Here Comes the Sun

I have been preparing my heart to accept the idea that we may never have living biological children. To be clear, there is no actual reason to believe that we won't; I am 30 and healthy and all of the tests that the doctor was willing to do before the one-year-of-trying mark came back normal. For me to be sane and enjoy life, I need to be able to accept the possibility that I may never conceive again. It is pretty hard for me to believe in happy endings when our daughter has been in the ground for 18 months and our second chance baby, our Grace, was gone before we got to know him or her. This is our seventh cycle trying to conceive and we weren't exactly careful for the three cycles before that. Why would we easily conceive twice, then struggle, unless something was off?

Lately, I have a love-hate relationship with the baby loss community. On the one hand, I think it is important to have connections to people who know how you are feeling, but on the other, it seems that most of those communities have only half the story in common with me now. As much as I celebrate each new "rainbow" pregnancy or healthy newborn "rainbow," I am not anywhere near knowing what it feels like to find comfort in the warmth of a new life. I used to feel so encouraged and hopeful when I read those stories, but now I feel bitterness and loneliness as I think again and again, "why not us?" I try not to be resentful when the well-meaning rainbow mommies reassure me that my time will come. Though no one likes to talk about it, for many parents the rainbow baby never does come. I have met some absolutely wonderful friends and acquaintances online over the past 18 months, but I find myself withdrawing from that world to try and protect my heart.

I accidentally came across a wonderful blog today called Losing Lucy and Finding Hope (click the text to visit). The author, Bethany, and her husband have been through stillbirth, two miscarriages, and adoption loss and just welcomed their "rainbow baby" in July at long last. I wept as I read post after post; her story and all of the scripture verses she shared along the way touched something in me that I have been trying to squelch. Hope. Though I am a long way from being able to believe in a happy ending for us, it helped to read her stories because I realized that she must have felt how I am feeling at so many points along their journey.

What is hope, anyway? These days, I'm trying not to be so specific with my hope. My heart believes that, one day, we will have a chance to parent children, however it is God chooses to bring them to us. When Haven died, I thought that my redemption as a mother, a wife, and a woman would only come through successfully bringing home another baby, but I don't know now if that is where our lives are headed. I surely do hope so, but I am trying to keep my heart open for the other possibilities that God may have in mind for us.

Soon after Haven died last February, we treated ourselves to iPhones. I immediately downloaded the Beatles song "Here Comes the Sun" as my ringtone, because it spoke to me of hope after such a heartbreaking winter. I feel now that we are coming out of a figurative winter and into the sun. I'm looking forward to what this "summer" will bring.

"Here comes the sun. Here comes the sun, and I say 'it's all right.'"

You know, I really think it will be all right.

Whiplash

I always struggle to put into words how it feels when your child dies. It is life-sized whiplash. One day you are at the top, moving forward, your life is planned out, you know what is coming. You're suspended for a moment, but you don't even know it until it's over. Suddenly you snap back, you find yourself at the bottom, lower than you ever dreamed the bottom could be, and you stare and strain upward, trying to glimpse what you thought was your reality. Surely this isn't real? The denial takes months to lift, and even a year later, your mind has moments of stubbornness and refuses to believe.

Eventually you climb your way up, up, up, but you never reach the top. You can't. The top was for Before You and you will never be that person again. 

As I end cycle 4, feeling that it has also been unsuccessful, I am a little melancholy thinking of Before Me with her baby alive and kicking, her nursery set up, baby clothes hang-drying on the rack, the bassinet sitting smugly next to the bed. What I wouldn't give for an hour in her shoes, not a real care in the world.

Month Four and the Kicks

I think one of the cruelest physical symptoms left over from my first pregnancy is phantom kicks and flutters. I have mentioned this sensation before, but this just really, really gets to me. I've had them almost every day for the past week and every time I catch my breath for a second and think, "what if I am actually pregnant?" even if I know for sure that I am not at the moment. My mind goes wild for a few minutes... "maybe I am one of those rare cases where I continue to bleed every month but am actually pregnant, and maybe I'm also one of those rare women who doesn't get a positive pregnancy test for one of her pregnancies." Geesh.

It's just a cruel symptom. I don't know what causes them; I know it's not trapped gas, because that feels different. I wish they would end or, better yet, that there would be a real baby in there sometime soon who would give me real flutters and the reassurance that they are growing.

I keep a mini daily journal - just a few lines to describe my day, or to include a quote or thought. I recently looked back on last fall when I got that second positive and we thought for a few weeks we might have a second chance. I was surprised at how hopeful my entries were, and how excited. I don't feel I can muster much of those feelings anymore after 15 and a half months of grief and disappointment, then hope, then more grief and disappointment.

The last little hopeful part of me thinks, "you got pregnant in month four of trying last time...maybe that will hold true again this time around." Who knows? It would be kind of cool, because I would be due just weeks from when I was due with Haven if I were to conceive this cycle or next. The idea of it being so close totally freaked me out when we were trying last year, but now I think it would be kind of comforting.

And on with the day. Stupid kicks.

Pitter Patter

I was writing in my journal yesterday and found myself writing, "Who am I now? What will my life be? I can't see into the future anymore."

If you had asked me before I became pregnant with Haven what I would like my life to look like, I would have had no trouble laying out a 5, 10, 20 year plan for you. But now that she was here and is gone, I can't see ahead anymore. Sure, I want children, I want to pursue my dream of working with endangered languages abroad or find another way to help people full-time, I want to grow old with Danny...but I can't picture any of it anymore. After so much disappointment and grief, none of my dreams feel possible. I feel stuck and unhappy in the life we find ourselves in. I guess it is just empty now. There is a line from an Iron and Wine song that sums it up: "we both learned to cradle then live without."

Anyway. It is an early, melancholy morning at the end of a terrible week and it is raining cats and dogs outside. I am sure I will feel motivated and okay again later, but for now I am listening to the patter against the window panes and longing for the sounds of new life instead.

Missing

There is always a piece missing from our lives; the little dark-haired girl who would be finding her legs and warbling out her first words. Well, two pieces; the little one we never got to know. There aren't words for how hard it is to be a childless parent. Because no one can see you are a parent, it is easily forgotten that you are constantly navigating a present that is drastically different from what it should have been.

I should have my hands full with Haven, big and pregnant with our second baby. We had talked about getting pregnant again right away so our kids would be close in age and so I could be home with them for as much of their early lives as possible. Yet here I am, nearly two years from when I first became pregnant, three negative pregnancy tests in the bathroom garbage, laying on the couch listening to the silence. One baby in the ground and one...I don't know where. 

I have been trusting God and choosing to believe that my time will come, but when months pass without another pregnancy, I feel like I am losing them again and again. When my period comes, it always feels so final. A friend of mine was talking about how stressful it can be to try and conceive and I felt like saying, "just imagine if both of your experiences with pregnancy ended in death." It's so hard to believe I will ever know the joy of parenthood.

As selfish as it is, I get anxious and angry when I think about the fact that some of my friends with babies Haven's age are probably already pregnant again and will have a second child before I bring home one living baby. I selfishly feel that it is my turn now. Anytime. 

I miss my babies so much tonight. I miss the life I should have had. 

Not Forgotten

Around two years ago, I was sitting in church and a lady whose name I didn't know at the time came up to me and said that, if I didn't mind, she would like to share something with me that she felt God was telling her regarding me and Danny. Inwardly, I was a little turned off and skeptical - I had attended a few extremely charismatic churches when I was younger and found myself a little leery of that kind of thing.

"Sure," I said, not wanting to offend her.

What she said has stayed with me. She said, "I feel that God is asking me to tell you that you have not been forgotten. You and Danny have not been forgotten."

At the time, it had significance for me - I was newly pregnant with Haven, which had been a welcome but scary surprise, and we had a lot of worry surrounding our finances. We had dreams which were hanging so far off in the distance that we never knew if we'd ever reach them. It was definitely applicable to us, as we had often felt forgotten. I was touched; I wept and thanked her for sharing with me.

Just a few months later, I was laying on a hospital bed having just heard that Haven had died. My heart was shattered. Suddenly, those words came to my mind and filled me with peace and the assurance that, somehow, everything was going to be okay. As I have seen many times in my life, sometimes we don't understand the significance of something until much later. This moment is when I needed those words the most.

This memory came to me again this morning as I lay awake in bed, depressed about our situation and wondering if we will ever know the joy of raising children of our own. As we step into the unknown and into another cycle of trying to conceive, I am going to hold onto those words, which are a promise.

"I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." (Matthew 28:20)

"I will lead the blind by a road they do not know; I will guide them on unfamiliar paths. I will make darkness into light before them and the rough places into level ground. These are the things I will do, and I will not forsake them." (Isaiah 42:16)

"And we know that in all things God causes everything to work together for the good of those who love him, who are called according to his purpose." (Romans 8:28)

The Ol' What Ifs

I don't often give in to the What Ifs, but every now and then my mind just can't help itself.

Ugh. I miss my babies tonight.

Last First

When you are expecting a baby you can't help but make plans, especially for your first year. It's like a script that has already been written for you with the specific details left to develop. First time sleeping through the night, the next size up diapers, teething, weaning, babbling, walking, words, etc.

When your baby dies, the script goes out the window. There is unfortunately not a handbook out there that can instruct you how to not feel like you want to die that first Mother's Day, or how you will push away fellow moms whose babies were born near yours, all living while your sweet one is underground and their nursery quiet and dusty.

The first year is a minefield of firsts and unfulfilled dreams, especially when facebook cruelly shows all of those babies hitting milestones that your baby should be experiencing. Your heart will twist and shrivel at the joy on their parents' faces and the unintentionally shattering comments that people tend to leave. "You deserve this more than anyone!" "There is nothing better than baby snuggles!"

Holidays and parent celebration days are the hardest, I think. You can't help but remember on those days that your life has been pulled apart and scattered to the wind. 

I was afraid of Haven's birthday, especially so soon after our miscarried baby and Christmas so fresh in our hearts. But thankfully (and surprisingly), I found this weekend peaceful. Rather than be sad at home, we stayed at a friend's cabin (he is out of the country). On the way out, I picked up a rose for Haven to quietly remind us of her. I lit a candle on her birthday (February 16th) and let it burn all day next to her rose. Danny and I relaxed, played games, watched movies, and enjoyed the quiet time together. On the way back into town today, I placed her rose on her stone. 

Yesterday was our last first. It is with some relief that we pass this milestone. I don't believe there is closure when your child dies - how can there be when you are constantly aware of their absence? But there can be peace and healing. I hope that both of those things continue to grow in us. 

Happy birthday, Haven. Mama and Dad love and miss you every day. I hope that wherever you are, you are warm and happy and laughing. 

Been a While

I haven't really felt the urge to write lately, and I have learned better than to force myself to keep up a blog (there are a few dusty, abandoned blogs out there saying "preach!")

Danny asked me about Sparrows Nest the other day and I told him that I had intended this blog to be a happy place, as I had started it when I was newly pregnant and hopeful. It just didn't seem right to post happy or funny things here now that it had become a place for me to air my grief. He reminded me of my last post, where I promised to start living and enjoying life and said it made perfect sense to write about whatever I wanted. Of course he is right - smart hubby. Believe it or not, my old blogs tended to be humorous. I don't find that as easy anymore.

Lately, I have been busy with living, I guess. We've eaten good food, spent time with friends, I've taken up craft projects for the first time in eons, read books, and am about to embark on an exercise project to boot. 

I've made some online friends who are going through similar things and it has helped to have a place to air my feelings. It always amazes me how good it feels when you share these kinds of fears and someone knows how you are feeling.

We're getting ready to start trying again and I'm equal parts anticipating and dreading it. I'm popping vitamins to help prepare my body to house new life. Even Danny is taking vitamins to do his bit. I wonder if this time it might work or if things will all fall apart again. It makes me so sad to admit that pregnancy is ruined for me; I absolutely loved being pregnant the first time, but now the thought of enduring those 9 months (if I'm that lucky) is much like how I would think about running across a minefield and hoping for the best. 

So that is an update of sorts. I will try to write more often. It really does feel good to talk about these things here.

Not Your Typical Fast

I have a confession to make:

I am a research addict.

When Haven died, I spent literally 2 months, morning to night, researching everything relating to stillbirth. And I mean Every. Single. Day. When her autopsy results came back, I again researched every day for several weeks so I could understand as much as possible about her cause of death. I am now a veritable encyclopaedia of knowledge on the topic. 

The problem? It turned me into a total basket case. It took months for me to figure out that the research was causing me intense anxiety. So much so that I fought insomnia for about four months and was having symptoms like shortness of breath, attacks, and heart palpitations.

Fast forward to the night of my D&C. I was only a few hours out of surgery and the search engine on my phone was being worked overtime.

Hubs has suggested (or told me sternly, perhaps) that I need to cut out the research completely. I think that he might be right. If I don't, there is no "cross that road when we come to it" because in my fearful mind, we are at ALLOFTHEROADSRIGHTNOW! I don't think I can handle much more of the constant panic (or the palpitations which have now been my friend for the last month and a half or so).

I hate to admit when hubby is right, but I have been slipping down that slippery slope again. I had a total meltdown this evening after finding out some really scary things I was unaware of and the fear and pain just swallowed me up without warning. See, though I am partly grateful for my extensive knowledge and understanding of the things we have gone through and now face, all of that research coupled with my fears has pretty much turned me into a fertility hypochondriac. If I read about something that is a scary cause of pregnancy loss or a side effect of the procedures I have had to go through, I am immediately convinced that I have those things. My hope is in tatters and I don't know how to overcome this.

So, dear husband, who reads my posts, I am going on a research fast...for now at least. You are permitted one free "I told you so" on the house.

Bereft

I have written 3 or 4 posts but stopped with my finger hovering over the "publish" button because I realized that I was not really getting out what I wanted to say. The problem is that what I want to say is inexpressible. How do I explain just how broken my heart is?

This December, this year, has been watered with so many tears that I am surprised I am still capable of producing them. I cry at home, I cry in the car before and after events, at events, with friends, alone...there isn't an end, it seems.

I've been so incredibly angry this past week, and it has taken all of my willpower to hold it inside so that it doesn't spill over and hurt someone I care about. It's just a symptom of my shattered heart, I know.

So here we are. Christmas Eve. Two, not three. Quiet. Alone. Bereft.

Lessons and Signs

I have been thinking back to a post that I published on my Map to Joy blog in September (click here to read it). We had just come off of our fourth unsuccessful month of trying to conceive again and I was overwhelmed with weariness and sadness and feelings of failure. When I read that passage of Hind's Feet on High Places, it came to me so clearly that I had a choice to become twisted and bitter or to accept with joy the circumstances of my life. As I sat on the gravel overlooking the river at my in-laws' cottage, I surrendered.

The same weekend, I wandered into the kitchen and froze; there was a rainbow dancing against the white of the oven. For those who don't know, rainbows symbolize babies born after miscarriage or stillbirth in the loss community (rainbows come after a storm). I looked up and saw that the rainbow was coming from a flat crystal which hangs in my mother-in-law's kitchen window on which Haven's footprints are etched. It was one of those experiences where time seemed to stand still; I felt so strongly in that moment that we would have another child.

We found out I was pregnant again about a month after that day and I thought immediately, "this is it! The baby I sensed was coming." We had come such a long way and this was our second chance. As you can probably imagine, I felt so betrayed, angry, and confused when we lost our "rainbow baby" to a miscarriage. I told Danny then that I didn't believe in signs anymore. How could I? He said that maybe we just misunderstand them when they come, though I thought, "what is the point of a sign then?"

I still don't know what the rainbow moment meant, or if it "meant" anything at all. Perhaps it was just that I needed hope that day and so it was communicated to me in a way that really caught my attention. I think I needed to receive that "sign" and this important lesson of acceptance at the same time so that I would not forget either one. I can't explain all of the changes that have happened inside of me this year, but I believe that God is at work in my heart, teaching me acceptance with joy. Teaching me empathy and generosity. Out of the worst pain has come some of the most beautiful fruit. It has been a year of surrenders.

Journal

I keep a daily journal that has space for only a few lines a day. The idea is that this diary will take you through 5 years. Each page represents a date; for example, March 5 has its own page with five sections so you can compare five years' worth of March 5 experiences. My first such journal was given to me when I was pregnant with Haven and was intended for mothers (click here to check it out). I couldn't bear to keep it up after Haven died, though now I wish I had. I started a new one (not mom-specific) a few weeks before we found out we were pregnant this time.

I decided to look through my current journal the other day...I missed Haven and I missed being pregnant. I noticed two things:

1) A few days before this little baby died, I had expressed to him or her that I loved them. It was a big deal for me, as I was so afraid to bond this time around. I am thankful that I said it before it was too late. Even though this little person couldn't hear me, I hope that the love was felt somehow. I've realized that no matter how I tried to deny my feelings, I was bonding anyway. I hope that, next time, I will open up my heart right away, no matter how hard it is. Life is delicate and too short to not love fully.

2) Around the time this baby died, there was a wicked winter wind storm and I noted in my journal that it reminded me of the weekend Haven died and was born. From the day we found out she had died to the day she was born (Friday-Sunday), the wind was violent, spewing ice pellets and freezing rain from an angry gray sky. It is fanciful, but I remember laying in my hospital bed watching the chaos outside my window and thinking with pleasure that she didn't go quietly. That the gale bore her up to heaven. Perhaps, my imagination says, that same wind visited and whisked this little one up too.

I have been reminded this week of how much I need this blog. Writing about my experiences is one of the only ways I have found to process this grief. Friends have told me that I am "brave" for sharing it publicly, but I only keep it public because I know how desperate I was to relate to someone after Haven died. If my blogs can provide that even on a small level for someone else, then it is all worth it.

'Tis the Season...for Heartbreak

It's stuff like this that makes me dread Christmas so much. I felt a stab in the heart when I saw it on facebook today.

The flip side to this is that the worst thing ever is not having your child with you during the holidays. When all of your many friends with kids get to buy gifts and plan new traditions while parents like us struggle to hold it together. I don't begrudge all of those families their happiness, but my aching arms long to hold my little ones too. Deep in my heart, I worry I will never get the chance.

I remember going to Target with Danny and looking at monogrammed stockings for Haven last year. It feels like another lifetime. Another us. I could never have imagined that our lives would fall apart like they have. That this year two babies would be gone and our house would be quiet as a tomb. 

Today was hard and it is only December 1. God, help me survive this month. I feel so weary.

Phantoms

There are a lot of hard things to deal with around pregnancy loss. One that really messes with your brain is phantom flutters. Even though little Walnut was not big enough yet for me to feel movement, I have little flutters in my abdomen today that are driving me crazy.

I still haven't processed that I am no longer pregnant. I keep pausing before saying yes to caffeine or alcohol, associating my nausea to hormones, and  being careful about pressure on my belly (though it is very tender and swollen from my D&C).

I hate this. I'm so angry and sad and disappointed.

Empty House, Empty Womb, Empty Room

When Haven died and I was waiting in my hospital bed to deliver her, I sent a good friend back to our house to put away all of the baby things that littered our common space. I had been furiously washing clothes and organizing Haven's things since her shower a few days before and I knew I couldn't return home without her and see everything set up as though she was still coming home.

In the following week, my mom helped me pack up all of Haven's things and stow them in the nursery closet. I left the furniture, bedding set, and decorations as they were, thinking it was for the best; surely we would be bringing home another child within the year. The better-hidden reminders that cropped up in the coming weeks were tucked just inside the door - I still haven't found the energy to put them away. It's fitting; just one more thing unfinished.

I rarely peek my head in the door, which I keep open. Sometimes I water the (neglected) plants in the window or the laundry creeps in from the hall and I step in to scoop it up, then quickly head back out. I know by now things are getting dusty in there, and the room is starting to taunt me. I should dismantle the whole thing and be done with it, but I can't.

I remember Danny so lovingly setting up the room; hanging the wooden shelf his late father made, assembling the crib, arranging the giant farm-themed stuffies on the dresser, making sure everything was just so. It makes me so angry to think about my tender, thoughtful husband putting all of that love into what has become a silent monument to Haven and a symbol of what we are still waiting for. I feel that we have been made fools of...twice now. We celebrated like a couple of trusting idiots, believing we could have what seemed to be our right, what most everyone came by so easily. 

Now we are returning home tomorrow after a week on the road and I'm empty again. Empty house, empty womb, empty room. Once again, freshly washed baby clothing will be snatched from the drying rack and stuffed into the nursery, along with the cheeky hockey onesie that I'd bought in a moment of bravery at a shop this week.

I had so little hope to begin with; having what remained of my confidence snuffed out along with that courageous little flicker of hope has exhausted me. How do I believe again? How many times do we extend our greatest desire only to have it slapped from our hands?

And yet, I am not ready to give up.

There's a bit of life left in me yet.

The Nurse

She was prepping me for surgery, fiddling with my IV bags and settling me into my wheelchair.

"So you have no children?"

I paused. My life has been full of such pauses since February when Haven died. Moments when everything stops and I have to choose whether to educate someone or let their insensitive comment pass.

"How can she ask such a question when she knows I am miscarrying," I thought. "When I just told her that my daughter died this winter. How can she not realize that I am in agony?"

I hated her then. 

Remorse. 

I hated her again. 

Resignation.

The pause ended.

"No," I muttered. "Only dead."

Another Ending

I had begun writing my 9 week post, but it sadly became moot.

Yesterday, at 10 weeks (ultrasound date), I woke in the night and found a little blood when I used the washroom. Due to some other symptoms, it seemed I might have a UTI, so in the morning we went to the ER to be safe. After many hours of waiting, multiple doctors and waiting rooms and tests (all clear), we found out the sad news that our little one stopped growing at 8 weeks. My body just didn't get the message; it's commonly called a "missed miscarriage." The doctors were concerned that I might have some type of infection in my abdomen and rushed me up for a D&C to clean out my uterus. Now I am recovering (in all senses of the word). 

We had finally found a nickname this week: Walnut (because of baby's size). We had been "showing" little Walnut the sights on our little road trip. Just started bonding. I convinced myself to buy a few onesies. I thought it was a boy. We finalized our name choices.

We may not have had a chance to get to know this little person, but I believe that he or she mattered. At least, they did to me and Danny and our friends and family.

It's hard to know what to feel. The sadness is so déjà vu...a lot of the experience was too: the bad news, the ultrasound, the wheelchair, the tests, the questions. The emptiness, physical and emotional. The feeling of being inadequate and less than. The anger. I went into this knowing that no one gets a free pass, but I still hoped we would, all the same.

I could keep writing, but it would just be more of this rambling and pain. I don't have the energy for silver linings and gratitude today. I think it will take me some time to find my way back there again. We're heartsick.