Square One

Recently, I made the decision to wean myself off of my medication and begin trying to conceive. Things were going well for a few weeks...and then I fell off an emotional cliff. All of the depression and crippling anxiety came flooding back, along with withdrawal symptoms I had heard about but thought were exaggerated (they're not). I hit a low point a few days ago and stayed there. A friend convinced me to go back on my antidepressants, so here I am. Here we are. No more baby after trying this month, and now no more baby until I can scrape myself together again.

I have never liked being in an unresolved or uncertain state, yet I have been living like that for almost seven months now, not living but not dead, a mother but not a mother. Where does one put all of these feelings? How do you live after you lose your child? Almost seven months later and I still can't answer these questions. I really thought that I would just immediately get pregnant and I would find zen feelings and float off into some fuzzy rainbow baby future where my hurts would be healed by the family we would grow. Yet, seven months later, I have tried for 3-4 cycles to get pregnant with no results, I am on antidepressants and now can't try again until I am weaned off in a healthy way, and I am still shredded emotionally.

But I wait. And I get up each morning. And I eat, and I drink, and I bathe myself. I work, I spend time with friends, and I go to church. But I do it all so mechanically; it's hard to remind myself of my "why" for living sometimes. Some stubborn part of me fights my fears, believing that it has to get better than this and that I will be happy again someday. I hope that part is right.

On the topic of "unresolved," we are still waiting on Haven's headstone, which we ordered about 3 months ago. We were assured it would be installed quickly, but every time we drive by, her place is still marked only by a gray, crudely nailed together marker, her name written on it in Sharpie. It is so ugly and hurts my mama's heart.

Ah, resolution. Where are you?

Bad Idea

*Language alert for this post, if you care about that sort of thing.

Today, I went to Target to do some shop therapy. Turns out it was a bad idea. There were some items I needed to pick up for baby shower gifts (have I mentioned that seemingly ALL the women of child-bearing age in our lives are pregnant or have just had babies?) As I walked up to the baby clothes section, I saw the most beautiful little white dress - exactly what I had wanted to get for Haven for her dedication. Next to it hung the dress my friend ended up buying for her, except in a different colour (her dedication dress ended up being her burial dress). I should have turned and ran. As I reached out and touched all of the little girl clothes, I could feel my face fall. I wondered what people thought of the sad woman touching the baby things. I was thinking, "I miss my baby so much. And what if I never get to have a living baby girl? Or any living babies?" I thought of the hours I'd spent in that same store picking out things for Haven and other friends' babies when I was pregnant. I was so happy back then. What a punch in the gut. I proceeded to the little boy clothes, and every little pair of pants and every little onesie was a knife in the heart. I walked away from there panicked and nearly hyperventilating.

I went to the ladies clothing section and, without consciously deciding to do so, ended up in the maternity clothes. I looked at the beautiful dresses and shirts and it was just painful how much my body longed at that moment to be pregnant again, waiting for Haven to come. So expectant and joyful and naive. I nearly bought a pretty black shirt for myself "for next time," but I couldn't bring myself to do it. It's just too hard to think about the fact that I might not get a chance to be that big again, and to think about the pain that my mind fully expects will be the next outcome. I can't let myself believe we'll be so blessed, even though the odds are so small. The odds were tiny this time: a 0.6% chance of it happening, and I got to be the unlucky mama who filled that statistic.

I headed toward housewares, and my super-sonic hearing detected a newborn a few aisles behind me. I doubt anyone else would have heard it, but I did, and I immediately began walking faster to get away, away, anywhere but near that sweet, beautiful, gut-wrenching sound. More panicked feelings, more almost-hyperventilation. Then, up ahead, a little girl around 4 years old with her daddy. Seriously?!

FUCK. (Yes, I love Jesus and I just cursed. Get over it.)

I just hurt so much.

Before I left the store, a family member called and, in the course of our conversation, told me about a drug-addicted woman in their city who apparently just walked out of the hospital, abandoning her newborn, who is now in withdrawal. And I thought, "Fuck you, you stupid woman. Don't you know how unfair it is that you somehow got your baby to term and now you don't even want it?" I could just strangle her. It makes me furious that people take their ability to have a child for granted. Even among my friends who grumble about this or that, I want to just scream at them, "you don't know how lucky you are!!!!"

Some of my friends try to be encouraging and say things like, "try not to think about it happening again," and I think to myself, "what the fuck else CAN I think? This is the only experience I've had: perfect pregnancy with a dead baby at the end for no detectable reason. Just bad fucking luck. And now I'm at least 5x more likely to experience that same pain again. Take your idiotic faith in happy outcomes and shove it." Maybe I'd throw in a kick to the babymaker for good measure. But I don't say those things. I don't kick people in the junk. I just shrivel up inside a little more.

I'm just SO angry.

I truly don't want to leave the house anymore. The world out there is too big, and there are too many babies and careless words and everyone's lives going on without Haven. Can I just hibernate until there is a baby in my arms? Or, better yet, can someone wake me from this horrible dream?

Bitterness

Sometimes the bitterness creeps in and wraps its clammy fingers around my thoughts. You see, my husband and I have never had an easy time of anything. It's like we somehow found each other, the perfect mates, and then everything else went to shit in our lives. From the financial issues that have plagued us, to death and sickness and turmoil and pain in our families, to car accidents and therapy and multiple cars dying in freak ways, to being abused in the workplace and losing jobs, to owning houses that fall apart, to endless days of stress and anxiety... it's been one thing after another for 7 years.

And then we are blessed with the ultimate surprise. Without even trying, we suddenly had a beautiful baby girl on the way. I finally let down my guard and began to believe life really could be beautiful. But she is yanked away from me after a perfect, healthy pregnancy. No warning, and our baby is stolen from us. It is like a sick joke. And then that wasn't enough to throw at us, so just three weeks after The Worst Day, my husband's mother and step-father were in a terrible accident (thankfully, they will recover), husband comes down with a case of gout, then gets in a minor car accident, all in 36 hours.

We just feel bitter sometimes.

And so my mind wanders, as it does when you are home alone for hours and days on end...

Why did my baby have to die? She wasn't sick, so why her? Why us? After everything else? Those living newborns whose photos crop up in the minefield of my facebook newsfeed, why not them? (Not that I would ever wish this on any of those precious babies). But WHY? Did I do something wrong in my life that I deserve this? But she didn't do anything wrong...she'll never have the chance to do anything wrong. Did she die to fill some kind of dead baby quota and she was just the unlucky lotto winner? Is the universe trying to teach me something in the most perverse way possible? Why my spunky little girl and not the baby of a drug addict who didn't even try to take care of her baby?

Those cat-poster facebook memes tell us that everything happens for a reason...I don't think I believe that. I believe we can take the painful things handed to us and decide to turn them into good things in our lives, but I don't think that those good results are the reason we suffered. Sometimes, there are just no answers. No answers to the burning question "why?!" The answer is that there are no answers. For Haven, it was probably a cord accident, based on our recollection of events that week. Pressure on her cord. An awkward position, restricted blood flow, and death. All with no obvious sign until we put together the pieces in the following weeks.

A friend nearly lost her son just three weeks before we lost Haven, and she told me about the signs and the "bad feeling" that lead her to go to the hospital, where an emergency C-section saved her son's life. That's a part of what eats at me and why I feel so damned culpable. Because if there was a sign, we missed it. The only thing that might have been a sign were accelerated movements the night before, but they happened during her usual busy time, so I didn't think it was odd. She had been increasingly active for about two weeks, so this wasn't a red flag. We laughed, thought it was cute. Thought, "she is getting so strong, she must be almost ready to come!" Now I just have a sick feeling in my stomach when I think about that last night, because the last time I for sure remember her moving, she was probably dying. She was dying, and we were laughing.

Anyway. I know none of this will bring her back, and it's torture to think this way. I know it's a part of grieving when this kind of thing happens and that someday I will no longer unjustly blame myself, but punishing myself makes me feel a little satisfaction because there is no one else to punish. No one to blame. Accidents happen, and terrible things happen to good people. The end.

I just wish it all could have been different.

In the Quiet

I am someone who loves quiet and solitude. My husband is the opposite and would be perfectly happy to have the t.v. on all day, or to spend most days with friends. The funny thing is, since Haven I have been craving distraction. I'm afraid to stop and think, because thinking leads to the most painful memories, and to longing, and to guilt, and to self-blame. I suppose trying to distract myself from my grief is not the healthiest thing, but it seems to be the only thing that is helping me hold it together.

Oh, the thoughts I think...

"What if it was something I ate?"

"What if I wasn't sleeping on my left side enough?"

"What if she had been born a few days earlier? Would she still have lived?"

"What if there were signs and I missed them?"

"I was laughing the last time she kicked me - what if that was a warning sign and I laughed?"

"What if I had gone in to the hospital sooner? Maybe her heart would have still been beating!"

"What if I had taken that last week off like I had planned? Maybe if I hadn't been so tired and distracted, I would have noticed something was off!"

"Will they ever find an answer or will I be tortured for the rest of my life wondering?"

The questions just swirl around in my head, and images and mental video play over and over. The look on the nurse's face, then the look on the doctor's face. That sick knowing feeling as we went into the hospital. The fear. The wailing I couldn't hold in. My sweet husband being there by my side through it all, being so brave and so helpful. Holding her and kissing her cold little cheek. The softness of her skin.

I will never forget these things. I take some small comfort from others who have gone down this sad, sad road. They say it becomes easier to bear with time. I really hope they are right. Right now the grief cuts like a knife.