Anarchist Mom

New blog

2010-12-07T08:59:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone! I have a new blog. I just started it. It's more about stillbirth and feminism; I'm becoming sort of an activist . It's on wordpress. If you'd like to know the name of it, just email me and I'll share it with you. ((((((((hugs))))))))

On a quick note, I'm doing well. Much better than I ever imagined 1, 2 or 3 years ago. I finished my PhD, I'm on my feet, I'm teaching at the University. Simone is a thriving 7yo, the light of my life. I am divorced now, and I've really enjoyed my freedom and independence. We had a peaceful star day for Myles on 11/24 and Thanksgiving was 'okay'. I've been sitting here reading my blog and bawling. It's amazing how far I've come. I can't hardly believe it. Anyway, lots of love to all of you who helped me through the hardest of times. I hope you are all doing well.

All I want for Christmas is you

2009-12-16T19:59:00.000-08:00

I've listened to this song about 50 times tonight. I like to think I can sing. I sing it, and it just chokes me up. Seriously. I just blubber to this song :(

I'm just so sad again. It seems like I've noticed so many birthdays in the last couple of weeks, everytime I turn around. My daughter was invited to a party on Saturday, and I just thought, we should be having one of those now and cried.

I've just been in such a funk. Just bone tired. I'm finding it hard to get out of bed again. I have little affect, I"m such a pessimist. My boss said (nicely) that I was 'in a bit of a mood today'. I didn't realize it was so obvious, i do try. I'm just so blue. Everytime I hear a sad Christmas song I cry.

There is just no preparing for these waves of sadness. Life goes on, and I hate life for that.

MISSing my son, Myles, this Christmas and always.

A poem for Myles on his birthday

2009-11-23T23:20:00.002-08:00

Born at Rest

Born to the world
Already at rest
Our search for lifes meaning
Is put to the test

Unlike his name
His journey not far
The road Myles traveled
Led right to his star

To walk with his family
And those here on earth
A path not to be
For his miraculous birth

Expressions to ease
Our need for a reason
With words meant to comfort
When too short the season

For tears shed in sorrow
And to eyes that have cried
On the wings of a butterfly
His spirit does glide

Those Myles touched
Should look to their heart
To bring them the peace
That he had to depart

Ever so close
In our mind's eye
His essence you'll find
Never to die

For our dear "Little Myles"
Is beyond our embrace
But etched in our soul
Is his sweet newborn face

Written by Myles' Great Aunt Rosary

Myles 2nd Birthday

2009-11-23T23:20:00.001-08:00

The days leading up to these big days are the worst, but after being on this journey for two years, I realize no day is ever how we expect it to be. So I don't know what today will bring. I just know I wish I was planning my son's second birthday.

Losing him sometimes feels like yesterday, and sometimes it feels like a century ago since I held him. The hardest part is remembering my daughter's second birthday. I've been packing and moving and ironically happened upon a bunch of cards from when she turned 2. I remember it like it was yesterday. I remember the gifts she received, how big she was, all the things she could say. It hurts that I can't imagine Myles doing any of those things. It hurts that he will forever be only what my imagination will allow, it just feels so inadequate. Trying to picture him doing those things, grasping at what should be today. It makes me frustrated and angry, he should be here. I'd love to hold him and hug him forever and ever and i can't, i want to so badly it hurts

So, we're going to a movie, decorating a cake for him, taking a birthday balloon and decorations to the cemetary. I find myself doting on l/c to make up for the little one I don't have to dote on. Like its another birthday for her. They say your heart expands everytime you have more children. It's so hard having this heart made for two and only having one to give it all to. It's a hole. And today I know that as much as I'm trying to celebrate, as much as I'm trying to make it a special day to remember my son, that really deep down I'm trying to fill a hole that can never be filled. Grasping to give love that I cannot physically express.

I just wish things were different. I wish this time of year was how I had imagined it would be for the rest of my life. My little turkey Myles should be here. And it makes me sad. It makes me wish I could turn back the clock and change something, anything to make it different today. But we get what we get. So I'm going to try to have the most gentle day I can.

Happy 2nd Birthday, Son. I miss you and love you and I am so proud of you and I wish so badly that you were right here so I could make you pancakes and surprise you with balloons and give you all the love I have to give.

Still here . . .

2009-10-15T19:51:00.000-07:00

Yep. Still alive. Doing well. Was without internet for about a month so that was not a bad hiatus. Can't say the fally doesn't hit me hard. Partially why I'm here again. I decided some time ago this was my grief blog, and with my divorce and move and new life (even dating) it's not that I don't grieve but it's harder to write about. I'm afraid. I think about that story about grief in a jar, and how you store it and then suddenly, the jar falls off the shelf and you're covered in grief and nobody understands.

So I'm a little covered in grief at the moment. Naturally I find myself back here. Today is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Day. I've got a candle lit for Myles now. This Fall I've found myself more raw than I've felt for awhile. It's been tough. I've got a new job, soon I'll have a new home, everything has changed. It's happy and sad and fuck; i'm ambivalent old me.

I've been trying to take it easy as the raw grief has resurfaced. I don't want to let my old bad self take over again. I want to be wiser, understand my limits, worry less about disappointing people than I worry about myself and my maintaing. I've learned that this life isabout knowing your own limits, and keeping the gentle people and distancing from the hurtful people.

Bah. So here I am. And as I've eluded. I'm thinking a blog less about greif and more about my other tribulations needs to happen. So. When it does, I'll let you know. If you have followed my grief blog I'd love for you to join me on the other side on a blog less about grief and more about my life as I find it today. When the time comes you can email me and I'll let you know. I've been longing for that anonymous venue for some time. Today I know I need it.

Remembering our children today and this Fall and just always and forever . . .

Failing my daughter

2009-07-09T23:31:00.000-07:00

My daughter was so excited to become a big sis. She knows she is still a big sis even though her brother died. She takes so much pride in him, sharing him freely with anyone who lets her, she is her brothers keeper and i'm so thankful for that. She has always been my constant reminder of all of the wonderful times we had with her brother, how loved he was, how happy he made us, and how he will never be forgotten.

Still, she wants a living sibling so bad. Her father and I are separated and it is likely we will get divorced eventually, it just hasn't been urgent to file the paperwork at this point.

It seems like at least twice a week, she brings up having another baby or (because she's precocious and knows) she wants me to adopt.

How do I explain to her the complexities of the world? I don't know that I could ever handle a sub preg, i'm not ruling it out because i am 29 and you never know what the future will bring, but it is obvious that this will not happen anytime soon. I also can't explain to her that being a single mom, my options for adoption are limited. I don't have any money for adoption, and I don't know enough about the child welfare system to know if they would allow a single mom to be a foster parent, let alone an adoptive parent. Even if they did, could I handle a child in my current capacity? Could I afford it? Do I have the emotional resources to foster a child? And if we did take that route, that child may not be with us forever, so I would be creating an attachment that could inevitably end in another loss (not the same, but i see parallels).

My daughter is almost six, her brother and her would be four years apart. It feels like time is ticking away and i'm losing any chance i had at giving my daughter the experience of having a living sibling. I certainly can't tell her, well maybe when you're older or I get remarried (bah, never want to get remarried!) or whatever. That's too much for her to understand, and I would never ever want to ever promise her a sibling ever again. That's what happened the first time and here we are.

I usually just find myself, each time she asks, just disappointing her all over again. That's what it feels like anyway. All I can say is that I don't know. That it might just be me and her, and that I'm so happy I have her in my life. She is all I need, not all I ever wanted, but she makes up what remains of my heart.

I know that many only children (i hate saying that, she is not my only child!) would have liked to have a sibling, and they are fine being the only child. It just seems doubly unfair though that she SHOULDN'T be an only child. That she had and has a little brother, yet she has very few of the experiences most children have and she perhaps will never know the love (and all the other stuff) that is a part of having a living sibling.

This has been my biggest turmoil since the moment the nurse couldn't find the heartbeat. How could I tell my daughter? As my marriage eroded, i've still grasped at any conceivable chance that maybe, just maybe I could somehow be a mommy to a rainbow baby. I don't know that I'll ever be there. And that is okay for me I've accepted that, but I feel like I'm failing her everytime she asks for a sibling.

Anyway, I know there aren't any answers really. It just feels like I need to get this off of my chest. How could I fail both my children so fully? How can I keep failing her? How can I possibly just tell her, life isn't fair? 'I don't know' seems like such an inadequate answer to her pleas. She deserves so much more

Out of the funk, then back in again

2009-06-02T11:18:00.000-07:00

I was such an insomniac for so long, I don't really remember having any bad dreams in the beginning. Maybe I've forgotten them. I dreamed that Myles wasn't dead, that it was all a mistake. That was a good dream, waking up was awful.

Having said that, I had an awful dream two nights ago. So bad I'm still trying to shake it. I dreamt that I was pregnant and had to have a c-sec (i've never had one before). My baby died, but it wasn't Myles, it was the next baby. I'm not pregnant or planning on ttc anytime soon. But there I was. And I remember trying to hide the fact that my baby had died. That I had even been pregnant. I didn't want to tell anybody. It was awful. It was like proof that there was something wrong with me, and I was so ashamed.

So that, and the assassination of Dr. Tiller both have me feeling sad and shaken. All of those women, enduring the worst time of their life, making the hardest choices they've ever had to make, and now the only person they could turn to is gone. Pro-life my ass. This man has helped and saved the lives of so many women. He will be missed by so many people in so many ways.

The abortion debate is front and center as a result it seems, and I can't help but feel stepped on by both sides. There is a way to promote womens' choices without devaluing the love and pain women like me feel. I know it.

He counts

2009-05-29T23:22:00.000-07:00

I've been struck recently by how I'm often off count. I get together with my sister, or go out to dinner, and someone asks me the number of people, and I'm never right it seems. It noticed for the first time last Christmas. I'm counting and recounting stalkings and presents, and I'm off. Bam, it hits me. Myles. I'm counting Myles. What a shot in the gut.

It has me thinking a lot about feminism and the right to choose. I guess what bothers me is that I think that the right to choose MEANING is often overlooked. The right to view your child as a person, with a life and future is often overshadowed by the pointless banter, back and forth, under and over each othdr.

My son was not a fetus to me. Medically, yes. But to me; he was a baby, a toddler, a little boy, and a man. He was my son. He counts to me. He counts to me the same whether he was born still or alive. He was loved and wanted, and he was our son.

I just want that reality recognized. That a child can be loved at conception, and that their loss at any gestation means the loss of meaning, the loss of the future and the loss of many women's dreams.

My son was very much a person to me, and I want that to be respected as much as anything.

Sigh

2009-05-14T14:20:00.000-07:00

I'm still debating on the deletion thing. Mostly I just don't want cruel people to have access to my personal thoughts, and I don't want people who can't constructively talk to me in real life to get the privelege of knowing what's going on with me. With family like this, who needs enemies? Sigh.

Anyway, that's not why I'm writing now. Last night Simone had a teary night. Sometimes she is upset about something else, and it turns into her being sad about Myles. Her pain over Myles generally grows out of a general feeling of shittiness for her, and I totally get it. Last night was different though. We were laying next to each other as I tried to get her to wind down and she said she had a lump in her throat. Usually the crying isn't crying like when she gets hurt (feelings or otherwise) it's a little more dramatic, somewhat forced. Her crying about Myles has always been that way. Last night, though, she really got swept up in tears like I haven't seen.

I think it was good for her. She doesn't see me cry like I once use to. When I cried last night as we were talking about what we had wanted for Myles, I could tell the sense of reciprocity and her ability to empathize and comfort really gives her a sense of mastery. Her compassion is unparalleled.

Okay, but teary nights we've had. What I have never heard her say before is what's been bouncing around my head:

'Mom, I just knowed it was going to happen. I tried to just act normal and smile, but I just knowed he was going to die.'

?! huh ?!

Simone will be 6 in August, is just finishing up her first year of Kindergarten. Kids grow so damn fast. When I told her she was three when we learned about my pregnancy, and we celebrated her 4th bday when I was very much prego, it blew us both away to contemplate how little she was, how long ago it was. She has grown so much since he died. She loves to play this game, how old would Myles be (or would he have been). So she'll say, When I'm 8, how old would Myles have been. She'll go up into their teens and 20's. It's so sad.

So watching Simone develop, and watching her understand her loss more deeply as she ages has really given me some insight. I know lots of women who have felt they've had a premonition. Hell, I look back and even B has looked back and said (because of x, y, and z) we knew something, even though we didn't KNOW. It makes me wonder if going back, and giving more weight to the fears and anxieties we felt during the pregnancy, is part of being human. I don't think anyone can know, but I think we have this inclination as humans to go back and make sense of the events in our lives. We create forshadowing in the aftermath. We tell some story in our minds leading up to whatever terrible life altering event we've been through, that makes sense like a book makes sense. I think perhaps it gives us some sense of control in a world where we really have no control. Where do psychic beliefs originate from? Are they something that evolved?

Sigh. I'm still thinking on it. Has anyone out there felt they didn't have a sense of forboding about their child's death?

Simone said a lot of interesting things last night. She also said, for the first time, that nobody knows what she feels. 'Nobody knows what it's like to lose their little brother'. It remeinded me of my blog a few weeks ago when I said nobody knows what I live through each day without Myles. That sense of loneliness I wish I could take for her. I know how painful that is :(

I'm so fortunate to have her, and I'm so glad to be her mother.

debating on deleting all of this

2009-05-03T22:11:00.000-07:00

I'm debating on deleting this blog. Quite frankly, i was stupid enough to let some family members see it, and i haven't remained as anonymous as i probably should have (using pseudonyms etc.). It makes me really kind of sad, but i don't really know what else to do? I've basically stopped blogging on myspace for the same reason, and/or kicked family members off (it's a private blog). I guess I'm just bummed because I really like being able to come here and vent, and for the few readers i have, read your replies. It's just not the same genre as posting on an online forum if you all know what i mean. I guess what's even more sad is that I used to not give a damn, but I feel so vulnerable, and I feel the world is so cruel, that I would delete this very personal diary/chronicle simply to protect myself from the hurt or questions forced on me by others. This blog has been with me since the beginning, and having to say goodbye to it is something i would mourn.

I just don't know what to do. Does anyone have any advice? :(

Time doesn't heal this

2009-04-27T12:16:00.000-07:00

I'm having a rough day today. I don't know why. It's 17 months to the day since I buried my son, and here I am again, crying alone in the shower, in front of my computer, smoking in the garage, tears running down my face everywhere I go.

It just feels like each day brings added weight, not relief. That I'm losing Myles each and every day because as time moves forward, I move further away from him and my life as I knew it. I'm a shell of a my former self, bitter and sad.

Mother's day is coming up and I think Simone and I are just going to make some cards together. Me for my mom, her for me and maybe for Myles too if she wants. I wish I could go to the zoo to see the butterfly plaque my family got last November in honor of Myles, but Simone and I will go see it together soon if not on Monther's day. Simone never tires of remembering Myles, she'll love to see his name there with all the children and butterflies. Everything is so bittersweet. She wants to take the plaster casts of Myles' two hands and one foot to school. I don't know if I can do it, and I can't let her take them alone, but for her I'll try.

Sadly, Mother's day doesn't remind me of what it should; this time two years ago when I had my two children with me. I didn't know that was my only true Mother's day, the only one I'd ever have. Instead, the upcoming Mother's day reminds me of last year, and crying in the parking lot at Perkins as my first family betrayal scorched my already tattered heart. I didn't know I could hurt more than I had. What little I knew almost 6 months out.

The trauma of the first year weighs heavily on me the second. Time moves forward and everyone else forgets. Nobody lives with this daily as I do, nobody. Each year, you remember the last. Last year at this time I was so utterly lost, more than I could fathom. This year I'm here, but my life is on it's head. I feel so defeated. I didn't know I could feel more defeated than after I lost Myles, but the death of my marriage is it's own loss. 11 years together, 8 years of marriage on May 26th; this will be our first anniversary apart. Somehow, it seems like we're failing both our children.

Anyway, there is no point to this, just thinking, typing, rambling, crying, blowing my nose. I'm just worried about next month, and the old pain it will dredge up and the new losses I will have to deal with. I used to love May, once upon a time. I will somehow have to find the courage and strength within me to sustain me through the month ahead :(

Redemption

2009-04-17T12:08:00.000-07:00

I've been in hell for the last 3 or 4 weeks, battling a depressive episode, working on my dissertation proposal, missing all the deadlines it seemed, and struggling to find the will or the energy to pull it together. While doing this, other drama weighed heavily, we lost the dogs (then found them), my stepdad may be very sick; I've just felt so helpless, hopeless, and alone.

On monday I passed my proposal defense (first 3 chapters of my diss.), and the positive response i got surpassed my wildest dreams. I got so many compliments they liked it 'as is' but had great suggestions. I could just about cry. I realized just how much i tear myself down in my own mind. I'm my own worst enemy.

So, there is the good news, my faith in my ability to do my job is returning. I feel redeemed.

My depression was better today, but here I am sleepless at 430am in limbo. I'm hoping to move back to home May 21st. It's my birthday and I can't think of a better present than being able to pick Simone up from her last day of school that day and just drive back, lol. Where we will live is yet to be seen. But at this point I don't care. I just miss Lincoln and so does Simone, so i want to make it happen very badly.

Anyway, just wanted to share some happy news, my actual dissertation and final defense do not feel near so intimidating, and that feels reassuring. With the response I got, I think things are going to work out well. Maybe I'll actually get my PhD after all?!

My shitty plan

2009-04-17T12:03:00.000-07:00

Okay, the plan, moving back to my hometown, uh . . . not so good. I didn't realize that what I needed was my ideal family, not the one I have. Because the family I have are just are who they are; each their assets and faults. They don't have a magic wand. They can't be what I need when I need it. Because on a very fundamental level they don't understand.
And I shouldn't expect them too.

And when they say things, hurtful things, they think they're helping. It's a catch 22 as another bereaved parent described the phenemonen of familial anlienation after the death of a child. What they want to do to help, hurts. They're destined to do everything wrong. Because they just want the old you back, and they want to 'fix'. There is no fix.

Well, my family has done EVERYTHING wrong (cept sweet Heidi ;).
From micromanaging our lives, to saying I don't deserve my daughter, to saying I'm doing my son's 'legacy' a disservice, to telling me they understand exactly how I feel and Myles would want . . . (rip someone's fuckin head off). When I skipped Thanksgiving (Myles died on Thanksgiving) I was told to 'get with it'.
I think I've been criticized for everything you can be criticized for. And I miss Lincoln, and the drama with families (Brandon's families have been probably the biggest jerks but there is a good competition) and with B and I trying to figure out our shit, and parenting, and defending my diss. proposal (April 13th, yay), and working, and I'm just about ready to lose it.

When will I be back in my home? I think the most depressing part is I can't say. Simone has to finish school, she finishes on my bday, and I think that might be the magic day. But . . . only . . . if things pan out like they need to. And I have so little hope for the minor things. For big things? I don't think I have it in me.
Missing Lincoln, and Myles, and my sanity.

Awful nightmare

2009-03-24T01:41:00.000-07:00

Not about Myles. My mom is 55, and has had more than her fair share of health problems. Well she went into urgent care for being dizzy, and I'm sick, and I went to bed at 830. The last thing Simone and I did was call her and we figured she was coming home soon, doctors said as soon as her heartrate came down.

Well, I just had the most horrible dream that she died. Just awful. And I had to tell my daughter, who adores her grandma Cyn, and it was more heartbreaking than words can describe. I just woke up sobbing, its 344am, and I don't think I'm going back to sleep. Just went and checked her bed. (okay, i was going to go cry to her and tell her how much I love her) but she wasn't there. Docs must have kept her in over night to watch her :(

I know she's going to be fine, but in my dream, all the things about her grandchildren's life she was gonna miss flashed through my head. It was excruciating thinking she would never see any of it. So, no one to console me, here I am.

I love my mom so much, and living with her, it seems like shes been driving me crazy. But none of that lame stuff matters that much in the grand scheme, and I'm feeling like an unappreciative heel.

I thought losing Myles had taught me something about life and death, and now I'm feeling like I learned nothing at all. That the next time life takes its inevitable course, I will be just as unprepared as anyone. And I know loss and grief, they have been my partners for so long. But something tells me that when it happens again, it will be like meeting them anew, and dealing with this human condition all over again.

For the first time, I wish I could call my brother (whom I haven't spoken to since around Christmas. I'm still angry with him, I just need someone to talk to.

I just want my baby

2009-03-13T10:39:00.001-07:00

I JUST WANT MY BABY!!! I just want my son. Thats all I want. Fuck school, fuck relationships, fuck it all. Just give me my baby you motherfuckers, cuz I don't think I can take another step without him on days like these.

What I think happened

2009-03-10T22:08:00.000-07:00

I'm a researcher, and was always that kid who wanted to know 'why'. I remember the first time I searched the internet for an illness. It was way back in 1998 when I was diagnosed with shingles. This also happened to be my first foray into academia, but scholarly journals were not yet in my repertoire. Thus I worked myself into a panic, thinking i had some autoimmune disorder. Hell maybe I do.

Anyway, that's where it began, but my need for more and more information would only increase from there. I'm an information junky. As I moved into graduate school, I only became more sophisticated, especially with the increased access to scholarly journals.

When I was pregnant with Simone, I read everything I could. When I was breastfeeding Simone, I read everything I could, so much so my dissertation is over that topic today. I'm a breastfeeding factotum.

So when I was pregnant with Myles, and knew I got to be home with home for at least 6 months, I was stoked. B was a SAHD, so I went back to work full-time when she was 8 weeks. She was exclusively breastfed (except when we added solids) and then we continued breastfeeding until she was 2 and 1/2.

I so looked forward to breastfeeding, Myles. But I researched a million other things too, going diaper free, using cloth diapers, making baby food. I was sooooo ready. And I remember writing a blog when I found out he was a boy, so enthralled with the idea of raising a son.

That's when, after my 20 week appt. my doc called and said there was an echogenic foci on Myles' heart. It looked like a little bit of calcium in his left ventrical, and it can be a marker for down syndrome. Well I got the quad screen and the level two, and I had a 1/2300 chance, and I ended up teaching my ob/gyn about it as it is a normal variant and it generally means nothing in and of itself. His heart was perfect, just a blip. So I told myself, so I told her, so the research said. But deep inside, I worried.

Then there was my girth. I measured 7cm big through most of my pg (at 20 weeks, I measured 27), I was borderline polyhydramnios (which I also researched the hell out of) but was assured that everything else was okay. This worried me, deep inside though.

During my pregnancy I had shingles (yep, remember those shingles when I was 18) twice. Never had I had them so close together. They are an indicator of stress for me, I've had them 6 times since I was 18.

I had awful ear infections. I had never had an ear infection in my life. I never knew how excruciating they were, I feel so sad for all those little ones who suffer. Oh, nights were the worst, wake up, ear throbbing; and that was in addition to all the other things that wake you up when you're giant prego. I had recurrent ear infections, with a total of 5 appointments for them starting at my 18th week of pregnancy. My last appt with the ENT I cancelled the Monday after the Saturday that Myles was born still. I knew deep down, that my ear infections would be gone soon. They've never returned.

I had carpal tunnel. This seems like and odd ante dote, but it was very painful and I hadn't had it with my last pregnancy (add that to the long list) so it was another piece of a puzzle I was frantically trying to figure out.

Well, it wasn't frantic yet. On Sept. 23rd, 2007, I went into preterm labor when Myles was 28 weeks. Bam, my world changed. Had blood and mucous, went to hospital, dilating, drugs, worry. Go home, bed rest, more and more worries. Gobs or research. I couldn't sleep, I was on bedrest, and I was glued to my computer. What was wrong with me? Why was my uterus irritable (I contracted 5 times or more an hour for 12 weeks). I had a couple non-stress tests, another level II ultra sound, I was put on the drugs visteril (sp?) and (procardia) and I as left all depressed and OCD.

And the ticking tock for me was a shift in the amniotic fluid. Up until 28 weeks I was measuring 7cm, by the time I had my appt. on the Tuesday before he died, I was 37 weeks and 37 centimeters. I remember commenting to midwife, I wonder where all that amniotic fluid is going? Then pooh poohing myself for finding something else to worry about.

My theory:
First, I think it has to do with gender. I already knew from my studies that boy babies did worse 'on average' than girl babies. They're less hardy, more likely to have complications, etc. They are also more likely to die from SIDS and stillbirth.

Then I read all these articles on testosterones effect on the immune system, and a lot of stuff on how autoimmune disorders are sometimes temporarily relieve during pregancy because the immune system is tuned down so the body does not reject the baby.

So what do I think happened? I think my immune system did the opposite, and that the cells from the placenta and uterine wall did not properly bind, or as they grew, did not grow quickly or were restricted in some way.

I believe that the scar tissue band in my uterus, and my placenta accreta are evidence of this.

I believe that Myles was smaller than he should be. Simone was born at 35 weeks and weighed 6lbs 11oz. I gained more weight with Myles (60lbs) than I did with Simone, and with 2 weeks longer in the oven, he only weighed 6lbs 7oz. He was big through every sonogram and I'm 5ft 8in and I'm the runt in my family.

Finally, I believe he died of fetal asphyxiation. I believe that when I went into pretern labor, that blood was indicative of an abruption or of the placenta hitting that band. I believe that is why I went into preterm labor, and why he fell off his growth chart between 28-37 weeks gestation.

I can't figure out that foci though, thats the part that haunts me. And so does the research on stress and pregnancy outcomes. I pushed myself to the brink that pregnancy, for what?

So, I actually do have a doc I saved all of this stuff on, its filled with articles and webpages to links to each piece. I will probably come back through and hyperlink, and would be thrilled to get such a request! The one thing I love about research is talking about research!

cautiously happy

2009-02-28T11:49:00.001-08:00

As deep and dark as my last two posts have been, it makes me wonder if perhaps I'm posting today to maintain some sense of balance on my blog. As perplexed as I am, and as much time I have put into pondering these facts of my life, these things that have forced themself onto my life and now are part of my very definition, for some reason, I'm just not that 'upset' about it all.

I don't think my lack of unrest or torment is a feeling specific to the horrible events I'm finally grappling with. No. Overall, I'm just not that upset about much anymore. I'm not upset about my broken marriage; even broken things can still 'work' at some level. I'm not upset at the haters. When I say they can go fuck themselves, its with an air of indifference. I'm not upset about my move, it is what it is, some good some bad.

I guess what I want to let everyone in blogland know is that I'm doing 'good'. Not the, 'my life is perfect good', the REAL good. The 'good' with the bad.

And for the first time in my life I'm feeling some congruence. I don't put on a happy front for many (unless i am in fact 'happy' at that moment), I don't pretend that everything is okay, I don't try to appear perfect, or act like wonder woman, or wonder grad, or wonder mom, or wonder wife.

And it's such a motherfucking relief.

So, I'm (oh my god it's so hard to say this right now) happy. Cautiously happy. And I think I haven't been this comfortable with me (and all my faults and all my mistakes) since perhaps when I was a child? I don't know!? Maybe I've discovered a new plane of being?

So, I hope some of you out there in blogland have found the same thing or will someday soon. Cyber cheers to all, here is hopeing for a moment of true peace and happiness for each of us!

facing death

2009-02-27T08:01:00.000-08:00

I like the phrase, "you only live twice, once when you are born, and once when you stare death in the face."

When the quote says, stare death in the face, it has two meanings for me, and for anyone who has lost a child. To lose your child is worse than death, of this I am certain. To look into the face of your dead child does indeed begin a second life. A worse one? A different one, that's certain.

But the meaning that most people attribute to this is when you stare your own death in the face. This I have also done, and I would like to talk about it.

Driving my 3 hour commute (between where I am in grad school and where I live back home with my parents) I realized that the only time I've ever felt pure peace is when I thought I was going to die. I've seen too many gory movies, war movies, horror movies, where death is feared. Conversely, I've seen death welcomed by those suffering, those who have lived there lives and are ready to go.

For me, death was a warm blanket. As I was wheeled to the OR, heavily drugged, it kind of reminds me of the end of 'big fish'. All my family was there, they all saw me go, and I was as happy as if I was a contestant on the price is right.

This baffles the fuck out of me.

Part of it was being through with the torture, the torture of losing my son, telling my daughter her long awaited brother was dead, waiting for the birth and having someone in the hospital hallway ask me if I was having a boy or a girl. (Boy I told them.) Part of it was being through with physical torture I described in my last post.

But none of that is it I don't think. I sometimes wonder if I knew, even then, that the hardest part was yet to come. That the real torture isn't the loss, the real torture was having to live life without Myles, every second, every day, without HIM.

But I know that now, I don't think I could've known or anticipated the torture that was Mother's day, or his angelversary, or the christenings and birthday parties.

I think what strikes me as most peculiar was the overwhelming feeling that my work here was done. How could someone with a 4yo believe that, I don't know. But I was at peace, I was at peace. And as I was driving yesterday, a vision occurred to me, and that was my son and I being buried together.

That picture filled me with joy, and even a sense of remorse that this will never be. Just the thought of him in my arms forever, both of us at peace, TOGETHER. I guess I just don't want him to be alone. Which really brings my beliefs into question because I don't believe we will be 'together' someday again. I just don't. But perhaps then, for me, the only way we could have something like that would be to have our physical remains together.

So, I didn't die and I wish I did. Right then and there. I still do. I wish I didn't want that. It is selfish, but there it is. And I think I've had a hard time moving forward from that. My suicide attempts were not to go back to that brush with death, they were mental illness, they were faulty thinking, they seemed to be the only way to free myself and everyone else from the pain I saw as originating from me.

So how does someone walk away from a death they embraced. Here I am, still walking away from it, but I don't know. I don't fear death, what I fear is life.

I was raped. Was I raped?

2009-02-24T13:52:00.000-08:00

raped - despoiled: having been robbed and destroyed by force and violence; "the raped countryside"
wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn

Any sexual behavior that involves an unwilling partner. Forced sexual contact, especially sexual intercourse, with an unwilling partner.
www.cpcphoenix.org/resources/glossary/

forced or manipulated nonconsensual sexual contact, including vaginal or anal intercourse, oral sex, or penetration with an object.
www.devoschildrenshospital.org/

I have not come to terms with the torture I endured after the birth of my son. You see, to me, both now and then, there was nothing that could be worse than his death. Not physical pain, not even my own death. Everything pales in comparison the searing anguish and despair of your childs death. That is worse than torture, that is worse than death.

I was not raped in the classical sense of the word. I don't believe what happened to me had to do with sex, though it had to do with my sexual organs being violated without my consent. I was not being assaulted out of hatred for women, but perhaps out of disregard.

I've discussed a few times on this blog the problems I had birthing my placenta. I birthed Myles' body naturally in the bath, 'problem free' except for THE PROBLEM that he had died. It was when I got out to birth the placenta that a tragic situation turned into a major emergency. Shit hit the fan, no placenta and lots of blood loss, and my Peri from my preterm birth is on call. I did not like this man then, never liked him. I did not like that he would be 'manually removing my placenta' but I had no choice.

My doctor tried to manually remove my placenta four times, he gave me a second degree tear. After the second time, after I writhed and screamed and was held down by four people (including my husband), everyone told my peri to 'stop'. My midwife told him to take me back for a D & C. My husband told him take me back. I cried frantically that I couldn't take it. He insisted on 'one more time'. Except. That one more time turned into two more times.

All I know is that this, in and of itself, profoundly effected both my husband and I. And I've never given it it's weight. And part of me wonders how much of my suicidal ideation, and my past risky behavior can be linked to this trauma I experienced?

I almost died that day. My husband watched me tortured (violated?) that day. He was powerless. I was powerless. I was raped. Was I raped? I don't know.

The Stillbirth Secret

2009-02-19T09:37:00.000-08:00

I'm just angry right now. Angry all over again it seems. I knew I wasn't past the anger, that there is no 'past' any part of this grief. I guess it's just been awhile and I've grown complacent about it, and feeling it again both surprised and scared me.

So, this is an official rant. And it's a rant at the medical community.

Why the fuck do Drs, Midwives, OB/GYNs and even PERIs keep stillbirth such a giant fucking secret?!

Is it because they're ignorant? Is it because you don't know what causes it, and they don't want to have to say that? Is it because it's easier to play the odds that chances are, the mother you're telling that everything is going to be fine is not the 1/200 that will lose her baby to stillbirth?!

Because somebody OWED IT TO ME to tell me.

They owed it to me to tell me to trust my instincts, they owed it to me to tell me my risk of stillbirth (and that it was increased due to preterm labor), they owed it to me to tell me what they DON'T KNOW, not just what they fucking know.

Having Simone first, I know how inundated new mothers are about SIDS. They scare the fuck out of EVERYONE, all new parents. They risk the breastfeeding relationship due to their demonization of co-sleeping (an arrangment done in EVERY stinking culture since the beginning of time that is evelotuinary based (see Dr. McKenna at Notre Dame). This public health campaign is everywhere.

Back to sleep. Back to sleep. Back to sleep.

And the SIDS back to sleep campaign has been good. They've reduced the rate of SIDS by half.

And what's that rate? Well, before it was 1/5th of the stillbirth rate, and now it's 1/10th. So now, only 2500 babies dies from SIDS every year, and anywhere between 20,000 and 40,000 die from stillbirth.

Forgive me if it seems like I'm minimizing SIDS, I am not, it's tragic and awful, and even with my own experience, I cannot imagine the pain of losing a child to SIDS.

BUT

Shouldn't I hear 5 times as many messages about stillbirth? Shouldn't I hear even ONE, just one message about the incidence and prevalence of stillbirth? Kick counts, eh? Fuck kick counts. Unlike the back to sleep campaign (and only the back to sleep campaign cuz the co-sleeping demonization is BS), kick counts are not evidence based. There is no scientific evidence that shows kick counts to save any lives. (and if anyone can show me different i'll gladly eat humble pie) Which brings me to the research community.

Where the fuck are you?! 20,000-40,000 babies are dying each year, 50% we have no fucking clue why. Where the fuck are you?

Which brings me to the March of Dimes.

Fuck you MOD.

You're supposed to be 'saving babies lives', and in your little bible of marternal child health, you don't even bother to mention stillbirth once. Not ONCE in over 100pages of statistics you fucking pukes.

This has got to change, as long as stillbirth remains the dark secret of childbirth, no one will ever do anything. I want to see goddamn billboards on stillbirth, I want to know that every pregnant woman talks about it with their provider, just like miscarriage, just like SIDS.

More Rilke

2009-02-15T17:39:00.000-08:00

This one speaks volumes about Rilkes understanding of child loss, particularly stillbirth I think:

You who never arrived

You who never arrived
in my arms, Beloved, who were lost
from the start,
I don't even know what songs
would please you. I have given up trying
to recognize you in the surging wave of the next
moment.

I wonder here if he is talking of his mother? He could be talking about any of us who blog and comment and support others who are grieving.

Do not assume that she who seeks to comfort you now, lives untroubled among the simple and quiet words that sometimes do you good. Her life may also have much sadness and difficulty, that remains far beyond yours. Were it otherwise, she would never have been able to find these words

And I liked this bit of feminism

Letter to a young poet (letter 7)

Someday there will be girls and women whose name will no longer mean the mere opposite of the male, but something in itself, something that makes one think not of any complement and limit, but only life and reality: the female human being.

optimism? too scary

2009-02-05T20:39:00.000-08:00

I've been posting a lot on message board for bipolar disorder. It's been a wonderful and supportive community. With the meds I'm on, I've been doing so well recently, everything is feeling 'normal', almost in a scary way. It's hard to loosen that grip on grief I suppose, it is a connection to Myles. Anyway, this poem brought me to tears (like everything seems to these days, lol) and it made me give optimism a second look:

Sometimes things don't go at all,
from bad to worse. Some years muscadel
faces down frost; green thrives;the crops don't fail,
sometimes a man aims high, and all goes well.

A people sometimes will step back from war;
elect an honest man; decide they care
enough, that they can't leave some stranger poor.
Some men become what they were born for.

Sometimes our best efforts do not go
amiss; sometimes we do as we meant to.
The sun will sometimes melt a field of sorrow
that seemed hard frozen: may it happen for you.

Sheena Pugh (b.1950)

Argh, and now I'm sitting here pondering the poem thinking, none of these things happen, who chooses peace. I'm sooo jaded :(

Rainer Maria Rilke

2009-02-03T00:01:00.000-08:00

I've been reading Rilke's poetry (thanks to a commenter ;). The line that first hooked me was:

"The purpose of life is to be defeated by greater and greater things."

So here I am at 2am reading all the Rilke I can online, all because I finally googled and read his wikipedia page. His quotes just seemed to get to the core of so much of what I have learned in this life, so I finally HAD to see his life. I guess I shouldn't have been surprised, but when I read this, I gasped:

"The relationship between Phia (his mother) and her only son was encumbered by her prolonged mourning for her elder daughter who was lost after only a week of life."

Rainer was his mother's rainbow baby. It all makes sense, he is someone who has been shaped by grief, raised by a mother who was profoundly impacted by child loss. His famous, Sonnets to Orpheus, were dedicated to his daughter's friend who died at the age of 19. Here is a section of one of his other most famous poems, Duino Elegies:

In the end, those who were carried off early no longer need us:
they are weaned from earth's sorrows and joys,
as gently as children outgrow the soft breasts of their mothers.
But we, who do need such great mysteries,
we for whom grief is so often the source of our spirit's growth--:
could we exist without them?
Is the legend meaningless that tells how, in the lament for Linus,
the daring first notes of song pierced through the barren numbness;
and then in the startled space which a youth as lovely as a god has suddenly left forever,
the Void felt for the first time that harmony which now enraptures and comforts and helps us.

Stupid assholes

2009-01-30T06:08:00.000-08:00

So I finally talked to my stepmom, you know the bitch who told me at Christmas that I didn't deserve my daughter. Well, let's just say, her apology was not sincere. I had an inkling, and I wanted to be judicious, but when all was said and done, she meant what she said, and the apology was just to keep the peace.

This is how it went. I've been talking to my Dad, and he obviously was upset with her, but still definitely trying to protect her and downplay her actions that day. He said that she said it to 'wake me up'. Pretty hilarious right? I have a bad day, and she was going to make it better by getting angry and hurling cruel insults. Did I mention she's a genius? (She's one of the most anti-intellectual people I've ever met) So I went over last night for an apology.

So anyway, I get there, it's awkward, and my Dad took Simone downstairs so SM and I could talk. Well, she barely looks at me, and flippantly says that she just wants to apologize for saying what she said, but 'she doesn't want to talk about it'. Real fair, huh? So, I'm not in a flippant mood at all, what she said is as grave as it gets and I'm not going to walk away without telling her what I thought and hearing her explanation. So I tell her that it was the most cruel thing anyone has ever said to me, and I want to know why she said it. Well, as I'm talking (calm, serious) she is interrupting me saying, no no, she doesn't want to talk about it, that's not what 'this' (her insincere apology) is about. She begins raising her voice saying if I don't accept her apology that's fine. I tell her that that actually would not be fine, that it is in her interest that I accept her apology because otherwise I will not visit while she is there, she will not see my daughter, and that will hurt all of our relationships with my Dad. She keeps saying she didn't want to talk about it and she starts yelling for my Dad (who is downstairs). It was pretty absurd because I hadn't said anything out of line or raised my voice or anything, and here she is, interrupting me, raising her voice, and yelling for my Dad. After saying what she said, she couldn't let me say anything??? What did she think my Dad was going to do?

So my Dad comes up and my daughter follows, so now we get to have the conversation with him AND her there, all because SM is a twit who can't have an honest conversation, one on one. Well, come to find out, I was a bad mom that day. See, it was my daughters Christmas (total BS, we 'celebrated' that on the 25th, this was the 27th) and when she opened her doll, she didn't even have a Mom sitting there to show it to, boohoo (dd is scarred for life, she doesn't have 5,000 dolls, she didn't get 30 Christmas presents this year, and toys really are the meaning of Christmas). Maybe if I had just tried that day (see, we can all try our way out of the pit) I would've had a better day.

What does this have to do with religion? Everything. Come to find out she wrote a letter from Myles to me (THE NERVE!!!!! As if she would knows what my son would say or want) and gave it to my sister and my sister wouldn't give it to me because God was mentioned. And this made SM upset.

Now, I don't believe that God was just mentioned, or that my sister kept it from me because it had some religion in it. No, I'm thinking this letter is filled with platitudes (religious and otherwise), the likes of which would boil my blood. My sister is no dummy, she knows I tolerate religious sentiment. When my grandmother told me my son was in the arms of jesus, I agreeably said he was at peace. I don't want to stir the shit with religious folk, let them find comfort in delusion. Why is it that religious people want to force there beliefs on me? My son died and the religious have to tragedy grub like vultures.

No, I think my sister kept it from me for a reason, she has only protected me so far and I'm going to trust her judgement and not read it. So SM is hurt that I didn't get this letter, then she says that she just wants me to see that God has blessed me with a daughter. And she goes to the fridge and points at a prayer and says she says that prayer for me everyday. Well, I've had enough, so I tell her I hope saying that prayer brings her comfort, because it doesn't do anything for me, and I would just prefer to not be judged and talked bad about because I happened to be sad at their Christmas.

Aside: Is that how religion works, people pray for you, and since they're providing so much help talking to the man upstairs that they can say and do whatever they want? Cuz I'd rather just be treated with common decency.

The fucking nerve.

So nothing is settled, we ended the conversation because it wasn't going anywhere, and I went and played pool with my daughter and dad. I think the most telling part is that her explanation for spewing her hate that day to my brother (who also can magically channel MY SONS wants and desires), was that she was afraid I was going to lose my daughter. That was never once discussed last night. So, as I had suspected, he lapped up a bunch of her lies and bullshit in the aftermath and liked the taste so much he thought he'd convince everyone else to eat it. What a fool. This woman genuinely thinks I don't deserve my daughter, plain and simple, and it has nothing to do with my morose attitude at THEIR Christmas, it's because I'm an atheist.

Well, fuck her, I'm a good mom and the proof is in the pudding. Simone is honest and compassionate and generous and it's because of me and her dad, and we didn't have to make her afraid of God or Santa Claus or any mythical being, she is just good for the sake of being good. I'm sure she'll have a lot more decency and compassion when she grows up than my wicked SM.

The fight to love

2009-01-29T06:48:00.000-08:00

My daughter is doing a jump rope for heart thing, and she gets to color a heart in memory of someone. Of course, the little dear wanted to put Myles' name on it and it will hang in her gym, which is so bittersweet. She had put glitter glue on the heart so they needed to dry, so this morning I cut it out for her and she took it to school.

On the way there, she did something she hasn't done before. She said that she can see Myles, he's not just in my heart, that he is right next to her in the back seat. Well, these are the things that I don't want to react to until I process it. I asked her what he looked like and she said, just like he did when he was born, except alive. (wince) I know she didn't mean anything by it, she's just a kid who says what she thinks, and the one thing she KNOWS is that Myles was dead; he looked dead, he felt dead.

I thought a lot about what she said in the car, we live in the country now so it's a good 10 minute drive to get to her school, and then I'm alone on the way back. I guess, what struck me, not for the first time, but for the first time this clearly, is how hard we have to fight to love our dead babies.

Stillbirth is such a unique and tragic situation. It's not like losing a child any other way, because we never get to see our loved one alive. I was arguing on this message board where people were saying those 'real babies' are creepy. I don't have one or want one, but it made me mad that this was their reaction knowing that some moms cherish those dolls. I was told I shouldn't be mad because that's how the majority of people think, but I don't think that's a good reason not be mad at all. Basically, the argument was that these babies didn't look quite alive, and that made them creepy. When I discussed bereaved parents, somebody even argued that bereaved parents are wrong to buy these dolls, one poster said it would be like having his brother die, and then getting a doll replica of him dead. GRRRRR.

The point I made to him, is that analogy is stupid. Unlike him and his brother, I NEVER SAW MY SON ALIVE. He had purple lips, and a bruised face. And even if those dolls were unsatisfactory in those people's eyes, they looked WAAAAY more alive than my son did.

So, I don't know if I was barking up the wrong tree, or maybe just beating my head against it? But one thing is true about stillbirth, we have to fight to love our dead babies. That's the one thing that has stayed with me from An Exact Replica, the idea that it's okay to love them, it's not morbid or macabre. Even though we never got to see them smile, or the color of their eyes, even though we've ONLY seen them dead and lifeless, we love them just the same.

I birthed a dead baby. I held and swaddled a dead baby. I love a dead baby. And in every other way he was a perfect baby, my Myles. He just wasn't alive.

And I have to fight for it, damn it. Because it makes people uncomfortable, grossed out. We have to fight because others combat their awkwardness by believing there is something wrong with us. They want us to move on because they can't deal with it, they aren't comfortable looking death in the face. But when you've experienced a stillbirth, you carry death in your womb, you birth death, then you hold death in your arms and you sing death a lullaby. It's not creepy, it's not gross, it's tragic.

So I guess I have a new sense of vigilence, thanks to a stupid people on a message board and a long commute. People who have lost a child to stillbirth deal with the guilt and shame of losing their child unexpectedly, why the hell should we be shamed into hiding our love and our grief?

Shame

2009-01-23T20:43:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow is 14 months, my son would be 14 months old. And finding myself here is a little surreal. What everyone told me in the beginning is right, it still hurts, sometimes just like it was yesterday. But somehow you start to find a new way, not the way you wanted, but a way forward.

In many ways, I'm just starting to deal with some of the issues that I think complicated my grief for so long. I've been reading a lot about shame and guilt and stillbirth. I guess I didn't know what shame was, but from what I understand, shame is what you feel when others look down upon you, and guilt is what you feel when you look down on yourself.

And so, I realized that what I felt from the beginning was just so ashamed, I couldn't show my face. Everything was hinging on me during my pregnancy. I went into preterm labor and was on bedrest. And I didn't follow bed rest very well. Period. Especially as time moved forward, I remember saying, 'maybe there is a reason he wants to come early?'. and I started doing things around the house, little things, and I couldn't stop working completely, so I started going back once a week. And the studies I read did not show bedrest to necessarily do what it was supposed to do (no evidence based in my circumstances), and I'm just so anti-authoritarian. So I blatantly broke some of the rules.

So when Myles died, I knew it wasn't my fault as far as bed rest, the bed rest had nothing to do with Myles health directly, he was NEVER in distress that we ever knew or saw. The bed rest was just to keep him in there until he was good and cooked. But nobody else knows that. Everyone I know knew I should be on bed rest and that I wasn't following it completely. So, when it comes down to it, from the beginning, I was so ashamed because I thought everyone would think I killed my son. My husband wrote a letter to Myles the other day that he wanted to read to me, and he even said that he wonders if I had followed my bed rest, if things would be different. And it hurt me so much to hear him say that.

I didn't kill my son.

Little boys with glasses

2009-01-19T15:33:00.000-08:00

The biggest trigger for me is not babies. It was never babies. The biggest trigger for me is little boys with glasses, they were everywhere it seemed the other day at the roller skating rink. Oh, I had all of these ideas about who Myles would be. I hoped he would be smart, and sensitive, but confident. I wanted him to be studious, lol. Really, everything I wished for Simone. But for Myles, I really remember imagining how he woud look when he was a preschooler, like Simone was during my pg. Would he look like her?

I've often wondered, 'why glasses?' what am I trying to say about having glasses? Would I have wished near sightedness on my son? No. As I've thought of it this last year, I think it was a way to make him like me. I've worn glasses since I was a young child. And it is said that losing a child is like losing a piece of yourself.

Well, after a child is born safely, at even a few weeks old they defy our wildest expectations in the most wonderful ways, we could never have truly imagined how unique and special that child was really gonna be. And those revelations happen throughout life, these wonderful gifts that keep on giving. Our beautiful children.

And when a child is not born safely, you only have those insufficient dreams, dreams that we dreamed knowing they would never come close to the magnificence that would be our child, dreams that we dreamed not knowing they would be all we have.

Little boys with glasses will always remind of Myles.

scared

2009-01-17T15:17:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, my mood got out of control, major anxiety, until I had a panic attack. I had a doctors appointment, and I saw a nurse that I saw the week I lost my son. We had talked a lot about my pg at that fateful appt., I've always been so afraid of having to talk to her again and have her ask me about 'how old my baby is'.

So, it was just a trigger, but a trigger that had more power than anything has had since the months after I first lost him. NOW I'm feeling like I just lost him all over again 14months out. When the nurse came in, my pulse was over 100, she didn't believe the machine so she took it and found out it was right. I told her it wsa my anxiety. Then I started crying when she left the room. I spent considerable time trying to get it under control, lots of deep breaths, and refocusing, but I'd just fall back into the crying.

Well I opened up the floodgates. I just haven't been able to hold back my tears since then. It's like I'm walking around with a lump in my throat on the verge of tears. All anyone would have to say is boo, and I'd probably burst into sobs. All I have to do is think his name, and I'm crying (see just started crying). What is doing this? I've dealt with a lot of hard situations, this shouldn't have me so panicked.

REVIEW: An exact replica of a figment of my imagination

2009-01-08T10:11:00.000-08:00

I finished reading Elizabeth McCracken's memoir this morning and abruptly burst into tears. I'm always sad when books are over, especially ones I love, though I've never cried, let alone sobbed. It was like the young male sage femme said to me, "C'est fini."

Finally finishing this book was devastating for me; first, because I loved it, second, because this book was to be about the 'lighter side of a child's death'. I was sad to say goodbye to the lighter side. Us mothers want truly to remember our child with pleasure instead of grief. To have permission to still love our dead children, a love that isn't 'morbid', 'unsightly', or that not all of this experience need not be 'shoved away'. Saying goodbye to that lighter side, and going back into my darkened grief was hard today. But as I look over the book as a whole, I welcomed the way that she was able to weave in both, the devastating grief, the calamity of it all, but also that immense love and hope we all felt during the short time we had with our dear babies.

Some of the lighter sided? I will never forget the dwarves of grief that provided such relief to McCracken and her husband, I've taken them on myself to use at the saddest times, to put a crack into some of my grief. They have become as dear to me as the pieces of comic relief that sustained me through my own birth. I will never forget my labor and numerous baths in the birthing pool, singing with Simone and my then 3yo niece Stazia. I also greatly appreciated her description of the man she met on a train in Boston, who presented her with a card that said, I AM DEAF. She says, "I have thought of that card ever since, during difficult times, mine or someone else's: surely when tragedy has struck you dumb, you should be given a stack to explain it for you." I reeaallly want that card.

I appreciated how she described her fear to wish for what was. I have felt the same fear, but didn't know why. Shouldn't I wish everyday for my son to be here and healthy? I don't think so. As McCracken stated, bargains/wishes are disastrous in all of fairy tales. "Terrible things happen." And I think the point is that you can't just change one piece of the past, and not risk everything there is today. Somedays, that doesn't feel like much, but I have no desire to risk what I have today (especially my daughter Simone) for a piece of the past which STILL would have no guarantees.

Sigh, there is so much in this book, and I read it so disjointedly, in fits and spurts. I empathized with her on so many things, i couldn't list them here. I also envied her, for I agree with her conclusion. When you are waiting for the birth of your child, you are waiting to be transformed. To go back to my same old life, where nothing was different, but where everything within you is so irreversibly changed is quite awful. Like, McCracken, I think that once you've experienced such calamity, that nothing that came before or will come after can be seen without that lens of disaster. I've want to run away so many times in the last year, to the ocean, to some far away place, to somewhere or to do something wholly unrelated, totally removed from my son's death. I do not have the means to do this, so I was jealous of her in that weird way us bereaved mothers never understand. A jealousy that isn't rational at all. I was also jealous of her rainbow baby, especially when she described how caring for baby Gus, nursing him, bathing him, made her feel like perhaps she was doing those things for Pudding somewhere, in some other dimension. I so looked forward to nursing Myles, but nothing in my daily life feels close to him. Nothing I do day to day is remotely 'baby'. Still, how can I be jealous of a rainbow baby? Inexplicable.

I think everyone should read this book, and by everyone, I mean every single person in the United States. It does everything I have never been able to do. When I have to talk about still birth, I tend to do it with facts and figures. I don't know if I'm trying to scare everyone or prepare everyone, that the statistics are there, and stillbirth is much more common than most ever want to believe. It also gives me an objective stance, one where i can spout of numbers which, in general, hardly bring people to tears, especially me.

What she is able to do is describe what it's like, really like, to live through that devastation, to be forced into this life where you are the worst case scenario, 13 black cats, a thousand broken mirrors. A pregnant woman's worst nightmare. I remember feeling like I would be seen as the harbinger of death. And she describes the awkward and sometimes insensitive comments, the difficult dates and events overlapping between her two pregnancies, and how it fit into her everyday life, sooo beautifully.

I will definitely read more Elizabeth McCracken, and I will pass this book onto everyone I know, bereaved mother or not, because stillbirth is real, it's not something that happened in history, it happens every day, too often. She takes stillbirth out of the shadows, and she takes those emotions we feel; love, guilt, shame, anger, despair, fear, jealousy, out of the shadows too. Surviving the stillbirth of your child is complex, no matter how many well meanign but oblivious people want to simplify it. McCracken portrays that complexity, and destigmatizes it. The love we feel for our dead children should not be considered 'unsightly' in our culture. McCracken's book makes that love beautiful, for all to see, as a mother's love should be.

2009, the beginning

2009-01-01T09:51:00.001-08:00

I woke up today and as I watched Simone sleep, paint still on her face from the New Year's party at the children's museum, I realized that 2009 will likely hold more for me than my tired mind can imagine, but no matter, it must ultimately be good. Not good in that I'll enjoy it, or even that the year will be a happy one. Good meaning that I will inevitably gain better insight into the world, that if I put this year to use, it may hold within it knowledge that could help me to better navigate my way. Or maybe it will hold a greater awareness so I can figure out when I am lost as I have been so often lately. I do have a hope for 2009, and it's actually a really really big one. One that puts a knot in my throat and a tear in my eye to contemplate.

I hope that I start to find my way again.

I hope to find some pieces of me. Pieces that I thought were lost forever or maybe that I questioned whether they ever really were me. I hope to find the 'new me' not just the 'different me' I'm so disappointed with. The true me. I also hope to accept the parts of me that feel so foreign today, and I dare to hope to take what is new, even if it is painful or hard, even if it will be misconstrued by others; and to use it to make my way. The 'new me' need not be a worst me, no matter how many times in 2008 I've thought so. It's a me without my beloved son, it's not the old me. And it will still likely be a me that smiles less, laughs less; but what I dare to hope is that eventually it will be a me that loves more deeply, understands more fully.

So I'm 28, and I've just begun. I've just begun. In 2008, I found myself a stranger, stripped of all I had built up for soo many years. I can't describe how unsettling that was. My house of cards came tumbling down, and I found myself lost. Foundationless. And damn. I almost didn't make it.

Thoreau said that not until we are lost do we begin to understand ourselves. I think many of us are lost, for most of us though, we don't even realize that we don't know where we're going or where we've been. It's not just being lost, it's knowing when you're lost.

So, I've survived, I'm surviving, today at least, and I must choose. Do I sit down, stay lost, do I wait for somebody to find me, or do I get up and find my own way? Will I find me in 2009? I don't think so. In fact, it may not be the year for me at all. hell, I may, in fact, search my whole life for me. But that doesn't mean the paths I take this year will not be worthwhile. Life is not just instrumentally valuable, it's not just made up of the things you tried and succeeded at. It's also made up of the things you put your heart into, and still ultimately failed at. Those things don't disappear, the ultimate failure is discounting all the love, and life, invested in something that was never and will never be realized.

The one thing I can walk away with, is that people fail. Everybody fails. I've failed. I will fail. But I've also succeeded. How will I define my world? By my epic fails, by my successes? I think we are all made up by both, but I think I'm going to focus on my success and, most importantly, instead of hiding from my mistakes, or not doing something because I'm petrified of failing, I think I'm just going to choose to fall flat on my face. Just like everyone does in life. I'm not going to be afraid, I'm not going to be complacent.

The fact is, I can wander down the path of life taking baby steps, hands grasping outstretched in front of me, like anyone, and maybe even 'succeed' in the eyes of others. But I'd much rather set forth on the path of life with an aim, even perhaps a foolish aim, like figuring out this world and how the heck I came to find myself in it. All with the knowledge I may never reach my goal, and that I will likely get turned around, misguided by myself or others, and never 'succeed'.

I just want to be able to say, before I die, hopefully when I'm old and gray:

"Somewhere, ages and ages hence
Two roads diverged in a wood
And I took the one less traveled by
And that has made all the difference."

And the one person who I will have to thank, the only person, is my sweet son, Myles. Myles is my guide; the meaning in his life, the impact it has had on me, the love we shared, the lessons he has taught me and so many others. I will be true, I will be me, and will live well, only so long as I remember him and what he has meant to me, and will always continue to mean to me. He will be my closest companion through this life; and though I wish he were here, right now, nursing or holding my hand, he is here in my heart, and that part of me I know is true. So that's where I must start from. 2008 is the year lost, on every level, 2009, I dare hope, will be the beginning.

2008 a year without hope?

2008-12-30T19:05:00.000-08:00

Before I describe what saying goodbye to 2008 is like, I have to reflect on what I thought about saying goodbye to 2007. So here is my entry, a little over a month after I lost my son:

2007 was the year of Hope. I had more hopes and dreams than ever
before in my life. I'm no stranger to disappointed hopes. I've seen
them crumble many times. But I've never questioned my ability to hope
again afterwards (okay, maybe after the 2004 elections, something about 4 more
years of Bush). But when Myles died, I've never seen my hopes
and dreams so completely anihilated. The feeling of it was like watching
those hopes, not just dashed to pieces; but beaten to a pulp, then ground into
the dirt, then shit on. And much of my recent existential
quandaries now revolve around even trying to justify the will to
hope. Emotionally, I don't have it in me anymore. Logically,
I can't see a reason why I ever dared to hope in the first place given my
beliefs.

Although I may appear a cynic, its always been my biggest con.
I'm a poser. Deep down, I've always been a hopeful person, even to
the point of naivete. If anyone asks, I say that I'm sure the worst will
happen, but in my mind I always hold out hope for the best.
I can think to so many moments in my life where I've been so filled with hope
and excitement, it was like my heart could burst. And last year
was filled to the brim with that heart-bursting hope. I just forced
myself to believe that everything would work out, all would fall into
place, and for so much of the year it really appeared it would.

So, saying goodbye to 2007 is quite a sad affair for me. I'm not just
saying goodbye to my son again (which I went and did today, and I will continue
to do for as long as it takes to set in). It's like I'm saying goodbye to
that piece of me that dared to hope. It's like I'm saying goodbye to hope
itself. I've already mourned so much, but now I mourn even for the New
Year. I've always loved the New Year. So much more
than xmas. Why? No, its not the drugs and parties you
fucking smart alec. It was that sense of hope! Hope that
maybe, just maybe, the next year would be better than the last. And this
year, I don't fucking have it. I feel like there is nothing for me in
2008.

Fuckmas

2008-12-27T17:41:00.000-08:00

So I've been operating on the assumption that everyone just wanted me to be THERE for Christmas. Nothing more nothing less. I wasn't told I had to be sociable, play games, take pictures, etc., etc. And I didn't expect that I would have to. At every christmas I've been to (My mom's and my Dad's, they're long time divorced) I've done what I could. Sometimes that means I disappear; at my Mom's I came and layed down for a couple hours after the presents were unwrapped. I didn't eat with them. At my dad's I did similar (didn't want to sit and eat and chat with everybody) and there I hid out downstairs where the kids were playing hide and seek.

Was I morose? Yes. Unsociable? Yes. Did I talk or smile? here and there. I thanked them for their gifts, in fact, I was thanking my step mom before I left, and everybody else (my dad, sis, bro, sil, and 5 kids) all went outside. As I thank her, she just looks at me and says, "You need to get some help." I say 'what?' surprised but unshaken. Then she starts yelling at me, "YOU NEED TO GET SOME HELP, YOU DIDN'T TALK TO ANYBODY HERE." I disagreed, I most certainly did chat with my dad while he fried the turkey, my bro and sis, just most of it was one on one, private talks. And no, I never did talk to her because I generally don't like her.

I told her she was being rude, and she had no right to say that to me. She yelled at me that she cared about me and loved me (who YELLS such things?). I just walked away and muttered to her that she couldn't love me, she doesn't even KNOW me. At this point I'm opening the front door and she is following me, yelling(?!) If it had been any other day, I might have argued with her, but instead, i'm just as zombified by the whole weird confrontation as I've been all day. I open the front door, and she shouts out after me:

"You don't even deserve to have your daughter."

All of my REAL family looks over confused and surprised, who was just yelling?! I said very matter of factly as I got in my car that that was just step mom telling me I don't deserve my daughter. After which I promptly left with my sis and the kids.

All I can say is I'm not telling my mom because she would tear her a new one, and it would create rifts where there needn't be. I'm not worried about my dad, we had nice discussions about my divorce, my depression, whether or not to file for bankruptcy. We've actually talked a lot. So I'm just hoping she feels like an idiot. I'm not going to grace her 'opinion' with a response, she's not worth it to me. I just can't believe someone could be soooo cruel.

FYI, by 'help' she means religion. Her and my Dad think my problem is I 'haven't heard the good news!' (barf). What they don't understand is that everytime they bring it up, they might as well be telling me that if I were religious, none of this would've happened. This is my punishment. And if losing Myles wasn't a punishment, my anguish and difficulties in handling this is due to my lack of appropriate religiopioid. Ugh, my dad, in his gentle kind way, kept saying the word 'forget'. I have to forget. I have to forget? IIII have to forget?!

I will never forget!!!

Child Grief

2008-12-14T19:30:00.000-08:00

My daughter has been talking about Myles more and more lately. Wait, first let me start by saying I've really been getting a kick out of how little my child thinks I know. I ask her who are the smartest people she knows? They're all cousins and friends from school, none over the age of 12. Who are the smartest adults? Her grandma's and grandpa's. Daddy and Mommy rank dead last, lol. So when I tell her to say 'fell' instead of 'falled' she completely argues with me. My parents think I'm getting what I deserve, lol, and they're right.

But it kind of took on a new meaning tonight, it really broke my heart. She was saying her ribs hurt, and asked why she had them and I explain they protect her lungs and heart. So she had a question about if a heart breaks, and I told her about cpr, and doctors fixing hearts, but that sometimes, people might die. And she said, 'Is that what happened to Myles?' And I don't know that, but I do know his heart stopped beating for some reason, so I was wavering. To reassure her, I said, "Simone his heart just stopped, and he didn't hurt, he was completely happy and loved, it didn't hurt him.'

And she said, "Mom, you finally figured it out." Getting more and more excited, as if I said something revolutionary. Then she said she missed Myles and started crying, she asked how old he would be now, how big. Then she stopped, as if this is the first time she ever asked it, "okay, Mom, but WHY did HIS heart stop beating?" and I had to say, 'I don't know, nobody knows'. And for the first time, she says, "but you have been alive for how long, and you're supposed to know all of this stuff, why don't you know that?"

And it occurs to me, no wonder she doesn't believe me, or believe in me, I couldn't even save her brother! Parents are gods I thought, and I know she still thinks I'm the greatest mom in the world, but deep down she knows I don't know everything, I can't stop everything, I can't protect her always, because that is how the world works.

She just wants me to have another baby, and I'm so dead set against it. She brings it up at least twice a week. And she'll say, but mom, if you had another baby, maybe it wouldn't die. And I said, maybe not, but it could, there's nothing we can do about that. And she's like, 'well, maybe we shouldn't have played with Myles so much.' And for the first time she said, "Mom, did [i]I[/i] play with him too much?"

I assured her, no, she didn't do anything wrong, we all did everything right. And even when you do everything right, there are no guarantees. Life just isn't fair.

Oh, I feel so terrible my poor dear has had to grow up so fast. How hard it is to watch her grow and for her to come up with new questions, new sources of pain from her loss. And I guess as she gets older, we'll revisit this discussion many many more times. It's just so hard to see the cruel world reveal itself even more as she develops and understands and can think about things more.

Perspective

2008-12-11T18:30:00.000-08:00

A long time ago, my best friend made these compilation cd's from the 80's and 90's when we were in Middle School and went to teen dances. Well, I pulled them out, and what a walk through memory lane. Some songs have struck home harder now, than they did when I thought they said it all. 'Long December' by the counting crows is one example. 'Losing My Religion' and 'Everybody hurts' by REM. Although I was never a fan of this band or this song, it had me in tears:

He said of lot things I think I needed to hear. What I can appreciate about his pleas to his friend are his promise of understanding, sympathy, but assurance that the past (not Myles, but everything I've fucked up since losing Myles) can be left behind, along with the lies I've been living.

The suicidal ideation has passed for the most part. It's tempting, but inadequate. I have a suicide letter I'll post. I read it today when I was sitting on the toilet (don't ask) and it said everything I wanted to say, so I was surprised. It still wasn't enough though, you can never say enough, as you have all pointed out. Everyone would walk away from my death, wounded as badly or worse than when we lost Myles. Everyone except me, I guess.

I've been reading through old blogs. Actually I went back to the beginning after I got an email from a new atheist reader and a new November 2008 addition to our sad club of child loss.

I guess what I've read has really revealed many things at this moment. First, my typos are much worse the more in the pit I am. The alcohol was the worst answer to my terrible days. No matter how many rules I created, it still managed to engulf me, though I thought I was immune.

Having the bipolar diagnosis makes more sense than I'd like to admit. Bipolar isn't inherently bad however, as my Psychiatrist said today (and as I've read) many very creative successful people have bipolar. The times of mania, prior to losing Myles were actually times of high productivity, I was supermom, supergrad student, super housewife. I juggled 50 things, seemlessly, and now I look back, and I could only be manic to believe that I could do all those things, and then actually find that 'crazy' energy to actually pull them off.

So the deep depression after losing Myles lead to a much more volatile mania, the two extremes became much more extreme than they had in my life up until that point. Though I would argue in my adolescents that I was definitely on this teeter totter of periods of deep depression, then manic episodes accompanied by major risk taking. On days I felt 'good' it wasn't the real 'good', it was the scary 'good'. The kind of feeling that makes you act impulsively, so sure of yourself in an instant. But at the time, sure of what? Sure of nothing except my life had no meaning anymore, my values were not so valuable, I was invincible to alcohol, invincible to grief, all of which is utter bullshit. It's a very powerful feeling, indifference, don't let anyone fool you. It's so much easier to not care anymore.

Part of me would like to find myself, mentally, in the same place I was a few months after Myles death. Certainly miserable, but at least a clear miserable, not one hazed over by alcohol, drugs, and gardening (I was a MAD gardener, crazy). I had some insight then, insights that are even clearer to me now if I were to just write them out. Gifts from my Myles, secrets to this life that no one can know until it's 'too late' (but it's never too late). I so wanted to know these secrets in the months leading up to Myles death, if I had known them, maybe I would've cherished him more when I had him. But you can't go back. So I have to use those lessons now. It's not just Myles I need to appreciate, it's Simone, and my nieces and nephews, brother and sisters, Mom and Dad.

To commit suicide would be to not apply that knowledge Myles has given me, and that would be the biggest tragedy. Because his short life was not short of radiant, and full of so much meaning, I wouldn't change anything today. Because I know that if he had lived, there would still be no guarantee he'd be in my arms now, or forever. Same with Simone. So I've got to cherish what I have, and mourn what I don't have, but do it in away that isn't sooooo harmful to my own conception of self.

I thought the hardest days would be then, I didn't know that the hardest days were ahead. Now I know that you can never know whether they are in front of you or behind you. They are both, they were always both. Can you prepare for them? Not really. But you can accept that having a terrrrrrrible day, isn't the end of the world. For tomorrow maybe less terrible, the day after, perhaps one filled with meaning, peace, or healing (as was this Tuesday when I got Myles birth certificate).

So, I'm not a failure yet. I might have failed here or there in the past, succeeded too, and in the future, I'll add to both tallies. And if I take what my son's life has shown me, and I apply it, then that means I go on. No matter what, I must go on. Because I was given a gift, and it would be a terrible thing to waste. And killing myself would've been throwing that gift in the garbage, perhaps. And that's not fair to anyone. Suicide may not be 'selfish' but it certainly isn't just; to me, or Simone, or Myles, or anyone who loves me. It doesn't do justice to the meaning of my son's life, and that perhaps would've been the biggest tragedy. For if he lives on in our hearts, then a piece of him would've died with me. It wouldn't have been fair to him.

So, I will go on, I will continue becoming, and I will continue to try to find hope in the future, no matter how forlorn I may feel at the moment. For there is still time, time to err, and time to succeed.

Suicide is not selfish

2008-12-02T17:18:00.000-08:00

Did I ask to be born? No. So here I am, and sadly I've placed another human being in this predicament and a second (though perhaps he had a choice in the matter, perhaps he made the smart one). I'm not going to feel bad about being indifferent to whether I live or die. Myles died. Life went on. The sun rose and set, fucksgiving and fuckmas came and went. Other children were brought kicking and screaming into this world by no choice of their own. To quote Camus: We get in the habit of living before we ever get in the habit of thinking. And thinking leads us to the absurd and that is: What is called a reason for living is also called an excellent reason for dying.

CAMUS:
We live on the future, "tomorrow," "later on," "when you have made your way," "you will understand when you are old enough." Such irrelevancies are wonderful enough, for, after all, it's a matter of dying.

[ . . . ]
Man admits that the stands at a certain point on on a curve that that he acknowledges having to travel to its end. He belongs to time, and by the horror that seizes him, he recognizes his worst enemy. Tomorrow, he was longing for tomorrow, whereas everything in him ought to reject it. The revolt of the flesh is absurd. (The myth of sisyphus).

Mania

2008-12-02T17:16:00.000-08:00

What the fuck? The fuckers stole my computer after they did a room search. I'm not gonna lie or be ashamed, I tried really hard to kill myself and I was really bummed I didn't succeed (it's like, 'I can't even do THIS right!'). I had my suicide note all written, I just couldn't create anything sharp enough to cut deep enough, so really it was pretty pathetic. I just have about 20 scratches on my left arm. So they made me do 1:1 and that blew cuz I'm a loner and having somebody follow you around all day is really fucking annoying, I'm sure the feeling is mutual.

Now, I don't feel that way today, so please I won't let any of you respond with all the well meaning bullshit about how great I am. Cuz lots of great people kill themselves and in my view, it's their fucking perogative. I. Am. Mine. Sorry. My life.

Blah, blah, blah, I should be telling you how much better I feel and all that jazz, but I feel about the same except fucksgiving is over, a holiday i vow to never celebrate again. So I move to NP this weekend sometime, don't have a phone until then but if you myspace, I'll keep my computer on, and if you want to IM me, I'm at anarchist.mom@live.com. I'll add you and we can hang out before I semi-officially move.

Peace. And I want to do away with Fuckmas this year too, FYI. "Now go make me a turkey pot pie, bitch" - bender.

bipolar I

2008-12-02T17:15:00.000-08:00

My therapist finally told me I have bipolar I (with mania), I broke my foot again, and I'm apparently a terrible wife (we are through), mother, and person. Guess I need to 'get with it', and 'toughen up' cuz if life is a test, I'm a fucking failure.

Oh yes, and I totally fucking snuck my computer in cuz these guys are fucking assholes, but I'm too sneaky for them, lol.

Childless Woman

2008-11-27T08:27:00.001-08:00

The womb
Rattles its pod, the moon
Discharges itself from the tree with nowhere to go.

My landscape is a hand with no lines,
The roads bunched to a knot,
The knot myself,

Myself the rose you acheive---
This body,
This ivory

Ungodly as a child's shriek.
Spiderlike, I spin mirrors,
Loyal to my image,

Uttering nothing but blood---
Taste it, dark red!
And my forest

My funeral,
And this hill and this
Gleaming with the mouths of corpses.

-Sylvia Plath

Fuck Thanksgiving.

2008-11-26T16:59:00.000-08:00

I just couldn't do it. I couldn't. I can't pretend to be happy on that day. I can't be thankful on that day. I can't be around all my relatives, pregnant relatives, happy relatives. My dad was a complete jerk about it when I called him. "Get with it" he said. I'm so sick of his 'toughen up' attitude. I'm just going to treat tomorrow like any other day, take a bath, watch movies, and not think about turkey or family.

I don't think I'll ever be able to celebrate it again. My second favorite holiday, all the family, all the food, none of the gifts, one more thing to mourn.

I just want my Myles, how can I be thankful? I was so thankful last year, 37 weeks, my little turkey Myles was cooked.

MISSing Myles, wishing my family understood, but I don't think they ever will.

Myles' big day (I didn't crawl into a hole)

2008-11-26T16:56:00.000-08:00

Technically, I birthed Myles on November 24, 2007, but we found out he was gone on the 23rd, maybe left us that very day. The 23rd always held special significance for me as I had experienced preterm labor, and November 23rd I was 37 weeks exact. It was my victory day. I made my space public for a short while and have been using it for a memorial site for him ( (as you may have seen). I'll change it back after Thanksgiving I think, another sad day, but i made it through the last one. Here's how the day went:

I thought I'd crawl in a hole these last few days, but my sister came down with her four kids (2,4,8,12) and of course Simone was there, and I have a small house, so I had a mad house. I ended up taking them all to the card store and letting them pick out what they think Myles would like, getting balloons and some party hats. They were a blessing (is there . Just what I needed to get the job done, with a smile, and some tears. My daughter of course told anyone who asked that we were celebrating her little brother's birthday, 'but he died'.

I added some pics and their in Myles slideshow. I just realized yesterday, I wanted a cake, and it did turn out nice. My sister and I sang the Rose, my 2 year old nephew popped Myles' balloon, but it was funny. The kids were so wise, and just said the right things. They're so innocent, they don't know enough about death to act all awkward and socially handicapped like adults do.

The day went well, but I'm glad this one is over. Now I have today, and tomorrow, all the rest of the days of my life living without my son to get through. I hope I find some healing days like I found this day in the future.

And btw, Thanks Heidi, you were amazing, just the person i needed. Wish mom coulda seen the balloon release, i saw you stopped by and put the ducks on Myles' stone. I love you so much, you're my best friend, even though I treat you like poop sometimes. I know you love me no matter what, and that means a lot to me.

November 16, 2007

2008-11-17T09:44:00.000-08:00

I'm 36 weeks today, and I am happy and miserable and nervous and excited and anxious and crabby all at the same time. Today I just wanted to hold my little baby so bad, I can't wait.

Brandon's in the dog house because he laughed (with a weird sort of triumph) when I told him I thought that I could be getting stretch marks under my bellybutton, my tummy is still free of stretch marks. Then, we're laying in bed and he says, "I can't believe you're getting so big." I'm like, jeez thanks, and he says, "Well you were just so skinny, who knew you could get so big." Yeah, seriously, he said this. His excuse is he's just proud his boy's getting big. It's irritating. I'm not reveling in my girth goddamnit, why should he get to?! I can't be too mad though, he acts as if the bigger I get, the more accomplished we are as parents. It's almost (but not quite) cute. I wonder if he were the one this gigantic if he would feel near so proud?

I look over the past year and compare it to last. So many changes have happened, and I just want to go back, back, back and I just keep moving forward. But not forward really; sideways, up, down (down, down, down). My hearts still lost somewhere back there. I wish my son were here with me this Thanksgiving, I feel like there is some alternate reality out there somewhere where he is. And we're all together as a family and happy like it was supposed to be. I can see it so clearly. I pretend to hold my son in my arms, it's so hard not having him here I like to pretend he is. And I know not everything would be better or perfect if he were here, but my heart would be so much bigger. The daily joys of a child? Oh, little children are so much fun. I could use some of that kind of life. That fun, some of those frustrations, and silly worries. Part of me wants to be oblivious to the harshness of this life, but part of me couldn't trade in the knowledge I have now, at how precious this life is. I just want my son.

Countdown: two weeks

2008-11-10T21:53:00.000-08:00

I've really fallen apart recently. One of my favorite movies is Donnie Darko (morbid I know) but I've just felt like what happened to him is happening to me. The past, present, and future, are all unrealized alternate realities due to some weird blip in the space time continuum, and yet there is this countdown, to the second, that will lead to self destruction. But for the better?

I was describing how I felt at Thanksgiving last year to my therapist. Oh, how I longed for my Turkey, Myles. I would make jokes about him as a turkey in the oven keeping him in there to get good and cooked (he wanted to come early), and how he was going to be an 8 pound holiday turkey, and I'd sing him the Adam Sandler thanksgiving song and my daughter would laugh with glee and Myles would kick at the rucus.

I remember being so thankful and happy. I had made it through many weeks of bedrest, and on the Friday after Thanksgiving, I would be 37 weeks. TERM!!! A term pregnancy. My daughter was born at 35 weeks, so making it even further, that was such an accomplishment. I thought the worse had come and past. I was counting my chickens before they hatched (a really sad platitude if you think about it). As Elizabeth mcCracken put it, i thought he was a sure thing. I tempted fate, not aloud, but i was certainly cavalier.

Could I wait for 40 weeks?! NO! I wanted him then, that suited me. That friday, November 23rd. I couldn't wait. So I did everything I could to make the contractions that had accompanied me for those long weeks of bedrest work to finally get him HERE, in my arms, my holiday baby that I imagined falling in love with so many times.

It sounds so silly, and romantic isn't the word for it, but I had the weeks after his birth planned like you would have a romantic vacation planned. I didn't want to leave the bed for the first week (YES, AFTER 9 weeks of bed rest!!!). We were going to nurse and sleep and play and bond, attachment parenting heaven.

I was so thankful that week, but for the wrong things. I was thankful that bed rest was over. I was thankful to get up and cook and clean and impress, my first thanksgiving in my own home. I was thankful that my son would be here soon. I was not thankful that he was still in my womb. I wanted him out of my body. I was not thankful (never was thankful) for being pregnant. I was not thankful for that wonderful Thanksgiving day with him inside me, myself completely oblivious to the fact he had likely already passed. That night we watched the movie 'Knocked up' eerily when I first began to wonder when i last felt him.

Life in the fast lane, taking everything and everyone for granted. Thinking I deserved my son. Feeling so entitled and bitter for those weeks of bed rest, broken down into seconds ticking in my mind each day of worry and frustration and of complete vulnerability. It was, nevertheless, hopeful worry as in my mind it was completely assured he'd arrive safe and healthy. He was my light at the end of a long dark tunnel, my reward for what I perceived to be my own self sacrifice, when really it feels like I was punished for caprice and ungratefulness.

That clock ticking away then is as loud and clear today as it was this exact day last november. But everything is the opposite. There is no hope this time, only a deep sense of loss, shame, and failure. But the ticking is there, in the back of my mind, like the crocodile searching for Captain Hook.

Not yet morning in America

2008-11-05T07:40:00.001-08:00

You will all have to forgive me, but I’m not celebrating yet. You see, he is President elect Obama. We have two months until he becomes President. And that scares the shit out of me. The negative campaign that capitalized on division and hatred has it’s true believers seething mad. Racist fascist right-wing fundamentalist assholes are waking up pissed off all over America and all over the world. So excuse me if I wait to cry and dance until inauguration day. I don’t think this President will make it. But that’s my life experience talking; calamity is around every corner in my world. I thought there was room in my heart for hope when it came to Obama, but I guess not. I’m just afraid this morning, and that makes me sad. No joy, not even in this.

Living liminally

2008-10-28T09:28:00.000-07:00

The other day, I got an email from an editor wanting me to review a book on my blog (my semi-pseudonymous blog). They sent me a free copy, and Brandon was so proud of me. He knows I could be a book reviewer (generally speaking) in a heartbeat, but I was less excited because I knew exactly what this book was, and why they wanted ME to review it on MY blog. Of course, I had to get the book on Oct. 15th, Pregnancy and Infant loss awareness day (not Pregnancy loss, stillbirth, and infant loss you'll notice).

The book is called, "An exact replica of a figment of my imagination." It's about a woman's stillbirth and the subsequent pregnancy and birth of her 'rainbow baby' (the term us forsaken mums use to refer to a living child after a stillbirth).

So, you'd think I'd gobble it up like every study on preterm labor and stillbirth I've consumed in the last year. It's short, and beautifully bound in baby boy blue, a book the old me could've read it in a matter of hours. She was a voracious reader. But, instead, I read the first page and put it down. It hit too close to home, that day, this Fall, that dark humor. This woman is me. And, godsdamnit, I don't like me. I don't need to read me. I don't want to read me. I need to read about politics. I need to read about the weather. I live this book every day. How can I possibly read it?

So, my friend called me today, so excited, totally ignorant to the memoir that has been sitting on my table torturing me since I received it on Oct. 15th. She had to tell me they were reviewing a book on stillbirth on NPR (god(s) love her, lol). Here it is if you'd all like to hear the review (5min), it's good:

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=96171637

So I don't know why I'm writing this blog. Mostly, because I've always liked the word liminal, and that's what this reviewer ended with, a ponderance on the word liminal. In the 11 months since I lost Myles, and really the months of bed rest before then, I didn't realize that I WAS fucking liminal. So I guess maybe now I've decided to finally pick up the baby blue book, this book about the full term stillbirth of a woman's beloved son, 'puddin', and just read the damn thing. Because as much as I know, I have lived, what's in it, if I can glean an insight from it, even a little one, maybe it's worth it. And I like the word liminal too.

Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness day

2008-10-15T13:42:00.000-07:00

We Miss You Myles 11/24/07

Though I believe that stillbirth should be in the title, Oct. 15th is a huge day to raise awareness about stillbirth. Too often, it's glossed over, forgotten or overshadowed as it is in the title. I'm feeling very sad today. There are just a lot of reminders, and I'll tell you, this time last year, I did not take note of this day. I couldn't have. How could I have known? I also just received my copy of "An Exact Replica of a Figment of My Imagination," which I plan on writing about here. Anyway, if anyone is reading it and wants to have a 'book club' with it where we can read and discuss, let me know in the comments. I started to read it, and I put it down until this evening, because it was too real. Especially the use of dark humor. I think I'm really going to like this book.

Anyway, earlier today, I decided to post something on my myspace page and on here, and looked for videos on pregnancy and infant loss. Needless to say, they were all religious and/or had country music. Now, I feel like an asshole for complaining about it, mostly because I'm ignorant as to even how to make a video such as these (and I would love to do one for Myles), let alone know how to post that video online. I just thought that I would find a video, like a nice secular PSA, to post to my friends. So, because I could find absolutely nothing, I've posted the best video I could find, CSPAN, 20 years ago, 1988. Enjoy:

We will be lighting a candle at 7pm in honor of Myles and all of the beautiful babies gone too soon.

Saying goodbye to complacency

2008-09-23T09:13:00.000-07:00

They say there is no wrong way to grieve, we all do what we have to do to survive, but I can tell you that I was doing it wrong. I began using alcohol, "responsibly", at first, but had it spiral out of control over the many months, slowly breaking my little rules that I set up to convince myself drinking wasn't a problem. By summer I was abusing alcohol, period. I managed to shield Simone from the brunt of it for a long time, but in the end, I was not being a good parent. I think that was the hardest part, and still is the hardest part now that I look back. She deserved better.

I'm happy to say that I've said goobye to alcohol for awhile and I don't think I've felt better for a very very long time. I realized that all I was doing was trying to escape from the pain. Whether it was my alcohol, my ipod, or my computer; I did not want to feel what I was feeling. After hitting rock bottom and almost committing suicide (I had convinced myself I was a terrible mother and Simone would be better without me, 'crazy' I know), I checked myself into the Psych ward at the hospital. It was my daughter's 5th birthday, and i think it will always be the single best gift I've ever given her.

Being there, where everything is done for you, where there are no responsibilities except getting better; I had to figure out very quickly what to do with myself without my distractions. No phone, no computer, no housework, no work, no childcare. It was soooooo hard. It's like I had to start all over and really question everything. But I learned that I can cope with the pain, it is bearable . . . barely.

. . .

So, here I am. I clawed my way out of the bottom of the pit. For months and months, I thought it was a bottomless pit, but I was wrong. I've stood at the bottom, it's the worst place you can be. I can't say I wish I had never been there, however. I think that knowing there is a bottom, having stood in the darkness, seeing no light above me, but knowing I could sink no further, grounded me in a way I never expected. One thing I came to realize there is how alienated my dh and I have gotten from each other. I realized during my four days at the hospital, that I would not be able to heal if I did not address the problems in our lives. I was wonder woman for so many years, I didn't even realize that i was trying to be everything to everyone. I needed boundaries, space, and a room of my own. Hence, the separation.
We haven't been happy for a long time, and I realize now that I was putting too much pressure on Myles. In the first few months, I would always cry for the longest time about how he was my 'savior', oh how my life needed that baby. In the pit, and over the last few weeks, I've really thought about what I was saying. How could I have so much riding on him, this tiny little innocent baby? He wouldn't have been my savior, everything would not be miraculously perfect if he were here. I see this realization as a gift from him, he WAS perfect, will always be perfect, but nothing else in this life is. I am so grateful to have had him in my life, he has given me the most precious gift in this world. He has helped me to realize that I do not have this life figured out, that it is much tougher than I ever realized, and that I can make mistakes but be better for them if I work hard enough? I will be forever indebted to my son.
. . .

Brandon and I started counseling a few weeks ago, and it has already started to help us reconnect. He has had chronic back pain for many years, and the separation and counseling has helped both of us realize that what I was doing with alcohol he has been doing with painkillers. Now that he has had no painkillers for over a week, he realizes he was not just numbing his back pain.

It's almost like we took turns bottoming out. It's so hard seeing him standing at the bottom of that pit this week. One of us has to be here for my daughter, and it's hard to think that for awhile, we might have been meeting her needs, but we weren't really 'there' for her. We were just getting by. Today, I am 'there' for her, and for him, and that feels really good.It's been overwhelming to see him crying everyday, I've never seen him cry like this. For the first time ever, having him say to me, "I need you. Please, help me." My Brandon never asks for help. And I've been staying the night back at our house to take care of him. I see our separation as short term because I still love him and I do not want a divorce. I may even want more children together someday. But I am committed to it through November and maybe longer, and I fully realize that it may end in divorce, and that divorce does not necessarily mean failure. I think an unhappy marriage is a bigger failure than any divorce. Complacency is the root of all evil. Anyway, even after only a month, I can already thank our separation for a new level of awareness in our marriage and in our parenting. It seemed like forever that we were just trading off babysitting, going through the motions, and now we are being more concerted in our effort to heal, not just ourselves, but our family.
. . .

Last night, I asked DH, where would we be if Myles had lived? And we both, for the first time acknowledged together that WE might be no better. We would have our darling son, and there is no doubt he would've brought so much joy to our world, anyone who knows us knows we both looooove babies sooooo much. But we wouldn't have this opportunity to stand back from our lives and truly question everything, to be able to really ask, "am I happy?" and to be strong enough to answer, "no", and take that knowledge and have the courage to change our lives for the better. Moving out was the hardest thing I've done, it's still not easy today, but I've realized anything worth doing is not going to be easy.

So here I am, a day away from 10 months without my Myles, exactly a year from the day i began my preterm labor and the long weeks of bed rest that did not culminate happily as I was so certain they would. The countdown has begun, and I have no doubt the next few months will be hard. But I do not think they will be my hardest. I can look back now and clearly see the worst months behind me, and that gives me hope that no matter how many good and bad days await in my future, that they will never be as bad as they have been.

I will survive.

Sorry I've been gone

2008-09-11T22:00:00.000-07:00

I can't say no news is good news. However, I have stopped drinking and have never had a more clear objective view of my life. It's terrifying and liberating.

Tonight, I was invited to go to a dinner for an organization that does work to improve maternal fetal health. The focus of the dinner was prematurity. Now, I had my daughter at 35 weeks, and I went into preterm labor with my son at 28 weeks, and proceeded to be on bed rest until I lost him for no reason at 37 weeks at Thanksgiving. He had always been wonderful, I'd always, always say, "I never worry about Myles, he's a fighter," because he kicked me soooo much. I thought I had made it when I lost him. All those weeks worrying, sacrificing, putting up with mom, mil rotating to come help and stay with us. I thought it was the worst thing in the world, bed rest, the fear of him coming early and being in the NICU.

So I had to listen to a panel of parents whose children were sick and in the NICU, pretty freaking terrifying. But I could not, just could not bear to hear there stories, as amazing as I know they would've been to me 18 months ago. They were talking about family support, and care packages, and all this stuff they gave them. They only made cursory mention of bereavement, none of the parents on the panel had lost an infant, and there book had one page on infant loss. But on that one page, they talked about helping plan funeral services. And the packages they got were beautiful. (Which makes me all the more made when I see that they would turn away bags from anyone for anything!!! ).

Nobody would say the word death. They'd just allude to it, and then they would cry about how close their children came. All I could think about was Myles. It was torture. And I couldn't help but being angry with them. I've said to myself many times, if Myles had come early, he'd likely be here. But then I look at the statistics for a 28 weeker, and they have a worst chance of neonatal death (5%) than anyone has risk of stillbirth (1%). So I can't say the statistics were in our favor if he had come on Sept. 23rd.

So I actually envied them. And while I was doing it, I was thinking how awful I was. I almost had to get up and leave. Then, they had speakers on about infant loss. I'm thankful for the work they do. But why wasn't anyone talking about stillbirth?! They were more afraid to utter it, than the word death. Sigh. Why is fetal death so taboo?!

I've been gone for awhile. It's good to be back. This fall has been hard, Myles seems to always be on my mind lately. I was walking in Walgreens, and I looked up, and I saw Halloween stuff!!! And my mind transported me instantly back, and for a millisecond I felt like it was a year ago. How can minutes seem like hours, but the time has gone by in a blink of an eye? I've lost almost a whole year now.

One thing I can remember with such utter happiness, is that my mom was down before Halloween and we decided to paint a pumpkin on my big pregnant belly. And it fills me with such sadness that he is not here with us to go trick or treating. But I'm so thankful that I thought of doing that then (I was on bed rest already, but with hope, as I'd made it through October). I'm so grateful I have those memories of his first halloween, when he was my little pumpkin.MISSing Myles and all our precious little ones this Fall

How I fell apart

2008-08-13T15:14:00.000-07:00

I'm trying to figure out why I had a 'nervous breakdown'. All I know is I hate the terms crazy and insane now, especially now that I realize I tell Simone she's 'driving me crazy'. My dad and I came up with the new term blonders (kind of like bonkers, but with a small dig at the blondies out there).

We had Simone's 5th birthday up there in the Psych ward; it was actually kind of special. Everyone had cake and ice cream and sang to her, and my honey took her to red lobster for supper afterwards (she is a shrimpaholic, not breaded shrimp either). Anyway, knowing that I might not make her b-day, or party, it was so much harder to admit myself, but I am now convinced I gave her the best gift I could give at the time.

So what does a nervous breakdown look like? I don't know. Ask B. All I know is how it felt, and that whatever it was, it was definitely a negative energy just radiating off of me; racing thoughts, the inability to stop crying, sleep, eat. Impulsvity is through the roof. Um. I think it's like watching a house you've built yourself crumble before your eyes.

So when 'your house' falls down like that, there is no logic. No thinking. Nothing is rational anymore. I realize now I had a panic attack Tuesday night and was deeply depressed by Wednesday morning. I was a danger to myself, I felt unable to care for Simone.

I wish I could describe it better. It's like taking the butterflies that are in your stomach, and turning up the volume from 1 to 100, instantly. Fight or flight, I'm not sure which one I did, but they are both the same response really. Whether you're running away or getting ready to duke it out, your heart and mind is racing miles a minute. Then you realize you have no idea where the predator is, I think because really the predator is you. There is no running away except maybe in death, which is extremely tempting. I'd like to think I chose to fight it out and I won. I think, though, that I won the battle, but am I still at war? Yes. To deny it is to go back to complacency.

Psychiatric Ward

2008-08-10T06:43:00.000-07:00

I'm back from the Affective Disorders unit at the hospital (the Psych ward). The grief finally caught up with me I've been there since Wednesday and got discharged about an hour ago. I wish I could say I'm feeling better, but I just found out my cousin died. His mom is such a special lady, his kids are such beautiful kids, my heart is in pain for them. He was a wonderful father and son, please keep my family in NY in your thoughts.

Because I have a mental illness, I will write about my experiences, because of the stigma, I will write about my experiences, I feel it weighing on me. So, I will write, like I always do, my friends, and because you're my friends, you'll listen I hope.

I want to survive, I will survive. It's just soooooo hard when you feel so down about yourself that you think you're doing other's a favor. That's how backwards your thinking can get. It's scary having thoughts you can't control, it's the most frightening thing I've experienced. It really is mental illness, I can't describe it (but has that ever stopped me from trying? smile:).

She wrote my soul

2008-07-24T19:48:00.000-07:00

. . . in a topic I started on a message board for bereaved parents I wrote about my incredible loneliness lately, a fellow mother wrote me this and she said I could repost it. I just want you all to understand when I'm not myself, it's because I'm not myself, not even to me:

Yes, it's hard to recognize ourselves. I guess because we really are profoundly changed people, right down to a cellular level. (she's right, chimerism, Myles will always literally be a part of me) There just isn't any going back to the old person we once were no matter how we try. You can only be you as you are right now - not as you were once or even as you are yet to be. This is true for everyone but family and friends can't see it in themselves because their changes have been in tiny progressions rather than in one great big lump of searing pain.

You, right now, are a lump of searing pain. And that is absolutely to be expected. Your beautiful son died!! You already know that this feeling is transitory (the get better, get worse experiences) and that even though it may be the dominant feeling right now, you have glimpses of other feelings. And eventually, there will be more of those. There will. (((((((hugs))))))))))The thing that always got to me was a feeling that somehow, others expected me to know how to navigate this horrible new agonizing world of being mother to a dead child. But it was all new to me too, so how could I know? They then would think that since I didn't know, they should come up with some (crap) suggestions of how to do it. But it seems to me, that no matter who we are, we all have to find our own way through this and yes, it is so lonely, especially when it's hard to recognize ourselves.

I'd even feel lonely in my own company! It's that Edvard Munch painting that comes to mind again.

As a sociologist, I don't think I've ever been in such a norm-less environment, it's an awful place to be sometimes.

2008-07-21T21:23:00.000-07:00

I can be surrounded by people, and I just feel so alone. So utterly desperately alone. I feel abandoned by my husband, he just doesn't get it. 8 months on Thursday, jeez, when is the 24th? It's like my subconscious knows it, but the rest of me is on pause while the world moves on around me.

I get 'better' I get 'worse' I get really 'better' then I get really 'worse'. I just want to disappear. Why do I feel so alienated around my old family and friends? I think they're plotting against me. They don't like my drinking, blah, blah, blah, they worry because I've lost a lot of weight. I don't know what to say? I'm not hungry. Food does not bring me joy.

My self worth is shattered. My body killed my baby, somehow, someway, and someday I'll know. Well, it's either drink and sleep at 10 or be up til 3, and I prefer to take some ibuprofen and handle the hangover, then miss sleep, wake up late for work (which I eerily don't get hangovers anyway) and I haven't had any blackouts, I'm maintaining.

Oh, fuck me, I'm just defeated, and the thoughtless comments have only just begun. My mom is putting pressure on me to be 'stronger', everyone wants the 'old Trish', my dad asked me if I was going to have another baby. They STILL don'te get that I will never the be the good ole predictable, debatin', grinning, thriving woman I once was. That's not me, they don't get it. My husband says he doesn't know me anymore, and I'm like, "join the club". Hell, I'd like to be let in cause I don't know what I'm going to do half the time; how I'm going to react.

Oh, this has turned into the nightmare blog of the century. On a happy note, I axed down a cedar today for my Myles garden (sorry Leigh, I do want to comment but sometimes I can't) and it just brought out so much anger. Has anyone here used an axe, they're fantastic, but where gloves. Of course, now I've got this tree to move but that didn't occur to me as I cussed at it and pulled on it, and tore that sucker to the ground. But darn it, my butterfly bushes and snowball bush weren't getting enough sun!

On an angry note, there was another burial in baby land today, I just drive up knowing, saying 'no, no, no, not another' seeing the awning, getting angry as I get closer, so mad it has happened again. Just so mad, I don't know what I'd do if I didn't have that 15 foot cedar to chop down.

Okay, I am losing. Don't know if it's just life (my laptop died, my transmission went out, my cell phone got lost) and I DO feel like Dory off of 'finding Nemo'. I hate the new me as much as my family, don't know how much I loved the 'old me' even then. So I'm just like everyone else, except I get to worry about being worried about, yipee.

I feel so alone, but surrounded by TOO many people who love me TOO much.
MISSing my son TERRIBLY, today, and always. I love you, Myles.

Can I rant about women's health issues?!

2008-07-16T07:33:00.000-07:00

I mean, this is my research, so most of my ranting takes place in a confined academic setting where I can't actually 'rant' more like humbly share my opinion in 10 to 15 second intervals. I'm finding this all overlapping with my freakishly fucked up life and I'm just in the need to write a rant that covers the gamut of what I do each fucking day.

This morning, I woke up to this article:
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1823096,00.html?cnn=yes
Now, Cochrane reviews are the BOMB. And I know women who have had many benign biopsies that are fucking painful.

So, as a society, we're all obsessively individualistic. In the health world? Yep, it's all on US (me and you), ladies and gents. So as a public health person, there is nothing that pisses me off more than this individualistic view on health aimed at changing our individual behaviors and SHIFTING responsibility, guilt, blame, and shame on us.

What does this relate to, oh let me think . . . KICK COUNTS . Yes, you know, that magical solution to stillbirth. For the record, fuck kick counts. Yep. That's right. I would never tell anyone to do them, I didn't do them, and they wouldn't have done shit for me. So I'm not carrying that baggage for the public health community any fucking more. What else does this relate to, BED REST, CERCLAGES, FETAL MONITORING on low-risk pregnancies, pap smears (which are only really needed every three years if that!).

You know what else? Fuck self breast exams, I don't fucking do them, I NEVER have, and I HAVE FELT GUILTY. NOT ANY MORE!!!!

Fuck it all, because at this point, I don't think there is anything in women's health that is EVIDENCE BASED, it's all a bunch of fucking bullshit. And I'm tired of carrying this individualistic bucket of water around for the public health community and for the peace of mind of doctors who don't miss a wink of sleep over recommending stupid spoonfed BULLSHIT about CHOICES.

So, here is my message to the public health community, and this is my goal as a reasearcher, as a woman, as a mother to a daughter; get the fuck off our backs and start working on the motherfucking institutional and socioeconomic causes OF BREAST CANCER, CERVICAL CANCER, and STILLBIRTH and PREMATURE LABOR. Because there are studies, a fucking ton of them if you ever wanted to pick up a Soc of health journal or gender and health book written by sociologists that indicate this shit is societal. We are organizing our society in a way that HURTS WOMEN'S HEALTH. And, because we live longer, but have more disabilities (yes, took a comprehensive exam on this issue), it's in our societies economic interests to FUCKING DO IT.

Thank you. Had to get that off my chest this morning before I go talk about this bullshit all day at work with a big grin on my face being a yes girl to all the psychologists and MALE MD's who think they know what the fuck they're doing.

Wisdom from my Simone

2008-07-03T10:47:00.000-07:00

I'm drying my tears, I can't tell if I'm crying because I'm happy or sad, has anyone felt that way before? I had to share this discussion before we leave town today.

Simone watches NOGGIN, which is like channel 36 here, and it doesn't have commercials and it's for preschoolers, blah, blah, blah. Well, in between shows they have these series' that teach and help kids learn, and one they introduced recently was Babu (a preschooler) and his pregnant mommy. It's very cute, the family is cute, the narrator talks with happy music in the background as the Babu helps is pregnant mom. Under most circumstances, it's fuckin' adorable. It's something I would've been all over last summer, showing Simone how she was just like the little boy on tv.

This summer, I see it, and I'm annoyed. I do my best to not have a reaction because I don't want Simone to know my aversion to this stuff, but she knows. Well today we saw the snippet (in between shows, I'm folding laundry, Simone's coloring) where the mom brings baby home and they talk about their cultural traditions, and how 'now he's a big brother' (as if he wasn't when his mom was pg, just a peeve) and I take a short breath and just leave the room. I'm cleaning so I didn't think Simone would notice. Well, she's more astute than I give her credit for. I come back five minutes later (I'd forgotten the commercial, the whole point of walking away) but then Simone says:

Simone: Mom, does watching Babu and the baby remind you of Myles?

Me: Yes (I say gently), does it remind you of Myles?

Simone: Yes

Me: What does it make you think of ?(I'm preparing for something really depressing, like I think, about him not being here, and us not bringing him home. You know, things I think when I see those commercials). Instead:

Simone: It makes me think about when Myles was in your tummy and we would sing to him and he'd kick me with his little foot, laughing the whole time.

Me: (surprised, joyous, stupored) yeah, he made us so happy didn't he?
Simone: Mom, maybe you and dad need to write that down, you know, like on a list, so you don't forget it.

She's so amazing, and so right, I see those commercials and all I think of is the bad, but good old Simone, this whole time when she's zombified watching this scenario on tv she's so familiar with, she's remembering how much fun we had. Why can't I be more like her. One more time, Simone takes my breath away, just like the day she was born, you know?

I missed my first 24th, but I didn't

2008-06-28T11:51:00.000-07:00

The sixth month mark was so big, and June went by (in a good way to an extent) like one of those commercials where everything is moving in fast motion all around you. May was so horrid. And now I feel guilty because I forgot my baby. I was actually there on his day briefly, swinging by his grave like I like to do, I did have a 'bad' day, I was just down.

Ah, retrospect, how did I know? I knew I was missing something, missing my son who should be with me 24/7, giggling. Missing his day. How could I?

Seven months old, I should be trying sweet potatoes and solids and . . . I don't like the new me either, the new me is a slacker who is apathetic, indifferent, why can't the best be brought out in me? Instead, the anger and frustration.MISSing Myles, today, and every 24th and every other day of the month too, god damn it.

People talk to me about days, weeks, months, next week, last week, they're all so jumbled up. I've resorted to a calendar and frequent calls and emails reconfirming appointments I can't keep straight, I kept it all in my head before, and I can't do it now. Now that I've forgotten my little man's day, it makes me mad. That time has moved on around me. That I have moved with it, I just want to go back. It's like I'm moving further away from him. And all I want is to be close to him again. Every day, that would be my wish.

Time moving forward hurts, taking these steps through grief, so tricky, nothing is positive, everything is both, negative and positive. Painful and powerful, beautiful and cruel.

I'm missing that I missed Myles' day, missing that grief that I had always anticipated before, honored, acknowledged. I hope he would forgive me and maybe be happy though it breaks my heart. I would be happy for my mother, you know?

I drove to the cemetary today, a string of events has now led me down this different path of grief, one not so fresh, but old, and always there, but underneath even the happiness and joy sometimes.

I wrote my letter to him and him to me. It was good, I wrote it on butterfly paper given to me as a gift from an old garage sale, so precious. I wrote a letter from me to Myles and Myles to me, and left them there. It was good to do and I thank Joanne for suggesting it. My views are very naturalistic, and tonight I watched the fireflies.

Another mothers poem really made me try to rethink it all a few weeks back, and I felt myself moving on but it wasn't until I missed that day (the 24th, 7 months) I knew I had actually transitioned. We always yearn for the old and familar eh? The old grief I knew intimately.

This poem (about 6 weeks ago) made me think and notice everything about nature differently, that Myles is just not 'there' at the cemetary, that he is everywhere and in every beautiful thing I see. I'll repost:

Do not stand at my grave and weep,

I am not there, I do not sleep,

I am a thousand winds that blow,

I am the sparkle on the snow,

I am the sun, on ripened grain,

I am the gentle summers rain,

And when you wake in mourning’s hush,

I am the swift uplifting rush... of quiet birds in circled flight,

I am the Moon and Stars at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry,I am not here, I did not die.

I wrote it on the back of his tattered picture I keep in my back pock. In retrospect, it was his message to me when I wrote it on there that day last week.

And I've been learning gardening, and appreciating nature, and the cycle of life. It just hurts to 'move on' to change my hair, and to be changed (the new me is very different), and to find so much has changed, but everything is still the same (same house, same dogs, same family, same jobs) and we were a hous in anticipation of so much change . . . change that never happened like we'd anticipated but CHANGE nonetheless.

We got change all right.

A tornado swirled through my life and left everything in it's place but nothing untouched.

My Menses

2008-06-25T10:39:00.000-07:00

Clockwork. Never skipped a period (except for pg), after Simone, I breastfed for 2.5 years, got mine back on month 12 and it was the same from there after.

30 days. 30 days give or take, but 30 days.

Now? Well, I waited 18 weeks to get a menstrual cycle, unheard of by all the moms I know who've experienced stillbirth.

Then, that one was so heavy I woke up in the middle of the night with blood all over my pj's, even though I was wearing some super duper night pad more akin to a diaper.

Then I spotted on days 15-18. They I waited until day 42 for the next one. Same as the first, heavy flow, spotting on or around those days, then it took 36 days this time.

WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME???

Why does everyone tell me it's fucking stress too. Don't tell me about stress. I'm a stressed person generally and I've gone through many periods of my life where my stress load was off the charts. Yeah, yeah, yeah, this is 'different', fuck that.

I'm not going to sit around and poo poo myself anymore, and I certainly don't want these MOFO doctors to do it to me either.

My shitlist of doctors, I'll never see Dr. D again which basically means I'm fucked when it comes to my next pg as I'm high risk.

Don't fucking tell me the second time you've met me that my stress level is high and then argue with me because I'm crying because MY SON DIED. I'm not crying because I'm being irrational, nothing you've said has made me cry, you're not that important to me doc. I cry because I love and miss my son, and if when I speak of him and I cry, it doesn't mean my fucking brain has shut off or that now I need treated like a mental patient. I have a psychiatrist and psychologist, I want a OB/GYN to sit and talk to me and answer my questions and speak to me like I know what or how the pituitary, hypathalomus, Follicles and their associated hormones work. I do. I just need some help

I hate doctors

2008-06-24T20:31:00.000-07:00

I do. I will be one next year. But I'll be a research doctor, I'm the one who comes up with the statistics everyone else is SUPPOSED to go by. Of course, nothing in a doctors office is hardly ever evidence based, and you better bet if its a drug you're receiving from your OB/GYN it has not been FDA approved for pregnant women. Basically, me and you are the guinea pigs. And they wonder, hmmmmm, why is maternal mortality rising. What causes 50% of stillbirth and 50% of SIDS births a year. Some magic freaking charm?!!!!!!

So help me, if I ever go through pregnancy again, I am not telling anyone, I'm getting a doppler and I'm just going with the flow. Because all these mofo doctors base everything off of is the trend (pharmaceuticals, hitech machines that don't tell you shit) and NOT WOMEN.

Okay, I''ll give more detail about this rant, but I've bawled for two days now, and I just want to know why. Why did I know there was something wrong? Why do these tests keep coming up borderline? Why, why, why? There are no answers, even to why I have a 42 day menstrual cycle with spotting when half my goddamn life I'd have periods like fucking clockwork.

Do they really want me to believe that everything (and oh, could I make a list) that EVERYTHING is unrelated. Fucking bullshit. And don't tell me, 'chances are', because that was my whole last pregnancy, me telling myself, 'chances, everything is fine, I'm overreacting'. Well guess what? I wasn't. I knew. And I didn't know how or what or why or even imagine I'd ever lose my baby. But I knew there was something wrong. And I'll be damned if I don't pay attention to what I believe are warning signs now.

I just hate being pooh, poohed. Talk to me like a fucking colleague because I do research in the development and reproductive health. Don't fucking listen to me like I'm 'hysterical' (as in hysterectomy, as in emotional, as in angry) because I want to theorize about what might be going on based on the in depth calendar I have of my menses.

Fucking bastard. Sorry. Didn't realize how pissed I was until just this moment.

Menstruation; I'm for the 13 month calendar

2008-06-16T18:49:00.000-07:00

hopefully the title filtered out those of you who don't care to hear my TMI blogs. If not, this isn't one, or it is. Toughen up and figure it out wusses. LOL. I am crazy.

I've become more naturalistic in my worldview, gardening, for example, and it's been my release (especially the axe and these horrid bushes out front). Well, here are some really neat facts about women and menstruation. (on re-reading these first two sentences have much to do with one another).

We've used natural family planning since Simone was born, which was completely predictable. I didn't know what I had until it was gone (ain't that everyone's life story? fuck.) Of course now I'm dealing with complete unpredictableness, and I can't figure out why despite OCD bordline searches for obscure articles that result in me being obsessed with chimeraism (women carry their fetuses DNA for sometimes up to 27 years, and fetuses carry their mothers, and they think it might have to do with autoimmune disorders).

Why!!!??? Why can't my body be normal and menstruate?!! (Where is that axe, that B accused me of swinging like a bat, Heidi, LOL. My chopping 'form' has gotten better). Shouldn't I get a 'life is easy' pass now that Myles is gone? I don't think I should ever have to put up with anyone's shit again, ask B, and especially not my own god damn body.

Blah, so now I think my body is dysfunctional (to say the least). I know many women have experienced this feeling, trying to conceive, or who have experienced miscarriage or pregnancy loss, like me. It's more than annoying.

Anyway, the whole point of this post was to share THIS site that (I'm linking and quoting) which cheered me up. Hope others are empowered by it too, Guys and gals :) Sorry about the bitchfest.

From the site: http://www.fwhc.org/health/moon.htm

Moon Time

Throughout all cultures, the magic of creation resides in the blood women gave forth in apparent harmony with the moon, and which sometimes stayed inside to create a baby. This blood was regarded with reverence: it had mysterious magical powers, was inexplicably shed without pain, and was wholly foreign to male experience. Early menstrual rites were perhaps the first expression of human culture.

Native American (Lakota):
"Follow your Grandmother Moon. Her illuminating cycles will transform your spirit." Begin with the Grandmother Moon at her brightest and most open. This is a time of outward activity and high energy. Sleep where the moonlight touches you. Walk outside where there are no artificial lights. Feel joy and creativity. As the Grandmother begins to cover her face, begin to withdraw into a quieter, less social place. Move to that inward place that is more about "being" than "doing." In the dark of the moon, when bleeding, the veil between you and the Great Mystery is the thinnest. Be receptive to visions, insights, intuitions. Go to a quiet separate place such as a Moon Lodge. Later, come out of the dark, a woman with a cleansed body. As the moon returns, come back out into the world, carrying your vision.

Customs and Traditions
Indians of South American said all humans were made of "moon blood" in the beginning.
In Mesopotamia, the Great Goddess created people out of clay and infused them with her blood of life. She taught women to form clay dolls and smear them with menstrual blood. Adam translates as bloody clay.

In Hindu theory, as the Great Mother created the earth, solid matter coalesced into a clot with a crust. Women use this same method to produce new life.
The Greeks believed the wisdom of man or god was centered in his blood which came from his mother.

Egyptian pharaohs became divine by ingesting the blood of Isis called sa. Its hieroglyphic sign was the same as the sign of the vulva, a yonic loop like the one on the ankh, RFLMAO
From the 8th to the 11th centuries, Christian churches refused communion to menstruating women.

In ancient societies, menstrual blood carried authority, transmitting lineage of the clan or tribe.
Among the Ashanti, girl children are more prized than boys because a girl is the carrier of the blood.
Chinese sages called menstrual blood the essence of Mother Earth, the yin principle giving life to all things.

Some African tribes believed that menstrual blood kept in a covered pot for nine months had the power to turn itself into a baby.

Easter eggs, classic womb-symbols, were dyed red and laid on graves to strengthen the dead. freaky

A born-again ceremony from Australia showed the Aborigines linked rebirth with blood of the womb.

Post-menopausal women were often the wisest because they retained their "wise blood." In the 17th century these old women were constantly persecuted for witch craft because their menstrual blood remained in their veins.

Calendars:
The Roman Goddess of measurement, numbers, calendars, and record-keeping; derived from the Moon-goddess as the inventor of numerical systems; measurer of time.
It has been shown that calendar consciousness developed first in women because their natural body rhythms corresponded to observations of the moon. Chinese women established a lunar calendar 3000 years ago. Mayan women understood the great Maya calendar was based on menstrual cycles. Romans called the calculation of time menstruation, meaning knowledge of the menses. In Gaelic, menstruation and calendar are the same word.

The lunar calendar's thirteen 28-day months had four 7-day weeks, marking the new, waxing, full, and waning moons. Thirteen months is 364 days. Pagan traditions describe an annual cycle as a 13 months and a day. Even today, Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon after the spring equinox. The 13 month calendar also led to pagan reverence for the number 13 and the Christian attempts to demolish it. Generally, the ancient symbols of matriarchy were the night, moon and 13. Patriarchy (under Christianity) honored the day, the sun and 12.

Irrational thoughts and deep anger.

2008-05-22T14:43:00.000-07:00

This was a conversation I was having online and it summed it perfectly.

Sometimes our heads think things, or thoughts pop in, or better described, feelings, or images. We can't control that. I bet I could name something every single day that has made me ashamed to have thought. Whether it is instantaneous or years later. What matters is what you do. You're not going to follow through and wish them the worst every single day, or sabatoge them or go out of your way.

Case in point, I will admit that within the last week I have contemplated many things anybody who knows me would be aghast at. Luckily I have a therapist who I can be honest with and say, 'I've had these thoughts and they bother me and sometimes scare me.' My most irrational thought and feeling that has occurred and reoccurred to me; my step sister in law (my dad's stepDIL, my stepmom's DIL) is now pg with her 3rd pregnancy, due in DECEMBER.

And you don't know how angry that makes me at them.

At the world. But especially at THEM.

I WAS SUPPOSED TO HAVE A XMAS BABY. ME. I WAS SUPPOSED TO BE THE ONE ARRIVING VICTORIOUSLY, HOME FOR CHRISTMAS WITH MY NEW BABY. I'M SO ANGRY AND HURT. This past Christmas no one once mentioned Myles when I was with them. It was the elephant the room and I felt contagious. Luckily I was still in shock at the time, but in hindsight, I can believe nobody just said, 'he Trish, I'm so sorry that happened to you'. I've had a lot of friends do it and be wonderful, but my son is dead less than a month and his name wasn't mentioned in that hous.

I don't wish them ill will, I've actually liked them, they're fun to talk to. That's the kicker, THEY ARE PERFECT and my Dad likes them better than me sometimes I think because I'm some liberal atheist. And they're like such conformists.

So what thought keeps running through my head? THEY STOLE MY BABY! That's how I feel, when I told my sistder that day, I just broke down and said, "they stole my baby" in sobs. And I'm sure they didn't do it on purpose, go out of there planning a December baby, and I'm sure they weren't thinking, they should stop ttc in March/April so they don't ruin every Xmas for me from here on out. I dread next Christmas with all my heart.

I'm so angry about this, even now, right this second, even though I know it's completely irrational. All I think is 'they stole my baby'.

My epiphany

2008-05-09T00:34:00.000-07:00

I haven't had a religious epiphany from losing my son. When my grandmother said he was in the arms of Jesus, I said 'he's at peace', and that was it.

Weeks since then, I realized part of deconstructing me (see last blog about imperfection) was trying to remember again what it felt to really be joyous. What things really bring me joy, and which don't. I found joy in nothing for many months; not eating, not sleeping, not even Simones shenanigans.

But it all finally came down to the question: what do I want from this world in the short term? If you could live your last day, and you knew it, what would you do?
Well, what I realized is that I've come to a more naturalistic worldview. Not Wiccan (sp?) but just the cruelty and beauty of what life is. Every day should be a good day to die, and I put that quote on my profile only days before Myles died. I took it off, felt like an asshole, but I still believe it even though I can't accept the fact that he should have at least died in my arms if I was going to have to say goodbye forever.

So the other day, I layed in the sun, just plopped down on my front deck and soaked in the rays, and I was happy. And I've been thinking about planting a garden, I've been moving perennials, putting some rocks up, and I'm just learning, but its challenging and fascinating and the suns rays feel like Myles. I like to think his energy is apart of them.

So I guess what I find faith in is the cycle of life. People call people tree huggers, but have any of you hugged a tree? I have. It was terrific. And I'm going to plant a tree that I have for Myles, and I'm going to plant whatever I can for him in the next few weeks. Because he was here and just as quick he was gone, and he was just as much a part of the cycle of life that I am or you are. I told my daughter a loooong time ago that everything that lives must die. I remind her of it if she asks. But not in a dreary way, more like an adventure. I tell her if everyone lived forever, life wouldn't be so special. It would have neither beauty nor cruelty, and that in the grand scheme, we are pretty lucky to find ourselves here, in a finite world. And I think Myles was even fortunate, to live, even such a short life, with love, and laughter, and singing, and talk always revolving around him. He kicked my sister in the head, and punched or kicked at least every other person dear to me.

Maybe living and dying in the womb is so not so bad after all. No hunger, I like to think no pain, just a warm embrace and a slow awareness of the voices and sounds around you. And he was a part of our family, he heard not just our laughter, but our arguments, Simone's tantrums, and my stress. All the while he was warm and nurtured, and growing and learning, and he will never know the sadness we feel that he is gone. I'm glad for that. All he knew was contentment and wonder, and maybe that's not so bad?

He felt love, but never grief. Maybe it's selfish to wish him with me instead, maybe he had felt the best life had to offer, hopefully not the worst.

Hope

2008-04-27T19:09:00.000-07:00

We could all use a little bit of hope, and I thought this picture was beautiful.
Of course, I think she should be pg, or have a child in her arms, but the musical instrument is symbolic of that. The hope of creating something so beautifule you close your eyes and feel like you're on top of the world.

Simone knows too much

2008-04-24T07:09:00.000-07:00

No, I'm not talking about life and death, I'm talking about sex. So I told you all how one day in the car, with the utmoust sincerity and very resolutely, Simone said that NEXT time, she wants to see us MAKE the baby. This kid's seen it all when it comes to carrying and birthing babies, so it was only a natural request. Well, B and I got a good laugh and told her we didn't think so; luckily that's the last we've heard of that one.

NOW, Holly Disco (our Christmas kitty that we've been so thankful for) is in . . . heat. I don't know how it happened, not even technically. I don't mind admitting I know very little about a cat's reproductive system. Disco's still so little! She's my little kitten, damnit. I've never had a cat that has gone into heat.

Anyway, So I was clueless when I heard her meowing at 7am yesterday morning. This cat doesn't say much (B's never heard her meow) I thought she was trapped somewhere. When I actually got up (930ish, hehe) I went looking for her to make sure she wasn't locked in a room somewhere. She was just chillin' under the table by then, so I wondered why she was meowing but, oh well.

Then last night, I noticed her ass up in the air. Her tail is off to the side and she's purring at everybody's feet. And when I say everybody, I mean both the dogs who are just trying to nap, poor things. Usually, she's way too cool for the dogs (as all cats are), she has certainly never layed down beside them and in front of them purring and putting her ass in their face. So it dawned on me. Shit. She was supposed to get fixed last week and we forgot, we would've done it just in time, too. She has an appt. this next Monday, but Monday is a long ways a way.
So I wondered how this topic would be broached with Simone and I decided, as most parents do about most things, avoid the subject at all cost. I managed okay, Simone seemed oblivious most of the evening. At bed time, Simone was coloring on the bed (and jumping on it, and being crazysleepyrotten) I walk in to suddenly find her with kitty on the bed and kitty's purring and Simone is so excited that kitty is giving her so much attention.

Simone: Mommy, kitty's acting funny. (she's says quizzically and with a giggle.)

Me: I know, now get her off my bed. (I say very authoritatively)

Simone: Why Mom? she likes me. (she says sadly)

Usually Disco runs from Simone if she hasn't already been trapped by the death grip. And she's was just petting her back and Holly was purring away.

Me: I know honey (I say sympathetically). Now, get her off MY bed.
Ugh, the phone rings. As I'm on the phone, I watch her pet kitty, and I'm unnerved by the fact this cat is standing on my bed. Just as I get off the phone she grabbed kitty's tail (kitty immediately raises her ass straight in the air) and then Simone laughs and tickles Disco's ass with the end of her own tail, to kitty's obvious delight. Simone thought it was hilarious (and it kind of was in a really disturbing way because I've never seen a cat act that way either) but I took action, I wanted that cat away from my daughter and off my goddamn bed.

I shoo the cat off (basically yell at her in a gruff voice and clap my hands). And of course, yay, Simone and I get another opportunity to talk about boys and girls and pee-pee's and how girls carry and feed babies, etc., etc. And then I break it to her, Disco is growing up and she wants to make babies and that's why we're getting her 'fixed'.

She was so excited, her eyes lit up, "oh please please please please please can we let her have babies, Mommy?! Please." So I start describing dog and cat overpopulation ad nauseam, and she knows all about rescuing animals and finding homes for them. She seems to understand, and she laughs it up and when I tell her if Sam and Nanna*, weren't fixed, they'd have had lots of babies by now. She giggles with glee and talks about how cute they'd be, and at the thought of all those puppies. It's like 4 yo heaven.

Anyway, it was the kind of conversation I was not expecting yesterday, or to have with my four year old. I'm okay with her knowing lots about babies development and the birthing part, but when it comes to making babies, I don't want my kid being the only kid in her Kindergarten class next year who knows how babies are made.

I was long-winded and boring enough to get around it this time, once again. Close call, big sigh of relief. Suddenly, at the end of our conversation, she says, very matter of factly, "Well, if Disco wants to, even after she is fixed, she CAN get married and NOT have any babies. Isn't that right, Mama?"

I smile and say, "Yes, that's right." She looks very happy about that. My little feminist.

*Nanna is our nickname for Elli Mae as Ellie brings us about a dozen of Simone's toys and things a day when she wants attention, like she's cleaning up after her. Simone get's pissed at Ellie about this (probably because if no one takes these items from her she chews them all to shit) so I thought if I called her Nanna, like on Petar Pan, she might not hate Ellie so much. It's kind of working too by the way

I am literally beating myself up.

2008-04-20T17:00:00.000-07:00

I've had a lot of self loathing issues, just no reason to care any more. You go from this place in pg where you are all about health and peace, vitamins, and minerals, and I was on bedrest for so long. And I do get resentful at the end of pg's, just so much self-sacrifice. I'm a selfish person, I feel like an ungrateful person. I feel so much guilt over that resentment and loss of autonomy at the end but I was waiting for my savior, my Myles, to rescue me. He was the light at the end of such a long tunnel.

And so now, I've mentioned I've gone from health nut to a depressed, anxious, PTSD, burgeoning alcoholic. The other night I got drunk (DD was sleeping but DH who doesn't drink so witnessed it all). I fell at some point (okay DH says on more than one occassion) and I woke up with bruises all over and of course, deep in the pit, not just over myles but with the shame and embarrassment that accompanies abusing alcohol. I'm 27 for godsake, I know better.

Today I was so mad at myself when I realized I missed my dearest friends b-day on Thursday (her 10th b-day, this sweet girl who is like my daughter who moved to NV two and a half years ago to my families heartache). I was just so freaking mad that my mind can't remember the simplest freaking things anymore. So, out of complete disgust with myself I just threw on some clothes and went outside and did yard work. And it was frantic, non-stop two hours, pulling up these perennials I hate (mud up to my wrists), cutting down these prickly bushes I've always hated, removing this huge branch from this ice storm from a winter storm, now I'm covered not just in bruises but in scratches (stupid me, I was wearing shorts and a tank top).

And in the background, and why I started this post, I haven't shared too much but I didn't get my period for 18 weeks (after I lost Myles). I was SO excited to get AF after 18 weeks. I waited and waited and we tested and tested (HSG's, genetic, hormonal, etc. looking at laproscopy) and I finally got it and here I am midcycle and I'M SPOTTING.

I have never spotted between periods, never had implantation spotting from two (pg's l/c DD, and DS Myles). Never, in 14 years of normal AF, half those years (seven) I was not on any contraception (either I was not sexually active) or my DH and I used natural family planning for the four years between Simone and Myles, and now I'm spotting? Seriously, maybe I don't have the most 'regular' periods (ranging between 29-31 days, so it's not always clockwork) but I know when I ovulate dammit. And here I am, day 15 thru 18 of my cycle and I've spotted EVERY DAY. WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?

AM I DEFICIENT?????

I just want to be pg so bad. No, let me rephrase that. I just want a BABY, sooo bad. The pg I could go without. Just a sweet warm baby to nurse, and hold sleeping on my chest, and to see smile, and teeth, and yes night awakenings, and stress, I WANT IT ALL. and I know I have to deal with all of my 'issues' which I am with professionals, but come on!

And when I go out and try to do the old stress relieving things (GARDENING), they send me into panic attacks. 6 weeks after I lost Myles I went to the gym, and after 45 minutes I left there, shaking, and angry, and with Myles all over my brain. And here I am, finally cleaned up from backbreaking labor in the yard, sobbing about another MISSters dog, and I'm shaking, and frantic looking up everything there is about spotting.

I'm sorry this is such a long rant. I JUST WANT A BABY SO BAD. SO BAD. I LOVE BABIES SO MUCH. But I know I'm in no shape (mentally or physically) and it hurts. But at least, AT LEAST, my body could go back to normal so that I know that when we're ready, WE CAN TTC. This uncertainty is driving me bonkers.

'Visiting' Myles III

2008-04-18T17:34:00.000-07:00

So tonight I bought two of those tiny little alcohol bottles, drank them and went to Myles grave. The only person I've told this is my Mom, but I've thought multiple times of just digging him up and holding him one more time. My mom is so great, she said she felt the same when her Dad died. I got him some beautiful windchimes and decided to go get so different colored floweres because these blue roses have been there since we buried him (so I don't want to change them) but . . . blue roses? What looks more fake than blue roses? There is no such thing.

I sat there this time and talked. I talked to him like he could hear me. What am I doing? I don't think he can here me, is it just an attempt to find closure in our social by verbalizing what I would say to him if I could?

It felt good. I'm not sure if it was the drinking or just the babbling like when I'm typing. Next time I should bring my laptop. I did a pg journal for Simone but my myspace blog seemed to do just that for Myles. But it wasn't in the first person, you know? It was all about me, and how excited we were, or how tired I was, or whatever blissfully pregnant women rant and rave about (good and bad).

With Simone, it was to her. It's about 20 pages. And I just told her things like I was talking to her, not an adult. I even joked one time that Myles' diary was my blog but I couldn't let him read it until he was older because I cussed too much. In Simone's I just tell her like I am talking to a child. And I suppose, when I talked to 'Myles' today, telling him all the things that excited me about him and our future together. How I knew he would be a challenge, but I thought in the stubborn toddler in a restaurant or rebellious teen challenge. NOT A CHALLENGE LIKE THIS.

I read a quote the other day that grief is the price of love. And that made me scared to love. I know we've discussed it before, but, to me (IMNSHO) love is what makes the world go round, not money. To pay such a cruel price? Could I wish my daughter weren't here, just so I never have to go through the pain of losing her? No. So it's worth it. But I've never paid this price, I love my son so much, so much. And this intense grief I feel this moment is a testament to that, but oh, what a burden. Life is beautiful and cruel.

'Visiting' Myles II

2008-04-17T20:09:00.000-07:00

Why do we come to grave sites, us atheists? I don't know why people who believe our loved ones are 'watching over us, can here or see, send us signs'. I can't put myself in that persons shoes, the thought of it bothers me on multiple levels. All I can do is ask myself why do I go to grave sites, and honestly I've never had one to visit. I've always visited cemeteries, actually loved old cemeteries.

Even when I was a believer I used to visit cemeteries. As a child I visited my grandfathers grave, haven't for a long time, but I never knew him. Still, I used to cry, and would tomorrow for the pain it causes my mom to be without her father for almost 30 years.

As a preteens, we visited them when we were causing trouble. I'd lay down, imagining myself the whole time as completely parallel to the lifeless body beneath me. Silly. Of course I still believed back then, and we used to believe that maybe something could happen, and we were scared. Scared of the supernatural. A feeling I haven't had for a long time.

As and adult, my sister and I, and even Simone and I once when I was pregnant with Myles, would walk along, read the names and ages and imagine the families and the tragedies of their lives. I especially like historic cemeteries, I live about 7 or 8 blocks from one and it is filled with so much history. That's where I ultimately decided to bury him.

My parents suggested my home town. My DH has always been adamant about that the fact that he wanted to be cremated, and I always wanted be buried in this obscure cemetery in sand hills where my great, great, great, and great grandparents have been buried, my grandma and grandpa too, my dad probably too. It's peaceful in the sand hills, standing in an ocean of grass, not a things in sight.

Yesterday I went to visit Myles. At first I think I did it for Simone. One day it had snowed and I couldn't find it, and I found him and with my bare fingers red from the freezing snow, I would clean off and clear off and manage his grave. Take care of 'him'. I don't believe he knows I'm there. I don't think 'he' is there. His body is buried there.

Why do I go there, for peace. To get away, and cry, and think about Myles and 'care' for my son, still so motherly. I like bringing things there, making it looked beautiful and cared for. So everyone who might see would know he would've been cared for tenderly had he lived. And tenderly I sit there, and cry, and I'm around these old trees, and whatever weather whithers that day.

It's nice to escape there. I don't like to go with other people. I will. I just don't 'get' anything out of it. Which is interesting to think about as what do I 'get' when I do go there? I'llm

Alcohol

2008-04-16T21:36:00.000-07:00

4/16/04
Alcohol
I'm an alcoholic. Am I an alcoholic? How did it begin? With two drinks every night for the first month. Simone and I packed our days full of things that I didn't get to do with her when I was on bed rest. And I felt she had been SO cheated. And we went here and walked there, anywhere you could think of we went. And I said 'screw school work' I did what my 6 hour assistantship required of me, and that was it. And that's how it was for a month or two, some really bad days, but really good days (roller skating, bowling) too. I was so bitter on bed rest. Outward appearance, rosy, inward feeling, irritation, impatience, bitter at DH for not picking up more slack, for his excuses. I felt like, as if I wasn't put out enough by this whole thing, that he couldn't handle it without my mom and his mom up here for 6 weeks.

So when Myles died, I was in shock, and I started using alcohol right away. Haven't drank much since DD was born, you can't when you're pg, limited with bf, but I've never been an alcoholic. In those early days I was catatonic, I didn't want to leave my house sometimes. But getting over those hurdles, seemingly meaningless but like mountains for me; going to Simone's preschool, taking her to dance, going to my school, and it was stressful and exhausting. I was a bitch everyday when I got home.

Anyway, the one thing I looked forward to was alcohol. A drink while making dinner, in my own world, listening to political podcasts on my ipod. Not thinking, just mindless stuff, doing the dishes. Sometimes a friend would call and SURPRISE I was in the mood to talk, even make jokes and in the darkest hours pour out my soul and cry like I never would sober.

The hardest I've cried to anybody is when I've been drunk. And because I put off talking about Myles at the hospital (except for the pragmatic stuff, my sister and I are like Navy Seals in crisis mode when something happens. We take charge (weddings, funerals, any emergency (she's an ER nurse)). And in the hospital after talking to Myles, I kept it on the light side. I don't think I cried in front of anybody. Certainly not on purpose, they'd catch me crying all those wonderful nurses.

I have this ability to shut my brain off. It's my bodies way of compensating for the information/emotion overload. In the hospital, my mother was out of her mind with grief, and I didn't want any of it. I was sad. I was quiet I was contemplative. I was on really good drugs. And then everyone left. I smoked a cigarette the second we dropped Simone off at her friends house we could go make funeral arrangements. Even there, I didn't know what was expected of me and my DH had NO opinion. My family did, they had lots of suggestions where he could be buried, but I wanted him close. He is only a few blocks away in Wyuka, I could walk there at Midnight and sit and cry. I'm glad I chose burial, the cemetary has been a peaceful place to me.
And that's where the complexity comes in I guess.

Because the drinking to become intoxicated happened on a 'bad day' catatonic left the house, bought one of those 2dollar little alcohol bottles and some Whiskey (I usually drink mixed drinks). I went to the cemetary. Drank that little bottle down, and went and sat in front of his grave where I always sit.

I've got dirty knees from it today even actually, they had just put his sod down an it was a muddy mess. My chistmas card is gone that I wrote him. I will miss that. I liked the outside, “Peace, Miracles, Hopes, Dreams, Love” and of course all the holiday rubbish and merry Christmas son.

After that day I started to drink to get drunk. I started thinking that drinking all that pop wasn't good so I would just have a shot of whiskey or my new favorite drink that I found at the liquor store that day, black cherry rum. And I think that is where the numbing came in. These last few weeks, I have been probably legally drunk at midnight. But I'm happy, bopping around, doing laundry, cleaning the house, thinking of things to do to the house. Everyone's asleep and I get my own time. Before the wee hours, when I've had a couple shots and B or Simone come to help clean up or make dinner, I'm goofy, we play, I'm more relaxed.

Then the hangovers began. The long nights of insomnia, my refusal to take alprazolam if I'd been drinking. The culmination of it all was two nights ago. B worked late, Simone and I went to the park at 4ish, and I picked up some of that rum at the time. We played at the park, she road her bike, got some takeout, we went home, and went on to finish the bottle of rum by midnight. I don't remember anything. I have bruises on my knees I feel like I'm 19 again. Brandon was home and witness, Simone was asleep early that night luckily. I spent most of the time bawling to my Dad and Best friend (Allyson's mom from Las Vegas) about how disappointed I was in them. Or, not that, but I finally told them what I needed from them. What sucks is I don't even remember now. So they were monumental conversations that I have virtually no recollections of.

So. I'm not drinking anymore. Just decided to quit. I”m humiliated and back to the self deprecation. I had a good day today at first, but anxiey-ed out by late afternoon and went to see Myles and put up some new decorations, butterfly wind chimes (muddy knees). And now here I am crying. I came home, made dinner, worked in the yard, and I feel like I'm on edge. I feel the TMJ in my jaw. I feel the pit in my stomach. I feel disinterested in everything. And do you know what I want? A beer. I have eaten nothing today. I've drank two diet cokes, and sip of sprite ( a few calories). I'm not hungry. At least drinking made me hungry when it was all said and done (at midnight).

This is it, as honest as it gets.

I liked this poem

2008-04-15T14:43:00.000-07:00

I can never find anything that doesn't include god or religion. Here is a nice poem that really spoke to me:

My Son, My Son
These days feel like the winter of my soul. But Spring comes and brings new life, and even beauty. All because of the growth of the roots in the darkness. ~ Iris Boulton

Where am I?

2008-04-14T10:21:00.000-07:00

I know, I haven't rambled for awhile. Always take that as a good sign. No news is good news, so I'm usually doing my job and working on research which I now feel very rejuvenated about. To be honest, I don't know where I'm going, and I can't explain where I'be been the last few weeks. I am happy to report that my health looks good, no more worries as I alluded to my last significant blog. It's a big load off my shoulders. but also brings more questions. So as everything in this world it brings assurances but more uncertainties.

Simone is growing up, and she loves it, while I"m tepid. I am excited for her and try not to feel too unahppy with her growing up and her recent advancements. She can now make her own food (cereal, popcorn, yogurt, choc. milk), she's so indepedent. It seems like yesterday she was this tiny toddler.It makes me sad in a way, but proud too.

I've had so much on my mind lately I forget what's happening around me. I'm baffled by the fact it's April. Anytime it occurrs to me, I'm like 'wtf?'. Is it even 2008?! where have I been?' Also, I have to admit that part of the reason I'm MIA is I"m back work, researching, writing papers, my initiative and ambition is back, so I'm usuallly tired of writing by the end of the day (and tend to vent by drinking and listening to music on my ipod while being happy housewife). The good news is I'll have two articles under review hopefully before the first of May, something I am very excited about. And I"ll continue be extremely busy as this last year, not only do I have to defend my dissertation proposal (basically the first 3 chapters) and I've got a full time assistantship for this summer and next year, whch is very exciting despite the fact I''ll miss summer teaching. Consdiering my mood over the last 6 months, being excited is a very good thing, and I'm glad to have at least the sense of enjoyment back.

Anyway, I'm here, I'm sometimes in the pit, and sometimes catch a breath or two and can hope for some distant happier future. It all depends on the day, and I just go with flow these days, sadly turning to alcohol more and more and relying anti-anxiety and anti-depresssant meds to my chagrin. At the moment, I'm just putting one foot in front of the other and hoping for a future where I'll have the confidence and courage I wish I had now. Time is what I need.

So, anyway, if you don't hear from me, no news is good news. But please email or call me anytime, anyone who wants to share their grief with me is giving me a special gift, I love nothing more than recognizing and loving the dream of my son. My friends and family have been priceless to me over the last several months, and I'd be in a much wosre state without them. I am always grateful to share or talk about our shared grief, so don't hesitate.
Thank you all for the overwhelming support.

Oh, to see his smile

2008-03-27T22:14:00.000-07:00

My best friend was in town for a meeting (we live 50 miles apart) and she kind of sprung it on me that I would be watching her baby for two hours. I forgot she had mentioned coming (I forget everything these days) and we've been missing each others' phone calls ever since. Anyway, I sucked it in, shut the brain off (Yes, I can turn my brain off, but only for short times), and I did it. And, with my brained turned off, I loved it. Simone was all over him, as usual she wanted us to pretend she was the 'big sister'. I took care of him, and shushed him to sleep, and held him on my chest while he slept for an hour. How sweet and warm and soft. And I love that little boy. But it pains me to see him so full of life, growing so big, only two months younger than my boy would be. Oh what a pair they would've been! My DH would not hold him, and I was frustrated with him. But we all grieve differently, so I understood.

I didn't finally succumb to it all until I opened up my tupperware she had returned to find the pictures she had mentioned she had left for me. There he was, this beautifult little baby boy. They got the best picture, tried as I might, I couldn't get him to smile for me in the short time I had him today. But, oh my, did that photographer get a good one. And as soon as I saw that smile, I immediately felt joy for her, but also such an utter sense of loss.

To see my boy smile? To imagine what that might be like? It leaves me breathless and so so defeated. If I think her son is beautiful (and I do, I'm so happy for her, she's wanted a baby for so long), imagine what that would've been like with Myles? I know how your heart overflows with joy when you see your own childs very first smile. It wasn't that long ago that I saw Simone's, it seems like a century. But, I did not appreciate hers, as much as my heart soared 4 years ago, not as I should've. I didn't know how miraculous it is to take your baby home and to watch them grow. I didn't know then what I know now.

So I put these beautiful pictures down and have just now sat down on the couch to sob in the night, by myself, as usual. DH and I haven't been getting along so well, and I sometimes feel so alone. Will every missed milestone hurt this much?!

four months

2008-03-23T04:01:00.000-07:00

So much has been going on. I finally got my ambition to work and do research back, that's about the only good news.

The bad news, I haven't had AF for 17 weeks (since I lost Myles) and I had an HSG, and I go in for the results on Tuesday. Needless to say, I've never questioned my fertility, I don't need this on top of everything else. We all have our own burdens I guess.

I had a particularly rough day today. And it's crazy because Easter ain't my thing. But my daughter of course gets into it. I guess what surprises me is that I find myself thinking of Myles. Now I had imagined Myles at Christmas, perhaps Thanksgiving (two holidays forever changed), definitely summer time at the pools, but Easter? And yet here I am, wondering, thinking about what I would be doing for his first Easter. It was this tie last year we began ttc, it took one time (thought I was fertile Myrtle), and it's sad to think back on how different this year is from the last. I told someone my age the other day, and when I heard myself say 27, I couldn't believe it. I don't feel 27, that's too young. I feel like I'm 50.

To top it all off, my husband said (drifting off to sleep no less) that a couple of people have mentioned I treat DD differently now. Of course, I'm like 'who'? I knew my mom, but then he wavered on the second person, and now I'm just pissed. I guess it confirms my worst fears. That I am not that great of a parent, that people are watching me under a microscope. And quite frankly, I don't care what they think because I'm not the same person when it's me and her (which it is, day in and day out) than I am when we go home to see the grandparents, or when grandparents come to visit. Quite honestly, I'm relieved to be able to get away and let the grandparents spend their time with her, and me just zone out on my computer, or reading the newspaper.

There is probably a little truth to their 'concerns', and as opposed to their opinions bothering me, it is that hint of truth bothering me. I don't think I'm the same to anybody as I used to be. I'm not me. And I'm not always interested in entertaining a four year old 70 hours a week who plays, 'baby' at least three times a day. I need a break, and 12 hours a day in preschool is not enough me time to get done the work I'm expected to do.

Ugh. I was just talking to my therapist and she told me I need to take care of me. I'm doing that, but is it at the expense of my daughter??? I don't know. That's a fine line to walk. I don't think I 'm a bad parent, but maybe not as good as before. I'm shorter with her maybe when I have a lot of anxiety, and the last couple of days when my husband gets home, I just try to escape for awhile.

Sigh, so Easter's got me down, my fertility is in question, and Myles has been gone four months and it seems like Novemeber was yesterday but in the meantime I've aged 20 years.

Visiting 'Myles'

2008-02-29T23:55:00.000-08:00

As an atheist, I've begun to wonder why I go to my son's memorial. I've been a little short with my husband regarding the way he talks about Myles in front of DD. We are not, in fact, visiting Myles. We are visiting his memorial. It is a ritual, one of remembrance, one of bonding and sharing our loss. A ritual for us, not for him. I don't see it as more than that. and I don't want my daughter to think it is more. I don't want her to think we are visiting 'him', because I think she could get confused by the fact that his body is there but that he is not his body. I don't want her to think, for example, that he is cold, or lonely, or experiencing things there where he is buried. So I think language makes a big difference but DH isn't as delicate as me.

My husband is a deist, and I wish I could say our views haven't clashed over the years a little. In general, I'm disappointed completely with how Myles' death has been discussed with our daughter by most of my family. I was gone for five hours after he had died. When DD was around our family and they all had Myles' body and were telling her all sorts of things. I'm just worried she is confused. I've always told my family, by all means, share your beliefs with my daughter. But please, preface it with, "I believe . . . ". Don't treat your beliefs as fact. I don't think she should be under the impression that this is factual, that everyone agrees. Because we, as a world, considering all of our religions, don't agree. So I want her to hear the beliefs of many people, but I want her to first and foremost realize that belief is subjective.

So, it does kind of suck that I didn't get to help guide those discussions at the time. Because now she has all these set things in her mind, things that aren't 'weird' (that Myles is an angel, that he's in heaven) but that I wish she didn't believe on a physical level. She was looking at this beautiful sunset the other day, and she said that was heaven but noted she didn't see anyone there. Very astute. I don't tell her either way, mostly when we talk about these things, I ask her more questions than I tell her what to think.

I've always thought that if religion brings my daughter peace, I'm glad for her. It has never brought me peace. The idea of my son being somehow conscious and in some alternate reality is actually disturbing to me. I guess I could talk about it further, but I don't want to make moms like me, who do believe this, upset or offended by my misgivings. As I said, whatever brings you peace and happiness is what you should do. I find peace in knowing my son is at peace, and that he never learned the cruelties of this world, only the warmth and love of my womb. And I guess that's all I have to say about that right now.

Bad day, insomnia

2008-02-27T20:15:00.000-08:00

I just have these days, stressful days. It seems like to get through work I have to put my emotions to the side. But when I get home from these days, I pay double for it. I had meetings all day and a terrible night tonight. The first time I felt like screaming. I've repressed it. Can you believe that? For three months. I've been in the abyss, but this is one of the first times that I've just moaned and groaned and cried on DH's shoulder. He said, "I can't believe it took you so long." He just doesn't know how much I grieve when I'm finally alone.

It's been three months, and I just have never put my son's clothes in storage (for many reasons). I was going to give them to my BF, but I couldn't bring myself to go through them then. Tonight, I thought I'd just get it over with, listen to my ipod as a distraction, but I couldn't resist looking at them one more time, and it was too much.

This low point began last night, when for the millionth time since losing sweet Myles that I couldn't sleep. I lay in my bed, heart racing, trying, grasping to think of something that will put me at rest, any happy thought to get lost in instead. But all thoughts lead back to one thing. sigh. And none of those things are conducive to sleeping, only anxiety and frustration and hurt. I know I'm not alone, many times I'm on the internet, grasping searching for answers. It's my time with Myles in a way, the only time the house is quiet and I'm really alone.

When I left the house today, I knew it would be a bad day, my DH asked me how I was feeling, and I said, 'does it matter?'. I've still have to do what I have to do. I'm just not ready for my life to speed up again; it's been in slow motion for so long. I don't know that I'm ready to pick it all back up again.

I've said it before. Everything is the same, but nothing is the same. It should be so very different. How can I move forward like this?

Why am I so pro Obama?

2008-02-26T06:39:00.001-08:00

This is a good question one I've pondered since it was posed to me in the comments by vixenne (h/t) at Beyond the Pale. I've been pro Obama since before 2004 Democratic meeting, he just seemed like an open book and a dynamic figure with lots of charisma. I first heard of him on Dailykos, and I was pulled in by what limited I knew of his life, his experiences. He wasn't a calculating politician, he seemed like a regular person just like me and you. He captured many hearts in 2004 at the Democratic National Convention, and I've watched him closely since.

On the issues, I like that he is transparent. He wants transparency in government. He is transparent about his life, even when it's not adventageous (like discussing his past drug use), and in politics, even when it ticks off establishment dems and repubs alike. I like that he opposed the war from the beginning (as did I) and he took that position long before it was popular. He didn't do it to benefit himself, and it could have easily been to his own demise. He doesn't just take positions because of his ambitions.

I like that Obama thinks government is for the people, that it won't work unless all of us stand up and make it happen. He believes in the American People. As misanthropic as I've been sometimes, I do believe that if every child had an opportunity, they would flourish. Right now, so many kids don't. And we only care about them when they're kids (if you call our current foster system 'caring') once they're adults we expect them to pull themselves up by their bootstraps at age 19, childhood be damned.

I like Obama because he knows that when challenged by a major catastrophe, that we (the american people) want to DO something (besides shopping). The book, "Downsizing Democracy" I think paints beautifully the problem with our current 'democratic' system and disconnect gov't has (and wants to continue to have) from the people. Establishment politicians act as if they don't need us. They act as if it's all explained by apathy, the whole generation me thing. And it's bullshit. I'm 27. I always felt like I was born too late. I looked back at the civil rights movement and feminist movement and I felt like I missed 'it'.

My first year of graduate school, I had this wondeful social theory course, and it was exactly what you'd probably imagine. A room full of young idealistic (yet ironically misanthropic) grad students arguing Habermas and Schutz and trying to solve all of the worlds problems in our tiny little seminar room. One day, I walked up to the board, and I wrote, "We're the one's we've been waiting for". I had read the quote the day before, and it gave me chills. And it gave everyone in the class chills. This was right after the Dems lost the 2004 election, and in hindsight, I can't believe I was that optimistic. Today, that is an Obama campaign slogan.

So anyway, I don't think the American people are delusional to support Obama, that we're all mindless zombies. Obamamania. That's the current narrative they're pushing. Obama has tapped into a social movement, one many in my generation have been itching for for a very long time.

And on a personal front, for somebody as hopeless as I have been since I lost Myles, I think it really says something for Obama that he can still bring that sense of hope back for even me. From an atheistic standpoint, I can no longer account for what that feeling is, what drives it, what is at it's base (I don't think it's utilitarianism), but simply to have it well up inside of me again, it makes me believe that I can find it in me again someday down the road in my little world, when I'm ready for another baby, another great hope.

"The setting of a great hope is like the setting of the sun. The brightness of our life is gone."

I think the sun might rise again for me, and I think it might rise again for our country. And, I hate to do it again, but I've got to post that Obama quote one more time:

"But we always knew that hope is not blind optimism. It's not ignoring the enormity of the tasks ahead or the roadblocks that stand in our path. It's not sitting on the sidelines or shirking from a fight. Hope is that thing inside us that insists, despite all the evidence to the contrary, that something better awaits us if we have the courage to reach for it and to work for it and to fight for it."

3 months

2008-02-24T21:29:00.000-08:00

What can I say? Today hurts, the finality of it all. Fuck.

Feminism and stillbirth

2008-02-19T19:18:00.000-08:00

I posted this in the comments over at feministing on a story discussing the Missouri law that will give tax deductions to parents of stillborn children (http://feministing.com/archives/008638.html):

My son was stillborn a little over 2 months ago at 37 weeks gestation for no known reason. Needless to say, me, my DH, and my DD (4yo) were devastated including countless other family members and friends. We have suffered financially from this loss. The paying for the 'nursery' bit is not 'upper class'. I'm an attachment parent, I bought little, no conspicuous consumption here, I didn't even by a crib. What I did buy added up, a baby wrap, clothes, cloth diapers(what a cruel joke, I thought this would save me money in the long run). Hell, there are lost dollars for most women in pregnancy discrimination alone. I personally spent 9 weeks on bed rest, which is a similar financial burden. Then there is the burial, the memorial, the missed days of work grieving, lowered productivity and most importantly MEDICAL BILLS. These babes growing inside of us are 'dependents'. We pay for them from day one.

It might sound calculating, but in order to have my son, I was depending on my deduction to pay for my medical bills. If my son had been born, he would've been on S-CHIP (as a family of four, we would then qualify), I even planned for that in all of my planning (for his medical bills/hospital care, etc.). You might think that's crazy, but when you plan a baby for two years on a fixed income (DH is blue collar, I'm a grad student with crappy insurance) you do take into account those deductions. And there are many moms like me, living on the edge of poverty, who are underinsured like me, who do the same in order to be able to have a baby. I certainly don't need to tell any of you the financial burdens that accompany pregnancy, carried mostly on the shoulders of women. It is well established that the birth of a child throws many families into poverty. But it really does start with pregnancy.

Of course, with all that planning, I never did plan for this. As a proud outspoken feminist Soc grad student, I view this bill through a lens of giving women choices. I go to my sons memorial all the time. It cost over $500, $100 of it we had to fork over for a temp. marker on the day we planned his funeral (which I 'm required to do as his 'guardian' by State law). We didn't have the money, but we wrote the check anyway. We were lucky enough to have family and friends help us with the permanent memorial. When I went the other day, as the snow had temporarily melted, I saw unmarked grave after unmarked grave. So many dreams lay there in babyland. It breaks my heart, that some parents didn't even have the scant resources my family has. I felt sorry for myself that we were in such a bind, but there are so many more families worse off than I.

As far as those laws slipped into State legislatures designed to chip away at Roe v Wade and women's rights, I understand your suspicion and worry. My reaction 4 months ago would probably have been the same. I'm for reproductive justice to the core. I believe abortion should be safe and available to any woman, anytime, anywhere, for any reason.

What I can tell you is that bills aimed at giving birth certificates to stillborn babies, or tax deductions to families like mine do not fall into that category. These bills are about giving women choices. They are about recognizing the burdens of women. Stillbirths are still swept under the rug, much like pregnancies themselves were for decades. Nobody wants to talk about birthing dead babies. Even recently (within the last 50-60 years), many women never got to see their stillborn child, they were whisked away, dead, not worth seeing in the eyes of the men who delivered them. No funeral service, a quick burial, and everyone was told to 'move on'. I saw a recent story of this here (http://pubsys.pressofatlanticcity.com/185/story/45104.html). The woman never knew for 40 years where her dear stillborn daughter was buried, and decades later, her children found that baby and bought her a memorial. It is heartbreaking, the hurt this woman must endure, the hurt I must endure, for decades.

The fact is, birth is a process that by definition has two outcomes, live birth and still birth. I can tell you after experiencing both, they are the same excruciating physiological process. Today, many opportunities are given to mothers to help them grieve the loss of their child. Locks of hair, casts of hands and feet, crib cards, pictures (Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep: http://www.nowilaymedowntosleep.org/). Why? Because their births are worth remembering. They are certainly worth tracking statistically given the atrocity that is stillbirth research.

My son's birth was transformative for me, it's one of the only positive pieces I turn to in my grief. My daughters birth was traumatic, it was birth rape, and I was looking forward to a natural water birth where I was treated like a human being. And you know what? I got my completely natural water birth, my son was dead, but I did give birth to him in a loving, supportive setting with my daughter, sister, husband, and midwife all there to support me. It was beautiful. And that is what birth certificates are for. They should be called 'birthed certificates', they are not about personhood, they are not about 'life' or loss, they are about the mother and her birth; whether it is live or still, it is equally harrowing, life threatening, breathtaking, healing, and, in some cases, devastating. Women deserve this respect, that States not only recognize only one type of birth. They deserve the respect of their dreams not being swept under the rug any longer.

As a feminist that has only recently experienced the stillbirth of my son, I've thought a lot about these issues. Obviously as I have a lot to say. And I think I understand feminism even more deeply after considering these issues from my new perspective. What women do is amazing, carrying children is a hardship but many gladly sacrifice, would risk their lives for it. Recognizing stillbirth is recognizing our work, our dreams, our sacrifices, and, through 'certificates of birth resulting in stillbirth', our births are recognized, for no surreptitious reason, only to give us closure, or just give us one more piece of paper with our beautiful child's name written on it that we can hold and remember for years to come. It might not seem like a lot, but to many women it is everything. They may never have another child again, are they a mother if their only child was stillborn? I say, yes, they birthed, they are mothers, only their children never lived. These bills are about recognizing motherhood, in all it's pain and all it's glory.

From atheism to what? Why do we hope?

2008-02-15T05:40:00.000-08:00

I've posted about my previously unequivocal atheism, discussed my hope, read some Nietzche and Camus and I'm more confused than ever. What am I hoping for? Do animals hope? Is hope the same as anticipation? Like does a squirrel watch your food 'anticipating' or 'hoping' that you may drop it? When my dogs gather around my daughter when she eats, LOL, is it out of 'hope' or 'want', and what is the difference? I think I can safely say that 'want' and 'anticipation' are necessary for there to be hope, but they are certainly not sufficient.Is hope simply to sit back and yearn for something? Is hope a thought, or an action or both? I think, unlike 'want', that hope requires action, sacrifice. You have to play to win, in other words. As a PhD student, I'm obviously willing and able to withstand temporary short term discomfort (if you consider grad school short term and if 'discomfort' means a self inflicted torture) for a long term gain. So is hope just a simple account of economics? But not just economics, short term loss for long term gain? It's certainly not cause and effect, the long term gain is not certain. Not everyone who enters a PhD program will leave with their degree. We know that our actions to attain what we hope for merely increase the probability that we gain whatever it is. Is hope simply a gamble?

Do we only differentiate hope from want by the odds against us? When I buy a lottery ticket, there is a part of me that hopes I win, but I recognize it as a 'fools hope' because I know the odds. But as they say, if you don't play, you can't win. So hope requires you 'play'. It is an action, and it is a sacrifice, financial or other.

So far, I think I can say that hope requires want/desire, anticipation, action, sacrifice AND that the outcome is essentialliy probabilistic. But is that alone hope? I think we've found necessary components, but not yet sufficient components to describe hope.

Through the lens of pregnancy, all of this applies. Pregnancy is many instances of hope. But there is something more than just probablistic economics to it. First, with gambling, there are known odds, we know the likelihood of flipping heads 10 times in a row or getting a royal flush, they are easily calculable. We know that sometimes we'll win, and sometimes we'll lose, but we know in the aggregate exactly what proportion will win or lose with the same hand. Hope, in this scenario, is that one wins monetarily more than they invest. The difference between gambling and pregnancy, though is that the odds aren't as clear.

Basically, fertility, family planning, it is a gamble. As you ttc each month, you're playing to win, and the majority of couples are fertile, but that doesn't necessarily mean the month they 'try' they will get pregnant. We all know that part of it is up to chance. So many of us want to get pregnant, while some of us hope to get pregnant, depending on those odds. I've always 'wanted' to get pregnant by the way, I don't know if I ever hoped, mostly because I've never had infertility issues.
Once you have conceived, does it become a hope? Once again, I think it depends on the odds against you, are you 'high risk' etc. I think perhaps for everyone it becomes a hope because we don't know a lot about pregnancy and miscarriage. Many pregnancies end in miscarriage, the majority of those losses occur before 12 weeks. And then we make it to 23 or 24 weeks and we know that probability speaking, if we do have preterm labor, that our baby would have pretty favorable odds at survival. And as we near the end of pregnancy, as we make it to term, we've pretty much made it, but most of us know that there are no guarantees until our babies are safe in our arms. But still, as our odds of giving birth to a live healthy child increase to over 99% as we reach term, it's still essentially a hope. Why? Is it the unknown? Because when it's a card game and you're 99% likely to win, I don't think you 'hope' to win anymore. You expect it.

So perhaps, then, why I feel so betrayed and hopeless is because I was no longer hoping. I felt entitled, it was almost a certainty. And I did forget, especially that 37th week, that this was still a gamble that hadn't yet paid off. And now, perhaps I feel hopeless because I realize that essentially everything is a gamble. And to hope is to believe that you will win, even if the odds are against you.

So, back to the conundrum, can true atheists justify their hope at all?

"Hope is the worst of evils, for it prolongs the torments of man." -- Nietzsche
to be continued . . .

'Earth Angels'

2008-02-13T23:32:00.000-08:00

My four-year-old daughter is just amazing. I think everyone who saw Simone at Myles' funeral knows this. She is not intimidated by people at all (so opposite from me), which is why when the pastor asked if anyone had anything to say (and I expected nothing) she, of course, piped up with an 'I do' and went up and told Myles that she loved him and put a rose on his casket. It took everyone's breath away, but it was so 'Simone'. That's just her personality.

So, today, she did something along these exact same lines. Her and I had went to get the oil changed in the car, and we'd sat down in two chairs next to a man who was reading the newspaper. Simone sat in between us. This was a man in his 50's, built like most men in their fifties, barrel chested/skinny legs. He wore a black leather jacket, and he looked a little rough (like he'd worked in the sun his whole life) He looked nice enough for just being a random stranger at Express Lube.

First of all, I did not get the vibe he wanted to chat. And I know it is true that there are people who just don't like kids, so I'm always conscientious of her friend-making because she just dives right in without regard. I think I try to hold her back because I get embarrassed and then am forced to do the Mom smile-shrug, which in sign language somehow means, "Kids, what do you do?". Also, I am kind of a loner and I'm not comfortable talking to strangers, and don't like people starting up conversations with me when I'm in my 'zone' (especially reading). Simone has challenged me on this many times, much to my frustration, but perhaps for my own good, too. Simone is simply the most outgoing child, she is an extrovert (how did this happen to me?) she thrives in group settings, gains energy from interacting with others.

So, of course, she whispers in my ear after we sit down and get comfortable, "Mom, I want to say 'hi' to that man." Now I at first tried to dissuade her from this, but decided to give in and reluctantly tell her to try if she wants to (I was reading my own newspaper by then). So she looks over and says 'hi' but he doesn't hear her. Simone whispers to me, "Mom, I said 'hi' but he didn't say anything." And I'm thinking to myself that this guy does not want to be bothered. She is determined so, with a sigh, I whisper back and tell her she has to get his attention, then say 'hi'. At that point I readied myself for the embarrassment that will inevitably follow.

Simone looks at him, and louder this time, says "Hi."

"Hi." the man turns, looks at me, then looks at her with a smile and asks "How are you, today?"

"Good" she says, as cool as a cucumber. The next part of their conversation I don't remember as well, they discussed this Christmas card she had made during Christmas time and found in the car, she showed it to him. She told him she was going to send it to Santa next Christmas, she told him her name, and showed him how she spelled it out on the back of the card, "S-I-M-O-N-E" she says point to the letters. The whole time he acted as interested as could be, and I felt relieved that he seemed nice and actually seemed to welcome the conversation. Here is where it get's more interesting.

Simone says, out of the blue, and very matter of factly, "My mom is trying to have a baby." I hear this, as I'm listening to their conversation, and immediately blush and sink down in my chair thinking to myself that I cannot believe she just said that. First, it's not true, I am not trying to get pregnant right now, someday, but certainly not now. In my embarrassment, I shake my head and silently vow that someday I am going to embarrass the hell out of her when she's a teenager for this single moment of embarrassment alone. I won't feel the least bit bad, either.
The man said, "Oh" nicely enough, probably knowing my chagrin at her telling him such personal information.

Simone continues, "Well," all of her sentences start with 'well' (she's so sassy), "she was already pregnant and had a baby. She had a water birth." She says with a sense of respect and excitement in her voice (she just loves water births I didn't mean to brainwash her). Of course, I go a shade redder and slink a little lower even as I'm chuckling at her water birth bit. I am thinking, however, that this has definitely taken a turn for the worse as I know where she is going with all this.

"Oh, she already had a baby, huh?" the man says still very polite although I think maybe he wondered, even if for only a split second, where that baby is.
"Yes. But he died." Simone pauses and then says, "My mom cries about it all the time." Of course now I'm really uncomfortable, almost mortified, obviously being talked about in the third person does that anyway but to share something so personal. So now I get to be 'debbie downer' and I'm going to have to talk about Myles with this strange man who is probably regretting the conversation began at all. I felt bad for him just like I felt bad for my former student who asked about whether I had my baby.

Then, something amazing happened. Before I can begin to stutter out an apology and explanation he says, just as matter of factly, and to Simone, "My daughter died too. She was almost an adult though." I was speechless, awestruck, saddened, and surprised at his candidness.

Simone says, "Oh."

I expected him to look at me, to have that moment of connection and understanding that accompanies child loss. But he never broke eye contact with her. Their amazingly nonchalant conversation continued from then on (she told him about her Chistmas gifts, and talks about how we were going to buy her a valentines day dress, and he listens as if it's his own little daughter or grandchild). I'm sitting their stunned, my heart simultaneously soaring and sinking.

So, once again, my daughter does what she has done to me on many occasions, beginning the day she was born when I first held her in my arms. She just left me awestruck. She knows how to take my breath away.

So, now that I'm writing about this interaction, I'm crying, but I wasn't then. Mostly I was smiling, and when Simone needed help articulating, I would help interpret for her in their completely Simone led conversation (about their dogs and cats and their names, etc., etc.).

As we said goodbye to him (his car was done) I made the conscious effort to remember their every word. It really did touch me in a very profound way.

I am not religious, not one bit. But sometimes there are coincidences, chance encounters with people that happen at just the right moment. I think of these people as earth angels. My midwife is certainly one, this lady I met on the bus the other day was one, too. And I can count at least half a dozen people who are just like that, virtual strangers who have stepped into my life, sometimes only for a moment. They say exactly what we need to hear, or they do exactly what we need done at that moment. This kind and gentle man who talked to me and my daughter for those 10 minutes is one of them, and we never even got his name!

So fucking tired

2008-02-12T20:23:00.000-08:00

Why is it that I'll think I've hit my low (yesterday) only to discover my lows go so much lower than I can ever prepare for. I'm just monotonic right now. My DH keeps talking at me, my DD, it's like they're on mute.

I just feel sad and so so fatigued, like I've got mono. And I was doing so good, so good last week, and now I'm worse than ever. My life feels so overwhelming. There is no refuge. This 'take it a day at a time' shit is not working. Not on days like this.

I feel so alone, alienated from DH. I even question whether I love him anymore. He grates on my nerves and I don't know why. I just have hostility for him. I think it's unfair to him. I feel bad for my daughter. I don't think she has seen us interactive positively in many months. We're like ghosts, interacting with her, ignoring each other.

On days like this I just want to start all over again. Because I don't like where I am. I can't just pick up my life as if nothing happened. But that's what I've been doing. And I chug a long for a few days, and I'll climb out and I'll reach the Nadir and I'll think I've finally got it together and then I begin the slow decline.

It's like I have to make myself pay for my good days. The 'better' the day, the more I'll pay. I loathe myself I loathe my DH, I love my daughter so much. How do I carry on when I hurt so bad? How do I take it one second at a time when each second hurts?

Democratic Caucus Hangover

2008-02-11T23:03:00.000-08:00

It was grand, everything I had imagined. But really, I've actually had an everything hangover. Last week was so brutal, thank zeus for xanax, LOL. With the MISSing Angels bill and so many other meetings and appointments, after it was all said and done, I crashed. It all culminated Sunday night and I am just now recovering. I think I've compared about 100 things to a roller coaster, but in all reality, grief is a roller coaster (I really need a new analogy). And when I have some good days (as in productive and relatively 'easy'), I always know I'll pay with some bad days back down in the abyss, wallowing again in self pity and grief.

This time, I went and saw my bf's baby at her house with Simone. It ended up being the trigger to send me spiraling down. I'm still so happy for her though. And anyone who knows me knows I'm obsessed with babies and maternal infant health and breastfeeding, etc. (ad nauseam). And I don't want that to change now that I've lost Myles. But in all honesty, it's hard to be around babies, and sadly, little Caleb Myles will always represent my son to me. He'll always be symbolic of what I missed what milestones my son has missed, and it makes me sad. When he is two and when he's 20, I'll always think of Myles when I see him. And I guess maybe that's a good thing. I don't ever want to forget my son, maybe I can shower Caleb with some love and attention and live a little vicariously through Jamee and him. He is a beautiful baby.

Anyway, when you don't hear from me for a couple of days, it's generally because I've hit a low. Now that I'm on my way back up from the abyss, here I am rambling. I started this post going to write about the caucus! Still downer debbie :)

No, I do have some pictures that I swear I am posting soon of me and B, and tbone all dressed in our matching Obama T-shirts. I spoke up for Obama during the caucus but eventually ended up defending Hillary even though I'm so strongly in the Obama camp (this Obama dude (>60yrs) was totally dissing her for crying and I and many others booed, and rightly so). I'm thinking about going to the August convention in Denver. I always like an excuse to go to Colorado, I so want to move there, sigh. Anyway, the rest of this primary is out of my control, so it's back to just plain hope without any course of action, I hate that, I've got to do something. So I'm actually sad the caucuses are over, and Super Tuesday too. When will this last year of Bush be over???!!! And when will I know if it's Obama or Hillary??? I am politicked out, but for me that means it's back to reading blogs and fucking with conservative douchebags on my hometown newspaper :) That is, until the MISSing Angels bill gets to the floor (please oh please I hope it happens), and of course I'll share, especially if I need your help again.

Big accomplishment, MISSing Angels Bill

2008-02-11T23:00:00.000-08:00

I'm experiencing so many emotions right now, so much happiness, and such deep sadness, and so much relief, and thank you all so much for writing letters. I just started sobbing, driving home in my car, and sitting here, and how can somebody feel so many emotions at once?

There were four of us who testified before the HHS committee today, I didn't get to see Barack because we were last on the schedule, but I could care less. The HHS committee was wonderful, empathetic, understanding, the Bill couldn't have been received better or with more compassion for us and our families. Our Senator, and her aid are my heroes; their whole office, they are such wonderful women. And they think that this could move through committee quite quickly and be on the floor in a matter of weeks. I will keep you updated when it comes up for a vote, our work isn't done, but we've really made so much progress.

I just want to say that this meant so much to me, I tried not to let it because I know how it feels to work SO HARD for something, to invest so much, to put every ounce of your being into something, and to have done it for nothing. And I've tried so hard not to get my hopes up, expecting the worst to happen. I'm so afraid to hope. So afraid to get the rug pulled out from under me again. And I'm not just sad, and relieved, but I'm also terrified that this is just going to be a moment where I fail again. But today was a great victory, getting our MISSing Angels Bill through committee, and I have to hope that this was not for nothing.

My son means everything to me, and my biggest fear is that he will be only a sad memory. That his short life could have a positive impact to help other mom's like me, well I'm just sobbing thinking about it and I can't tell if it is from happiness or sadness. It's both. I wish he was in my arms now, but I can't go back, I can only go forward.

Thank you, MISSter, for walking those halls with me and being such a great coordinator. I could've never done this alone, we're a helluva team, girl!!!!!

MISSing angels bill

2008-02-11T22:53:00.000-08:00

I'm officially no longer a spectator when it comes to politics and policy. As much as I've always enjoyed following the national politics, I've never really been much into State level politics, for obvious reasons (too many conservative douchebags). Recently it's all changed and it's been an interesting experience.

I met up with midwest mom who experienced the stillbirth of her son in 2005, and we're talking to State Senators trying to get them to pass a MISSing Angels bill. Currently, a mother experiencing a stillbirth (defined as a birth after 20 weeks gestation) only receive a death certificate. A MISSing Angels bill would give us a 'birth certificate resulting in stillbirth' from the State. Many women who find themselves in my situation are surprised and upset that their birth isn't recognized but the death is. How does someone die if they are not born?

Let me just say that I personally don't feel particularly offended about not receiving a birth certificate for Myles, but I can empathize and understand why women would want their birth event recognized as not just negative (death), and would want that birth certificate as a positive memento and an affirmation that they did give birth. Don't get me wrong, If I could get a birth certificate for Myles, I would, but I wanted to make clear that this is not the primary reason I'm pushing the bill. The reason I'm putting time and energy to this Bill is that in two of the 21 States that have MISSing Angels bills also give a tax credit to families experiencing a stillbirth, much like I would've received a dependent tax credit if Myles had lived only a second outside the womb.

I'm for this provision first, because I'm a sociologist and I know that many people experience financial hardship during the birth of a child; second, because I'm personally feeling this financial hardship and it's hard enough to get through my days without stressing out about medical bills and debt and tax returns, etc., etc. It's been awful. Third, it also, in my mind, falls under a similar umbrella as Family Medical Leave (FMLA) which is my policy specialization area in my research as a Sociologist.

It only makes logical sense to me that parents are able to get a tax credit for a child they carried. They are a 'dependent' in every sense of the word, I spent $200 on cloth diapers for Myles thinking they'd save me money in the long run. What a cruel joke, right? And B and I (in our master plan that life diverted) had always counted on Myles' return for medical bills. The preterm labor had me freaked out enough about bills, now we're screwed, you know?

So, my MISS friend and I've been walking around the capital, canvassing the Senators on the HHS committee, we've visited with 6 or 7 Senators telling them about our sons, Myles and Carter, and informing them about Sudden Antenatal Death Syndrome (SADS)/stillbirth. I was amazed after I had Myles that stillbirth is so common. In the US, roughly 30,000 women experience stillbirth a year, it is 10 times more common than SIDS, yet the subject gets little recognition. Many cases are like mine, the causes are unknown (although there are suspects, we'll never know what happened to Myles) and very little research is conducted on it. It's been infuriating to me as I'm all about research. Think about it, I'm sociologist doing research in maternal infant health, I can't believe there is so little out there, and how little I knew even though I know a lot about maternal infant health. All I did on my bedrest when I had preterm labor was research it (but there is a lot more out there on preterm labor, even though the causes are still largely a mystery, it's an issue on the radar unlike SADS).

I guess what I'm saying is this is an issue that people need to be more aware of, it is an issue that needs funding for research. I feel every woman should be aware of SADS, even if it is only so they aren't completely blindsided like I was.

Just think of how many people were impacted by Myles' death? And I don't know about you all, but I really was completely blindsided. The fact that he could die had never crossed my mind. Not really. I thought the worse case scenario was preterm labor, I was victoriously celebrating my 37th week. I remember saying numerous times, through everything, "I never worry about Myles," and I didn't, because his heartbeat was always so strong, he always kicked like crazy, even during preterm labor, he always appeared so strong. He never once showed any indication of distress, and I had three ultrasounds and four non-stress tests?!

And after having the rug pulled out from me, so violently, I just wish I were more aware. I can't describe that feeling I felt when it really sank in he was gone. I'll never be able to describe it. And I hope none of you ever know what that is like, although life is cruel and the realities of that spare none.

So, anyway, this is what I've been doing for Myles. I think I found my new direction, I think I found something to strive for. And I think I have something to funnel my grief into. Telling my story, raising awareness, trying to make the topic less taboo. It's been weird and odd, and I'm so glad my MISS friend is so prepared (she has handouts, etc., she's so awesome). We've got this little 15 minute 'schtick' we do with each Senator as we try to convince them that this is a bill that needs sponsored and co-sponsored and pushed through committee and discussed on the floor.

So, we have a lot of work to do, and we're looking for small victories. Right now, none of the Senators have completely committed to sponsoring it, but it has been sent it to drafters.

Anyway, this is it. I wanted to share it, partly because I might be asking for support from all of you to call your Senators to support this bill if it does come up for debate, and because I wanted you to know that I think I found what I needed to find. That different road I needed to take. And I think it's a good thing.

Questions from Simone

2008-02-09T09:02:00.000-08:00

My daughter asked me the other night when we were laying in bed together, 'when Myles was dying, was he hurting'. I told her 'no'. I told her he just went to sleep and that was it. But it bothers me because I've wondered that on many a miserable night, and it hurts me to know that she has wondered that too. Because it feels really bad to wonder that. It also hurts me to lie to her, when I don't actually know. I don't like lying to my daughter, but I also have a responsibility to reassure her and make her feel safe. It just hurts me to have so many doubts, but to act as if I have none, because I am afraid everyday that I will lose her too. Just yesterday, my DH had her and he wasn't answering his phone and I just freaked out.

After she asked me about Myles hurting, she said, "Mommy, can't you just try to have another baby, just try, try, Mommy?". I wish I could just snap my fingers and be pregnant, and she wants another sibling so bad, but you can't just have babies willie nillie (not in my world). They take planning, and I can't even wrap my brain around all that right now. I don't think I could financially work in another baby until next Fall, maybe start ttc in August or September. It makes me sad for her. She's waited for so long. She loves babies so much. And she will already be almost six by then, which isn't terrible, but I wanted my children to be closer in age. Her and Myles, that was perfect to me. Four years, we joked around about him having crushes on all of her friends, and her getting him into trouble when she was 21 and he was 17. So many dreams, so lost.

It's hard navigating this with my DD at the age she is. She's old enough to understand some things but not others, and I think as she grows she'll understand more, and also mourn more. I feel like it won't really hit her until she is 7 or 8 or 9 or if we are ever to have another baby maybe then (there are no guarantees that we will though, I know that too well).

I just wish I knew what she was thinking. When we were at Myles graveside service, the pastor asked if anyone wanted to say anything, I expected nothing, when my daughter belted out 'I do', I was so surprised. She stood up, said we will always miss you Myles and put a flower on his coffin. Totally and completely spontaneous. I'll never forget it so long as I live. She took everyone's breath away. Her courage and love, she didn't think twice. She had something to say, and she was going to say it, LOL.

I love her so much, it hurts my heart so much that she has to go through this. The second I knew Myles was gone, I just started sobbing, 'what am I going to tell Simone, she was so excited, so excited'. I repeated it over and over with so much anguish. And she was, just SOOOO excited. I hurt so bad to let my daughter down like that. I feel like I failed her.

Finally, my atheism

2008-02-08T17:22:00.001-08:00

On my private myspace blog, I discussed my atheism a long time ago. I've thought about retrieving those blogs and posting them all here. In general, I wish I knew how to take my myspace blog and transfer it to blogspot, but in chronological order. I don't want my old post to appear as new posts etc., so any ideas on that would be great.

So here is my first post from August 2006:

Okay, so I'm doing this more for me than for all of you, but I was asked the other day if I just woke up one day and was an atheist. The answer is 'no'. It is something that spanned many years, and I'm sure that many atheists have gone through similar awakenings. So depending on where you fall as far as religion vs. atheism goes, my next few blogs are going to be about my enlightenment, or my descension into hell :)

Part2: How I was raised

I think my upbringing was very average when it comes to religion. My parents were not zealots, they were default christians (that is, 'everyone is a christian so I guess I am too') and they accepted the basic tenets of the christrian religion without any thought at all. In my earliest years, we didn't go to church 'regularly'. We went to an evangelical free church down the street sometimes (I remember going their once) but for some reason my parents didn't like it. Of course, now that I know what evangelicalism is, I know why, but I didn't know at the time :) I had a good friend that I met when I was about 5, and by the time I was seven our families were pretty good friends. At that time, we were invited to the First Baptist Church and we all seemed to like it.

I can only speak for me, but I remember really embracing religion, starting when I was probably around 8 years old. I wanted to be baptized, I wanted my whole family to be baptized, and I remember really arguing for it and being excited about it. I remember getting a bible and taking my first communion after that, and I remember enjoying Sunday school, and bible school in the summers, and especially Wednesday night kids groups. I loved my church, I had lots of friends there and our youth director was a really special person in my life for a number of years starting at that young age.

So, the community part was obviously a large part of it, but it wasn't the only part I was sold on. As far as spirituality, I was also a complete believer. Looking back on it, and knowing what I know now about how I enjoy reading and studying and philosophy, I really think church and the bible filled that void for me at the time. Reading a really old text and trying to understand what it meant was something I liked doing, and this may seem odd to other atheists, but there is a logic behind religion. A logic I now know as faith. I guess what I mean is that there was a system to how you should think about religion and the world, there was a right and wrong, and most importatnly, there was a formula. The formula had nothing to do with evidence or rationality, but it was a formula nonetheless, and I think people deep down really like formulas. Really, thats all church is, its one big classroom, where the priest/preacher/clergyman/pastor use the formula of faith to take scripture and turn it into a message of fear, hope, and salvation. Not very different than the examples I do when teaching my statistics class.

So as I went from being a tween to my early teens, I was very active in my church, I sang in the choir, teen choir, did youth groups, went to bible school, bible camp, and church. I prayed (even around my school flag pole) I sang songs, and I thought I felt the presence of God on many many occassions. Of course, I also believed in astronomy, ghosts, tarot, and ouiji boards. Not coincidentally, I remember being afraid, afraid of the unknown, of death and dying, of heaven and hell. I remember crying and worrying, 'was my Grandpa in heaven even though he wasn't a believer before he died?' 'what if you do something awful and die before asking for forgiveness?' and things along that line. So religion did not bring me the peace many think it should. In fact the peace I have now as an atheist is not like any I've ever experienced, but I will get to that later I suppose.

Thus, I was not born an atheist, I was very much a christian at one point in my life, so much so that I took a discipleship course and was even interested in witnessing and spreading the good word as an adolescent.

Part 2: What the hell happened?

After reading through my last entry, I guess what isn't amazing is that I was a firm believer as a child, and I think children are the most faithful and magical people on earth. I wanted to believe in everything as a child. Invisibility, witches, wizards, magical spells, flying, hypnotism, astrology, ghosts, unicorns, angels, and of course, Santa Claus. And from my perspective now, god fits right in there with the rest of it all. I firmly believe god is Santa Claus for adults, and I believe that I came to my realizations about god and the church much like a child finds out about Santa Claus.

For example, there were just the plain old bald faced inconsistencies, kind of like your presents from your parents and your presents from santa claus being wrapped in the same paper. Finding out that god didn't write the bible, that a bunch of fallible men wrote it, and then others decided what should and shouldn't be included, and that they added things and censored things. And just like presents wrapped in the same paper, or catching your parents eating Santas cookies, these revelations happened periodically.

When I was 13 or 14, in a very laid back conversation, I asked my much revered youth pastor what he would do if somebody who was gay wanted to join our congregation. I didnt know the answer because unlike some religions, I dont ever remember anyone vocally condemning homosexuality in my church. Im sure you can all guess his answer, but at the time I was shocked. Here was one of the most principled, funny, sweet, wise people Id ever known (he was on a pedestal) and his answer was unequivocal. Add that little nugget to the occasional verse subjugating women in the bible, and it was an unsettling journey.

Of course, you have to remember, like the majority of christians, I was part of a mainstream church, so a lot of the more radical (and disturbing) doctrine were swept under the rug. There were no sermons on the role of women or on how homosexuality was a sin. This isnt to say people didnt believe these things, but it wasnt my churches selling point. And just like with Santa Claus, I wanted to believe so bad that I would just take evidence to the contrary and set it aside, or forget about it.

But I think the most important thing for me, and very much related to these small revelations, were the kinks in their formula of morality. I've always been a very righteous person, many times self-righteous, but always quickly assessing the rightness and wrongness and proclaiming injustice from the mountain tops if I saw it. I have my mom to thank for this. And deep down in my gut, many things in the Christian religion weren't adding up. As I mentioned in my last post, I cried and really worried about the fate of my grandfather's soul (a grandfather I never met) because he wasn't saved. And when I expressed this concern to my spiritual elders, the responses I got were different. I think a christians answer to this question is the test of their extremism. I would have some allude to the idea that we couldn't know, but maybe he was saved, and if he was a good person then I shouldn't worry etc. etc., oh yeah, and that I should pray about it.

On the other hand, at one particular Sunday school (I was probably 11 but maybe 12) at my grandparents church (not my regular church) the person leading our group discussed a young girl who in only the last few months before her death in a car accident, had done a lot of bad things (ran away, did drugs), and how her parents were so torn over her spiritual fate. And the teacher actually told us she probably wasn't in heaven. Of course, she did it more suavely than saying the girl was damned to hell, but I'm sure no one in that class questioned the theme of that message: You don't know when you're going to die, one slip up and you're damned to hell. I don't know the veracity of this story (it sounds made up now that I think about it), but if it isn't true, that's almost more fucked up than if it is true. Because if it isn't true, then she just made it up to scare all of us, if you know what I mean, her version of the religious bogeyman for preteens. And I guess, with perspective I have now, I feel like fear is the basis of religion; not hope.

So, I do believe that this scare factor is the biggest part of religion. They tap into that fear, a fear nobody wants to talk about, and they fear-monger very delicately, very subtley, in most sermons I've heard. I now know many extremists aren't so subtle, but I can not point out enough that most of this was very subtle in my very mainstream church.

There is one line in Santa Claus is Coming to Town, that I believe really gets at the moral core of religion, 'you better be good for goodness sake'. So, the whole song is about how SC knows all, and that you will be rewarded for good behavior and punished for bad, but don't think that means the reward is the reason for being good. No, they actually have to state that being good is intrinsically valuable. Now, why would anyone have to state such an obvious thing; that being good is good in its own right? Is it maybe because the entire song is all about earning rewards, and doing what you're told because if you don't you'll be punished? The intrinsic value of doing good is a side note, a small disclaimer. Everything else in the song says be good for authoritys sake, be good for your own sake. Be good because unlike your parents, SC is always watching. So when it says, be good for goodness sake, it is conceding that the entire rest of message has absolutely nothing to do with the virtues of being good.

Religion is exactly the same. Morally, it is hollow. People don't do good for goodness sake. They do good for their own sake, they do good because god is watching, they do good so you can pat yourself on the back, they do good because they are afraid of what they don't understand (death). And Im even making the grand assumption that all Christians do at least some good in the name of their faith, which isnt true. Many dont do good at all, but they use the idea of gods rewards for good and bad as justification for the worlds inequalities. Whether they did good or not, their fortunes are earned rewards (blessings), and misfortunes are punishments. If you're a millionaire, then you MUST have been good, right?

And the hollowness of the moral foundation of religion is seen in just about everything, and its hollowness is evident in the vast array of differences between different religious groups and what they believe to be right and wrong (from eating pork to blood transfusions). I guess it is a lot easier for people to base their life on dogma than it is to really think about ethics and morality. And I guess that is what is so ironic about religious people believing that atheists are amoral or immoral. For even the most religious person must see the hypocrisy of their system of morality. They have to know that when you get down to the foundations of it all, that it doesnt make logical sense. And the more you read the bible literally, the more you believe in biblical inerrancy, the more absurd the logic becomes.

So what happened? A lot of little things. Its not like somebody came up and told me one day, and that was it. It was a process where a small piece of the lie was revealed over a period of time until the entire thing was as absurd as it obviously shouldve been from the beginning. I had a comment on my last section regarding being born an atheist and I have thought about it a lot. I have to disagree, children are born into a world of faith, all of your knowledge is based on faith, faith in your god-like parents. I dont think anyone is born an atheist, I think we are all born innately to be believers and we believe whatever we are told.

From the view of the faithful, the story of what happened to my faith is, as I joked, my descencion into 'sin'. I started doing drugs, hanging out with the wrong crowd, etc., etc.,. This is true, I was questioning all authority at the time, but during my teen years, when I did the stupidest things in my life, I would never have called myself an atheist. I was still a believer, perhaps a wayward believer, but I had been much too frightened as a teenager to say or believe god didnt exist. And let me tell you, being a wayward believer is probably one of the worst feelings in the world, because you still believe some of the dogma, and at that age, I had no idea how to assess anything on real philosophical, moral level. Well, let me take that back, I did, I did a lot of philosophy before I knew what it was, but I hadnt started to really really question the basis of morality in this world. And I was still sad and frightened, but most of all I was confused. I didnt call myself an atheist until right around 2004. Before that I was an non-Christian agnostic (I didnt know what I was, but I knew for sure I wasnt a Christian), and before that, I wouldve been a deist, and before that probably a Christian.

Part 3: Peace through atheism

So, I mentioned that I never felt more at peace with the world and my place in it since becoming an atheist. So, I'm going to describe what that means for me.

Since I've become an atheist, I'm not scared anymore. I'm not scared of trivial things, and I 'm not scared of big things. I'm not scared of ghosts, or walking through my house at night, I'm not scared of anything supernatural. I'm scared of people and pain (okay, I'm also scared of spiders although completely and admittedly irrational). Once more, I don't ponder death, or more to the point, what happens after. I just don't, I can't explain it. I don't dwell on it, I don't wonder or worry at all, unlike before. I'm at peace with the human condition. And I guess, honestly, even if I thought that there was a 1 in a billion chance that there were in 'afterlife', I still wouldn't ponder it, because it would be futile. After saying that, let me ponder . . . LMAO

Let's assume there is an 'afterlife', first of all, if we could know what it was really like, how could we possibly understand it? 'Heaven' is characterized in the bible as this place full of earthly goods and mansions, and streets, and people (virgins for Islam), and this just seems completelely culturally constructed to me. Would heaven really entail these man made things? Would it mean that we would still be communicating in a society? And if so, what makes it so much different than this world? Don't people who believe in heaven or hell grasp that the only conceptions of heaven that have ever been came so clearly from the human brain?

For me, the peace that will come from dying is the kind of peace where I don't have to think, react, or feel. Many people, when they grow older, are just plain tired, it is said 'they are ready to die'. Hell, many people who take their own lives are just as tired, and I guess I can understand that. Being a finite creature is about the only thing we have going for us, because to be part of this human condition, good and bad, takes a lot of work. An afterlife that entailed anything remotely close to what this life entails (socially or mentally) would not be 'heaven' by definition.

I love my family, I love communicating with them, sharing my life with them, but what would there be to communicate in the afterlife? And if there is no communication, no physical body, no language or emotion, then does it matter if we are with our loved ones? Wouldn't every 'entity' be a loved one? And if there is communication, and language, and bodies, what would we do or discuss? Our life back on earth? Wouldn't our thoughts be covetous of that life lost? And if that were true, then would it be 'heaven'. There is no family without life. Social bonds, language, and experiences create friendship, and these are things that cannot be a part of any rational conception of 'heaven'.

And that brings me to the fear. I guess heaven was conceived because people are afraid of not thinking or not being. When I was a kid, I cried once thinking about these things, I remember it distinctly, I was probably 10 or 12, and it was a hard hit. I think to finally fully understand that we will no longer 'be' can be a traumatic realization. I remember thinking, 'I don't ever want to not exist', and the feeling of it was awful. But on top of trying to deny the finite nature of our 'selves', we are also afraid of losing the social bonds we have with our loved ones. I think that people are afraid that when one of their loved ones dies, that things weren't communicated that should've been, or that things didn't happen in a way they imagined or would have wanted, they're upset about the circumstances surrounding their death (if it was violent or unexpected), or just because of an unhappy circumstance that may surround the timing of their death. And the whole idea of heaven is that people will have that chance to communicate or to follow through with their promises, or will be able to show their worth or prove themselves in ways they weren't able to before the death happened. The conception of heaven is just a way to not close the door on those social interactions that were inevitably unfulfilled. And for a 'self' that was created from social communication and social bonds (socialization), this is equally as devastating as losing one's self.

What I think people are forgetting when they have these regrets is that what is happening in our world, from the worst attrocity to the most glorious acts are all quite beside the point. What I mean is that, each of our lives, in the grand scheme, does not matter that much. Our hopes and fears and the love and laughter we experience are important to us, they're all we have; but in the universe, they are inconsequential. Subjectively, they are EVERYTHING, they are our world. Objectively, they are as meaningless as a summer breeze. No matter the life, no matter how grand or humble, short or long, it is magnificent, and it is miniscule at the same time. To focus only on the social obligations that went unfulfilled in anyone's lifespan is to lose that perspective.

And the hope of heaven is also part of the yearning to know and understand this life in a way that is impossible for us, and it is a way to fulfill our curiosity so we can find peace in knowing the past and the future and so we can know that our unfinished dreams will be realized in the next generations. My question is, what is the difference between being all knowing and knowing absolutely NOTHING? The answer is, when you die, there is no difference. And that isn't a tragic thing, or something to regret. And I guess that is what will be wonderful about death, no more hoping or worrying, no more wondering or regretting, simply no more. And its that simple, and it is neither a good or bad thing for the person who died, it just is. Because even if they didn't want to die, or they were angry that their time here was done, that anger and want and regret will end in peace just like the love and laughter will end in peace.

Death is only bad for those of us still alive because we miss people, and there is nothing wrong with that. When I cry at funerals, I cry for the living. I cry for myself, I cry for the people who won't get to know who I knew, I cry for those who were closest to the person who died, I cry for the hole I know they will have in their lives. But I don't cry for the person who died, because they are at peace, and you don't have to believe in heaven or god to believe that.

So, I hope that there is not an afterlife, I really do, because it could never be better or worse than life itself. Peace is nothing, and nothing will not be good or bad or happy or sad, it will just be, and I find comfort in that. And that comfort is not reliant upon supernatural forces.

Mourning some dreams

2008-02-04T16:15:00.000-08:00

My bf has wanted a baby for so long. She wanted to do it 'right' (whatever that means) and waited until she finished school, then got married, then tried for two years to get pregnant. It was a long wait for her, and I so badly wanted her to get her wish, to finally be a Mommy. She's watched most of her friends have babies, including me when I had my DD back in 2003.

We were so excited to be pregnant together. She was a few weeks behind me, but I remember getting the news and knowing that, despite our already very close 16 year long friendship (beginning in the 6th grade) that this would bring us so much closer to go through pregnancy together.

Both of us have older brothers, so when we found out we were both having boys, well we were both ecstatic. And we dreamed all of those dreams two good friends have. We wanted our sons to play together, and hang out together, and do football and sports and our conversations were filled with such wonder and hope.

When Myles died, she was the only person I called personally. See, we shared every gross pregnancy detail you could with one another. It was always like we were in it together. And it was soooo cool, the ups and downs and worries and complaints, we were just always there for each other. When Myles died I had to call and tell her (while I was in my eerily easy labor) to give her the worst news a pregnant friend can give to another pregnant friend. And she mourned our loss too, and it was a hard conversation to have.

When she had her son, and named him Caleb Myles, exactly two months to the day that I lost my son, I was okay. Honestly, my heart filled with joy for her. I did go to visit her at the hospital, and it was not the nightmare I thought. I think it went okay because her son was not my son, and nothing could diminish my excitement that now she was finally a mommy. It was hard to watch my DD with that little baby as she LOVES babies so much. She told me in the car that she wantd to take that baby home with her, and I felt so sad that she hasn't got that experience. She rode in the wheelchair with me, so my arms weren't empty, but bringing Myles home would've been so wonderful for her.

I was going to go visit my BF this weekend, to see the baby, and just hang out. She lives an hour away, so logistics always come in. But when it came down to it, I totally chickened out. And I know why, but I don't know why. It's not that I envy her and her son. I do, but I don't. Envy has never been my reaction when it comes to other mothers and babes, although it appears that many women who have lost a child feel that way.

No, instead I'm upset because of that dream, and that our comraderie over the last 10 12 months is so altered. Because as we've discussed her new baby woes, I have to think back 4 long years ago to my DD when she was baby, when I should be right there in the thick of those grueling first weeks with her. I'm no longer able to share that journey with her. You know? we should both have our babies and be going through that sleep depravation, and complaints about nursing, and frustrations with sleep patterns and all of it. Up until she had the baby, our journeys had been mutual. Now they've diverted drastically. And for the first time, it has finally hit me that that bond between us was broken. Not when I gave birth, but when she got to taker her son home.

We'll always be friends, and I'm so scared that this will now push us apart, but to not be there with her, going through those things with her. I feel like I left her alone, and I feel like our journey is over. And I'm just so so so sad today to not be sharing these challenges alongside her anymore. And it's suddenly just really got me down in the dumps all over again.

Trading in some baggage

2008-01-29T21:37:00.000-08:00

I had a lot of baggage from my first birth. Prior to Myles, giving birth to Simone was simultaneously the best day and the worst day of my entire life. I had this 'terrible' birth. She came five weeks early, before my baby shower, before my birth plan, before I bought a single diaper. I said yes to induction (cytotec) which I now regret, my water was broken without my permission, the epidural was coerced, my doctor said she was going to give me an episiotomy no matter what (when I was 5cm). She was right about that. In addition to my 3rd degree episiotomy, my DD was born with forceps in a room off a NICU and she was whisked away. I didn't see her for an hour, didn't attempt nursing for four hours.

In hindsight, it was not any one intervention that upset me. It was the way I was treated; like an object. I was made to feel ashamed and scared and out of control. It was awful. As soon as it was over and I had my darling baby, it was pure love at first sight, but my initial reaction to the actual birth was that I wanted another try. I wanted to do it again, right that day (isn't that insane?).

It took me months to physically heal, I had lots of pain, and some problems with my stitches. Afterwards I was scared to death of my yearly physical (PTSD), so much so that I didn't go back for one for over two years after her birth. I was emotionally scarred, scars only another birth could heal.

This was my baggage. And when I went to my midwife (not the bitch OBGYN I had with Simone) for the first time after learning about my pregnancy with Myles, I bawled and unloaded all of it. I thought I had a lot, and I wanted to let it go. I had something to prove, to me, to myself, with his birth. Some might think that childbirth is just one day, and it is, but it is a day that you will never forget. A positive birth experience is a powerful thing, and a negative one, well, mine haunted me for years. Thus, I instantly saw my pregnancy with Myles as my second chance, perhaps my last chance, to get it right.

That dream was almost shattered when I went into preterm labor with Myles at 28 weeks. I didn't think there was anything worse than a premature birth, my son in the hospital for 10 weeks. My vision of a natural water birth was gone. My worst case scenario for Myles was premature birth, I never imagined anything worse was out there. I was so naive. But after many weeks of bed rest, battling depression, I achieved my dream. I made it to term. My water birth was once again in sight, and I was SO EXCITED to give birth to my dear son. I did hypnobirthing, and a big part of preparation was imagining and visualizing your perfect birth experience. Imagine I did.

Never did I imagine at 37 weeks to the day, that I would lose my son. Never did I imagine that his heartbeat would be there on a Tuesday and gone on a Friday. But Myles didn't leave without giving me a gift. I got my water birth, except for the most important piece (my sweet boy), it was everything I had ever dreamed and more. It hurt (there is no word adequate to describe the pain of childbirth) but I was surrounded by my loved ones; my caregivers were AMAZING, they wanted whatever I wanted. And I gave birth to my son in an hour, completely naturally, with everyone listening to me and honoring my body and my wishes.

So, Myles gave me the gift of healing. I was able to let go of the fears and worries and questions that haunted me from four long years before. But I didn't just drop off some baggage that day. I picked up some new baggage, baggage I never wanted to carry, baggage that no one should ever have to carry. It's a heavy load, though I've had some help here and there, it is for the most part my burden alone. And it is overwhelming. But the experience; to be simultaneously healed and scarred on the same day, to have my dream birth, and lose my dream baby. Well, it was the worst day and the best day of my entire life. It was the day I met and lost my son. It was the day I dropped off what I thought was some major baggage only to find out life had a much greater load waiting for me to haul around this world.

And now I realize, to be pregnant, to give birth, to have a child, is an amazing journey. It is an experience that takes place in that gray area between birth and death; it brings not only fear and immense heartache, but also love and healing and strength. I don't know if I will have another pregnancy, another birth, another baby. But I do know that it is all worth it. This is life, and it's cruel AND beautiful, and I'm not going to give up on the beautiful in order to avoid the cruel. So I want another baby, a hundred babies, because they are worth it a million times over. And I'll carry this baggage forever, losing my son will hurt me every day for the rest of my life, but maybe my next baby will help ease my load a little, and maybe (s)he'll have a new lesson for me as well.

I have no title, just sad

2008-01-23T07:38:00.000-08:00

My life these past weeks has been a haze. I think I've been walking around in shock, going through the motions with little comprehension of what's going on around me. My brain is mush, it's gone. I have no short or long term memory (no it's not the weed, LOL) and I rarely experience any strong emotion; except when I do, and then it's immense pain and sadness and anger and everything bad you can feel. I take no real joy in anything (not even food) even though I manage to smile or even joke around or make light conversation, it's more out of a sense social obligation than from feelings of happiness. The major exception is Simone, of course. Looking at her face, hearing her crazy ponderings about this world still brings me a genuine smile, and I'm thankful for that. If something happened to her, I would kill myself. Period. I realized that today when my sister took her to NP. I'm so scared of something happening to her now. I couldn't do this again.

I've thought a lot about my death since I had my postpartum appt. with my midwife. She referred to me as an 'angel', and felt it necessary to reiterate how close I was to dying. I hadn't thought much of it until then, and then I thought what a sick tragedy that would've been for DD and DH, and all who love me. But if it weren't for Simone and my family, it wouldn't have bothered me that much. Even when they were wheeling me into surgery, I thought 'this is it', and I was at peace with it. I was wheeled past most of my loved ones, and I saw their faces, and I felt at the time like I was saying my last goodbye.

But here I am. I was wrong. I didn't die. But part of me died. And I don't really like the 'new me'. And I don't like life much anymore even. I think what is bothering me today is just putting together my CV (like a resume) and realizing how far off track I am from where I wanted to be. And I feel like I've let everyone down. I know I've let myself down, but I feel like I've let everyeone down, and I have absolutely no desire anymore to do any of it, so I know that I will continue to let them down. And it's depressing because I've made them expect so much over the years. But now I don't care. I don't care about anything anymore on days like this.

Imagining myself, sitting down with my committee, and going through evaluations, and telling them what I've 'accomplished' and what I'm going to do next year, and yada yada yada. I feel like I'm going to be making promises I can't keep, the whole thing is going to be one big line of bullshit. And it makes me feel like shit to know that because these people believe in me. But I'm not the same old me. I'm not excited about research. I'm not excited about next year, or getting publications. I don't believe in me. Why should I put any effort in trying to get them to believe in me? And I don't want them to pity me either. And above all, I dont want to make excuses, and promises, and tell them everything is fine, or will be fine. Because I don't know anymore. I don't know anything.

So, I'm sorry to unload my depression on all of you. I've tried to shield all of you for the most part from my turmoil (except for my bad poetry). I've been posting on a message board with other bereaved parents, and they get most of my late night rants that would've, under any other circumstance, gone to you all. I know there isn't much you can say (please don't tell me to get help, LMAO, I am) but I always feel better after writing my woes on here for some reason.

Please don't worry. I've been here before, and I'll be here again; wallowing. But I will feel better tomorrow, I will forget this. And I'll finish my CV and write my personal statement, and I'll feel like a lie, but I'll go through the motions just like every other day and maybe one of these days I'll be able to better understand the 'new' me, and not loathe her so much.

Dear Myles

2008-01-23T07:36:00.000-08:00

I don't believe in heaven, but if I could say something to my son, this is what I would say. So, for what it's worth, I thought I would share.

Dear Myles,
I often feel so sad for you. That your time on this earth was so brief, you had so little chance to change this world for the better. I've had my whole life and can't boast it yet, but I had such high hopes for you. If you had lived, I have no doubt you would've rocked this world. It pains me to think you and I don't have anymore than what we had, all those weeks and months waiting and preparing, but for nothing. What we had is what we got, and then it was over. The world didn't know you as I wanted, and it would've been a better place with you in it. My world was a better place with you in it, that's how I know.

I guess I wish you could know that what happened was not your fault. You didn't mean to break my heart. It pains me to think that your legacy is one of broken hearts. That the only thing to come of all of your short life is grief and mourning and disappointed hopes. I can't stand the thought of it. So much sadness and loss; that's not you.

I wish you could know that you didn't cause my broken heart. LOSING YOU is what shattered my heart. Though I never had you in my arms; I, we, everyone, had this precious dream of you. I had your future, our future, before us. And I didn't know what it entailed, but it filled my heart with such joy to ponder how you would be. What you might do in this world. Today those same thoughts fill my heart with such sorrow. To have them taken away; from you, from me, from Dad. All without reason. But I don't want your impact on my world to be negative. I don't want the outcome of your birth to spoil those dreams. Because they were wonderful dreams.

I already knew you, you know? You were a 'mover and a shaker' to quote myself at about 18 weeks. I never worried about you, not my little Myles. You always gave us such good signs. Big and strong, you were such a constant comfort to me. I always had such faith in you, that you were a fighter. Even if you were born early; you had this vivacious spirit. You danced, my boy, plain and simple. You made so many people smile. I think of the countless people who felt you kick, everyone I know and love. B and Simone of course, but all the family knew your presence. You let your presence be known. You were not someone to be trifled with, despite the fact you were in my tummy. You were a little piece of me, and Dad; another Simone. What a personality!

Myles, you had a positive impact on this world. Even in that short time. The dream of you was wonderful. We thrived on that dream. And just because it's lost didn't mean it wasn't worthwhile when we embraced it so fully; when you were alive in my belly and in my dreams. We loved it then. We loved you then. We love you now. You were part of us then, and I know we were a part of you. We were a family, if only for a few short months. And without you we will never be a whole family again. Not so long as I live. But I will be damned if your legacy is your absence. We will honor your life. I will work hard to make sure those tiny footprints you left in my heart turn into a large footprint in this world. And that will be my lifes' work. Everything I will do, I will do for you.

Just know, sweet boy, that although my heart is broken, it is not your fault. You were an amazing little man, even though we never saw you alive, we knew your spirit. We knew your energy. You made us laugh and smile and dream. And for that I thank you. Because you were worth it. You were worth every sacrifice. I didn't know it then, I thought I was miserable. But I was just tired. And even at my most troubled moments, it was always the thought of you that would lift my spirits. I remember (after weeks of bed rest and other ailments) describing that dream once to my best friend. I just described how excited I was to hold you in my arms and have you home. How decadent. How luxurious. My own soft, new, tiny, beautiful, sweet baby. All mine. And it was so exciting it took my breath away. And that in itself is worth something. How you could make my problems melt away; just the thought of you.

You are my dream child, Myles. You will always be my dream child. Your dream kept my hope alive in what I thought were the darkest days. And that is powerful, and you will always have that power over me. I will try to use it to honor you. To help moms and baby's, and also moms with empty arms like mine; to try to do something that makes this world a better place for them and their families. And just because I cry, doesn't mean you weren't everything I'd hoped and dreamed. You were everything I ever wanted, and all in a short 37 weeks. I'm so proud of you. You were amazing, my son!

I will always love you, every second, every day!!!!!
MOMMY

I have strength, I need courage

2008-01-15T18:13:00.000-08:00

You say I have strength . . .

but it's so much harder to have courage.

I liked this poem:

It takes strength to be certain,
It takes courage to have doubts.

It takes strength to fit in,
It takes courage to stand out.

It takes strength to share a friend's pain,
It takes courage to feel your own pain.

It takes strength to hide your own pain,
It takes courage to show it and deal with it.

It takes strength to stand guard,
It takes courage to let down your guard.

It takes strength to conquer,
It takes courage to surrender.

It takes strength to endure abuses,
It takes courage to stop them.

It takes strength to stand alone,
It takes courage to lean on a friend.

It takes strength to love,
It takes courage to be loved.

It takes strength to survive,
It takes courage to live.

~ Unknown ~

Here's to having more courage to go with my strength

Pics of Myles

2008-01-15T18:09:00.000-08:00

It's been seven weeks since I lost my precious Myles, and for the first time today I got to see the pictures taken by the photographer. They bring so many mixed emotions, everything seems to these days, but the overpowering emotion they have brought to me is pride. So now I'm just excited to be a gloating mom and show off my baby.

Here they are:

I also want to take this opportunity to talk about stillbirth awareness, or sudden antenatal death syndrom (SADS). I was amazed to discover it is 10 times more common than SIDS, and the number of babies that die of SADS rivals that of breast cancer deaths a year (30,000). Yet it is such a taboo topic, it just doesn't seem to get the press.

One forum I've been on a lot recently is MISS, it's a great community of mourning parents, but also a place for social action. I'm currently working on getting a MISSing Angels bill passed in Nebraska (working the unicameral) which would give certificates of birth resulting in stillbirth to parents. I first heard about it on NPR long before I ever had Myles. Anyway, there has been some pretty recent press coverage of these bills, unfortunately it tends to get embroiled in the abortion debate. Pretty frustrating for somebody as pro-choice as I am as the intent and texts of these bills are all about giving mother's choices.

A good quote

2008-01-09T22:16:00.000-08:00

I wanted to share a quote that struck a note for me personally. I've been reading and trying to understand hope in most of my blogs since I lost Myles. Why do we hope, what is it, can I hope again? And double whammy, did I mention that this quote was from Barack Obama's victory speech (yipee) in Iowa?!

"But we always knew that hope is not blind optimism. It's not ignoring the enormity of the tasks ahead or the roadblocks that stand in our path. It's not sitting on the sidelines or shirking from a fight. Hope is that thing inside us that insists, despite all the evidence to the contrary [emphasis added], that something better awaits us if we have the courage to reach for it and to work for it and to fight for it."

It doesn't answer any of my questions (there are no answers), but it felt timely and poignant, and it made me feel like I might be able to hope again. (Of course now I can claim Obama is talking to me from my tv too, which is always a plus. I'll use that to persuade others in the Nebraska caucus on Feb. 9th, LMAO).

Fuck that, Go Barack!

2008-01-01T09:48:00.000-08:00

Okay, thanks to a timely (New Year's Eve) call from my brother and SIL (and few drinks), I have to rescind and say that I do have one hope for 2008. In fact, my hopes may be dashed in only a few days, or they may grow larger yet. Please, please, please, I hope so badly that Barack wins Iowa, then N.H. then the whole shbang.

Something in me obviously can still muster to give a shit about politics. Maybe there is hope for me yet, RFLMAO. I never thought I'd envy an Iowan, but go Dust and Lil, caucus your asses off! I wish I were there with you!

Goodbye 2007

2008-01-01T09:47:00.000-08:00

Update: I found this quote this morning, it about sums it up. "Losing a parent is like losing the past, losing a child is like losing the future."

My whole world for the last month can be described by one word, ambivalence. I don't know what I want. I feel 20 emotions a day. Anyone who knows me knows there are very few positions in which I'm a 'fence rider'. I've always got my opinions firmly planted on one side or the other. I have even switched sides of the fence, but rarely do I teeter. On the issue of the new year, I'm stuck.

2007 is a conundrum. I think I could easily say, 'Fuck 2007, good riddance'. Part of me feels that way. You might expect I'd welcome a new year, a frest start, maybe something to get me back on my feet. But for some reason, it makes me so sad to say goodbye. Becuase although it was the year my son died, it was also the year my son was born. It was a year defined by my tenacity. My tenacity to finish up my course work, finish my comps, complete the survey for my dissertation. It was a year where I was forced (kicking and screaming) into complete pregnant submission. but I persevered, I even 'successfully' accomplished the goal of my bed rest. My son was 'born' term. When you put it all together, I was miserable, but I did so much. I had so many hopes come through even and I felt like I had so much to look forward to, and so much to be proud of.

2007 was the year of Hope. I had more hopes and dreams than ever before in my life. I'm no stranger to disappointed hopes. I've seen them crumble many times. But I've never questioned my ability to hope again afterwards (okay, maybe after the 2004 elections, something about 4 more years of Bush). But when Myles died, I've never seen my hopes and dreams so completely annhilated. The feeling of it was like watching those hopes, not just dashed to pieces; but beaten to a pulp, then ground into the dirt, then shit on. And much of my recent existential quandaries now revolve around even trying to justify the will to hope. Emotionally, I don't have it in anymore. Logically, I can't see a reason why I ever dared to hope in the first place given my beliefs.

Although I may appear a cynic, its always been my biggest con. I'm a poser. Deep down, I've always been a hopeful person, even to the point of naivete. If anyone asks, I say that I'm sure the worst will happen, but in my mind I always hold out hope for the best. I can think to so many moments in my life where I've been so filled with hope and excitement, it was like my heart could burst. And last year was filled to the brim with that heart-bursting hope. I just forced myself to believe that everything would work out, all would fall into place, and for so much of the year it really appeared it would.

So, saying goodbye to 2007 is quite a sad affair for me. I'm not just saying goodbye to my son again (which I went and did today, and I will continue to do for as long as it takes to set in). It's like I'm saying goodbye to that piece of me that dared to hope. It's like I'm saying goodbye to hope itself. I've already mourned so much, but now I mourn even for the New Year. I've always loved the New Year. So much more than xmas. Why? No, its not the drugs and parties you fucking smart alecs. It was that sense of hope! Hope that maybe, just maybe, the next year will be better than the last. And this year, I don't fucking have it. I feel like there is nothing for me in 2008.

This time last year, I dreamed of a child, sadly this year, that dream is still the same. But its defined more by fear and anxiety than excitement and hope. So anyway. Goodbye 2007. I wish you didn't have to go. But there are no do-overs or we'd all sign up, eh? It reminds me of a poem (yes another tear jerker, I'm so sorry I'm downer Debbie now, LOL):

If I could have a lifetime wish
A dream that would come true.
I would wish with all my heart for yesterday and you.
A thousand words can't bring you back;
I know because I've tried.
And neither will a million tears;
I know because I've cried.
You left behind my broken heart, and happy memories too,
but I never wanted memories,
I only wanted you.

Big Sister

2008-01-01T09:44:00.000-08:00

I wrote this late last night, I have tendencies toward being a 'weepy' drunk, so I hope you'll forgive my sentimentality. There is something about writing poetry that makes me feel like I'm in grade school again, I'm such and amateur, LOL.

Big Sister

She was a wonderful big sister,
she helped plan for you with thoughtful care.
She thought of everything a baby needs
always a sense of excitement in her air.

She was a wonderful big sister,
she helped me fold and sort your clothes.
We would sing to you as you would kick,
we'd laugh at all your throes.

She is a wonderful big sister,
she talks of you each day.
She wonders why you left so soon,
she asks us why you couldn't stay.

She is a wonderful big sister,
she keeps her mommy and daddy strong.
She gives us hugs and grieves with us
when for you we long.

She is a wonderful big sister,
she keeps our days so bright
with lots of talk and laughter
she helps to keep our dreams in sight.

She'll be a wonderful big sister
to any new babies who come our way
but we all know deep in our hearts
she'll always be a your big sister either way.

Dead end.

2008-01-01T09:42:00.000-08:00

One thing that has bothered me about all of this is how normal 'normal' is. As if I were never pregnant, never on bed rest, never had this dream of a child. And there is something deeply disturbing to me about just picking up where I left off. Because, honestly, where I left off, I was miserable. Myles was my savior. I had so many hopes wrapped up in him. And in so many ways I didn't know how he would change my life, what new dynamic he would bring to the mix, but I knew it would be radical and I knew it would be positive. And I fucking needed that change so much. And now it's like none of it ever happened.

You would think that my life would be easier now, pragmatically speaking. Babies are so much work, and four year olds are so much work, and dissertations are so much work, and the job hunt is so much work. But without Myles, doing all of those other things seems SO much harder, not easier. He was my inspiration. Knowing he would be here gave me so much hope, and so much energy, and so much excitement. Now I just feel hopeless. I feel like I need to reevaluate everything in my life, question everything, go back to the beginning. Because the only thing I do know, in my gut, is that I don't want anything to be the same as it was. I just don't want to pick it all back up again and stay on the same course. It's a disconcerting feeling, knowing you need to go somewhere but not even knowing where, let alone how to get there.

All I know is nothing is as it should be but everything is still the same.

Epiphany? No.

2008-01-01T09:41:00.000-08:00

I wasn't looking for a religious epiphany from my experience with Myles, and I haven't had one. Having said that, it's 2am and for the first time in a long time I've started asking religious questions again. Not the really lame cliche religious questions that probably jump into some of your heads (Andrew!) but I've begun to look more deeply at my atheism from a philosophical point of view. Because it was in 2004-2005, right around the Presidential elections that I closed the book on all of that pondering and uncertainty. I embraced my atheism wholeheartedly and never looked back (except maybe to crack jokes). Good times. But part of me knows that closing that book was a reaction to the politics of the time. I was pretty bitter, and now that I think about it, perhaps what happened is I lost hope. So anyway, I haven't got it all figured out yet (I've all of the sudden got some big questions to chew on and some books to read), but do expect more long drawn out posts about my atheism alla Fall of 2006.

What I'm contemplating right now (yes at 2am on a Tuesday):

Does atheism=nihilism. I've never thought so, but I recently read an argument by John Haught that made me question it. The question is: can you be an atheist and justify hope for humanity? So, to any atheists out there who want to step up to the plate, are you nihilists? If not, why not? No, I'm not asking if atheists can be moral, most atheists I know have much more deeply held values than most christians (and certainly they are more just). The question isn't the can, its the why? And it's not the why, as in tell me about social justice. It's the why as in, what in your consciousness keeps you striving for those values? Why do you still hope and what are you hoping for?

Why I'm not a proponent of adoption

2007-12-17T10:10:00.000-08:00

I've perused a lot of message boards lately, just reading stories of child loss and stillbirth. I haven't decided if its a 'good' thing or not. But I cope by reading and writing, and reading the stories of others gives me some perspective so even though it puts me in a sad weepy mood, I think its a positive way for me to cope. One thing I've realized is that child loss is not uncommon. Stillbirth is much more common than I think most pregnant women realize, but in general, people lose children at every stage in the lifecourse. One post that really caught my attention, however, was the post of a woman who 'lost' a child, but the child didn't die. She was forced into an adoption when she was a teenager.

Reading this post was an epiphany for me. You see, my mom flipped when all of this happened. Don't get me wrong, we were all knocked on our asses when Myles died. My mom, however, was literally knocked on her ass. She couldn't function. She was dazed, and nonresponsive, and basically she became a zombie. And I was annoyed with it at the time, and other family members I think were pissed because she didn't hold up better for me. And they were right in the fact that I didn't need to be worried by my mom when I still had to give birth, etc. But what I realized afterwards, what I've come to understand so clearly now, is that there was a reason my mom acted that way. Why it shook her to her core, perhaps more than even me. My mom has experienced what I experienced. And in a way, she had to experience it all over again when I lost Myles. You see, she gave up a baby for adoption in 1970, when she was 16.

I think what disturbs me the most when I compare our two experiences is that my mom got more time with Myles' dead body than she got with her very much alive baby girl. Can you imagine? She had more time to say goodbye to my dead son, her grandson, than to her own newborn healthy little daughter. I think about all of the momentos given to me to remember him by, and the care and support I've received from countless people. Do you think my Mom got these things? Her arms were just as empty as mine when we left hospitals 25 years apart. She got her milk, like I did, she had to see other pregnant women and other babies just like I have to see. And goddamnit, she experienced an infant loss. And just like many women who have experienced a stillbirth will attest to, many people want you to move on, have another baby, etc., etc., much sooner than we're ready to. With my Mom's adoption, take that times 10. She had to do it, and be ashamed about it, and then she was told to MOVE ON. She didn't have any support, or any closure, just the assurance that it was for the best. It breaks my heart and boils my blood just thinking about what that must have been like for her.

And you know what? Giving up her baby probably wasn't 'for the best'. Because my mom is a great mom, and she would've been a great mom to that little girl. She didn't have big plans for her life, she was in the working class, she had no plans for college, no bright and shiny middle class dreams she was aspiring to. Her life tanked after that adoption; drugs, prison, etc., until she met my Dad and had my older brother in 1975. That baby would've saved her life. If you've read 'promises I could keep' than you know what I'm talking about. The only thing my mom didn't have was a father to the baby, or resources to support herself. But in the most important sense, she had everything she needed to be a good mom to that baby, because my Mom has the biggest heart in the world.

Which brings me to another point. Even today, especially for women in the middle class, having a baby outside of marriage is seen as a dream destroyer. And we can argue all day about whether it is or not as many single moms have achieved their dreams. But this perception, this aversion to babies (BABIES!!!!) I think is quite telling in our society. Why is our society structured so that for the majority of women, a mistimed pregnancy is feared as much or more than many STD's? Baby's don't just naturally destroy your life. They are not inherently good or bad, it is the social norms that surround that new baby that are met with approval or disapproval, and MORE IMPORTANTLY, with love and support and other important social resources or the denial of all of those things. And because of this, adoption seems like the ultimate coercion to me. Because our society doesn't want to support pregnant women, but we also don't want women to have free will and therefore the freedom to abort the children they have no personal or social resources to support. So we march out infertile couples who meet all of the standards, individuals who are 'deserving', and we take babies from the undeserving and hand them over.

And the whole time we're doing this, we convince these pregnant women that the baby that is growing inside of them is 'better off' with someone else. And when they birth that baby and hand that baby over, do they really have a choice? Aren't they losing their baby they've MOTHERED for 40 weeks in their womb, just like I lost my baby Myles?

I'm all for adoption in a world where women really have a choice. But my mom didn't have a choice. She was just a teenager who got pregnant and then was convinced to give her baby away. It haunts my mom to this day. And how many adoptions today are freely entered into? How many adoptions just wouldn't be if we as a society weren't structured so that the lives of 'undeserving' (whether they are teens, or a unmarried, or poor, or whatever) women are ruined for choosing to keep and care for the babies they carry.

I am 100% pro-choice, no ifs ands or buts. I also believe that the fewer mistimed pregnancies and abortions we have in our society the better our society is. And therefore, logically, I think the fewer ADOPTIONS we have in our society, the better. I know there are many childless couples out there, but they are not entitled to the babies of the young, poor, and/or uneducated. Because taking babies from these mothers is wrong. Period. Because we as a society are doing to them is what happened by chance to me. And I have a hard time believing that women walk away from coerced adoptions happy and healthy. And truly how many adoptions in the US can we honestly say are completely free of coercion?

So, I am not a proponent of adoption. Despite knowing that the individuals who adopt babies just want so bad what I want; a tiny little baby to call their own. I know their pain intimately, I long for what they long for. And I don't know what to tell them about my opinion, because in a perfect world, my arguments ultimately lead to the conclusion that the vast majority of infertile couples would be childless. But I'm not going to pretend that it is okay to remedy what happens by chance (infertility) by purposefully doing to women what happened by chance to me.

The inevitable

2007-12-13T21:17:00.000-08:00

This entire time, one of my greatest fears has been running into someone who doesn't know about Myles. Well, it finally just happened. But you know what? It wasn't that bad.

It was one of my former students. She had me this summer for stats, I was so big so fast with this pregnancy, I'm sure the whole class thought I could go any day, and that was August! And the whole time I'm talking to her, for her sake, I'm hoping she doesn't ask. I'm thinking, please don't ask, please don't ask, please don't ask. And, finally, she asked. And I told her. And she felt terrible. But you know what? I didn't start bawling. And I kept the conversation light, and although I know she felt more than awkward about it, I'm happy I made it through it.

So, it is what it is, and it's something I'm glad I don't have to dread anymore. Because if I did it this time, then I can do it next time. And as time goes on, I'll have to do it less and less.

And to be honest, that's part of the reason I came back to school today. I've had a couple people ask me why I'm here today. And I thought about it, and I wasn't really sure. There is nothing here I need to do today that I can't do from home. But the more I sit here and think about it, the more I realized this is what I needed to do. I needed to come back to work and school. Just to come back and to be seen and to get my mail and to say 'hi' to people who haven't seen me and to get over this hump.

Because even at the hospital, one of my first worries was becoming some sort of harbinger of death to everyone around me. Especially my pregnant friends, I instantly felt so bad for them. Isn't that stupid, I lose a baby and I worry about what everyone is going to think or how they will feel? I don't know what's wrong with me. I've often wondered if I'm some sort of sociopath, LOL. I guess I just don't like bumming people out. I want to make people happy, not sad. I want to give my pregnant friends hope and strength, not fear. And having to tell people about Myles, its just not something I've wanted to do in person with anyone.

So, now I know I can do it, I can talk about Myles, I can tell people what happened. And getting over this hump gives me a little peace anyway. That maybe the days to come won't be as bad as I imagined, that I will be able to pick up the pieces with a little bit of normalcy. That I'm still the same person, and that my life is still my life, and the world hasn't come to an end. Because I guess somedays it has really felt that way. It's felt like the whole world has changed. And I've been a little scared about finding my niche in that world again. But maybe I can do it.

Angry

2007-12-13T21:15:00.000-08:00

My SIL sent me this poem last week, I really really liked it.

If.

If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you
But make allowance for their doubting too,
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,
Or being hated, don't give way to hating,
And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master,
If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you;
If all men count with you, but none too much,
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!

--Rudyard Kipling

There are some verses in this poem that I've been thinking a lot about:

Or [if you can] watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breath a word about your loss;

And I guess somedays I've thought, you know, I can do that. I can do that. I can stand back up from this, and brush myself off, and start again. And days like today, I think that there is no fucking way I can do that. That I can't just start all over again and do what I did. Because what I did these last 9 months was really fucking hard. And how do you give your life to something like that, how do you risk everything when you know what I know now; that there are no guarantees. Because I did it the first time on the assumption that it would pay off. I did it under the assumption that I was sacrificing FOR something, not for nothing.

So I'm angry, and I don't have anybody to be angry with except myself. And it's stupid, and I know it's stupid, but what do you do with this kind of anger when there is absolutely nobody to be angry with? All I have is me. And I just feel so stupid, and so naive, and so angry with myself for never once considering that I could lose it all. That I could put all my eggs in one basket like that, and never consider once that it might be for nothing. Because if I had really appreciated that reality, then I would've done so many things differently. With Simone, and with school, and with everything. If I had ever once even considered that possibility, I wouldn't be so lost right now.

Perspective

2007-12-05T15:28:00.000-08:00

I've done a lot of hand wringing about some of my past pregnancy blogs. I use my private blog many times as a bitchfest (as if I'm telling you something you don't know), and I'd be lying if I didn't admit that I've wished I could take some of it back. Okay, that's putting mildly. I wish I could go back and punch myself in the head, LMAO. I've got this great visual of it I wish I you could all see, similar to that Andy Samberg video where he punches people in the head while they're eating that I bulletined out a few weeks ago.

I think back on some of my blogs and I feel like I was so ungrateful and so entitled. It was a hard pregnancy, I know that, but honestly I'd do a thousand more weeks of bedrest for a different outcome. I would do the whole pregnancy over again a thousand times. What wouldn't I do? I know this is a stupid game to play with myself, I'm pretty hard on myself when it comes to self reflection, but there is some truth to my critiques.

The blog that's bothered me the most was when I was angry about my mom suggesting I 'enjoy my pregnancy'. To me, pregnancy has always been a means to an end; no intrinsic value whatsoever. I thought the same with DD's pregnancy, and hers was a relatively easy pregnancy in comparison. For some reason I always knew birth was intrinsically valuable, a reason why I was so disappointed with DD's birth and why I put so much emphasis on the type of birth I wanted for Myles. And even now, the birth of Myles was one of the positive things I can look to, despite the circumstances. I like to joke that I'm no longer a proponent of natural child birth having done it now, but it's a joke. I wouldn't change a thing. There were some wonderful moments, when my daughter and niece hopped in the jacuzzi with me as I labored and began singing to me, 'the sun will come out tomorrow'. But I digress. I guess what I'm saying is I don't think I'll think the same when/if I do this whole pregnancy thing again. There were many special moments in my pregnancy, ones I wish I would've documented better now.

And in general, maybe there should be a little intrinsic value in everything we do. Okay, maybe not everything (getting the oil changed in your car probably has no value, he he), but as many seemingly mundane things as we can possibly manage. One of my major flaws is I'm entirely too goal oriented. Look at me. I've planned the last 2 years for a baby (seriously, we planned the date of conception 9 months in advance, LOL, I'm dead serious. really.). I scheduled my whole life around this baby, I made myself utterly miserable because of said scheduling (comps, teaching, etc.). And. Here. I. Am. We've sacrificed so much, S, me, B. I've been a total bitch sometimes because of the stress. Think of all the time I wasted, all the hours I wished away.

Okay, so I know I'm no genius here. I experience the death of a loved one and now I value life more. But fuck it, that's exactly how I feel. I've been on some message boards for people who have lost a child (of all ages), and I also realize that there is a lot of tragedy in this world and I'm not immune. But I've got a lot of things in my life to appreciate, Simone and B most of all. So some of the past days have been hard. S asked me when I was going to stop crying, LOL, most of the times she ignores me, but she is getting a little bored with the whole mourning thing. I told her probably never, but that I'll cry less and less as time goes on. Of course, even as I say this to her she's yawning. But this morning, as I layed in bed going over everything in my head again for the thousandth time, I think I turned a small corner. I don't think I'm going to stop crying, but I think I'm going to be a little more positive in the in between times. Because even now, I can't be wasting these days. I've wasted too much time in the past six months just waiting for the shit to blow over. And it's stupid, because that 'shit' is my life, and I better fucking make the most of it.

Just sad

2007-12-04T10:44:00.000-08:00

It seems that most of my days are filled with attempts at trying to forget I should have a tiny baby to take care of. I just feel like something very essential to me is missing. What I wouldn't give to be pregnant right now, to know that I have another one on the way to fill the void in my life. You prepare so much for a new baby. Because I'm already a mom, I knew what it was it going to take. It was so tangible. And I just wanted to wrap myself in that experience this time. The first time around, I just wanted to get through it, like a war or something. This time I knew what I was getting and I was so looking forward to every little piece of it. Yes, even lugging a carseat around, and the poops and the laundry and the vaccinations. Everything. Mostly, I just couldn't wait to breastfeed again, and cosleep again, and carry that little baby on my chest by my heart.

It hurts so bad to remember each day what is missing. Should I forget? When I was in the tub with my daughter awaiting to give birth to Myles, she began singing, "the sun will come out, tomorrow." It was so sweet. Now I can't stop thinking of Daddy Warbucks singing,

And someday I'll forget,
how much s/he meant to me,
and how s/he was almost my baby, maybe.

Part of me does want to forget, this instant, that I was ever pregnant. I feel so guilty about it. That baby meant everything to me, everything. I just wish I could look down now, from behind my laptop and there he would be in a bouncy, sleeping soundly, with his sweet little eyes closed. I feel like he is still here sometimes. But it hurts too bad to think these types of thoughts all day. If I forget, than I can get on with my life, and maybe have another pregnancy, and just forget that I should have a baby right now. A beautiful baby boy.

Where are the grieving atheists?

2007-12-03T20:28:00.000-08:00

You wouldn't believe how pressured I feel to have some religious epiphany lately. My only recourse is making jokes. Right now, my schtick is that I now believe in God . . . and he is most definitely evil. No really, I have a hard time believing that religious conversions are so effective in times of tragedy. Am I that naive?

All I can think of is how ineffective religion would be in helping me deal with the loss of my child. If I were a religious person, I think I would be plaqued by the 'whys'. Or the whole, 'why do bad things happen to good people' BS. Currently, these aren't the types of things I'm dwelling on, and they weren't when it all happened. I almost feel bad for deeply religious people who find themselves in these situations. I became an atheist, not through tragedy, but through a long organic rational process. Tragedy, in my mind, is probably the worst way to become an atheist. Atheism isn't about anger, after all.

All I know about what happened to me is that I'm a statistic, a rare one. I'm not a bad person, I didn't deserve to lose my son, no one deserves this. And nobody, certainly no omnipotent entity, would 'do' this to someone. There is no justification, no long term 'lesson' to be learned, no big picture that could possibly satisfy or justify what has happened to me and my family. So any talk of such just makes me frustrated with the silliness of it. Do people really expect me to believe that a) god is loving, b) he nevertheless 'took' my son, c) it was a good thing that this happened in 'the big picture', d) that people are rewarded for doing gods work and punished for not, e) but because I'm a 'good' person I'm not one of those people being punished. Who can believe that all at the same time and not have their head explode? Really, if religious people were being honest with me and themselves, they would say that this happened because I'm a non-believer. Am I wrong?