Faces of Loss, Faces of Hope. I have relived what happened over and over and over again in my mind, and I've written it down before, but I guess it helped me to do it again.

I also started writing about the pregnancy in general, which I haven't done before. I wrote a few things when I actually was pregnant. I so wish I had done it more often, but it is what it is. Some of the memories even made me laugh....mainly how nauseous I was and how a few times I'd be in the shower throwing up. Another time I was in the middle of eating dinner and I had to slap my hand over my mouth and run for the bathroom. At the time I never thought that would be a fond memory, but you were a part of it, so it is a good one.
I was looking outside the window yesterday and I suddenly remembered how I used to do that with you when I got up in the middle of the night to have some crackers. I was never alone and I loved that.

My favorite times in the pregnancy were when I felt you move, when I would lie on the couch or the bed and see the bump that you were creating in my belly, and seeing you move on the ultrasounds. I loved seeing you. I couldn't believe you were actually inside of me, that I was actually growing a baby. I cherished every second of it at the time and I still do.

I haven't cried yet today, but of course, the day isn't over. It bothers me that I haven't cried yet. Usually Tuesdays are really hard. I don't know if I am ready to let that go yet, I don't think so.

I miss you baby, you have no idea how much I miss you.

Love,

Mom

Addendum: The crying started just before midnight and lasted an hour.

I wish I could have....

Dear Jacob,

There are so many things that I wish could have been different. My biggest wish, of course, is that you had lived and that you were healthy. My second biggest wish is that you had lived longer.

I should be 27 weeks pregnant with you now and how I wish that I was. Even if I knew that I was going to lose you, I wish I was still pregnant. I would have known you so much better. I would have gotten to know what you liked me to eat, I would have felt more of your cute little kicks. They would have kept me awake at night and I would have loved that. I thank God that I got to feel you kick for a month before you died, I waited for it everyday and it made me so happy. But it wasn't enough time. I guess whatever time we had would never have been enough, but what we did have definitely wasn't. We were cheated. You were cheated and I'm sorry I couldn't do anything about that. You know that I would have done anything to save you.

I wish I had a better idea of what you would have looked like, we would have if only you had lived even another week or two. Or if you hadn't died before you were born. We did get an idea. You had a wide mouth, big lips (your Daddy's) and your Dad's nose. We couldn't really tell whose eyes you had, but I like to think they were mine. You had broad shoulders and your collarbones stuck out the way mine do. Your legs were muscular. Your Aunty Jessie was fascinated by your right leg and foot. The way it was positioned, it looked like it was in action, as if you were about to kick a soccer ball. No matter how many times we moved you around, it always seemed to go back to that position. Adorable.

I wonder if you would have had my cheekbones and my ears. I think you did and I think you had my chin, but it was hard to tell. Would you have had long fingers like Daddy and I do? I think you had my long neck. When I see pictures of other babies who were born when we think you died, their little faces look like a miniature version of a full-term baby, with a little less fat. I know you looked like that before you died, we have such a clear profile shot of your face at 18.5 weeks. You are my beautiful boy.

I feel like it was such a gift that your eyes were open when you were born. I didn't expect them to be, from everything that I have read, they shouldn't have opened for a few more weeks. I wish I could remember seeing both of your eyes open, but Dr. A was still working on me and I still had to push out the placenta when I first got to hold you. I couldn't see you that well because of the position I was in. Your Dad did though and he told me that both of your eyes were open. Then your right eye shut, I guess just because of the position I was holding you in kind of made your right eyelid close. I am so grateful your left eye didn't close. It was like you were keeping one eye open to have a look at us too. I feel like we got a better look into your soul. We got to know you better than we would have if we had never looked into your beautiful little eyes.

Thank you baby.

Love,

Mom