12/04

One year ago today, I found out I was pregnant.  It would be the fourth pregnancy since I had delivered my fourth living child, three years prior.  I can remember like yesterday the emotions I felt upon discovering that I, once again, had new life within me.  I was excited, which is ALWAYS the initial reaction I have when I am newly pregnant.  I felt hopeful that night, calculated my due date (August 2014), and dreamt of a late-summer baby.  The next morning was a different story.  I woke early, at least an hour before it was time to wake the children for school.  I was scared, terrified.  Positively CERTAIN that I was only on the brink of miscarrying...again...for the fourth time in 16 months.  I did not have any symptoms of miscarriage, but I had scarcely a reason not to, either.  I prayed, I cried, oh, so fervently that day and throughout December (..and throughout pregnancy...and today...).  Funny how different things are today than they were this time last year.  Last December, I spent most days on the couch.  I was sick, but I didn't know if it was from morning sickness or from all of my emotional distress (ie. I cried ALL the time) or if it was from my kids (they passed around the stomach bug s.e.v.e.r.a.l. times last winter).  It was hard.  I did everything I could just to get through each day.  And I did my very best to be cheery for the children--I didn't always succeed, but I gave it my best effort.  I couldn't even discuss the pregnancy with Justin.  It hurt him too much because of what had already happened.  

But.  We made it.  SHE made it.  I have always been so thankful for my children, but nothing makes you hold them closer than the feeling of loss.  I look at my baby now, and still, to this day, I cannot believe she is real.  How do I deserve these precious children?  I clearly do not, but somehow, God has entrusted them to me while here on earth.  I am not worthy...    

Remembrance Day

Today is the day set aside to remember babies lost to miscarriage, still birth, and infant loss.  I should say that it is a day that Ronald Reagan declared back in 1988 for our nation to remember those babies.  Everyday is remembrance day for me.  I don't dwell on it, but I think of my babies each and every single day.  They are on my heart in everything I do.  I love them, and still thank God for them.  And, at times, I still cry for them.

While I was pregnant with Mila, all I could think about was miscarriage...but it was the last thing I wanted to talk about.  Our third angel baby still remains unnamed. Mostly because after I miscarried him/her, I was so distraught, I could not think of a name.  Then I got pregnant again, and I couldn't bear to speak of miscarriage.  I think we will eventually name our baby...eventually.  But for now, each day, as I think of my little Ezra, Susanna, and Baby3, I thank God for His gifts.  I am so unworthy of these precious souls--even the ones I never held in my arms.  I love them, I mourn them, I am grateful for them.  Thank you God, for letting me be their mommy. Thank you for loving me that much.

love lives on

I never thought much about getting a tattoo in the past.  I don't have a problem with them, but I never thought of anything in particular that I'd especially like to have drawn on me...forever.  However, I have seriously been considering a tattoo to memorialize my babies since I lost my third angel last summer.  I googled different ideas, and apparently a miscarriage tattoo is not too unheard of.  Most of the ideas I saw were babies with angel wings, foot prints, etc.  Then I saw someone on a forum had mentioned they were getting a dandelion with the seeds blowing in the wind, representing her lost babies.  There was no pic posted, so I googled dandelion tattoos...and the image above popped up.  I followed the link to the original site, and it was actually a tattoo a woman had gotten after her divorce.  This is similar to what I would like to get eventually, but maybe with just three little fluttering seeds in the wind.  I like how she put 'love lives on' underneath. Actually, seeing this brought tears to my eyes.  Not a day goes by that I don't think of them, love them, and remember them.  I read once that a woman who had miscarried many times had pictured her children in Heaven like they were running though a field of flowers, laughing, and having so much fun they did not notice she was not yet there with them. And that when she finally did join them in Heaven, they would look back at her, and she would catch up to them in that field of flowers. I think that is a beautiful image...and again, I can't think of that without having tears spill down my cheeks. It's amazing how raw the emotion is, all these months later.  Thank you God, for ALL of my babies.  I know one day I will be with them all.

Hard Feelings

It's been a rollercoaster of a year for me, with regard to my fertility.  Who knew that after four healthy, uneventful pregnancies, I would suffer so much loss.  When I think back to my fifth pregnancy ( the one that would result in my first-ever miscarried baby), I have many different emotions.  It was the last pregnancy that I had (or will ever have) feelings of excitement and not a trace of worry about whether it would result in a new life brought home from the hospital.  I was so shocked, so completely unprepared for that miscarriage.  Not to say that you can ever really be "prepared" for one to occur, but it was the one that felt like such a "sucker-punch." I never expected it.  I had taken all of my healthy pregnancies for granted, and even though I like to think that I do not have the mind-set, as a mother that I "know it all," due to having a few kids, subconsciously I did think I knew it all when it came to my body and pregnancy. Such a foolish notion.

It was a rough Advent/Christmas season in a way.  I have now been through the first anniversary of my second miscarried baby, Susanna (lost 12/26/11).  I have also now lived through yet another unfulfilled due date (12/27/12).  I am wondering about what December 2013 will bring. Will I be dreading it for yet another reason (I found out I was pregnant 12/04/12), or will we be celebrating the lives of five living children and just three in Heaven?  I am trying not to let myself think of it.  Right now my goal is focusing on one day at a time.  Sometimes that is really, really easy to do.  Other times it could not be harder.

But on a positive note, and this is what I try to think about when I am alone in my own dark thoughts, I really have been given so much.  I have more than so many.  I am mother to eight (EIGHT!!!) beautiful souls. No matter what happens in this life, I am one blessed mama.  My heart aches to hold the children I never met.  It fears whatever losses the future may hold.  But it is eternally grateful for what God has given me.  The word 'grateful' doesn't actually even do justice for what I really feel.  I am so unworthy of all of my blessings, but thankful for God's plan.  Though my tears may be plentiful at times, even in my deepest sorrow, He is with me.  There is nothing more I need.