One week

Today makes one week since I lost my unborn baby. It has been a long, stressful week. A week full of pain. A week of learning about myself and my loved ones. A week of drawing even closer to my husband. A week of finding myself drifting further away from people I had been closer too.

A week of hurt.

A week of healing.

A week of trying to find my footing in a world that from one second to the next became different. Or at least I became different in that second. Without warning my focus shifted. What was important in my life, already a very narrow list, dwindled to almost nothing.

Five years ago I spent several months crocheting little hats and booties for premature babies. I did it because I’ve always had a soft spot for preemies. Once upon a time I wanted to be a doctor that took care of those oh-so-tiny babies. In searching for patterns and information I came across patterns for burial gowns for the babies that were born too soon, too tiny, to fit even the smallest of preemie clothes. I made two of those so small little dresses. At the time I focused only on what I was doing and not who or what I was making them for. That was the only way I could make those burial gowns, by not thinking of the fact that I was making them for dead babies. I remember wondering how people could make those little burial gowns one after another and keep making them. How could they make gowns, hats, booties so small and know that they would only ever be used on dead babies.

Today I understand.

As the mother of one of those babies born too soon, gone too soon, I understand. I’d have loved to have a blanket, a hat, booties…anything…for my baby. Not because I felt the need to dress my baby but because I need something to hold onto. Even now…a week later…I’d give a lot to have something that belonged to my baby, just to have something to hold onto. To have something to hold when the pain gets to be too much. To have something to look at…and remember…when the memories are sweet. But for me…there’s nothing to hold onto, nothing to hug while I cry, nothing to touch.

There’s no birth certificate, no baby blanket, no footprints on paper…nothing. Just the memory of carrying my baby in my body and of holding it in my hand. I do have pictures….but there are no happy pictures, only pictures of a baby gone too soon. A baby that fit inside my wedding ring with plenty of room to spare.

A picture of my wedding ring, inside my husbands wedding ring…both of them encircling our child. The baby that was a part of us. A baby that lived in love for the two months we were given with it. A baby that had a purpose in life, even though that life was so very, very short.

Today, on this one week anniversary of the loss of the baby I wanted so very much, I still find myself struggling through life. I find myself clinging more to my husband, holding tighter to our children. I find myself hurting over things like baby pictures on TV, things that I once found enjoyment in. I find myself giving myself permission on a daily basis to feel whatever emotion may be coming my way each day, each moment. At first I just hurt, then I was very sick and that was a blessing because while I was sick I was just miserable. I didn’t have to try and cope, didn’t have to fight the tears when I needed to be strong for others….I was sick and everyone was okay with Mommy being in bed. Mommy was sick so they had to cope on their own for a couple of days. And those days gave me time I desperately needed. Time to cope myself, time to grieve, time to heal a little.

But as the virus passed I was once again faced with the same things. The grief. The stabbing pain. The loss. But those weren’t the only feelings I was experiencing. Those were the easy feelings. They were the feelings I expected. The feelings I was okay with. The feelings I wanted to feel. Because I needed to hurt to know that I had loved enough. I needed to experience the loss because I couldn’t just keep going like my baby had never existed. But…it was the other feelings that made me stop. The other feelings that made me feel guilty.

The first time I laughed after losing the baby.

Not even a real laugh, just a little sound of mirth, but it stopped me in my mental tracks. Took me by surprise. Made me feel guilty. I didn’t want to feel any kind of happiness. I wanted to hurt, and I was hurting. To feel happiness in any way, it seemed, was to disregard the life I so recently lost.

It was only with thought that I realized my baby, so much a part of its Mama and Daddy, wouldn’t want any of us to live in sadness. Our baby that knew nothing of happiness or sadness…wouldn’t want us to live in sadness forever. And so I let the guilt go.

I still haven’t laughed. Not really. Not real laughter. But I’ve chuckled a few times. I’ve let myself feel happiness.

I’ve also let myself feel any emotion that sweeps through me and in doing so it has helped with the pain, with the healing, with the loss. The day I looked at my other children and faced the fact that my baby would never live to be like them, would never be a child…that day…I let myself feel a different kind of loss, a different kind of pain. And I let myself feel the anger. I didn’t fight it, didn’t try and stop it. I just let the anger come. And then I let it go.

I still hurt. I still ache. I still feel the loss of my baby.

Every.

Single.

Day.

I wake up in the morning and it hits me. My baby’s gone. Gone. Never to be again. And it hurts. But I’m facing each day, each moment, as it comes. I feel whatever emotion comes at me in this second and I don’t feel guilty for whatever that emotion may be.

Because I have to get through this and for me…that is what I need to do. I’ve found solace in talking to my husband. In telling him anything and everything about what I’m feeling, what I’m thinking. But I’ve also found comfort, peace, healing, in hearing him talk of his feelings through it all. I don’t want him being strong for me. I don’t want him worrying that what he says may make me hurt more. Because…for me…when he shares his hurt with me I know I’m not in it alone. I know I’m not hurting alone.

I have one daughter that has hurt badly over the loss of this baby. I don’t want my children to hurt but because that child has hurt, because she has cried with me, because she has shared her pain with me…she has shared my pain. And because she has…I am closer to her. I know that she understands.

It’s the same way with my husband. His pain doesn’t make me hurt more…it makes me feel like it’s okay to share my pain with him, to hurt with him. If he hid his pain from me I couldn’t share my pain with him.

It’s been a week. A long, painful week. A week that’s passed way too fast. I’ve learned things this past week. About myself. About others. In a multitude of ways. I’ve learned to lean harder on my husband…for that I’m glad and grateful. I’ve learned not to lean on people I once thought I could. And I’ve learned that others…are just what I always thought they were. Sometimes I find myself wondering if I’ve become too sensitive. If when I take offense at things others say or do…or don’t do…if it’s just me and if I should just let it go. Or is it them? I just don’t know.

People I thought would show the most support…haven’t. People I thought would call and check on me…haven’t. People I thought would be there for me…haven’t been. Someone I didn’t know…showed me the most understanding. People that should have been the most concerned…haven’t even asked how I am.

It’s been eye opening and has brought with it its own kind of pain and yet…I’m kind of glad to see these people for what they are. And like the anger that I let wash over me, not an anger at anyone- just anger at the circumstances I found myself in- anger at the loss, I let these feelings of shock, surprise, and offense wash over me and then I let it go. I forgive those that didn’t live up to my expectations, those that made the hurt worse at times because I thought I would be able to share the hurt with them and not being able too brought its own kind of hurt. I let that go…let the love and forgiveness take its place. Because if I’m to have anything long lasting from the loss of my baby I want it to be a legacy of love. I want to remember that in an instant all we love can be gone and that those we love are, after Christ, the only thing important on this earth.

Love.

If I’m to learn anything from my baby…I want it to be love. My baby lived in love. It died in love. Years from now…everytime I remember my baby…I want to remember it in love. I want to know that I loved more because I loved my baby. I want to know others felt love…because I loved my baby.

And so because I want to love those that have been given to me by the Lord, no matter their place in my life, I let everything else go and just remember love is all that matters.

I know someone that tells everyone that crosses her path that she loves them. I asked her once if she was always that way and she said no. There was a time that she couldn’t forgive. You’d never know that if you saw this person today. She lives in love. And everyone that knows her feels it. If I could use only one word to describe her it would be love. If someone asked me what she brought into my life I would say love.

That is what I want to be. I don’t want to dwell on other feelings. I just want those I care about to know that I love them.

But it isn’t always easy. Just this week I’ve discovered that wanting everyone to know I love them and being able to show it aren’t always the same thing. There have been several people that didn’t live up to my expectations this week. They didn’t show love the way I thought they should.

One day this past week as I was speaking of someone who didn’t react as I thought they would my husband reminded me that Scripture tells us not to put our faith in men for they will let us down but to put our faith in the Lord as He never will.

A search for verses that speak of trusting in the Lord not man brought me a list of them. I wasn’t looking for anything but the verse itself…context didn’t matter. Here are just a few of the verses that came back when I did an internet search…

It is better to take refuge in the Lord than to trust in man. Psalm 118:8

Put no trust in a neighbor; have no confidence in a friend; guard the doors of your mouth from her who lies in your arms; for the son treats the father with contempt, the daughter rises up against her mother, the daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law; a man's enemies are the men of his own house. But as for me, I will look to the Lord; I will wait for the God of my salvation; my God will hear me. Rejoice not over me, O my enemy; when I fall, I shall rise; when I sit in darkness, the Lord will be a light to me. Micah 7:5-8

Let everyone beware of his neighbor, and put no trust in any brother, for every brother is a deceiver, and every neighbor goes about as a slanderer. Jeremiah 9:4

Lessons abound in the midst of loss. Earthly lessons, spiritual lessons. Lessons of the heart. They are all there at a time when I didn’t want them. And yet as I leave the first week following the loss of my baby behind me and begin a new one…I’m left seeing things in a way I haven’t before. I’m left looking at life and those I love in ways I haven’t before.

Even as I struggled through so much this week, the Lord has thrown yet more at me. My husband showed me an article online that was about being gentle. And my husband has used that a few times to remind me to be gentle. While I thought I was showing love…apparently I wasn’t always showing gentleness. When I thought I was nurturing my children…apparently I wasn’t gentle.

When I sit down to write I don’t think out my subjects ahead of time. I don’t plan what I want to say. I simply start typing and let the words…whatever they may be…start flowing. Usually what comes out creates a good letter or blog post or whatever but it isn’t because I planned it. It’s just how I write. And when I talk I tend to do the same thing. I open my mouth and let the words come out. I saw one of those pictures with the cutesy sayings online the other day, it was a cat wearing glasses giving one of those looks that question your sanity, the caption around it said ‘did your ears hear what your mouth just said?’

It was a reminder…a lesson…as if I needed anything else during this last week…apparently the Lord thought I did because he wanted me to learn not only love but gentleness. And so lessons abound…in loss…through loss…around loss. Just because we feel we have enough going on and we don’t want or need anymore…the Lord may not agree.

When I started this blog I never intended to use it to share such a personal time of trial but as this week has slipped by, when I struggled with whether or not to share my thoughts and feelings this week, I couldn’t not share them. I know that there are few people that read this blog but if my experience helps only one person…then I’m glad I shared. If my hurt helps another person through a similar hurt…then I’m glad I shared. If writing this helps those I love understand even a tiny bit of what I’m going through…then I’m glad I shared.

And if it does nothing for anyone…writing these blogs has helped me…and I’m still glad I shared.

I struggled with my own thoughts and reasons for starting this blog long before I set it up. I struggled with whether or not to write posts on it after I set it up. My intention in making this blog was to share some of my thoughts and feelings on the things I was seeing in Scripture. That was it.

I knew that as a wife and mother I would slip things on parenting in, things on being a wife in, but my purpose was the Truths of Scripture and nothing else. Only…it didn’t quite work out that way. Instead of writing only of the Truths of Scripture I find myself writing of my heart. So much of what is in my heart is from Scripture but…I’m still a wife…still a mother…still a woman…still flesh.

The blog that started out because I enjoy writing…because I thought someone might like reading what I was writing about Scripture…has become the tool that is helping me through a very difficult, very painful experience.

This wasn’t my purpose for this blog but I’m glad it was here when I needed it. In writing I find…healing. In writing I find…comfort. In writing I find…peace. I find myself wishing I could hand these posts I’ve written over the last week to those in my life that don’t seem to understand. To those that haven’t been there, that haven’t seemed to care. And yet…I know I never will. I won’t hand them to those people. I will leave them here for the Lord to use, to bring to those He wants to read them.

I know those closest to me…like my husband…read every post I write. And that’s enough for me.

For those people that do read this blog…they’ve taken this journey with me…even if I don’t know they’re there or who they are. For that I’m glad and grateful.

My life was irrevocably changed this last week. I learned a lot about others and even more about myself. I learned to hurt in ways I never thought I could. I learned I’ll still lean hard on my Lord even when He allowed and even caused the pain I’m experiencing. I’ve learned I hate the word miscarriage.

I’ve never liked the term pregnant. It’s a word that takes something amazing and turns it into nothing more than a medical term. I don’t like it. I prefer things like expecting or my personal favorite ‘with child’ but I can live with the word pregnant. Because it is a word that describes something amazing, something miraculous, and it means…baby.

But over the last week I’ve learned I don’t even want to try and live with the word miscarriage. Nowhere in that word does it give any acknowledgement to the fact that my baby lived and died. People talk about a miscarriage the same way they do a blow out on a care. ‘So-and-so had a miscarriage yesterday’…where in that does it acknowledge the life that lived and died? Where does it acknowledge the pain and grief of those left dealing with the loss of the baby?

Someone told me today that she has never had a conversation with a mother that that mother hadn’t experienced a miscarriage. Yes, she had…me. Before the loss of my baby last week I had never been through this before. And as this person said this it was put to me like a normal, expected happening in every woman’s life. Just a part of becoming a mother.

Maybe it is just a part of it. Maybe it is just one of those things on the way to having children. But it isn’t just anything for me. There’s no just a miscarriage. No every mother experiences it. No…anything.

It was my baby. My baby. And it died. There’s no just…anything…in that. It was my child, my husbands child. It lived in me…our love and lives brought to life…and it died in me.

For a little while I carried a miracle in my body.

Now I carry it in my heart.