The Box

You'd think that with all of my writing, I would have worked through the more difficult moments. You'd think I would have written everything I need to write and sorted through what I need to sort by now, but that's not true. It's not even close to true. There are moments I can't bring myself to think about for more than a few seconds. There are moments that hurt so badly that I have to keep them in an armored box, far away from my conscious mind, or they will break me.

Writing and talking about her has certainly helped keep that armored box free of clutter. I've been able to move many memories out into the open that way. Some memories that used to stab merely prickle now, but there is still quite a bit of darkness in that box. There are still several memories that hulk inside there, powerful and frightening and covered in pain. Memories I keep trying to bring out into the light, but just can't. They are too heavy, too sharp, too painful. The moment my hand clasps around them, their spikes shoot through me, tearing me to ribbons.

I know people want me to be finished with grieving, and that they don't want to know about the armored box. They want to think the worst is behind me, and that there is only growth and light in my future. But the truth is, the box exists. It exists deep within me and it contains pain I am not brave enough to feel or strong enough to sort through. How it felt to sit in a hospital for hours, knowing she was gone, yet was still inside me. How it felt wondering what it was going to be like to give birth to my dead daughter. How it felt to walk into the delivery room swollen with death. How it felt to wake up empty. How it felt to hold her in my arms that night, so still and pale and silent. How the sound of my own anguish still echoes in my ears and reverberates within my soul. What it was like to roll over in my bed, knowing I had just seen her for the last time. How it felt to reach over the railing of my bed for my husband's hand in the middle of the night, knowing I would find him desperately searching for me too. How it felt to go from two to three over the course of 8 months and then back to two in less than 8 seconds. How the world seemed to fall away from us in a gray and foggy swirl, and how the two of us just continued to spin as we clung to each other in sorrow and fear. How I don't know the color of her eyes because I never saw them open. How I only know what her feet look like in photographs, but how, every day, I still see her face, her beautiful face, white and slack-jawed. How I will only ever know her face as a face of death, and how that breaks my heart more than anyone can ever imagine. What can you do with memories like these? You certainly can't live with them on a daily basis. It's just too much. It's why we all have a box.

The box stores them for me. It keeps these memories from pulling me into the darkness. It protects my heart from the onslaught of pain these memories hold. It's simply impossible to feel all of this all of the time. It would kill me.

I know I need to get them out of the box. For the past several months, I have felt the need to talk about them, to share them, to bring them out into the open. But, there are no words for them. They are so primally painful, there are no words. There is only pain and dark. There is only brokeness. There is no way I can communicate how they feel without being misunderstood, without people thinking I have succumbed to the darkness, without people seeing me as irrevocably broken. There is no way I can revisit them without bathing myself in their agony. To deal with them, I have to feel them. And I just can't. Even two years later, I am not strong enough. Even just dipping my big toe into their icy, black waters sends me reeling backwards in pain. And so I leave them there. Closed up in that armored box. I can feel them stomping around. I can hear their screams. They want out. And I can't release them. I don't know how, and even if I did, I am not sure I would want to.

Maybe one day, I'll be strong enough for what lies inside that box. Maybe one day, I'll be able to work through the blackness beneath the lid. Today is not that day. I don't expect tomorrow to be that day either. I expect that box to always exist, to always shield me from the harshest memories in one way or another.

I wish I was stronger. Better yet, I wish she was here.

Shifting

My grief is changing.  I can feel it.  It's shifting and transforming.  It's settling in.

At the beginning, everything is so raw and open.  Sorrow and rage and shock join forces in the dark and rush at you full force.  Grief stabs you repeatedly in the heart with the sharpest knives imaginable.  Blood pours, thick and metallic, from your wounds.  It bubbles up and out, choking your screams back into your throat.  The beginning is flashes of pain, thunderous screams, and gnashing teeth.   You lay on the floor, weak and beaten, helpless to do anything about the fact that all the light and goodness that once filled your soul is seeping out onto the cold tile.   You wait to die.  You are pretty sure that you will.  After all, what else could you really expect?  You have just been torn open like a gutted fish.   But, you don't.

As you lay there, bloody and broken, expecting the darkness to just take you away, you realize it's not going to.  You don't get to escape.   This is the first shift of grief.   The shift from painful chaos to sorrowed silence.  In this stage, you don't really do much of anything.  You've been ravaged by wolves and you're really too weak to even move.  So, you lie there.  Drained.  Empty.  Full of nothing but an echo of what once was but is no longer.   You wonder how you will ever get the strength to move, let alone stand.   Eventually, you do.  You wiggle your fingers and your toes.  You bend your knees and your elbows.  Slowly, slowly, slowly, you manage to pull yourself upright.  You are still a bloody mess, bits of you still raw and hanging.

This is the third shift of grief.  This is the part where you attempt to put yourself back together.  All of the pieces ripped away and torn apart - you gather them up and you try to shove them back where they belong.  Only, they don't really fit.  Some been stretched out and ripped to shreds. Other parts of you are lost forever, and you will never have them back.   So, you do the best you can with what you have left to make yourself resemble a human again.  This stage is never really, truly done.  Throughout the rest of your life, you will always have to rearrange your pieces.  Tuck things in, pull things out, move things over.  Nothing fits right, but it's what you've got.

Then comes the settling in.  Once you've figured out the basic mechanics of keeping yourself in place, you have one more thing to do.  You have to make room for your grief.  You can't leave that behind.  It's a part of you now.  It's a hard, lumpy boulder that you must fit into yourself somewhere.  You nestle it in among your soft insides, the weight of it crushing the air from your lungs.  It's heavy and cumbersome.  It makes you hunch over with effort.  Maybe one day, your muscles will gain enough strength to straighten up, but not yet.  For now, you are Quasimodo (which in Latin means almost, merely), misshapen and malformed.  You limp through your life, weary and burdened.

This is where I am now.  Carrying my grief inside like a rock.  Hard and unyielding - and as much a part of me as Kenley ever was.  It's exhausting.  Day in.  Day out.  Heaving this load around inside me.  I can't set it down.  I can't let it go.  I don't know what else to do except live with it.  So, that's what I do.  What I will continue to do until it shifts again.  

Saturday Spotlight #16

This week has been really rough for me.  The Royal Baby was born on Monday, I saw my grief counselor Tuesday, I visited my grandfather in the hospital on Wednesday, Kenley's 5 month anniversary was Thursday, and I went to school to start the overwhelming set up of my classroom yesterday.   I haven't had much time to do anything of consequence to write up for today.   I did, however, manage to watch the 6th season of 30 Rock on Netflix.  So...yay?

As I tried to think of what I could write for today's post, I kept coming up blank. I didn't do anything but survive.   When I think about it, that's really all I've been doing all this time anyway.  Surviving.  Waking up every morning, getting through my day one moment at a time, going to bed, and then doing it all over again. 

So, today, I am going to focus this post on two things I am going to do in the coming weeks.

1.  I am going to go back to work.   August 7th is the first day teachers report.  Kids start the following Wednesday.   As uncomfortable as I am right now to start working again, I know most of that is just my anxiety.   Once I get through the stress of setting up the room and have my plans organized for the first few weeks, I'll be fine.  I know I am a good teacher.  I know I can do my job well - and I know that I enjoy it.   I just have to take a few deep breaths and relax.  It will be like riding a bike.  A little wobbly at first, but once I get my footing, I'll start to glide and I'll realize I really missed the wind in my face.

2. I am going to try for another baby.  August 25th will be 6 months since Kenley died.   6 months is the acceptable go-ahead for trying again after a C-section, and we are ready.   It will not be easy to be pregnant again.  I will be an insane bundle of nerves.  I will be completely terrified until I am holding a crying baby in my arms.  But, I can't let that stop me from trying again.  We did not have any difficulty whatsoever conceiving Kenley, so I am not feeling too much stress about that aspect.  However, that might change depending on how quickly we are successful this time.   It's so easy to think the worst once the worst has actually happened to you, but I will try to as hard as I possibly can to stay positive and rational.

Both of these things will affect the blog.  

Going back to work will mean I will have less time to write.  Most likely, I will not be able to post as regularly as I have been.  Six days a week will probably dwindle to about three.  Maybe four.  Although, some weeks, I might write more.  Who knows, really?  Posting will be irregular and unpredictable.  So, if you want to stay connected without forgetting about me, now is a good time to become a "follower".   You just need a google (gmail) account.    

Trying for a baby will affect the emotions and actions I write about in the blog.  My posts might begin to shift to the added stress of trying to conceive again.  When I become pregnant, that pregnancy will definitely be a subject of my writing.   I want to make it very clear now - beyond a shadow of a doubt - that this shift will in no way reflect any sort of dwindling memories or love of Kenley.  I will not love her less.  I will not think about her less.   I will not suddenly be "over" her death.   In the same way a second baby in a house with a living child does not diminish the importance of the first born, trying again does not mean I am forgetting about my little ninja.   When you are in a fancy restaurant and you order a delicious and decadent dessert, do you eat one bite and then put down the fork?  No way, Jose.   You savor every bit of that richness.   Kenley was just the first bite of motherhood.  I'm ready for more.  Kenley WILL be a big sister one day.   And Mike and I will be parents to a baby we can hold in our arms.   This story is far from finished.

Back to School

Today, I am going to my classroom to start getting things organized for the start of the school year.  It is not going to be easy.  The beginning of the year is always stressful anyway.  You have to sort through all of the randomness you shoved into cabinets a few months ago.  You have to figure out what you want to do the same and what you might want to change.  You have to decide what you might need from Target or the teacher's store to get the room re-organized and to set up a new group of students.  Every year, I spend anywhere from $300 to $500 in set up costs.   New folders.  New pencils.  New desk labels and cubby organizers.  But, before I get the joy of shopping, I have to go through the tediousness of sorting.

Normally, the first few days setting up a classroom result in a bigger and bigger mess before it starts to resemble anything of any sort of order.  It's always a little harried and hectic.   This year, it will be ten fold.  Because this year, I have to do it while carrying my grief on my back.   This year, I will hang pocket charts and cover bulletin boards with a piece of my heart missing.  
I am fully aware of how much of myself is available to the world.  Some of me is missing and the rest of me is wrapped up in holding myself together.  Can I do this?  Can I organize a classroom?  Can I still teach effectively?  Can I give the amount of focus necessary to do my job?  I hope so.   I know I will try my very best.  

I am nervous about what today will bring.  I am worried I will start pulling out posters and books and just fall apart.   I am worried I won't be able to focus on the decisions I have to make.   I suppose I just have to get in there, roll up my sleeves, and tackle it the way I have tackled everything else lately.  Head on and with a positive attitude.  So, here I go.  Diving back into the life I had before loss.   I just hope the water is still warm, and I don't drown.  

Time Heals All Wounds

Yet another quote that is untrue.  I hate it when people say this to me.   It makes me feel like my pain is being dismissed.  "I know you are hurting right now, but one day you won't, so that makes it okay."  It's not okay.  It will never be okay.  No amount of time could pass to ever make it okay.  You could travel in your TARDIS to the origin of the universe and back again and it still would not be okay.  

Time heals nothing.   Time fixes nothing.  Time cannot make things better simply by passing.  What time does is give you the tools you need to make your pain more bearable.   Time allows you to work through your grief - to take tiny bites, to chew, to swallow, to digest, and then discard what you can't hold onto. 

A year from now, I will not feel better because a year has passed.   I will feel better because I have been able to learn how to better manage my pain.  If a person is in a severe car accident and shatters their leg, it is not time that heals them.   It is surgery and physical therapy.  It is their body creating platelets and reconstructing bone and fighting infection.  If they received no medical attention and their body shut down and was unable to do what it needed to do to heal, no amount of time would fix their injury.  Their leg would still hang useless and they would still be tormented by pain.   Mental anguish is the same.  Time does nothing but to provide the vehicle for change.   It won't take us anywhere unless we fill up the tank.  And even then, some things will always hurt.

With time, we learn how to manage our pain.  We learn how to shift our insides around the shards of glass wedged in our heart so they only poke instead of slice.  We learn how to control the deluge of tears that seem to always be on the edge of our eyes.  We learn how to move that river further down - how to shift its course.  Time allows us to figure out how our brain responds to triggers and how our emotions can be affected by the outside world.   We begin to understand how we need to approach our lives in order to function with greater purpose and less impulsiveness.  We learn how to walk again after being cut off at the knees.    Time doesn't do all of this.  We do.   Time just gives us the opportunity to do it.

So, no, time does not heal all wounds.  Some wounds do not heal.   Never.  I know people say "Never say never."  Well, I'm saying it.  Some wounds never heal, and this is one of them.  Time will let me discover how best to live with this wound, but it will not heal it.  It will not make it better.  It will not make it okay.  Nothing will make it okay.   But, with time's help, I can learn how to make it bearable.  



 

Hell

"Everyone's hell is different.  It's not all fire and pain.  The real Hell is your life gone wrong." - What Dreams May Come by Richard Matheson

When this movie came out in 1998, I was a sophomore in college.  I loved the vivid imagery used in the scenes.  The symbolism of the colors.  Blue for their children and loss.  Red for their love and journey together.  Green for the complicated emotions of grief.  I am embarrassed to admit that I didn't even know it was a book first until a few years later.   I read it in an afternoon.   Matheson's interpretation of life and death, love and loss is amazing.   It always struck a chord with me.  Now, it does even more.  

In both versions, one of the characters is stuck in hell.   She is not burning or being tortured by an outside source.  Instead, she is trapped in the most terrible version of her life.   Her house is dilapidated and falling apart.  The floor is covered in thick, black, cold water.  She knows something is wrong, but she can't figure it out.  She knows she is alone, but she doesn't know why.   She is scared and unable to see anything other than the fact her life is not what it is supposed to be.  Even when her husband, her soul mate, comes to try to rescue her from her own private hell, she does not recognize him.   She sees only a life that shouldn't be.

Do you want to know what hell is like?   Hell is living 8 bliss-filled months anticipating a new life and having that life torn from your body and then handed to you still and silent.   Hell is watching your husband crumple when he puts his daughter's coming home outfit away for the first and last time. Hell is seeing other people do what you failed to do -  bring their babies home.   Hell is knowing your daughter should be sitting up and working on learning how  to crawl right now, but instead sits on a shelf in your living room in a pretty pink vase.  Hell is never knowing what her first word would have been, what books she would have loved to read, or where she would have gone to college.   Hell is feeling that you have been catapulted into the wrong timeline - into a life you weren't supposed to have - forced to live each day without your baby.  Hell is the inability to do anything about it.

Right now, life is hell.  There is no point in sugar coating this.  It is what it is. I live every day in the best way I know how.  I try to bring meaning to her death with my blog and my volunteering efforts.  I work so hard just to feel normal, but I never do.   I always feel heavy and burdened with a tragedy I didn't deserve.  If I am not constantly working on something, I feel empty and hollow.   I'm tired of fighting so hard to distract myself from the pain.   This should not be my life.  But it is.  No matter how hard I pinch myself, I am not going to wake up because this is not a dream.  This is my life gone wrong. This is the life of a mother without her child.  This is hell.

If you've watched or read What Dreams May Come, you know that the story doesn't end in hell, though.  You know that the two main characters, who are true soul mates, choose to go through hell together rather than being separated.  As a result, their love pulls them out.   And then, they get to start over.  

Today, it's hard to see how my life will ever get better.   It's hard to see past the pain of being without her - the anguish of knowing that this isn't what was supposed to happen.  It's hard to believe I'll ever feel anything else other than despair and anger and jealousy.  But then, I remember that somewhere deep inside, there is another feeling.   A soft, fleshy nugget nestled deep beneath the sludge.  Warm and light and good.   Love.   I have love.  Love for Kenley.  Love for Mike.  Love for life beyond loss.   Love can pull me through hell.  I just have to be willing to hold on to it.

A Good Day

Saturday was "Cupcakes to Cherish", a Cherishing the Journey fundraiser I have been helping with for the past several weeks.   I have been putting a great deal of energy into it; writing press releases, securing a few raffle and silent auction items, and other miscellaneous things.  Mike and I arrived at 9:30 to help set up.  We made some signs to put out on the road and helped get the area organized for the event.   When it started, I was in charge of selling the raffle tickets as well as some baseball game tickets for another fundraiser in August.   For the entire afternoon, I was extremely busy selling tickets.   Several friends came by to say hello, which meant so much to me.  I am so honored that they would take time on their own Saturday to come support my efforts and to remember Kenley.  Towards the end of the afternoon, I spoke to the crowd about how much the memory box I received from Cherishing the Journey meant to me.  I was nervous because I thought I would lose it, but I think I held it together fairly well.   I wavered a few times throughout my speech, but I didn't go over the edge.  Mike stood behind me the whole time.   

The day ended with me completely exhausted.   But, I realized something amazing.  I smiled - almost all day long.  Except for the five minutes of my speech, I smiled.   For a good part of the day, I felt like an enormous weight had been lifted from my shoulders.  Not permanently, but just for a moment. For a moment, I could breathe again.  For a moment, I could feel the sorrow slipping away from my heart.   For a moment, I felt like I had purpose again.   I felt good about what I was doing with my life.   And I realized something.  I am not beaten.

I am still in charge of where I am going.   My grief may have changed my course, but I can still chose my path from here.   For the past few weeks, I have been having a very difficult time.  The reality and finality of losing Kenley hit hard.   Once the initial shock of loss has worn off, you are left with an eerie silence.  Your heart has stopped its piercing screams, and instead settles into a dull and constant ache - and you begin to painfully realize that you will always battle the heaviness that accompanies loss.  That is a hard pill to swallow.  When you're forced to look down the road at a lifetime of hurt, you want to turn away in disbelief.  You want to throw in the towel and just give up.   What good is a life of pain?  What good am I with such a broken heart?  Saturday made me see that good.   My life is not at all what I want it to be - but since I still have to live it, I might as well live it the best I can.  I might as well bring as much light into it as possible.   Saturday made me realize that life can still be good - in spite of pain.   I can still find a place to put joy inside my broken heart.   It might slip through the cracks, and I might have to consistently monitor it to keep it from falling out - but there is still a place for it there.   

Everything that happens to me from now on is a falling domino from Kenley's death.   I realize this.   I can't change the past.   I wish I could - with every fiber of my broken being, how I wish I could - but I can't.  I'd like to tell you I can control my future, but I am not really even sure about that either.   What I am sure about though, is that I will not let either one of those defeat me.  I am not free of heartbreak.   My past will always hurt.  My future might have more pain tucked up its sleeve.  I don't know.  None of us know.   The only thing we know is that we are guaranteed nothing in this life.   But instead of allowing things to happen to me, I can choose to make them happen for me.

Working at Cupcakes to Cherish this weekend helped me to see the good that can be accomplished as a direct result of great sadness.   It helped me to see that I am stronger than my sorrow.   I will have bad days. For the rest of my life,  darkness and light will come and go.  For the rest of my life, I will have moments that bring me to my knees with a sucker punch of blinding pain.   I will have moments that open up old wounds, letting the blood flow freely from my heart.  I will have moments that make me feel like I have been beaten, like I have nothing left inside of me but razor sharp shards of a fractured soul.  For the rest of my life, I will fight this.   And, while it seems so daunting sometimes, other times it seems like a fight I can win.   And as long as I keep fighting - as long as I keep pulling my bloodied and broken self up onto the ropes - as long as I keep getting back on my feet - I will win.   I am not beaten.  I'm just catching my breath.

Gratitude

As part of the photography project I am participating in,  I have been assigned to write about what I am grateful for in my life right now.  I imagine the purpose of this is to get me focusing on the good things as opposed to the staggering emptiness of my loss.  This is something I try my hardest to do every single day, but it is often very difficult.  It is not easy to look at my life with anything other than distain.  Everything good that has happened since February has happened because Kenley died.  How can I be happy about something that is a direct result of my child's death?  How can I find fulfillment in joy that rises from such emptiness?  It's not easy, but I am trying.  So, so, hard.   So, here goes.  Things for which I am grateful (in no particular order):

My amazing support system of friends   
It's sad but true, nothing brings people together like tragedy.  When Kenley died, everyone pulled together like a drawstring bag, nestling in and holding tight.   I'm not just talking about the initial support of food, money, and condolences.   People I haven't heard from in years - decades even - pulled themselves back into my life to support me.   Friends who had lost touch made contact.  Not just, "Hey, I'm so sorry" contact, but "Hey, let's be the good friends we should have been all this time" contact.  I have rekindled real and true friendships with so many people, and I am so grateful for these wonderful souls who were so willing to hold me up even though we hadn't spoken in ages.  That is the mark of a true friend.  

I am also obviously grateful to those people who had strong footholds in my life before loss and have not allowed that grip to waver.  No one knows what to say to give comfort, but these people did not allow their loss of words to stop them from being there for me.  When their shoulder was soaking wet from my tears, they offered me their other one.  Words cannot do justice to the swelling of my heart that occurs because of these people.  

My family
I have never once doubted my parents' love for me.  Oh, there were moments in my childhood and teenage years when I was convinced they did things just to spite me - but beyond not being allowed to eat a Little Debbie Oatmeal Cream Pie or staying out past midnight, deep down, I knew everything they did was because it was what was best for me.  They are the parents I want to be to my children one day.  I am grateful they have taught me the true role of a parent and have shown me the full extent of a parent's love.   
When Kenley died, I became a child once again.  Weak, scared, and completely unsure of where to go.  My parents were right there by my side to help put back together their broken little girl.  They still are.

My sister and I have really found a support in each other during this time as well.  Our trip to Boston recently is a great example of that.  I am truly grateful to have a sister with such a big heart - especially when my own seems so small.

My husband
I can't say it enough.  He is my other half.  Despite both of our flaws, despite how this journey has left us exhausted and broken, we are in this together.  In the four and a half years I have known him, the one and a half we have been married, and the four months we have been parents, I have never once doubted that he is the one for me.  From our first date to this morning when I woke up with him by my side, I knew.  I have always known.  Loss is hard.  Loss changes you.   But what hasn't changed, and what will not change, is our love for each other.  We understand each other when no one else does.  We cling to each other in this tornado.  While the world spins angrily and destructively around us, we find sanctuary in each other's arms.  I am grateful that I have him by my side, now and forever.  

Community Outreach
Volunteering with Cherishing the Journey has been healing for me in so many ways.  It has given me a purpose again.  I am grateful that charities like this exist to help grieving mothers remember their babies - and I am grateful to have found myself a part of their mission.  When I return to work in August, I realize that less of my efforts will be spent on this cause, but I will give all I have to give because it is important to others and it helps me give meaning to my loss.

My blog and new friends
Like the pole a tightrope walker carries to hold her balance, this blog is what keeps me careening over the edge of my own emotions.  It keeps me sane.  Without the ability to write it out, my feelings would kill me.  I would be locked inside a maze I couldn't navigate.  I am grateful for my ability to sort through this mess through my writing.   Because of my blog, I have been able to grieve appropriately.  I have been able to work through my grief in increments I can handle.  I am certain I wouldn't be as far as I am now without my writing.  

In addition to helping me sort my own grief and find my new path, my blog has put me in contact with many women wading through their own rivers of loss.  My blog has made me feel less alone in this fight.  I have met sisters in loss who are fighting with me.  I like to think we are helping each other figure out how to live again in the face of grief.  I am grateful for all of them.

I have also forged some very strong friendships in the wake of Kenley's death.  Friendships that wouldn't exist had our children lived.  So, in this way, these relationships are very bittersweet.  Some women I have met in person and some I only know through facebook, blog comments, or email, but each of these friendships are invaluable to me.  Some of them have recently discovered they are pregnant with their rainbow baby.  Some of them are still waiting for that moment, myself included.   Even though it is sorrow that brings us together, it is hope that will bring us through.

Gratitude is a difficult emotion to grasp when your fingers are stiffened by sadness and grief.  It is hard to find things to be thankful for when everything that happens in your life is a result of your loss.  But, I cling to all of these things with every part of me.   They are the lights in my darkness, and they help me find my way.  

Big, Fat Zero

Yesterday, I was filling out paperwork to return from leave.   As I entered my tax exemptions for payroll, I got to the part for children.  How many dependent children am I claiming?  Zero.

I should be writing a 1 in that box.  Instead, I had to write a big, fat, hollow zero.

That action cost me about 10 minutes of tears. After which, I folded up the paperwork, slid it into the envelope, and got it ready to send out to human resources tomorrow.  Life goes on.

Life goes on and it is full of constant, tiny reminders of what I don't have.  I'm not talking about the glaring ones - the baby department in Target or the commercials on daytime TV.   I'm not talking about the obvious triggers I have learned to avoid.  I'm talking about all of the details that no one really notices - but are always there to just slap me in the face.

The tax exemption paperwork that requires me to list myself has having no children, even though that is very much untrue.   The baby seat in the back of the man's car who helped jump our dead battery the other day.  The box containing one leftover pregnancy test in the the bathroom cabinet.  The junk mail that comes addressed to The Wood Family.  A dropped pacifier in the grocery store parking lot.  

Every day, it is something.  Every day, I am reminded in the smallest and cruelest ways that the life I am living is not the life I am supposed to have.  And there is nothing I can do about it.  As much as I would like to, I can't crawl into a hole and ignore this life.   I have to life it.  I have to face it.  I have to deal with it - with every single bit of it.   

I can't go back in time and save her, and I can't go forward in time to a moment where there is another baby and a lighter heart.   I am here.  Stuck in the middle of a big, fat, terrible life full of big, fat, terrible zeroes.  A life where the only thing I have to cling to is the love I have for the people in it.

And I need them all more than ever.  

Right Now

It has been 117 days since I lost my daughter.  2,808 hours.  168, 480 minutes.  10, 108, 800 seconds.  10, 108, 801.  10, 108, 802...

Where am I in my grief?   I am lost.  

So many metaphors can be used to describe this journey.  Swimming in a stormy sea.  Climbing up a rocky cliff.   Navigating through a winding labyrinth.  Right now, in this moment, I feel like I am scrambling through a dense, dark forest.  

Everything looks the same.   All of the trees tower above me like prison guards.  They grab at me with gnarled fingers.  When I try to run, I stumble over the jagged roots that shoot from the dirt.   I am covered in grime and debris and I am so, so tired.   So unbelievably tired.   I don't want to run anymore.  It's dark and cold and I just want to go back home.   I think of my warm, well lit house.  Of the fire that is burning in the fireplace.  Of the soft, cozy bed and the cup of steaming hot chocolate that awaits me there.   And I would give anything to just make this forest disappear so I could find my way to where my heart is.

But then, I remember that nice, crackling fire sparked the blanket on the bed. And, my entire house was quickly engulfed in flames and burned to the ground.  I can't go back because there is nothing to go back to.  My home - and my heart - are gone, so I have no choice but to keep going forward.

Right now, I am overwhelmed.   Right now, I am exhausted.   Right now, I am so angry that I can't change anything - that this is my life.  Right now, I am lost inside this forest, inside the darkness, trying and fighting as hard as I can and for some reason, it is still not good enough.  I am not getting anywhere.  It's not getting any lighter and I'm not getting any warmer, and I am pretty sure I have passed this same tree twenty times already.  

I have heard stories of women finding their way out of the forest.  Or at least to parts where the the foliage isn't so thick, where the roots aren't so twisted.   To parts where there are even clearings where the sun streams through the canopy and there are soft patches of ground to rest.  But, I can't seem to get there.  I am stuck in the dark and the cold.

There has never been a moment where I wasn't giving every ounce of myself to this fight - and there will never be one.  I will always, always keep going.  No matter how dark it gets.  No matter how exhausted I feel.   I owe it to my daughter to live a life of joy and light - and I will do whatever it takes to find my way.   

Saturday Spotlight #11

In scrolling through my newsfeed a few weeks ago, an interesting blog link caught my eye.   It was an online photography course directed to mothers of loss.  The woman who created it did so because when she lost her baby, she searched for some sort of outlet to help her explore her emotions.   She didn't find what she wanted, so she designed her own, and now she is sharing it with others.  You can find information about that here.  

Anyway, I am completing the first week.  This week focuses on self portraits.  I was to take a few pictures of myself that showed how I felt following my loss.   Then, I am to write a letter to my daughter explaining those emotions. I've written several letters to Kenley already - and I explain my emotions almost daily in my blog.  So, what I am going to do is to post these pictures in dedication to Kenley and write her a letter telling her (and you)  why I chose to take them.   

Dear Kenley, 

It's been four months since you left me, empty and broken.  The cloud of grief that surrounds me isn't as thick as it used to be.  I can see through the haze to the outside world, but I am still cloaked in sadness.  I still miss you more than anything I could imagine.  I know for certain I always will.   You were a part of me.  A part of my body, of my heart, and of my soul.   In some ways, you still are, but it is not nearly enough.  There are still some roads deep inside me that I still do not venture down.   There are still some dark places I have yet to bring light back to.  There are still moments where I have to calm the rising storm of sobs that swell within me.   No matter what I do or how I try to heal, I am still sad.  I still mourn for you, baby girl.  I still ache for you.  I still feel sometimes that I cannot live without you.  I still feel hollow inside.  A hollow shell filled only with the sloshing water of a million tears.   I tried to capture those feelings of sorrow in this picture.  

You're in this picture too, my little ninja.  A little owl I wear around my neck at all times.   You are always, always with me.  I just wish you were here in my arms instead of a tiny charm on a chain.   I wish you were in your nursery, laughing and squealing.   I'd even love you to be screaming and crying and pitching a fit.  I would gladly have you colicky at three a.m. just to have you here.  I hate that you are gone.  I never knew how much I could love until I felt you growing inside of me.  I never knew how much a heart could split open and spill out with such raw force.   Everyone has good days and bad days, but until I lost you, I could not have ever imagined just how terrible my days could get.   The person in this picture is a patchwork of missing pieces.  She is not whole, nor does she aspire to be.   She knows that she will never be whole again.   What she strives for instead is a life where the pieces that are left come together in some sort of working order.  She aspires to make change and do good in spite of the chasm left behind.  She aspires to be the person worthy of being your mother.  

When you died, I felt like my entire life derailed like a runaway train.  Screeching wheels, ripping metal.   The moment I found out you were gone, my world split into two.   One world where I live now - and one world where I could have lived with you.  I feel like I have been torn away from the life I was supposed to lead.  Carried away against my will, my arms stretched out before me - reaching and grabbing at you as you disappear from view.   Sometimes, mostly when I see other mothers with their babies, I think about that life we should have had.   The life where you showed that cord who was boss.  The life where I get to hold you and love you.   The life where your father has his little girl.   This next self portrait is of me in those quiet moments where I think about what was supposed to happen.   The glimpse of a life I so badly wanted - and is not mine to have.  

If you look closely, you can see the reflection of my fingers in the glass.  Those faint images represent the other me.  The me I can't be.  The me who doesn't exist because you are gone.  But the me I miss almost as much as I miss you.

Every life is nothing  more than a series of defining events.  Had you lived, you would have had several milestones.   Your first everything - from tooth to kiss.  You would have gone to college.  You might have gotten married and had children of your own.  Your mama was a late bloomer.  I didn't really have very many "oh my goodness, this is huge!" moments in my life for quite a while.   One of those moments was my wedding day.   The other was your baby shower.   On both of those days, I wore the same shoes.  I have never worn these shoes on any other day.   There's really no special significance to this.   I wore them on my wedding day because they were comfortable - and to your baby shower for the same reason.  Plus, they matched.   The initial reasons are not important.  But, now these shoes symbolize the start of something wonderful.   My marriage to your father - and becoming your mother.  Even though there is sadness woven through my motherhood, I still stand strong.   I am still your mother even though you are not here.  I still love you even though you are gone.  

I don't know what the future holds for me, baby girl.  I want to think that I am creating some sort of meaning for your death.  I want to think I am making myself a better person than I was.   I am trying so hard to hold myself together in spite of it all.   I have never tried harder at anything in my entire life.  Some days, I think I am doing a pretty good job.  Other days, it's all I can do to just get out of bed.   But know, that whatever happens in my life, however much I change or grow or learn - a few things will stay the same.  How much I love you.  How much I miss you.  And how much I think about you - every day.  

I'll love you forever.  I'll like you for always.  As long as I'm living...my baby you'll be.  

Love eternal, 
Mom

You Are My Sunshine

Today, I was looking at updates from Return to Zero and I saw someone posted a picture in memory of their child with a verse from "You Are My Sunshine".   The line that says "The other night dear, when I was sleeping, I dreamed I held you in my arms.  But when I woke dear, I was mistaken.  So, I hung my head and I cried."   And I lost it.   Fell to my knees and cried.  Seriously and completely fell apart.   It was not pretty.

You can imagine why.   However, an underlying reason was that I sang that song, at least the first verse, to Kenley every day in the shower while I was pregnant.  Every single day.  It just made me happy, soaping up my belly and belting it out to my little girl.  Mike liked to try to sneak in with his iphone and record me in all of my off-key glory because he thought it was hilarious.  So, this song reminds me of a joyful and innocent time.  But now, it is as if that second verse has been added to my life now.  And the song means something completely different.  It is a song of what I have lost.

After pulling myself together this afternoon, I pulled out my ipad.  I downloaded a pretty version of this song and I coordinated it with some photos to create a movie.   I used photos from the beginning of the pregnancy all the way through to last week.   Throughout the entire process of creating it, I cried.  It actually felt wonderful to do so.  A cleansing of sorts, I suppose.  And now, I am sharing it with you.   Fair Warning:  You will likely also cry.

What You Don't Know

You might think you know what my life has become.    You might imagine some residual heartbreak on the edges of my days...but hey...I'm going on vacation.   I'm posting fun pictures from my trip.   I'm making jokes and witty comments on status updates. I'm spending time with friends.   Things must be getting better.   I'm back to my old self again, right?    No.  

 My old self is dead.   

 I said goodbye to her when I said goodbye to my daughter.   I will never be back to my old self because there is no "old self" anymore.   Nothing remains of her.   Nothing.   

When Kenley died, everything I was imploded and then turned to dust.  That dust scattered into the winds and is irrevocably gone.    What remained was a hollowed shell, the insides charred and scarred, the outside blank and vacant.   And so, I was left to rebuild.  Everything.   Everyone who has walked in these shoes knows that rebuilding yourself after the death of your child starts from the outside first.   We learn to appear normal again.   

 We learn to smile, not just with our mouths, but with our eyes.  That's what makes it believable.   We learn to convey some sort of spark of life behind our eyes, even if its not really there.   We learn to recreate realistic laughter.   The kind that comes from the gut and not the throat. It involves more air and effort, but the results are worth it in the long run.   We are conscious of where we put our hands...keep them away from the belly and keep them steady so that no one asks questions.   We learn how to interact with people again.   Make eye contact, keep them wide and bright.   Turn up the corners of your mouth, just slightly, so your features look softened and relaxed.  Try to make light physical contact if appropriate.  Don't cringe when someone touches you uninvited.   Turn toward and not away when in conversation.   Ask questions about their life and respond in kind.   (Remember...everyone means well.  No matter what they say or what they do...everyone means well. )

Everything that used to be routine is now calculated and rehearsed.  What would a non-grieving person do in this situation?  How would they react?  We think about it and then we do it.  Carefully.  Methodically. To the very best of our ability.  We assess all situations before allowing ourselves to get fully involved - to make sure it won't be too much for us to handle.   You can imagine the amount of effort it takes to live life like this.  It's enormous.  

Then, you might want to say to us, "Hey...you don't have to pretend.  You can just act the way you feel.  We will all understand."   The fact that you think to say this shows that you, indeed, do not understand.  We DO have to put on this mask.  We DO have to work hard at showing the world that we aren't dying inside, when we are.   If we allowed ourselves to act the way we feel, we would be coming apart at the seams.  All the time.  We force ourselves to look normal so we can feel normal - so we can have some sort of order to the chaos our insides have become.   

So, yes, I am going out with friends.  I am taking trips and standing behind causes.   I talk.  I smile.  I hug.   And it is all very, very hard work.   I work hard at functioning just so I can continue to function.  Every.  Single.  Day.

Some Days

Some days are just really hard.  Some days, I wake up covered in sadness and I stay wrapped in that blanket all day.  Some days, I don't even try to find sunlight because, some days, I don't really care.    Not every day.   Not really even most days - at least not any more.  But some days.  The last week or so has been filled with a lot of those some days.   Days where I am just sad and gray, where a dull and heavy rock just sits on my heart, squeezing out any energy I may have had to try to be happy.   Some days, happiness just isn't there.  

It's not a feeling of desperation.  I know light might seep in later, just not this day.  It's a feeling of unwilling acceptance.  Accepting that today is just "one of those days."  Today is a day I am going to be sad and there's nothing I can really do about it.   It hangs over me, thick and gray.  Rain clouds my vision and the world is blurry and wet.  I do the best I can to see through the rain and the dark.  I go about my usual activities, but everything is heavier and more difficult on these days.  

On these Some Days, I am slightly askew.   I'm like a telescope where not all parts are aligned.  The stars are still there, but I don't see them.  I am off.  Tilted.  Removed.   

On these Some Days, I don't really care about anything other than the fact that I am sad.   Nothing seems exciting or interesting.   I don't want to write, or bake, or paint.  I don't want to put on pants - although, Mike usually makes me.   

On these Some Days, I find my eyes glazing over as I stare at nothing in particular.  My mind is a little less sharp and I am a little less present.  If I go out of the house, I feel removed from most interactions - almost like I am watching someone else be me for the day.   

On these Some Days, I cry more easily and usually for most of the day.  I feel like I am being crushed underneath layers of sadness - like a brittle leaf pressed between the pages of the Oxford Dictionary.  I am tired and lethargic and just want to go back to bed.  But, I don't because then the Some Day wins and as long as I am strong enough to fight it, I will.

Some Days are better than others.  Some Days are worse.  Some Days come and go, and I deal with them as they do.  

Tubby Time

Imagine two bathtubs side by side.   Go ahead and get fancy, and think of those huge, white porcelain tubs with the claw feet and the long, swooping faucet.  One of those tubs is full of water.  Filled to the brim and almost spilling over.   The other tub is completely empty.  Dry as a bone.  Ok, so I suppose it's a little weird that these tubs are right next to each other, so let's go ahead and move the empty tub to another room.   With such fancy clawed feet tubs, we must be in an enormous mansion, so how about we move the empty tub to a bathroom in the back of the west wing?   You know where the west wing is, right?   Down two flights of stairs, across the grand ballroom, past the library and then the third door on the right just after the kitchen.   Got it?   Alright, so now, I'm going to give you a job.  It's a very important job and it must be done as quickly as possible - otherwise everyone will get very impatient with you and probably make some inappropriate comments about your abilities to do it.   Your job is to transfer the water from the tub upstairs to the one in the west wing.   What should you use to move the water from tub to tub?   Hmmmm...here's a thimble. That is definitely big enough, no problem.    Oh, by the way, you want to make sure that once you're done that there is absolutely no water in the upstairs tub whatsoever.  We are out of towels, so you can use this sandpaper, as long as you don't scratch the porcelain.   Oh yeah, also, every once in a while, I'm going to turn on the faucet up there and let it run for a few minutes.  You know, just to keep you on your toes.   Then, obviously, I'll probably have to let a little water out of the west wing tub every few minutes too.   People will want to take a bath in there and they'll need it completely full of hot water when they do, so you'll really have to stay on top of that.  Now, remember, the world is timing you, so you'd better do this pretty soon.  Plus, we're all watching you, so don't spill anything either.  Did I forget to mention, you'll need to be wearing these roller skates?   Aaaannnnd....GO! 

That is what overcoming grief is like.   

Brave

In the three months since my life split into two, I have met several completely amazing women.  All of them at different points in their journey.  All of them hurting with the same pain.  A wonderful thing about human nature is that we come together in times of trouble.   Heartbreak unites us.  Those who share a common thread are tied together.   When I know another woman has experienced this tragedy, I immediately want to reach out my hand to her.  I want to give her hugs and be her friend.   I am not the only one.  This seems like a very common attitude.   We hold each other very dear.    All of us.  All the time.  I've called it a Sisterhood before and it is.  We are sisters, walking this path hand in hand in hand, pulling each other forward, holding each other up, allowing each other to rest.

As you know, this journey is not an easy one.   It's an uphill battle every day, but we do it.  Sometimes because we want to - but mostly because we have to.   Move forward or die trying.  Every day, each one of us wakes up and faces her day without her child.   Every day, each one of us goes through hundreds of mundane tasks that should be easy, but are not because nothing is routine anymore.  Every day, each one of us pulls herself up by her bootstraps and goes out into a world that doesn't understand her.  Every day, each one of us has so much to say, but can't always say it because not everyone wants to hear it.

Let me tell you, it takes courage to live a life like this. When our children died, our lives lost all meaning.  We felt we had no purpose, no direction, no future.  We had to rebuild from the ground up.  Everything.  All of it.  We want to live our lives the same way everyone else does, but our perspective has completely shifted and we see the world in a totally different light.   And we know that the world sees us differently too.   We see the look in your eyes when we talk about our children.  We see you flinch when we bring up our pregnancy or a memory we have of our life just before loss.   We see you waiting in shifty uneasiness to see if we are going to make it through this conversation with you without tears.  We are well aware of our scarlet letter, and we are all doing the very best we can each and every day to wear it with dignity and pride, despite the various attitudes toward it.    We face the world with deep breaths, with our shoulders squared, and our heart on our sleeve.

To my sisters in loss, to the proud mothers of Hunter, Avery, Keelin, Josie, Brooke, Tyler, Matthew, Zoe, Ava, Gabriel, Joseph, Jack, Olivia, Janessa, and Declan,  I'd like to say you are my hope.   You help me see that life without my daughter is hard, but not impossible.   You inspire me to continue with my efforts to find meaning in the meaningless.   To those I have met and those I have yet to meet, you are so brave, whether you think you are or not.   Just the fact that you are here, reading this, living without your baby, proves it.

On a day when you don't want to get out of bed because it's too much, think about the rest of us who are fighting the same fight.   You are our sister and we love you, whether we've met you or not.  We fight with you.  When you feel you can't walk, we will hoist you on our shoulders.  When you feel lost and alone, we will hold your hand in the dark.   When you can't find your voice, we will speak for you, and we will say what you need us to say.   So, get up, put on your gloves, and show the world how brave you really are!

Brave

by, 

Sara Bareilles

You can be amazing

You can turn a phrase into a weapon or a drug

You can be the outcast

Or be the backlash of somebody’s lack of love

Or you can start speaking up

Nothing’s gonna hurt you the way that words do

And they settle ‘neath your skin

Kept on the inside and no sunlight

Sometimes a shadow wins

But I wonder what would happen if you

Say what you wanna say

And let the words fall out

Honestly I wanna see you be brave

With what you want to say

And let the words fall out

Honestly I wanna see you be brave

I just wanna see you

I just wanna see you

I just wanna see you

I wanna see you be brave

I just wanna see you

I just wanna see you

I just wanna see you

I wanna see you be brave

Everybody’s been there, everybody’s been stared down

By the enemy

Fallen for the fear and done some disappearing

Bow down to the mighty

Don’t run, stop holding your tongue

Maybe there’s a way out of the cage where you live

Maybe one of these days you can let the light in

Show me how big your brave is

Say what you wanna say

And let the words fall out

Honestly I wanna see you be brave

With what you want to say

And let the words fall out

Honestly I wanna see you be brave

Innocence, your history of silence

Won’t do you any good

Did you think it would?

Let your words be anything but empty

Why don’t you tell them the truth?

Say what you wanna say

And let the words fall out

Honestly I wanna see you be brave

With what you want to say

And let the words fall out

Honestly I wanna see you be brave

I just wanna see you

I just wanna see you

I just wanna see you

I wanna see you be brave

Pink Part One

I have always been a fan of Pink - the musician, not the color.  Her songs usually fall into one of two categories:  Badass Attitude or Meaningful Melody.   Songs like So What, Stupid Girls and Don't Let Me Get Me are anthems to individuality with an upbeat bass.  They are songs to dance to - to jog to (if you're into that sort of thing) - to clean your house to.   Some of her songs are filled with anger and rage.  Others are simple determination.   Pink has always refused to pigeon hole herself into the female pop star role, and I admire that about her.  I always have.

Her new album has spoken to me more than any other though.  It's partially because of what I am going through - and partially because she's just basically amazingly talented.  Not all of her songs are rock beats that may or may not drop the F-bomb.  Many of them are stunningly beautiful, soul-bearing, and heart-breaking.  The raw vulnerability she shows in her songs has always spoken to me - as a writer, as a woman, and as someone who knows what it's like to feel so violently.   There are a lot of her songs that apply to my life these days and those will be coming up in some future posts.   This one though, is about her single "Just Give Me a Reason", which is a duet with Nate Ruess, the lead singer of Fun.  To sum up the song, it's about a couple who has experienced some hard times in their relationship and are trying to figure things out again.  The song begins with these words: 

Right from the start

You were a thief

You stole my heart

And I your willing victim

I let you see the parts of me

That weren't all that pretty

And with every touch 

you fixed them

If those aren't the perfect words to describe my relationship with Mike, I don't know what is.   In the first 30 years of my life, I kept guys at arm's reach.  I never let them get too close.   When I met Mike, everything changed.  Suddenly and completely.   He is my other half - there is no question.

The song continues with Pink being concerned that something has changed in their relationship and she is afraid he is pulling away.   At the same time, Nate begins to sing his part and tells her that she is making things up.  He loves her just as much as always.  She's not interpreting things the way they truly are.   He doesn't understand what she's feeling.  She doesn't understand what he's feeling.   

This is what it is like to lose your child.   Men and women grieve so differently, it is so easy to misinterpret your spouse's actions and intentions.  Men are able to compartmentalize their emotions and deal with them in a more matter of factly kind of way.   To their wives, this seems callous and cold.   A woman fears he isn't grieving or that he doesn't understand  the complexity of her grief.  She is falling apart, why isn't he?   The poor man doesn't understand why his wife is having so much trouble with her emotions. Why can't she sort through them rationally?  Why is everything spilling out of her all the time?  The thing is - both of them are grieving.  Both of them are doing things correctly and the way they need to - it's just lost in translation.  This is where communication is so important.

In the song, the two are trying to communicate with each other.  They are trying to tell the other one what they need and how they feel.  They sing the chorus together:

Just give me a reason

Just a little bits enough

Just a second we're not broken just bent

And we can learn to love again

It's in the starsIt's been written in the scars on our heartsThat we're not broken just bentAnd we can learn to love again
Just give me a reasonJust a little bit's enoughJust a second we're not broken just bentAnd we can learn to love again

Statistically, 16% of marriages do not survive the loss of a child. Objectively, I can see why. Loss changes you. When you build a relationship on who you are, when you change, the relationship also changes. If you're not willing to work on staying together - you won't. The loss will divide you. Personally, though, I am not worried.


When your heart is broken in the same places as the one you love, you have to relearn how to make it beat again. Even if you have no idea what the other person is talking about, you try your best to understand. You make yourself realize that this person is in just as much pain and needs just as much support as you do. You look at your life together as more than what it once was. Before, you loved each other with a carefree innocence - skipping through a meadow of lavender. But now, you are both hobbled by this loss and you aren't really sure how to pick yourselves up and walk on your splintered legs. So, you lean on each other. You bind your broken bones to theirs, you wrap your arms around them, and you limp forward. Slowly. Painfully. But together. And we are doing that.


That's what Pink's song says to me. Life is so much harder than it used to be. We are different. Who we are is different. How we react to things is different. But our love is the same. We don't love each other any less. We don't value each other any less. In fact, I think we value each other more.
The scars on our hearts are healing together. And even though this tragedy has covered us in dirt and muck and pain, "we'll come clean".

                                    



 

Emptiness

There is a feeling of emptiness that accompanies loss that is almost unexplainable. It's as if a deep canyon has opened up in your soul, splitting you down the middle.   You hear the bedrock of your heart crack and break as the hollowness tears you in half.   You are wide open, a hole of echoing darkness taking over what once was solid ground.   You feel not only impossibly empty, but also impossibly vulnerable.  You are like a hollowed out egg.  The shell that surrounds you is so fragile that you know even the slightest tap will cause you to crumble into yourself.  

You realize that in order to survive, you must fill the giant gash left behind.  You must find a way to become whole again.  You must find a way to fill the void.   So, you reach your arms out as far as they can go and you pull in anything of substance within your grasp.   Sometimes these things are healthy, sometimes they are not, but you don't care.  You shove them in, packing them into the emptiness, hoping that soon, you will feel complete again.   But, you don't.   It's not enough.  It's never enough.   No matter what you do or how you try to satisfy the emptiness, it will not go away.  Like a junkie, you always need more.  

Everything I am doing with my life right now is a direct attempt to fill the empty chasm inside.  The blog, the baking, the charities, the art.   If I buy another owl, maybe I won't feel so hollow.   If I write one more post, maybe the crack will close a little.   I need to paint another picture.  I need to help another mother.   I need to perfect another recipe.  I need to organize a fundraiser.  I need to plant a garden.   I need, I need, I need.  Thankfully, I have not been pulled towards less savory ways to fill this emptiness, but I can completely see why some women are.  You just want the constant pull of nothingness to let go of your heart.   You just want to feel whole again - and you will try anything to make that happen.

I don't know how to fill this emptiness.  I don't know what else I can do.  There is a giant hole inside me - a dark hollowness where there used to be light.  I try to find positive and meaningful activities to fill the void, but it's not enough.  She's gone.  This is what she left behind.