My emotional state is all over the place right now!! One moment I’m crying in despair because I had just hung up all my pregnancy clothes in my closet a couple of weeks ago and had just barely started to wear them but I didn’t get to wear them all and then the next moment I’m angrily throwing those clothes all over my room because I didn’t get to wear them—my room looks like a war zone. I’m finding that night time is the worst. When I was pregnant that is when the morning sickness was the worst and when I realized that I was pregnant and I would try and cradle my baby in my belly. Now I cry myself to sleep because I miss him so much. It is the time of day when I get a “reality reminder” that this really happened and it wasn’t just a nightmare.
Friday was hard because we took that awful collection jar that contained my baby back to the doctors. But, this time I had experience and knowledge on my side, and I knew what I wanted to do things differently than what I did with Hope. So I held that little jar one last time and whispered my goodbyes. I took lots of pictures. The brown paper sack that they want you to put the jar in to bring back in so that you won’t upset all the other pregnant ladies in the waiting room has always upset me especially because I didn’t know what would happen when I had Hope and my doctor’s nurse took that bag with Hope so fast last time I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye or anything. So this time I decorated that brown paper sack with hearts and I wrote my baby’s name, Jason Nephi, all over the sack and wrote messages of love from me—then I put my baby’s jar inside of that and proudly handed that to my nurse so that she would see that this was NOT just a miscarried jar of cells—this was my wanted, missed, and loved baby and she better treat him with respect. I dressed all in black including my fingernails and became “Darth Shauna” just for yesterday. I just remember how awful it was to go into the doctor’s after I miscarried Hope and to be treated like it was nothing more than a common cold and to be told my baby was a mass of cells and it was for the best and that it happens to everyone. This time they were NOT going to get away with that kind of talk to me, because I’ve been through this twice now and it is NOT just a miscarriage—it is a very traumatizing and horrible thing to literally watch your body eject your baby and to catch your baby in your hands. I was going to tell them all the gory details until they felt what I felt so that they would act differently this time. I didn’t have to worry—they had just seen me the day before when I got the verdict of No Heartbeat. They had hugged me and cried with me and knew how important this baby was to me and they were very empathetic and kind to my emotional state of mind. My nurse read all the messages on the bag and told me how touched she was to see the effort I went through to let this baby know how much he was wanted and loved.
One of the things I regret was last Monday I felt like I wanted to plant yellow daffodils in my front yard barrels so that in the spring when they came up and I was big and huge and miserably pregnant it would give me hope to keep enduring and it would have been so beautiful to see that when I brought my alive baby home from the hospital. I regret that I didn’t act on that prompting then and planted them while I was still pregnant. I still want to plant some today because now it will give me something to look forward to when my due date comes around on April 25th and be a beautiful reminder of my precious Jason.
It is so very hard to go through all the new grief emotions again. The good thing is I know that it is okay to go through all these emotions. In fact I know I need to and have to go through all of these emotions because I know that is how my brain processes all of this. If I don't allow myself to go through it because it's too hard or because I don't want to accept it or because I'm afraid of what others will think, then, it will stop my healing and become traumatic like what happened with Janessa and Hope. So this time I choose to accept all these emotions and know that it is just a normal part of the grieving process.
I am heart broken and grief stricken and it will be a long and hard road for the next little while, but, I am NOT devastated. I know where my babies are, I know that unfortunately for me their missions in life were short but they are complete and that part of their missions were to help me to learn some very hard lessons about death and grief and empathy and about God's plan for our lives and how different that is from our own plans but that trusting God's plan is the only way and that true healing and peace come from God, day by day, piece by piece as God sends little hugs from Heaven to help you cope and find strength each day. God has just sent me 6 living children to raise at this time and 3 angel children I will get to see and raise later.
People will ask what they can do to help and this time I am ready to answer that question. Definitely pray for me and my family to accept what has happened and for God to help us find peace amongst this tragedy. Next, because I've been through this I know what things help the most and what things will be really hard for me. So for me every Friday is going to be hard because that was the day of the week I passed milestones like, 10 weeks and 12 weeks, etc., when I celebrated that I had made it one more week in this pregnancy. I had already marked my little planning calendar from now until April highlighting each Friday and what week I would be on. Every 10th of the month is going to be hard because I will relive my miscarriage and all of those hard emotions will come streaming through. My due date April 25th, 2014 will be an extremely hard day for me. So, what can people do--well, I found that it really helped to have people just acknowledge me on those hard days and to just send a card or a simple email to just say I'm thinking of you and praying for you today. It helps to see my angel baby's name written and know that he is not forgotten. It would mean the world to me to have people send me emails or cards or pictures of his name on those hard days. It can be as simple as an email that says Remembering Jason today to as complicated as writing his name in a unique and creative way like I had people do this year for Janessa's angel birthday. This Tuesday Oct. 15th is Baby Loss Awareness Day--or The Wave of Light where people all over the world light a candle at 7 p.m. and keep it lit for an hour in honor of angel baby. It is the day that I will again this year be putting all my pinwheels (over 200 this year!) out in my front lawn and light candles around them. It would mean a lot to have people light candles in memory of all 3 of my angel babies and just send me an email to tell me that they did and that they are remembering them.
So amidst the hurricane of emotions that swirl around me, I still have a core of peace and hope!
Friday was hard because we took that awful collection jar that contained my baby back to the doctors. But, this time I had experience and knowledge on my side, and I knew what I wanted to do things differently than what I did with Hope. So I held that little jar one last time and whispered my goodbyes. I took lots of pictures. The brown paper sack that they want you to put the jar in to bring back in so that you won’t upset all the other pregnant ladies in the waiting room has always upset me especially because I didn’t know what would happen when I had Hope and my doctor’s nurse took that bag with Hope so fast last time I didn’t get a chance to say goodbye or anything. So this time I decorated that brown paper sack with hearts and I wrote my baby’s name, Jason Nephi, all over the sack and wrote messages of love from me—then I put my baby’s jar inside of that and proudly handed that to my nurse so that she would see that this was NOT just a miscarried jar of cells—this was my wanted, missed, and loved baby and she better treat him with respect. I dressed all in black including my fingernails and became “Darth Shauna” just for yesterday. I just remember how awful it was to go into the doctor’s after I miscarried Hope and to be treated like it was nothing more than a common cold and to be told my baby was a mass of cells and it was for the best and that it happens to everyone. This time they were NOT going to get away with that kind of talk to me, because I’ve been through this twice now and it is NOT just a miscarriage—it is a very traumatizing and horrible thing to literally watch your body eject your baby and to catch your baby in your hands. I was going to tell them all the gory details until they felt what I felt so that they would act differently this time. I didn’t have to worry—they had just seen me the day before when I got the verdict of No Heartbeat. They had hugged me and cried with me and knew how important this baby was to me and they were very empathetic and kind to my emotional state of mind. My nurse read all the messages on the bag and told me how touched she was to see the effort I went through to let this baby know how much he was wanted and loved.
One of the things I regret was last Monday I felt like I wanted to plant yellow daffodils in my front yard barrels so that in the spring when they came up and I was big and huge and miserably pregnant it would give me hope to keep enduring and it would have been so beautiful to see that when I brought my alive baby home from the hospital. I regret that I didn’t act on that prompting then and planted them while I was still pregnant. I still want to plant some today because now it will give me something to look forward to when my due date comes around on April 25th and be a beautiful reminder of my precious Jason.
It is so very hard to go through all the new grief emotions again. The good thing is I know that it is okay to go through all these emotions. In fact I know I need to and have to go through all of these emotions because I know that is how my brain processes all of this. If I don't allow myself to go through it because it's too hard or because I don't want to accept it or because I'm afraid of what others will think, then, it will stop my healing and become traumatic like what happened with Janessa and Hope. So this time I choose to accept all these emotions and know that it is just a normal part of the grieving process.
I am heart broken and grief stricken and it will be a long and hard road for the next little while, but, I am NOT devastated. I know where my babies are, I know that unfortunately for me their missions in life were short but they are complete and that part of their missions were to help me to learn some very hard lessons about death and grief and empathy and about God's plan for our lives and how different that is from our own plans but that trusting God's plan is the only way and that true healing and peace come from God, day by day, piece by piece as God sends little hugs from Heaven to help you cope and find strength each day. God has just sent me 6 living children to raise at this time and 3 angel children I will get to see and raise later.
People will ask what they can do to help and this time I am ready to answer that question. Definitely pray for me and my family to accept what has happened and for God to help us find peace amongst this tragedy. Next, because I've been through this I know what things help the most and what things will be really hard for me. So for me every Friday is going to be hard because that was the day of the week I passed milestones like, 10 weeks and 12 weeks, etc., when I celebrated that I had made it one more week in this pregnancy. I had already marked my little planning calendar from now until April highlighting each Friday and what week I would be on. Every 10th of the month is going to be hard because I will relive my miscarriage and all of those hard emotions will come streaming through. My due date April 25th, 2014 will be an extremely hard day for me. So, what can people do--well, I found that it really helped to have people just acknowledge me on those hard days and to just send a card or a simple email to just say I'm thinking of you and praying for you today. It helps to see my angel baby's name written and know that he is not forgotten. It would mean the world to me to have people send me emails or cards or pictures of his name on those hard days. It can be as simple as an email that says Remembering Jason today to as complicated as writing his name in a unique and creative way like I had people do this year for Janessa's angel birthday. This Tuesday Oct. 15th is Baby Loss Awareness Day--or The Wave of Light where people all over the world light a candle at 7 p.m. and keep it lit for an hour in honor of angel baby. It is the day that I will again this year be putting all my pinwheels (over 200 this year!) out in my front lawn and light candles around them. It would mean a lot to have people light candles in memory of all 3 of my angel babies and just send me an email to tell me that they did and that they are remembering them.
So amidst the hurricane of emotions that swirl around me, I still have a core of peace and hope!
I found this quote on sweet angel babies Quinton and Owen's mommy's blog that I just love and hope that she won't mind me sharing here. This has become my new motto for life!
Hope
is not pretending that troubles don't exist.
It's the trust that they will not last forever,
that hurts will be healed and difficulties overcome.
It is faith that a source of strength and renewal lies within
to lead us through the dark to the sunshine.
is not pretending that troubles don't exist.
It's the trust that they will not last forever,
that hurts will be healed and difficulties overcome.
It is faith that a source of strength and renewal lies within
to lead us through the dark to the sunshine.
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