Missing in action

I miss being pregnant and I miss my little boy so much it's almost unbearable sometimes. I guess I'll ache for him for the rest of my life. And to be honest, I wouldn't have it any other way. The dull ache of my sorrow is all I have left of him.

Oh my God I miss him.

It's my party and I'll cry if I want to (or not)

I turned 35 today. Aside from the fact that I can't believe I'm this old (seriously, HOW did this happen??) I can't believe I spent this day without my son. I thought a lot about it towards the end of my pregnancy. I thought about the fact that I would have my baby in my arms on my 35th birthday -- that I would finally be a Mommy. I knew I wouldn't care what presents I got or what festivities anyone did or didn't have planned because my beloved and I would have our son. That's all I wanted. Just my little family around me as I rang in a new year.

Well we all know that didn't happen. And I single-handedly made this one of the most depressing birthdays ever. About two weeks after Thomas died my beloved asked me what I wanted for my birthday while we were out for a drive, trying desperately to distract ourselves from the unending pain of our grief. I told him I didn't want anything because the only thing I wanted I couldn't have. Eventually my Mom and my sister also asked what I'd like for my birthday. I told them the same thing. I wanted to be with them to mark the occasion, but I didn't want gifts.

Somehow this turned into "She doesn't want to have a birthday at all". That's never what I had in mind. In fact, my feelings about this day had changed over the ensuing four weeks and I was starting to feel that it might be nice, maybe even uplifting, to have a present or two. But the damage was done. I'd successfully put a pall over the day. My Mom called to wish me a happy birthday, but prefaced it with "I know you don't want to hear this, but I wanted to wish you a happy birthday." Granted, I knew it wasn't going to be the very happiest birthday ever, but who doesn't want to hear their Mom wish them a happy birthday? I'd have been crushed if she hadn't called today.

I'm an idiot. A depressing and, now, depressed idiot. The sun is setting on my 35th birthday and I made it a miserable one. If it hadn't been for my beloved (who bought me a beautiful necklace and some gardening books, made me breakfast, took me out for lunch and asked me all day long what I wanted to do next in a vain attempt to help me have a good day) I'm sure I'd have spent the day in a pool of my own tears and snot.

By some miracle I haven't cried today. I'm not really sure why. Maybe, at 35, I just don't have the energy or maybe the love of a good man has kept my spirits above the sobbing point. Or maybe, like a very good friend's 3-year old said, Thomas "is in heaven helping God" and they've spent the day working to get me through one of the hardest birthdays ever.

So thank you my beloved, my sweet Thomas and God. What would I do without you?

"Thanks For Trying"

I picked up an orange pop today. I didn't notice the "check under the cap -- you could be a winner" message on the label until I was in the car. It went on to say that I had a 1 in 5 chance of winning a Pepsi and a slim chance of winning a mini iPod. Foolishly believing that after everything we've been through we deserve to win something (anything -- even a friggin' can of Pepsi) I pick, pick, picked away at the plastic cap liner until it finally came loose.

"Thanks for trying". That's what it said in screaming white letters on a happy blue background.

"Thanks for trying". Well isn't that just fan-freakin-tastic. And if that doesn't just sum up my life these days. "Thanks for trying".

Why does it feel like the world is laughing at me today?

Losing your son isn't funny...

...so why am I laughing?

Okay, obviously I'm not laughing at that, but I AM laughing -- at my beloved, at funny stuff on TV, at the book I'm currently reading -- at all kinds of things. The thing of it is, I'm laughing but all the while I'm wondering how I can possibly find anything funny when my little boy is gone.

Sometimes I'll find myself laughing that gut-busting kind of laugh that makes you feel so incredibly good, only to have it replaced by crushing guilt when I remember that it hasn't even been six weeks. How can I betray my son by laughing -- by moving on?

I asked my beloved if he feels the same guilt. He looked confused, and then said no. He has come to terms with what I'm still stuggling with. He knows that we have no choice BUT to go on -- that Thomas would want us to go on. He knows that to stay mired in the unbearable grief we felt as we held our dying son is a waste of our lives. He knows that we have a lifetime to go, a lifetime that may very well be filled with happiness as incredible as this current sadness is horrible, and to squander the opportunity to be happy just doesn't make sense.

He's right. Of course he's right. So why do I still feel guilty when I laugh?

Still no answer

My beloved suggested that perhaps God was asleep at the wheel. After stepping far, far away from him to avoid being hit by the bolt of lightning, I laughed. It wasn't a jolly belly laugh though. It was more of a knowing chuckle paired with an eye roll. I know God had a reason, I just can't for the life of me figure out what it was.

And he still hasn't answered my question. I still don't know where I go from here. Maybe I'm not listening hard enough (God's whisper is awfully quiet sometimes), or maybe he hasn't gotten around to telling me yet, but I still don't know where I'm headed.

I know I'm not ready to consider getting pregnant again just yet. I've been pregnant on and off since 2003 and I have nothing to show for it except a slightly purple scar, a slight incontinence issue, a very fragile psyche, and some gut-wrenching pictures of the world's most beautiful and perfect baby boy. After two miscarriages and then losing Thomas, I don't know if or when I'll be ready to travel down that road again.

But the thing is, if don't make that journey, I'll never again have the chance to look into the face of my own child and see bits of me and bits of my beloved and know that our love created a life.

Poor, sweet Thomas. It was horrific seeing him hooked up to so much machinery and even more horrific knowing he wasn't really there at all -- but I can still feel the warmth of his little head under my hand as I touched him and stared, with awe, at the tiny person we'd made.

God, if that's you, whisper a little louder, okay?

Um, God?

Where do I go from here?

How do I make it feel real?

When your son only lives for 20 hours and you spend most of that time in a morphine induced slumber, how do you make it feel real after the fact? It’s been almost 5 weeks since my little man came and went, and when I look at pictures of my beautiful son it’s like I’m looking at a child I don’t know. I mean, he has my nose, plain as day, and he has my beloved’s chin and body shape – he obviously belongs to us – but I don’t know him. I never got to hear him cry or coo, I never rocked him to sleep, I never changed his diaper - the poor little thing never even opened his eyes.

We had no bonding time. I was in recovery for four hours after the birth – slipping in and out of said morphine induced slumber – and when I did see him for a precious few moments before being taken to my room, I feel asleep. I feel asleep while my son struggled for life. He lay in his little incubator hooked up to every piece of machinery imaginable and I lay on a stretcher beside him…and fell asleep.

I slept through the night and didn’t see him again until about 12:30pm the next day, by which time we knew there was no hope. No brain activity. That’s what they told us. The only activity in his brain was producing seizures that were wracking his tiny, perfect body. And so we decided to let him go. And I held him, for the first time, as he died.

But even then I couldn’t stay awake. The loss of blood, shock and morphine once again stole time from me and my son that I’ll never get back. When they told us it could take two hours for him to die I asked if they could take him back and call us when the time was close. I wanted to hold my son while he slipped away but I was too weak to wait it out in the tiny, cluttered office they let us use. I needed to rest. I couldn’t stay awake.

In the end, he went without us there. It happened faster than they thought and our little boy died in the special care nursery without us. It breaks my heart – but what I almost can’t bear is the fact that he never knew we were there at all. He was brain dead. I held him and he never felt my arms. I kissed him and he never felt my lips. I loved him and he never knew it. I love him still – with all my heart.

I know that now, finally, he knows. But now I don’t know him. I remember him inside me, kicking and rolling and poking, and I remember the grainy images on the countless ultrasounds I had. That’s the boy I know.

So how do I make it real? How do I connect the boy I know to the heartbreakingly beautiful boy in the pictures? Will I ever make the connection? Will I go crazy trying? Will it all fall into place and somehow make sense one day? I guess all I can do is hope and pray that it will, one blissful day.

I am a Mother

What is it like to be a mother when your child is gone — when all physical evidence points to a recent birth (pain, scars, fatigue) but your child has died? I am a mother, but my arms are empty. I gave birth to our son on March 9th. Thomas died just 20 hours later on March 10th. He was our first child.

So I am in fact a mother — but instead of changing diapers, nursing and staying up all night rocking my son, I’m wandering aimlessly about a deafeningly quiet house trying to find something to do with all the endless free time I didn’t think I’d have after giving birth. Instead of planning for his future, we’re planning our own. Will we try again? Will we adopt? Will we resign ourselves to a childless life? When will we take down the nursery we had so lovingly prepared for our sweet little boy? We don’t know yet. All we know is that we had a perfect and beautiful son and that we are parents. The problem is, we don’t look like parents.

So how do I go about being a mother in the absence of my child? I think I’ve earned the title, but what does society say? Are you only a mother if you have a child in tow? Will mothers who have been in the trenches raising kids for years resent me using the title they may feel they deserve more than I do? Doesn’t the fact that my beloved and I had to make the hardest decision a parent ever has to make right out of the gate give us the right to call ourselves mother and father? We loved our son so much we let him go. We did what was right for him despite the fact that it broke our hearts.

I’ve been trying to figure out what I’m going to say the next time a well-meaning stranger asks me if I have any kids. Will they want to know that I had a son who died? Would they prefer if I just say no? I don’t know. But if they ask if I’m a mother I will say yes. There’s no question in my mind. I carried my son for 9 months — I knew him. He was a rascal. He’d kick me when I sneezed, he’d nudge me back when I’d gently poke at him and he spent the last few weeks in utero trying to figure out if he was going to be breech or not. Every other week he’d present himself in a new position until finally he decided he’d do it the right way. The rascal.

So yes, I only got to hold him once while he was alive, but he was my son and I am his mother. I don’t know quite how or where I fit in yet, but I know that I am a mother. My time in the trenches was painfully short, but it was more painful than a lifetime of mothering. Of that I’m sure.

Cake Makes Me Happy

Is that weird? That cake makes me so happy? I mean deep down, pit of my stomach, grinning from ear to ear happy? I think it might be, but I'll let you be the judge.

Here's the story: My beloved came home from work with a few bags of groceries I'd asked him to pick up and there was cake in one of them. CAKE. I was genuinely excited to see the Kleenex and juice (I'm sick and needed him to forage for sick girl supplies for me since I'm too pitiful and snotty to venture out myself at the moment) but the cake was unexpected -- and, and just so thrilling. CAKE -- cake on a damp, dreary February day. Unexpected cake. There it was, dark and gooey, sitting in a little plastic dome all chocolatey and full of sweet promise. And my heart leapt. And I smiled. I was at peace -- all was right with the world when I had that one blissful moment of realization that I was going to eat CAKE reeeallllllly soon.

As it so often is, my euphoria was interrupted by the mundane as I finished making dinner and poked through the mail. But then I'd catch site of CAKE again and the flush of anticipation would race through me anew. When I sat down to eat dinner, CAKE left my mind, ever so briefly. But throughout the meal it would pop back into my consciousness every now and then, rekindling the flame of my raw desire.

And then it was time to eat CAKE. And it was bliss. Thick, sticky-icing bliss on a plate. I was happy. It's been an hour and I'm still happy. CAKE is coursing through my veins. We are one.

See? Is this weird? I keep thinking it's just because my beloved surprised me with a sweet treat on a day he knew I needed a little pick-me-up. I keep thinking THAT'S what's made me so happy. I keep thinking HE'S the sweet one, not CAKE. But the thing of it is, CAKE IS sweet and I do love CAKE. I love CAKE a lot.

But of course it goes without saying that I love my beloved more. And maybe, just maybe he'll bring me CAKE again one day soon...

I Miss Me.

I just e-mailed my beloved and asked if he's as tired of my pregnant mood swings as I am. How stupid am I? The poor man can't answer this question. What was I thinking? So now there's a small, sunny office in downtown Toronto covered with the contents of his head. There's gray matter sliding down yellow walls onto scuffed hardwood floors and a MAC that's dripping with the blood of the man I love.

I've blown up my husband. I'm sure of it. His brain went into overdrive trying to figure out the best response (the one that would cause the least violently emotional outburst from me) and it simply blew up.

Men aren't equipped for answering these kinds of questions this late in their wives' pregnancies. Not after 8 months of calming irrational fears, dodging endless "does this make me look fat?" queries, researching morning sickness and heartburn remedies online, watching doctors poke and prod, pretending to see the sweetness in a grainy black and white ultrasound of an alien blob, sitting through breastfeeding classes and just generally soothing, placating, reassuring and comforting.

So this is my public apology to my beloved. Or what's left of him. I'm sorry I asked you if you were as sick of my mood swings as I am. Of COURSE you are -- but I had no right to ask, because I know you can't answer with any truthfulness.

I'm also sorry that I'm at my most exhausted and bloated (and, therefore, freaked out) right about the time you walk in the door after working hard all day long. I'm sorry that the me you married has turned into some other women (who even I don't recognize half the time) who burps and farts with reckless abandon but chastizes you when you do the same. I'm sorry I have no energy and prefer naps to making out. I'm sorry I can't lift anything bigger than a slice of bread, shovel snow or change the cat box (okay, I'm not actually that sorry about the cat box).

I miss me too. But they say I'll be back. Unfortunately I'll be back with a tiny someone whose mood swings will be far worse than anything you've seen from me these past 8 months. Fortunately they say we'll love every single second of it.

So they say, anyway. But somehow I believe them.

Life and death and other things on my mind

Right now as I sit here creating my first ever blog (which I know I'm not actually cool enough to do -- but apparently they'll let just about anyone do it) I'm filled with life and consumed by thoughts of death.

Let's chat about the life part first. I'm quite literally filled with it. My little Peanut, who has been quietly and miraculously growing inside me for 29 weeks -- is making his presence known with kicks and jabs as well as gentle rumblies this afternoon. I wonder if this means he'll sleep tonight. It would be nice if one of us made it through the night without waking up.

But actually, the one nice thing about being up in the middle of the night is Peanut. My once able bladder is slowly being rendered quite useless by the pressure of the Peanut, so I'm up a lot. And so is he. I guess my moving wakes him and so when I lay back down he starts squirming -- ready for action. When it's not the kind of low, hard abdominal kicks that, to be honest, freak me out, I love feeling him moving around in the night. I lay on my back in the darkness and put my hands on my stomach, waiting for each new movement. The (sometimes) soft breathing of my beloved laying beside me provides the music for this little in-utero dance recital. And I love every moment of it. Feeling the baby I love and hearing the man I love.

I don't love the man's snoring all that much, but apparently I'm quite adept at nasal trumpeting myself, so I try to keep the complaining down to a minimum. And really, with all I have in my life right now -- blessings too many to count -- a little snoring is nothing at all.

I'm actually really in awe of my blessings these days. Like Maria (The Sound of Music lovers out there should easily catch this reference) I figure I must have done something good to deserve all this, but I can't for the life of me figure out what it is. But I know I have the rest of my life to be thankful -- and to make sure I make the most of these blessings by being the best mother and wife I can.

I still can't quite believe I'm going to be a mother, or that the man I love is going to be a father. But we are -- it's charging at us like a freight train. Yes, that's a scary image, and I just finished saying I'm blessed and thankful for the gift, but it's a scary proposition too. I've never done this before -- been responsible for a little human I made myself. A little human who doesn't come with a manual, or so I've been told. So forgive me if every once in a while I freak out ever so slightly at the prospect of being a parent.

I'm sure all will be well, as the man I love keeps telling me (in a vain attempt to stave off another panic attack and/or hormone-induced crying jag). I'm sure all will be well, but I'm sure there will be more tears and more panic on the horizon. I do actually have to birth this little Peanut, you see. Right now that's scaring me more than raising him, but I actually think that's a good thing. The birthing will last a few hours (God willing) but the raising won't end until I do.

Which brings me to thoughts of death. Maybe they're not actually consuming me (a little dramatic up there, I suppose) but they're certainly surrounding me today. I found out a good friend's Father died on New Year's Eve. He's been hovering near the brink for years really, but it's still a shock when someone takes that last step and moves beyond this world. Here one minute, gone the next.

It's just so weird to be sitting here with a new life inside me while other lives are ending. I know this is the way of life, but I've never felt like such a key part of the process before. It's kind of awesome -- awe-inspiring, I mean. I'm carrying new life while others are preparing themselves for the rituals of saying goodbye to an old one.

Heady thoughts for a cold, snowy January day. But that too, is life. I guess the trick is getting used to the things that inspire awe, but never letting those things cease to amaze you. Another trick is sleeping through the night when you're seven months pregnant, but that's one I'm sure I'll never master.