Goodbye 2015/Hello 2016

Another year come and gone and one about to begin.  I have dreaded these new year beginnings since Janessa died until this year.  Finally, I have no countdowns to what should have been EDD's, no 1st angel b-days to endure, and no more TTC for a rainbow baby.  I am finding acceptance in the children I have been blessed with, though there will always be that 5th hole in my heart for a wanted rainbow baby.  I am learning to incorporate my grief into my everyday living, and I am able to find a little bit more joy in my daily life and in remembering my angel babies, Janessa, Hope, Jason, and Rae Anne.

I'm still not sure if I am ready to set goals for myself for next year beyond, endure and survive, but maybe I could add begin to live life again.

Maybe my goals and theme for 2016 can be the quote I have on my wall:

CHERISH YESTERDAY,

DREAM OF TOMORROW,

LIVE TODAY!

I'll make 6 predictions and hopes for 2016:

It will be a little hard in May because 2016 is a copycat of 2011 so that means Hope Abigail's 5th Angel Birthday will be on the same day of the week and on mother's day weekend like it was when I miscarried her--NOT excited about that.  But, it was also the year that we got to go on our big family vacation through Wyoming and over to South Dakota to see Mount Rushmore, so I hope that in 2016 we get to go on 1 family vacation and some more Day-cations.

I want 2016 to be a better year financially for us--NO more broken appliances or cars, or trips to ER or hospital stays.  I want us to be able to save more money, to be able to pay more on our loan, and be able to make more money so we can donate to help others.

I want 2016 to be less stressful and emotional for my whole family.  I want there to be more heart to heart talks and friendship among us and more time spending together playing games and watching movies and just having fun. :)

I want to be more physically in shape through exercise and eating right.  No more emotional eating!  I want to take walks everyday and just enjoy the beauty of the outdoors.  I want to have lost at least 16 pounds by the end of next year.

2016 is going to see my first child graduate from college and my 3rd child to graduate from High School.  2016 I will have 3 adult children and 3 teens/preteens and all my living children will be double digits.

And finally, 2016 will be when I have to say goodbye to another child, but, thankfully not to death, marriage, or college, but, to a mission for my church for 2 years.  For me, I hope he goes somewhere in the United States--maybe Texas, or North Carolina, or Wisconsin or somewhere where some of my BLM friends live so they can watch out for him.  If he goes out of the country then I hope it is either to Canada or England.  Having him gone will be tough, but, I get to email and write to him and he gets to make some phone calls and I'll get to start another blog detailing his weekly adventures--I'd give anything to have those same privileges with Janessa, Hope, Jason and Rae Anne in Heaven.

So it looks like 2016 is going to be full of new adventures for our family.

HELLO 2016!

18 Years with Rambo!

18 years ago today I was given this plant as a congratulations gift for the birth of my only living son. I am very happy to report that this plant is still alive! I am lousy with plants so to have this plant survive 2 moves and more times than I can count lack of water because I forgot to water it--this plant is a miracle!!!! I named it Rambo after it lasted 10 years with us. It is the only plant that has survived this long with us!!! Of course this also means that my son becomes an adult today too--this makes me sadappy. Half of my living kids will now be adults and that makes me want to curl up in a blanket and just cry :`(

Remembering 2015

2--2 + times Credit Card  rejected and sent to fraud at Smiths

     2 new movies watched, Home and Inside/Out

     2 kids went on Pioneer Trek

     2nd Angel B-day for Jason

     2 Uncles passed away

0--0 Rainbow Babies Again
      0 miscarriages/loss babies
      0 new house moved to
      0 pounds lost
      0 Vacations

1--1 50th anniversary party for my parents
     1 trip to ER and HOSPITAL stay with pneumonia for me
     1 drivers license for son
     1st Angel B-day for Rae Anne

     1 move for married kids
     1 Payson Temple Open House attended
     1 New Star Wars Movie
     1 new online Grief Class started and lasts for 40 weeks
     1 new internet provider

     1 new braces for daughter

     1 new glasses for son

     1 new Water Heater

    
5--5th Angel B-day for Janessa

      5 living kids at home
      5 + times internet died

The Longest Walk Ever

Walking out to Janessa's grave is the Longest. Walk. Ever!  I hate being out there in the winter time and seeing her grave all covered in snow.  It makes me feel awful that my baby is out there in all that cold and misery.

:`(

A Christmas Gift to Myself

This year I gave myself a Christmas gift--but, not like a normal store bought gift that you can touch and feel.  I have really been struggling this year with depression and discouragement and loss of hope.  As I thought and pondered and prayed about how to handle all these overwhelming feelings I felt inspired to participate in the 40 day Book of Mormon challenge that my church gave to our youth.  The Book of Mormon is one of the scriptures we use in addition to the Bible--it is just another book of scripture that testifies of people who were on the American continent who also got to see Jesus Christ, but, not until he was resurrected.  This challenge was the last thing I expected as an answer to my struggles.  I have NEVER participated in a 40 day scripture challenge in my life.  In fact, I am the Ebeneezer Scrooge when it comes to these challenges because I believed that they were stupid and that scriptures should be cherished and read and studied and pondered carefully and slowly 1 chapter, 1 verse, at a time, NOT read as fast as you possibly can like eating your favorite candy bar.  And, I still believe that, but, my attitude has now dramatically changed regarding these scripture challenges and I do believe in them.

Not very happily I bought myself a new Book of Mormon, a journal, and red scripture marking pencil so that I could mark up things that inspired me and record the feelings and promptings that came as I read.  I attached the scripture reading chart to the front cover and I started it the week before Thanksgiving.  I quickly found that it was NOT easy to read and ponder 6-7 chapters a day.  I had to wake up an hour earlier each day in order to have time to get all the reading done.  I asked my kids for pointers on what would help me be the most successful and they told me to first have a question/purpose/theme in mind as I was reading.  So my theme/question was "How can I find acceptance, peace, joy, hope, faith, and trust in God's new plan for my life and let go of my original plan? And how can I find joy in this stage of my life?  The next thing they told me was to pray before I read each day and then to record my thoughts into a journal.

I was amazed the first 20 days that I found the time to do this reading and still get accomplished the other things I needed to.  I was amazed at the peace I felt even as the holiday season began and the things I was seeing and learning for the first time even though I was reading at a faster pace than I ever have.  I have read the Book of Mormon consistently over and over for the past 35 years of my life so I have read this book probably thousands of times, but, I was finding things that I have never seen before.  That was amazing to me.  Then I hit the half way mark of the challenge--day 21 and things began to get really hard.  It was the beginning of the Christmas holidays and I was hitting some really hard trigger memory days that brought on my depression strong.  I found myself struggling to get out of bed early and struggling to even stay awake while I was reading.  I even found myself getting angry at all the time this was stealing from me and I just wanted this challenge to just end.  But, I persevered and hung on even if some days it was by the skin of my teeth.  It was then that I began to notice that as I had hard days, the scripture reading scheduled for that day had things in it that were encouragements for me.  I started to really notice the word JOY everywhere in my reading.  I probably didn't learn as much the second half of the challenge as I did the first half, but, the small and little things I did learn helped me so much!

Today, Christmas Day, I finished the last chapter of the Book of Mormon challenge and I am so proud of myself for accomplishing this gift for myself.  It truly was just what I needed to help me through the last 40 days.

This is what I wrote in my Scripture Journal today:

I'm done!!!!!!  How do I Feel????????????

I feel amazed that I was able to read the whole Book of Mormon in 40 days!!!
I feel relieved that it is over because it was a lot of work and stress on my time.
I feel a little sad that it is over because it unified us as a family as we could talk about it and share our favorite scriptures for the week.
I feel grateful for all the things I felt and learned as I read.
I feel astonished at all the little things I was able to pull out and learn that I have never noticed before.
I feel grateful to have the Book of Mormon and the truths that it teaches me.
I liked reading some sections all at once because you got to see the whole story before you instead of broken apart and that helped me pull different things out of it.
I feel grateful for different sections we ended up on reading on some of my hard days that helped me through the day.

This is the first time in my life that I was able to read the Book of Mormon in 40 days.  It has been an amazing experience.  I think there is both good and bad in reading it slowly 1 chapter a day and reading it quickly.  I was amazed at all the people I saw that had their life plans changed and how they were able to adapt to and accept God's plan for their life instead.

I learned that you can't do it alone and rely on your own strength, you have to ask God for help and let him help carry the load and have his strength to help you through.  You need to Trust God and have hope and faith that everything will be okay.  By doing what is right and keeping the commandments--Heavenly Father truly will bless and prosper you.  By constantly remembering the things you and others have gone through and the faith and blessings you received will help you through the tough times now and constantly remind you to stay on the right path.  Joy can be found at all times through little things in your life.

This has truly been the best Christmas present I could have given myself this year.

Merry Christmas to My Angel Babies

I can't give you toys like dolls or cars or books, but, I can give you my love, and my time to create a remembrance name picture for you, and the gift that you will NEVER be forgotten <3

Merry Christmas

Janessa 

Hope Abigail

Jason Nephi

& Rae Anne

You Are Loved!

You Are Missed!

You are Always in my Heart!

Love, Mommy

<3 Merry Christmas Angel Children <3

We Miss You!

We Love You!

We Will Always Remember You!

From Snowmen to Snow Castle

All my snowmen that we had made yesterday fell over and broke apart within hours of us creating them.  It was sad.  Represents how long my pregnancies with each of my angel babies lasted for me.  I really didn't like how it looked like a snowman massacre out there so I went out and reshaped everything and turned it into a PinWheel Snow Castle instead.

Just Breathe

A fellow baby loss mommy, Carly Marie, wrote this encouragement post and created the picture and I absolutely loved it.  For me this is a Christmas gift to help me through the next couple of days.

CarlyMarie

These two words.

Just Breathe.

They have been my mantra over the years through the experience of a life threatening illness for our first born, a fatal diagnosis' for our second born, his subsequent death, our youngest daughter falling ill for 2 years and multiple diagnosis' since then for 2 of our daughters.

Life feels impossible sometimes.

When there is no light - Just Breathe
When there is only pain - Just Breathe
When sorrow fills your heart - Just Breathe
When you are angry beyond words - Just Breathe
When your world falls apart - Just Breathe
When you are suspended between two worlds of Why? and What If? - Just Breathe
When you feel there is no hope - Just Breathe
When you feel alone - Just Breathe

"Just keep breathing... Everything is going to be okay." Those are the words I would speak to myself over and over. I will probably be saying them for the rest of my life.

There are times in this life when all you can do is keep on breathing and when you find yourself in those moments - I send you all my love.

http://carlymarieprojectheal.com/

Snow Men for my Angel Babies

Return of the Black Fingernails

I thought I was through with painting my fingernails black after I went through my emdr therapy and got most of the traumatic grief in me settled down 2 years ago, but, yesterday I got out the black fingernail polish again.  I felt like a failure at first as I started painting my nails all black and then a streak of new blue glitter on top.  It is weird, but, it does bring me a little comfort to see them this way.  Some times the pain and hurt I feel inside my heart is so bad there are no words to describe it and so painting my nails this way helps me express that pain.  I always try to top it with glitter polish to remind myself that even though the pain is deep and dark, there is still a glimmer of hope and faith and joy deep down inside that will surface again another day.  Maybe it is my way of saying to myself  "The Sun will come out Tomorrow--gotta hang on til tomorrow."

When we went to decorate Janessa's grave the other day, surprisingly all the stuff from Thanksgiving was still there buried under the slushy snow.  That brought me comfort knowing that Janessa's grave had not be empty and alone for the past month.  As we cleaned it up, I discovered another little word rock that we had not seen last time--this one said Joy.  It brought me comfort and pain at the same time.  I am trying to find little bits of joy, but, right now I feel so much pain and heartache that joy feels completely buried and frozen under all my discouragement and despair.  Maybe finding this rock later than the other ones symbolizes that joy is still there and it is coming I just gotta endure and hang on.

Decorating Janessa's Grave for Christmas

Going out to that cemetery to decorate 

Janessa's grave for Christmas 

NEVER 

gets 

easier!

:`(

A Moment to Escape the Grief

I've felt the same familiar anger/sadness as Christmas has gotten closer and closer.  Each year I think it is going to get better and not so hard and over the last 6 years, yes, things have changed and yes, some things are not as hard as they use to be.  BUT, the fact of the matter is I have 4 kids stockings hanging up for children that are NOT with me and that will NEVER change while I am on this earth. I have to decorate a grave and remembrance stones to give them any presents and that SUCKS and that never gets any easier.  I still have to hear all the hard Christmas music that makes me want to scream and I have to see all the happy families with their alive, 5 years olds, preschoolers, toddlers, and babies knowing that they get to give them presents and have a complete family picture without any missing faces.

The other day I was doing some research on Amazon on previous orders and this picture popped up and I cried and cried.

This is the bassinet I ordered in December 2009, 6 years ago when I was 7 months pregnant with Janessa and I was happily planning her birth.  Further down the list were diapers and blankets and formula I ordered later in Feb. a couple of weeks before she died.  Just heart breaking to see now.  All those plans and dreams--STOLEN.  That bassinet was the only gift my husband and I gave to each other that year--is it any wonder that Christmas has lost some of its magic for me.  That bassinet that still sits empty in my basement, never used because Hope, Jason, and Rae Anne slipped away too soon from my life too.  All of that has just added to the anxiety and stress that I feel as the clock ticks on ever closer to December 25th.

This week I decided I had had enough!  I'm tired of all the hardness of the holidays.  I'm tired of feeling sad and angry and unable to find any joy so I decided to escape from grief for a moment and revisit my past.  I got tickets to take my son to see the new Star Wars movie today for an early birthday present for him.  It was so AWESOME!!!!  It was so nice to just sit in the theater with other people all of us just there to relive parts of our childhood and to escape into the world of Star Wars for just a couple of hours. In fact when the beginning music started and the familiar words started to scroll up the screen the theater broke out into applause and I started to cry tears of happiness to be back in a familiar environment.  I even got so involved in the movie that I forgot that I wasn't at home and started yelling at the screen to "take him out!"  Oops--sorry to all the people I was sitting around.

Thank you Star Wars for being a part of my childhood and for allowing me today to escape from the harsh realities of my current life circumstances and just find joy and happiness in your story line and for being able to see some of my childhood heroes again......Han Solo, Chewbacca, Leia, Luke, and R2-D2.