The Grief Workshop Journal is Finished

After a year and 2 months I have finally completed the grief journal that I was doing all of the weekly workshop classes in.  I am very happy with how it turned out.  This journal is a lot bigger than what it was originally and it is full of memories and activities that have helped me heal just a little bit more along my grief journey.  I will always be grateful for the experiences and memories I gained over this past year.

 The Outside Cover

 The Inside pages that are exploding out!

The First Page

The Last Page--The End!

Grief Class Week 40

Wow 60 Weeks later and I have finally reached week 40 and the end of the Grief Class.  It was a week I was looking forward to and dreading when I first started this workshop.  Looking forward to it because it was symbolically a way for me to finally finish all 40 weeks of this "pretended" grief pregnancy, something that I was unable to do with Janessa's 36 weeks, Hope's 10 weeks, Jason's 12 weeks, and Rae Anne's 6 weeks.  I was dreading it because for the first 30 weeks of this workshop it gave me a reason to get up in the morning and face each new week because I knew there would be a new workshop in my email to challenge me and help me face some of my grief challenges.  As we got to week 30 and the workshop emails became more and more sporadic until they finally just disappeared and ended at week 37 this workshop became more and more of a frustration and disappointment to me.  So now, I'm just grateful to finally have it end and that I was able to come up with my own classes for the last 3 weeks.  I wish that things had turned out differently and that this workshop hadn't ended in disappointment to me too, but, in a way I am glad that I was able to design these last 3 classes on topics that I needed most in my life.  So now, I say goodbye Grief Class you helped me and challenged me and disappointed me like so many other things in my life since grief entered the stage, but, I have overcome you too and I can stand on my own now without your help.

The topic I chose for Week 40 is "Moving Forward and Learning to Live Again" not getting over grief, not moving beyond grief, not pretending that grief never happened, but, moving forward with grief as a part of my life now and accepting it as my new normal.

Moving forward and learning to live again is hard!!  It is safe in my grief cave and at times I wish to just linger there and never try to merge my two worlds of grief and life together.  But I can not live my life split into 2 different worlds anymore--I am not 2 different people like I sometimes pretend to be.  

This is me grief stricken and sometimes broken, trying to endure each day and find some sort of little joy along the way.  Some times I am happy and can take on life, other times I have ptsd trigger attacks and hide in a corner trembling and crying.  Some times I feel grateful for all the children I've been blessed with no matter how long I've had them in my life, and other times I am jealous and angry that life is so unfair to steal 4 of my babies away.  Accepting all of me and my emotions is complicated but worth it.

For my project I chose to make a Grief/Life Quilt.  This idea is based on a sympathy card I received after Janessa died.  I loved the verses on this card and how it talked about how our lives are like these big quilts that we are weaving, but, how we are unable to see the finished project with our limited view, but, how God can see it all.

Each of the pieces in my Grief/Life Quilt stands for different areas of my life, past, present, grief, marriage, children, future and how they are all connected and weaved together to make a beautiful quilt.  I love how it turned out, I just wish I had left one of the ends open to represent that my Grief/Life Quilt is still very much a work in progress and won't be finished until I take my last breathe and finally am reunited with my angel babies. <3

5 Lillys

Found 5 lilies all in bloom--they are gorgeous orange in memory of my little Rae Anne.  I think lilies are one of my favorite flowers.  In my wedding bouquet I had tons of pink and blue lilies.

I love that there are 5 in bloom, 4 for each of my angel babies and 1 for the Nonexistent Rainbow Baby that I so desperately wanted, a different type of grief all in itself.

Remembering you today my precious little <3 Janessa <3

Broken Record

It is almost June 28th again and I am a broken record going around and around always coming back to the start but NEVER finding the end.  What is June 28th???  It is the date I repeated over and over and over again to nurses, secretaries, doctors, and ultrasound technicians--what was the 1st day of your last period--June 28th, 2010.  It is the beginning of Janessa's story.  A story that began with a dream and ended in a nightmare, but, not a nightmare for her just for me.  I know that Janessa's spirit is alive and well and she is happy in the arms of her Great Grandparents and Jesus.  Her earthly life story is short but her life continues on in Heaven.  I believe that and I know that and on some days I am okay with that and I am at peace and happy for her, but, on some days having her story continue over there in Heaven while I am here without her is pure hell for me.

You see my mind and my heart are unable to understand what has happened.  They know I got pregnant and that new little life grew and grew inside me for 9 months and then when that happy day of her arrival came there was no new little baby to love and take care of and bring home and watch grow, there was only darkness and emptiness.  For 6 years my broken heart and mind have tried unceasingly to make some sense out of there never being a baby at the ending to that pregnancy.  Every year I go through the same broken record cycle as I relive these same trigger dates and memories that lead up to March 9th only to end in the same way--NO BABY.

It is an illogical and unacceptable answer to my broken heart and confused mind so they continue to search year after year.  It is only my spirit deep inside me that knows the horrible truth she is gone from this earth life and never coming back. Someday we will be reunited and it will be a glorious reunion, but for now I will continue to remember and honor her in the best way I know how and trying to convince my empty and broken heart that it is okay even though it continues to search on and on for her like a broken record.

24 Years Together

This past week my husband and I celebrated our 24th anniversary.  We didn't have the money to do anything really expensive or exciting so we grabbed all the gift cards we had and tried to enjoy just spending time together.

Getting Cooled Off

My cat cracks me up because of the extremes she goes to stay cool with all her fluffy fur.  I found her on my rocking chair all sprawled out today, paws hanging off the edge, it was adorable!

Watching her sleeping and breathing triggered this intense craving to be sitting in that rocking chair holding and rocking one of my own babies to sleep.  I wanted so badly to just go hold this cat in my arms, but, she is a hands off cat she doesn't like me to pet her or hold her I can only "look with my eyes" and it is very sad and unfulfilling--I've never been around a cat that is so unlovable, she is adorable and funny, but, very unlovable to me.  I'm glad someone is getting some use out of this rocking chair!  :`( 

Grief Class Week 39

UPDATE:    I actually made the mandala last Wednesday and over the weekend it gently rained and slowly but surely washed it away--a new beginning . . . . . . . .

For Week 39 I chose the topic "Let It Go".  This one is similar to last weeks of forgiveness because it involves letting go of all those hard bitter memories.  It is letting go of my plan for my life and accepting God's plan for my life instead.  It is letting go of all the hopes and dreams of having a rainbow baby.  It is letting go of all those unrealistic expectations to be perfect and never grieve or be angry or jealous or sad again.  Grief is HARD work and it creeps up on you at unexpected moments and I want to let go of feeling guilty or bad that sometimes I just need to feel sad, or angry, or jealous and that is how I will work my way through it.  Letting Go of thinking that Grief is a temporary delay in my life that will go away like a cold or a zit.  Grief is here to stay and I need to accept that and allow it to mesh with my everyday life and be okay with that.

For my project I chose 2 different things.  The first is based from a scripture story found in the Book of Mormon about a group of Lamanites that have repented of their sins and are so determined not to sin again that they bury their weapons of war deep into the ground so they won't be tempted to use them ever again.  https://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/alma/24.7-19?lang=eng

So I took an envelope and colored it brown like dirt and made swords that I wrote all the things I want to let go on then one by one placed them into the envelope.

For the 2nd project it connects with Week 38 of Forgiveness as I created a mandala drawing of forgiveness and letting go on paper and then recreated it with chalk on my driveway.  It turned out Awesome.  This will stay on my driveway until the next rainstorm and then figuratively wash away or my way of letting all of those hurts go.

Explanation of my Forgiveness mandala:  First there is a purple heart in the center which represents all the hurts and disappointments and expectations and anger and jealosy and things that I have been holding onto inside me that have made me bitter.  That heart is surrounded by 4 other hearts that are in my angel babies colors that represent their way of surrounding me and helping me.  Next, the hearts are surrounded by big gray/white/green clouds that again symbolize all the hurts.  Coming out from those clouds is bright yellow lighting bolts or the anger and hurt I feel striking out, but, instead of ending in hurting others they are stopped by pink hearts as a way to symbolize love from my savior in helping me turn those feelings around.  There are blue tear drops symbolizing tears of sadness and of joy.  Next are orange/yellow sunbeams coming from the clouds and ending as flowers to represent the sun is always shining behind the darkness and clouds.  The flowers represent that the turmoil and hurt can be replaced with beauty and joy.  And finally there are purple/green/yellow balloons floating off that representing letting all those hurts go.