3 Months Gone

We just got home from a trip out west to visit my husband's family.  Overall, it went really well and gave me some much needed distraction.  After a lot of soul-searching and a doctor imposed healing period, we've decided to move ahead and try to conceive again.  I'd be lying if I said the thought of being pregnant again doesn't terrify me some days, because it definitely does.  I know I'll be an anxious wreck throughout the whole process, but I can't have a family if I don't suck it up and power through.  I would do anything to have a baby at this point.  At least the next time, we will see a high-risk specialist in addition to my regular OB and we will be monitored much more closely.  We did another injectable cycle (Follistim) and timed intercourse since that's the route that worked last time.  The "two week wait" until I can take a test and see if it worked, as all my fellow fertility-challenged friends will know, is absolutely brutal.  Time drags on even slower than normal so it was nice that a good five days was taken up with travel and people I haven't seen in years and who never saw me pregnant, so they don't remind me of the babies.

There was one surprise during my visit, however, that caught me off guard.  I met with an old colleague of mine for lunch.  I haven't seen her for several years when she stopped teaching to stay home with her first child.  I wondered from time to time if she was planning on having another baby, but it never really popped up on social media so I assumed they were waiting.  When I got to the restaurant, I was greeted by my friend who is very clearly 28 weeks pregnant with a girl.  Literally, the first thing I thought when she told me was, "28 weeks means your baby is "viable" and could possibly survive if you gave birth right now."  Ugh.  That's how I see all pregnancies now, viable or not viable.  Life or death.  Hope or misery.  I used to get excited for people, even a little jealous, when they'd announce their pregnancies.  Now the excitement is replaced by fear and the hope that their babies survive.  How morbid!  I kind of wish she had told me before I had gotten there.  I don't know if I would've changed my mind about meeting up or not, but it would have been nice not to have been blindsided.  So for a few hours we ate and talked about babies, hers and mine.  I guess in a way it was nice- to have an open conversation about the whole ordeal with someone who doesn't understand, but still cares enough to listen.  I've found that is a rare event in my life now.

This morning as my husband and I were lying bed, perusing social media on our phones, I came across a post on my Facebook feed about a song a woman had written after her baby was stillborn.  Somehow in all my previous googling and song-searching, I had never come across it.  Today's the 3 month anniversary of their birth/death and of course it shows up now, almost out of the blue when I've been doing pretty well.  The universe has a funny way of never letting you forget that your heart will never be whole again.  The song is called "Almost" by Rebekah Garvin and it's honestly the most beautiful song I've ever heard, but it totally wrecked me.  I've only had the courage to listen to it twice so far, but I know I'll keep going back to it again and again because it's just so sad and I like to torture myself that way I guess.

We did our usual hunt for something to add to the babies' shelf today.  We found a few perfect pieces at Kirkland's.  I seriously am obsessed with that store! Of course, elephants are our go-to and I thought this little figurine was perfect.  My husband spotted the letters which went so perfectly with the elephants, so we got them both.

Here's the shelf so far.  A little sparse here and there, but that's what the next 9 months are for. The painting isn't really going to stay on the shelf, but it's there for now.

Well, I've survived another month.  I hope that when next month's anniversary rolls around, I'll be pregnant and can look towards the future with a little hope instead of complete sadness.

2 Months Gone

I've been meaning to get on here and update my journey, but I keep procrastinating.  I've been in this zone where I can go a few hours without being crushed by grief.  Blogging just opens me up and takes me to a place where I cry and I guess I've been trying to avoid that.  Today is the two month anniversary of the twins' birth/death though, so I'm forcing myself to check in.  Each day that goes by, I can go a little longer without being overwhelmed by how much I miss them.  That being said, there has not been one single day that I have not thought about Beau and Maisie constantly.  They're never far from my thoughts and every little thing suddenly seems to remind me of them.  I was so worried about forgetting them, but I see now that that will never be possible.  I'm grateful for that.

In the past month I have survived Mother's Day and a 10 day visit with family that included a 15 month old staying in my house.  A local infant loss group was hosting a picnic for bereaved mothers and their families the Saturday of Mother's Day weekend.  I really wanted to go and had been telling my husband about it since I found out a week earlier.  He didn't take off work though, which really hurt my feelings.  I chickened out and ended up not going, which I do kind of regret.  I want to meet other women who have gone through something similar because so far, I haven't found many people who really seem to understand what this has all been like.  I've gone to two Share meetings at a local church, but so far I've been the only one to show up.  I've appreciated the man who leads the group staying to talk with me about my journey, but I'd be lying if I said it hasn't been awkward.  Hopefully someone else shows up next month or I might not go again.

On Mother's Day, I woke up and instantly called my mother to get it over with.  I was fully expecting her to tell me something about it being my day too, but she didn't.  I said, "Hey, Mom.  Happy Mother's Day," and all she said was, "Thanks, Becky."  That kind of stung.  I guess I was hoping for a simple "you too" or something to that effect.  A colleague of mine did give me a hug the Friday before and told me that she would be thinking of me this weekend because I was as much of a mother as anyone else.  I was really touched by that.  It's funny how the people you expect empathy from sometimes disappoint, while others you'd never even think of step up and provide comfort.  Overall, the weekend could have been much worse.

Enduring Mother's Day was a breeze compared to my brother- and sister-in-law's visit. Seeing a baby in my house-the same house where I imagined twins would wobble and squeal down the hall- almost killed me.  I can't describe enough how much I wanted my babies to be doing the things that my nephew was doing- taking a bath, chasing the cats, playing in the backyard.  What made the situation even worse was that my husband's family showed no empathy whatsoever towards me or what I must possibly be going through.  In fact, the second night they were here, my sister-in-law got confrontational and asked me why I didn't love her son when I refused to babysit while she and her husband went out on a date night.  I just tried to softly explain that this was all very difficult for me while she stared me down with cold eyes that clearly showed my excuse wasn't good enough for her.  What I was screaming in my head was "NO! I DO NOT WANT TO PLAY FUCKING HOUSE WITH YOUR BABY WHEN MY BABIES DIED NOT EVEN TWO MONTHS AGO!" Seeing my husband be the perfect uncle to his nephew was so incredibly bittersweet.  He was patient and fun, just like I always knew he would be with Beau and Maisie.  I couldn't help but be thankful that I had a job to go to part of the time they were here because I needed an escape so badly.  That visit was harder than I ever anticipated it would be, but I made it through and I suppose I am stronger for it.

Last month we bought and assembled a shelf that serves as a memorial to Beau and Maisie.  Our plan is that each month that passes, we will add something to the shelf that either reminds us of them or is something we think they would have liked.  I need to remember to take a picture and post it on here next month.  Right now we have their urn and several other little figurines/toys on the shelf.  Today we added two small picture frames that display their footprints.  I hate feet in general, but those prints really touch me.  Beau had my feet and Maisie had her dad's.  It was just one of those immediately identifiable characteristics that solidified the fact that these were our babies.  We made them and they each had little parts of us.  It makes me wonder what other similarities we would have shared.  I guess I'll never know.

Remembering My Babies

Well, the one month anniversary of Beau and Maisie's passing has come and gone.  I wanted it to be memorable, but I think I failed.  My husband and I fought over what to do and by the time we made up, it was so late that most stores were closed.  We did go to Lowe's and get a ladder-style shelf to put in the living room.  Currently, it holds a lamp, the babies' urn, two stuffed elephants that Tender Mercies gave us, a little wooden plaque given to us by our cousins, and their memory box from the hospital.  It's looking pretty sparse at the moment, but we decided that on each month anniversary, we will add something to the shelf.  Once we reach their annual birthday, we will celebrate and come up with something different to do.  At that point, the shelf should be pretty full.

While the shelf is beautiful, I am bummed about how the day went.  I really wanted it to be special for them, but it was basically a normal day.  I went to work and slogged through the motions.  Several people asked if I was okay because I didn't go to lunch with everyone.  When I told them it was the month anniversary, they gave me a pity smile and just backed away, as if I had some contagious disease that could affect them or their children.  I know I shouldn't look at it that way, but I've been angry with people lately.  Maybe it's part of the grief?

It really hurt me that no one even thought about them or me on that day.  I know they weren't anyone's babies but ours, but still.  I really needed a message, a card, something from anyone that said, "I still remember them."  It's so difficult right now, because if I don't bring them up, people continue to go on their lives as if they never existed.  Even if I do bring them up, I get fewer and fewer responses on Facebook as time passes.  I get comments now like "keep your chin up" and "pick yourself up by the boot straps and move on."  Everyone's over it and they're ready for me to be over it too.  But those babies changed my whole world, first when I learned that they were a reality and then again when I lost them.  They are all I think about right now and it feels like everyone else, including my husband, has gone back to the "real world" and my babies are just a sad thing that happened once and have been forgotten.  That really kills me. 

I feel like I need to think and talk about them all the time as a way to keep their memories alive.  I can't really find anyone to talk to about it.  I want people to ask me about them so I can acknowledge their existence and the imprint they've left on my life.  I get so weighed down by the grief that I just want to vent.  I'm worried that if someone doesn't let me unload sometime soon that I will just be that weirdo that brings it up in every conversation, hoping someone will bite.  I envision people whispering about me, warning each other to stay away, lest they end up backed into a corner being forced to listen to me lament about my dead babies.  It's not socially acceptable to talk about such unpleasant things, and yet, it makes me feel better.  I hate being a burden on everyone I love, but I'm not a mystery.  I tell everyone exactly what I need and if that makes them uncomfortable (which is usually does nowadays), they just stop talking to me or they don't respond to my messages or they don't answer the phone.  Maybe I already am that weirdo who has pushed everyone away because she was such a downer about her dead babies.  I also thought that something like this would bring me closer to my husband, family, and friends, but so far, it just seems to have isolated me from absolutely everyone else because they just don't understand.  Will my relationships ever go back to normal again or is this just the beginning of a life filled with loneliness and anger?

Before and After

So I wrote a poem that reflects my internal conflict and confusion about who I am now.  I can't quite grasp the circumstances of my new life.  I know I'm not pregnant anymore.  I know that Beau and Maisie are gone.  Every day I wake up, I am reminded instantly that all of that happiness was the Before and I am now living in the After, which can never, ever be as carefree and fulfilling. I just want to feel like me again.  I want my babies and my innocence back.

Music about Miscarriages

Four weeks ago today at this time, I was at the hospital being told that the babies were coming and unfortunately "not viable."  That's the medically insensitive way of saying that they were not developed enough to survive in the outside world.

I can't believe it's been almost a month already.  My pregnancy seemed to progress at a snail's pace as I logged my feelings and symptoms each day on my pregnancy tracker app.  I anxiously awaited the second trimester when I could take a deep breath and finally feel like we were "safe."  I found out the hard way that there's no such thing as a pregnancy that's safe from unexpected tragedy.  When you think about how intricate and complex the whole process of bringing a human being into this world, let alone two at once, it's amazing any babies are born alive and without complications.  I guess that's why they refer to it as "the miracle of childbirth."

It's been rough going for me lately.  I guess my heart still isn't ready to accept that they've been gone for a whole month.  I miss them so much and have started sobbing hysterically at the weirdest moments this weekend.  One step forward, two steps back seems to be a good way to describe my journey with this grief.

I've been torturing myself with music that puts all my emotions into words in a way that I never could express, at least not so beautifully.  There are a few songs I want to mention by name because while they break my heart and make me cry every time I hear them, they bring me comfort in some way.  I can't explain it, but it's the power of music.  I'm awed by how much listening to a song that "gets me" and what I'm going through currently can speak to me and take away some of the heaviness in my chest.  I never heard these songs before Beau and Maisie, but I know that if I had, I wouldn't have fully understood the true beauty of the lyrics.

1. "I Would Die for That" by Kellie Coffey

This was apparently written by Kellie after she suffered a miscarriage.  This is EXACTLY how I feel.  My favorite parts are when she talks about just wanting a family like everyone else seems to have and being able to hear the words "I love you, Mom" just once before she dies.  The emptiness I feel when I see all my friends and relatives with their kids is more painful than I hope most people ever know.

2. "I Will Carry You" by Selah

I'm not religious.  I'm spiritual, but my beliefs do not align with the God-loving kind.  I bought this song and was almost disappointed as soon as I realized that it all revolved around faith, but honestly, it's become my favorite.  It can break me down like no other song.  The music is beautiful on its own, but the ending where God has her baby and shows her everything the mom wanted to show her and more really touches me.  I want so desperately to believe that there is someone out there who is taking care of my sweet babies right now and loves them as much as I do.  Of course the line, "I will carry you all my life," is also very powerful to me.

3. "Beam Me Up" by P!NK

This song has really grown on me.  I didn't really like the music at first, but I do now.  It expresses my desire to just be with my babies, wherever they are now.  The song is about a mother wanting to be beamed up to heaven so she can spend just a few minutes holding her baby.  The music when she sings, "Give me a minute, I don't know what I'd say in it" and "Let me be lighter, I'm tired of being a fighter" is just beautiful.  Those are my favorite lyrics in the song because that pull to be with my babies is so strong some days, I think if they weren't cremated I would physically be pulled to their grave site.  If I could hold my babies I don't know what I'd be able to say in just a minute or two, so I get why she says she'd just hold them and love them.  I'm also so sick of being expected to be strong.  I really am tired of being a fighter.  I'm broken right now and I don't know how much longer I can keep up this charade that I'm coping.

I've downloaded a few other songs to put on my "Heartbroken" song list, but these three are the ones I play on repeat when I'm feeling like I really need to release my pent-up emotions and just cry and hurt for my lost babies.  Someday I'd like to be able to sing these songs without breaking down, but that definitely won't be anytime soon.  This Thursday is going to be difficult, being the month anniversary of their births and deaths.  I am dreading it.  My heart's already broken so much, I don't know how it can handle much more.  I would be lying if I said there weren't days when I secretly wish that it will just stop beating already so I can be with my babies. </3

3 Weeks

It's been 3 weeks since we lost Beau and Maisie and I've reached the point in my grieving process where I have good days and bad days.  Still mostly bad days, but I have made it a few days where I didn't actually cry.  Every little thing reminds me of them and I still think about them constantly, but I think my heart is beginning to numb itself.  Either that, or I'm getting stronger.

I never noticed how prevalent babies and pregnancy are in our society until after I lost the twins.  Now it's difficult to turn on the TV, which used to be my favorite way to zone out after a long day at work.  This week, my husband and I sat down to catch up on some recorded shows that we haven't watched since I was pregnant.  'The Last Man on Earth' was all about babies and pregnancy as two of the main characters decide it's time to repopulate the earth.  Anna on 'Downton Abbey' is finally preggers after multiple miscarriages, but a doctor decides to give her a stitch to keep her uterus closed and voila! All good.  That one is hard because we watched that show right after we found out we were finally pregnant and I really related to Anna's struggle to have a baby.  And even 'Brooklyn 99' which is usually just a fluff comedy, has gotten to me.  One of the cops has to go undercover in a woman's prison and her cover to see her partner so often is that she is 8 months pregnant and he is her obstetrician.  She has a big fake bump and while in the prison, her partner, who has been undergoing fertility treatments, learns that he and his girlfriend have finally been approved for adoption.  Something else we had spent a lot of time discussing after each failed fertility round. There's also a new RAV4 car commercial that is on every channel, which kills me because we actually talked about upgrading vehicles before the twins came.  In the commercial, a couple is talking about how their life is all about adventure and they need a car that fits that lifestyle.  At the end, they turn sideways and you see they each have a baby on their back and they make some comment about how twins are the ultimate adventure.  It. Is. Everywhere.  Is it so bad to just want to forget about the pain for just a few minutes?

So, I've been avoiding TV and trying to get out and walk more and do more yard work.  The only problem with that is it gives me quiet time to think and sometimes my thoughts can't leave the twins and I get overwhelmed with grief.  Guess it's a lose-lose either way and I'll just have to suck it up and get through it.

On a positive note, I've been making plans to create a memorial shelf for the babies.  It will hold their urn, their framed footprints, and any little related knick-knacks I find along the way.  One of the thing I stumbled upon was this beautiful figurine that literally makes me cry every time I look at it.  I am just so drawn to it because I feel like it does an amazing job at displaying the grief that goes along with losing two babies.  This sculpture just gets me and what I've been through.  I posted it on Facebook with a plea for my husband to buy it for me (nothing like a little public pressure to do the trick!), but my very generous aunt offered to get it for us.  I'm so thankful that I'll have such a beautiful reminder of my babies and this hard time in our lives.  I know one day it will bring me peace to look at it.  The artist who makes these has a whole line of miscarriage/infant loss memorial figurines.  She really does beautiful work.  You can see her Etsy shop HERE.

Physically, other than being emotional all the time (which is nothing new), I have been experiencing some strong cramping.  I only had a little bit for a few days after delivery, but the cramps are back with a vengeance.  The doctor says it's too early for a period and this is just my body's way of cleaning everything out and preparing for normal cycles again.  My bleeding has been minimal, but consistent every since giving birth.  I've read that cramps can last up to 2 months after a miscarriage or stillbirth.  I really hope that isn't the case for me, because I find the pain makes it harder to function.  With every cramp, I'm reminded of delivering my beautiful babies and walking out of that hospital without them.  I have enough emotional reminders already; I don't really need physical ones now too.

I just have to keep moving forward, one breath, one day at a time.  Some days are easier than others, but there's no way to avoid the bad days so I just need to embrace the pain and remember my babies as the beautiful blessings they were. 

My 19 Week Pregnancy

I should be 21 weeks and 1 day pregnant with twins right now, but instead my heart and uterus are both empty.  I lost my precious babies at 19 weeks exactly, the morning of our anatomy scan that would finally confirm whether we were having two boys or a boy and a girl.  I had been anxiously awaiting that appointment since the day it was scheduled two months prior.  I imagined every scenario and even dreamt about the visit a handful of times, but it never crossed my mind that the experience would be ripped from me when we were so close.  The universe really can be cruel sometimes.

A urine test at the OB's office yesterday officially confirmed that all pregnancy hormones were out of my system, but my entire being still aches with loneliness.  I feel like a third of a person.  I don't know who I am anymore.  It's so crazy to think about who I was before this pregnancy compared to who I am now.  I was independent, hopeful, and innocent.  Now I'm so needy, lost, and empty that I barely recognize myself.  I get a little better each day, of course.  I've progressed from not being able to be in a room alone and not eating for days at a time to going back to work and taking long walks by myself.  People talk about how grief lifts with time and while you'll never forget, it does get easier to move on.  I hope they're right.  On the outside I look like I'm slowly putting myself together, but on the inside, I'm still a broken mess.

It's been two whole weeks since my miscarriage and I'm so shocked by how quickly the world moves on and forgets.  Time seems to continue ticking by for everyone else but me.  The days seem so long when grief makes it difficult to look forward to anything. People don't want to talk about my tragedy anymore.  If I bring up the babies, they immediately change the subject or give me an awkward hug and find a reason to leave.  I know they just want me to be happy and hate seeing me in pain.  Remembering what I lost makes them uncomfortable or sad and therefore they would rather pretend that my loss is just a single moment in time that fades like all memories do.  They want me to wake up one day and just be me again, but I don't think they understand that I will never fully recover from this.  I can't blame them.  They don't know what this pain feels like.  I sure as heck didn't before it happened to me.  I never could've imagined how heartbreaking it is to lose a pregnancy or a child.  But I will not forget the beautiful babies that I lost and I need to continue talking about my miscarriage as a way to heal and find hope for the future.  I can't do this with the usual people in my life unless I want to become a social pariah, so I am starting this blog with the hope that:

1. I can use it as an outlet for my grief, especially when I feel like I have no one to talk to or that there's no one who understands.
2. I can chronicle my experience so that when enough time has passed, I can look back on all the details of this journey and find positives to remember and hold on to during the rough times.
3. My babies will be remembered for the blessings that they were.
4. I can connect with others who have had similar losses and who understand my pain.  I know I'm not alone and I would desperately love to make friends with women who are currently needing the same kind of support that I do.

This whole process of moving on has turned out to be completely different than I imagined.  I'm a planner who doesn't like to be surprised, so naturally I had prepared myself during the first trimester for a miscarriage.  It was so hard to believe that we were finally pregnant after years of trying, I refused to get my hopes up until it was "safe."  Realistically, I knew there was no such thing as "safe" since my pregnancy was high-risk in general and adding twins to the mix just made things even more risky, but with each passing day I let go of a little more worry and anxiety.  At 10 weeks, 4 days, I came home from work and just started bleeding.  I was gushing blood and passed several large clots.  I thought for sure I was losing the babies.  I didn't understand why and I cried and cried as we waited our turn in the ER, but the bad news didn't cut to my core.  I was still hopeful we could try again.  I was sad, but not defeated.  Maybe it was because of all the walls I put up early on in my pregnancy.  Maybe my resistance to really enjoy my pregnancy at first gave my heart some extra protection.  I don't know.

It was a wonderful surprise when the ultrasound revealed that the babies looked perfectly fine and the bleeding was caused by a subchorionic hematoma.  No one could tell me why this happened, only that it left a 4 inch blood clot in the womb, which now added "threatened miscarriage" to my medical chart.  The doctor said the next few weeks would be telling and that I might lose them or I might be
totally fine.

Our Valentine's Day pregnancy announcement.

I continued to bleed some for the next month and a half, but eventually it went away.  With every scan, things looked good and the absence of blood really caused me to let my guard down.  We made it into the second trimester and I finally felt like this was for real.  We announced the pregnancy to our extended circle on Valentine's Day.  We painted the nursery, I bought a ton of boy clothes because a blood test told us we were having at least one boy.  I hoped and hoped that the other was a girl, despite the fact I kept having dreams that we were having two boys.  I wanted one of each so badly.  It felt like we were in the clear when I felt "baby b" kick.  Those magical flutters instantly bonded me to those two beings inside me in a way I never imagined possible.  I saw the same love instantly hit my husband when he put his hand on my belly and felt the baby too.  In the span of 5 short months, my life had suddenly become everything I had ever wanted it to be and I couldn't be happier.

Easter weekend came and I had that Friday and Monday off of work.  My father in law was visiting from out of town and the long weekend had been a whirlwind, full of sightseeing and walking in Nashville.  I had an undeniable belly and loved walking around showing it off.  I finally looked pregnant and not just fat!  That Saturday night, I felt really worn out.  I was cramping a little more than usual, but it was nothing major and there was no blood so I didn't see any cause for alarm.  I chalked it up to round ligament pain and told my husband I needed to go back to the hotel early to lay down and give my body a rest.  The next morning, we visited the home of President Andrew Jackson, which was right outside of Nashville.  We walked the grounds of his estate and gardens all morning and I still felt tired and achy.  Again, I just figured this was normal now that the babies were almost 20 weeks along and my body was having to adjust for their increasing sizes.

We began making the 3 hour drive home so we could rest up for the exciting anatomy scan we had scheduled for Monday.  When we were an hour away from my hospital, my water broke suddenly.  I felt the gush of fluid and instantly thought I was bleeding, just like I had at 10 weeks.  I didn't panic immediately because the doctor warned that the blood clot that was still in there would have to come out eventually.  However, when I saw the liquid was clear, I knew we were in trouble because that is a sign of labor.  The doctor on call confirmed my worst fear and told us to get to the hospital as soon as possible.  My husband drove like crazy to get me to the hospital and what normally should have been a 75 minute drive only took us a half hour!

Needless to say, I delivered two perfect little babies in the early morning hours on that Easter Monday.  A boy we named Beau and a girl we named Maisie.  I will have to write about the delivery another time because this post has been much more difficult to write than I expected.  But now my pregnancy story is out there for all of cyberspace to see and that brings me comfort in an odd way.

I know my story is not unique.  If you've stumbled upon my silly little blog because you've also had to deal with miscarriage, stillbirth, or infant loss, then please know that you are not alone.  I know it might feel that way at first, but you're not.  Just try googling "I've had a miscarriage" and a limitless number of forums and blogs will pop up.  I'm more than happy to talk with anyone who needs to talk or to just listen if that is what you need.  I am starting this blog because I do not want to forget my babies or this experience, no matter how painful remembering might be.  They were only here for a little while, but they were fiercely and wildly loved, and I am truly grateful for the chance to be their mother.