End of the Road

We have decided to stop trying.

It's not a decision I came to easily. Really, I think the decision was made for me, and I was the last one to notice. I'm not in control - of my body or my life or anyone's life. It just isn't up to me.

Still, reaching for a golden ring and missing, again and again, just hurts too much.

Eventually, even I realize when I'm banging my head against a wall.

I wish it felt better to stop, as it does with walls and heads. But so far... no luck. Just more hurt.

Yeah, I should be used to it by now.

Census 2.0

I filled out the census and returned it. I hated it - they had to pick April 1, 2010 as the cutoff date? It would have been William's first birthday...

So anyway, I filled it out, hated not putting his name on it, and returned it. I even wrote about it here on my blog.

And then today a census taker showed up at my door.

COME ON! Really!?!?!?! I filled the %$*#&*#$&@& thing out already!! 

So I stood there for ten minutes, answering her questions. Hating hearing that date, "How many people were living here on April 1, 2010?" One less than there should have been, okay, lady!??

 And then at the end, she says, "I just have to make sure we're not missing anyone. So on April 1, 2010, there were no babies living here?" 

Jeeeeeeeeeeeez!!! NO! There were NO BABIES living here on April 1, 2010! There SHOULD HAVE BEEN! But there WASN'T!

 Can I go crawl in a hole and die now? I hate how things like this bring it all back. It was easier to deal with when it was new... now these things come out of nowhere at hit me upside the head like a baseball bat and I just sit there, dazed and stunned and in pain...

This Little Light...

I have an online friend from many-moons-ago who wrote me after William’s death and, like many here, have followed this blog and my ups and downs since his passing. I recently received this email from her. I thought I would share it with you, both because it was so moving to me, and because so many of you have done similar things to remember my William, and what I say in response is meant for her, but for all of you as well: 

"The real reason I am writing to you tonight is because I wanted you to know about the unique way I am honoring William in my heart.  I may not ever have shared this before, but I am an actor and occasionally do plays when I can find the time.  Right now I am doing a musical called "Quilters" which is about pioneer women and how they got through the good times and the bad, and it uses quilts as a metaphor for making do with what you had, for community in helping each other through, etc.  It's an all-woman show and is a charming (and emotional) show.  (I don't really recommend you see the show right now, as some parts might be too emotional or strong for you right now. Perhaps someday.)

There is a scene in the second act about the large families women had back then, and how childbirth/pregnancy was both a bane and a blessing at times. The actors say things like, "My eighth was Nan; she was always the quiet one" or "My second was Elizabeth.  She was the light of her daddy's eyes," etc.  Each actor takes multiple names for babies, and has multiple experiences with pregnancy, both good and bad. My character has 16 children, as some women did back then.

As in real life, there are miscarriages and stillbirths represented.  I happen to have been assigned the stillbirth.  My line is simply, "My third baby was stillborn" and with such a simple line, could easily be lost in the play. But we have taken the opportunity to give this line real meaning and time.  I come in carrying a cloth folded to symbolically represent a baby. I say, "My third baby was stillborn," and then I hand the baby to the oldest actress in the show.  Very simple, but I take time to kiss the baby tenderly and have great difficulty handing the baby over, giving the baby one last caress, and having difficulty moving on.  It's only a minute or so in time, but it gives a lump in the throat of everyone in the cast, and no one more so than me.

The moment is so meaningful to me because I am thinking of William.  In my mind, it's William I am speaking of, William whose little face I see, and William who I have such trouble letting go of.  Every night I dedicate that little bit of the play to William's memory and to you, in honor of your grief and that of grieving mothers everywhere.  Chances are there will be a mother in the audience sooner or later who has experienced a miscarriage, perhaps even one with a stillbirth, and I want to make sure that moment is treated with dignity and deep sorrow and the respect it deserves.

Anyhow, I wanted to let you know that each night we perform, a little bit of time and love is going out to William and to you, and each night we perform, William and you are remembered again, with love and sorrow and tenderness."

This was my response to her:

I just can't tell you how moved I am by your remembering William in your play. It's so comforting to feel his light shining on still, in some way, after being so quickly extinguished in this world. More people "know" my stillborn son than ever would have "known" him in life. If he were alive, he would be just another child, another smiling little face lost in the sea of our growing children. But because he's gone, because his going was such a heartbreak, we all remember, forever, his little baby-face. Strange, to say that, but it's true. And of course, I would take his growing, breathing, alive little body over 1,000 people remembering him any day...

But because I don't have him, because he is gone, I cherish what I have, and the truth is, my memory isn't big enough to hold him. He will never grow up or grow old, but he will and does go on, in your actions and thoughts, in so many other of my online friends' thoughts and actions and words. And in remembering him, we are remembering all of those lost babies - one sibling of sixteen, born still and lost to us all.

And thank you for thinking of me, warning me against "Quilters" because it might be too difficult. I'm at a stage in my grief, though, where I'm almost seeking out experiences like that. It's painful, but I'm not quite as raw as I once was, and watching/seeing loss like my own brings it back for me in an almost familiar/comforting way. It's validating, I guess. It happens, it happened to me, it really exists and it's as sad and heartbreaking to everyone else on the outside as it feels from the inside.

Thank you again. You are such a gift.

Easter Reflection

I can't do Easter without thinking of William.

We colored eggs and I remembered doing them last year, trying not to cry the whole time. I was only days into my losing him. I also remembered how I didn't buy him anything for Easter. I sat there and thought to myself... did I know somehow that I wasn't going to bring a baby home?

But the hardest part of Easter to me is the "He is Risen!" part. Because while I get the whole metaphor of eternal life... the point is, Jesus got to come back. According to the story, he rose again, walked around, talked, ate, slept, and did all-things-human after his death.

God is such a tease.

And when I think about communicating with "God" or whatever energy is out there, as my extended family is wont to do on this holiday... I just want to say, "Dude, don't talk to me. YOUR son got to come back."

How fair is that?

Not.

April Fools

My children, especially Miss Z., all LOVE to play tricks and today they were in April Fool's Day heaven. "Mom, you dropped your pocket on the floor." I look... April Fool! "Hey, Mom, look at that, it's a dry puddle!" Ha. April Fool!

But I have been an April fool since William was born, exactly on the day M. didn't want him to be. It's been a year of the coyote, the raven, the trickster. You thought you were going to have a baby? Ha! You thought you would get pregnant again after losing that baby? Well, okay... we'll let that happen... twice... and then say - April Fool!

I have watched women who lost babies after mine conceive again, and even give birth. I am watching bellies grow from afar while mine remains empty. I knew today would be too hard, knowing, not knowing. I could have taken a pregnancy test today. But I decided not to. Not today. I didn't want another horrible April Fool's joke.

Today I had to answer the question, "Are you pregnant?" on the tattoo form. I didn't know, of course, but I checked, "No." Tonight, right about the time William was born at 10:13 pm, I went into the bathroom and that question was answered for me.

Once again it all ends in blood and tears, just like last year. Full circle.

April Fools.

William's First Un-Birthday

Pictures of what we did on William's first "unbirthday," as M. calls it.

William's cake

Z&D playing at the park where we'll do the balloon release

By the water

Writing messages on our balloons

Ready to let them go

Off they go!

D. - reluctant to let it go...

M. getting his tattoo

Almost done!

All done!

My tattoo - William's hand, actual size

My heart in his hands...

My Dear Sweet William

My dear sweet William...

There aren't words to tell you how much we miss you. I wish we were gearing up for a crazy, hectic one-year-old's party, something that would disrupt your whole routine and make you good and cranky and more than ready for your usual nap. I want that child, the boy turning one who would be taking his first toddling steps toward a lifetime of walking away.

I wanted to be the one to let go first.

I took your memory box down today from the shelf for the first time in six months. I said, the day we knew you were dead - the day you were born - that I didn't want to be that woman, the one who had a cardboard box instead of a baby. But I am that woman, and I have a box instead of a son. I have pictures and a stuffed bear and a blanket. There are drops of your blood on the little outfit you wore and I smelled it, hoping to find any lingering scent of you, but there was none. I left my tears there. Your DNA and mine.

I found the lock of your hair, so dark and fine and beautiful. It's the thing I cherish most, that reminds me, yes, you were here, you were alive inside me, floating in a waiting darkness. You heard my voice, were rocked to sleep by my movements, and felt my love, thick as blood and pouring through that lifeline, the one that failed us both. You were here, and then you were gone.

I can't tell you not to pull the dog's ears or listen to you talking to yourself in that sweet baby-babble in your crib across the hall in the morning. I can't complain that you're growing out of everything so FAST and how running after a little one at forty is a lot more tiring than it is at twenty. I can't give you anything, anymore. I had one shot - that oblivious nine months you spent in my belly - and it's past.

You will forever be my future-child, a projection on the screen of my mind. I don't turn that movie on daily anymore, like I once did. But days like today - your first year! - I imagine you forward, and I probably will do it until I, too, am gone. Your first smile, your first words, your first steps, your first birthday. Your first lost tooth, your first skinned knee, your first day of school, your first heartbreak.Your first date, your first car, your graduation, your wedding. But I know, I will never have those firsts. It's all a mind-movie, a bit of future-projection to help ease my presently aching heart of the heaviness of past regret.

I will never know or have you again. You are just paper and wisps and ash.

But I can still close my eyes and feel you. I held the weight of the world in my arms the day you were born, and you...just barely a five-pound bundle of bittersweet love. Your skin was as soft as flower petals, your mouth a little rosebud. I remember those things. Your spine was perfection - I felt it with my hand, every groove, just like the string of pearls we'd seen on the screen. Your fingers were long and delicate. They were my hands, not your father's. I remember the wet smell of your birth, the doctor asking, "Do you want to see your son?" and reaching my arms out because yes, yes, of course I wanted you, I'd never wanted anything more. I remember rocking you and sobbing and asking you, "What happened, baby? What happened?" As if you could open your eyes and tell me. I remember the blood that ran in a trickle out of your nose that I wiped delicately away with the edge of the blanket like I would have wiped your tears had you been born alive.

And I remember most how much I loved you, how much that feeling consumed me.

It still does.

Today would have been your first birthday, and for me, there's not a lot of "happy" in it. But there is a lot of love. I may not be able to kiss your forehead and wish you happy birthday today, but my love for you knows no bounds. There are no edges to it; there is no end. I know you felt it, when you were inside of me, how loved and wanted you were - and just like I know my love crossed that placenta-barrier and fed you, like the blood in my veins...I know it crosses over to wherever you are now.

I love you, William, today on your first birthday and every day.

This Time Last Year

This time last year, my baby was already dead inside me, but I didn't know it. 
Now my baby is dead and I can't unknow it.

This time last year, I had an empty nursery.
Now, too, I have an empty nursery. 

This time last year the skies were blue and the sun was shining and spring was coming... 
Right now the skies are blue and the sun is shining and spring is coming... 

This time last year I had hope. I didn't know that in just a little over twenty-four hours, my midwife wouldn't be able to find my baby's heartbeat. 

But still, a part of me knew - our little mommy group had lost one precious life already, but I told myself it couldn't happen again. Lightning couldn't strike twice. But I was afraid. My usually active baby had slowed down so much... but this was labor, pre-labor, I told myself, it would be over soon...

And then it was over. Forever over and now I relive it all, over and over.


My grief has grown less sharp around the edges over this past year, like a knife blade worn dull from use. I cut myself with a butter-knife nowadays. That's progress, isn't it?

This time last year I was oblivious. Today, I wish I still was.

Today, I am spending a gorgeous spring afternoon sitting in the dark and watching movies about the holocaust and crying.

Maybe I just want to be reminded - there are worse horrors. I didn't have to choose - who should die, my son or my daughter? My son didn't know that he was going to die - he didn't suffer (please, god, let that last be true...) and he isn't suffering anymore.

Or maybe I just want to see fear and hopelessness and the pain of loss mirrored a million times on a million faces. Maybe then I can recognize my own face in the mirror - who is this woman who has aged exponentially in the past year, who fell down a rabbit hole, who crossed over to the other side and hasn't managed to find her way back through hell...?

Who is she? Who am I?

This time last year, I thought I knew.

Now, I don't think I'll ever know.

Gifts

I am blessed to have such amazing, generous, thoughtful women in my life. I will burn the candle they sent for William's first birthday on April 1... to honor them remembering him... 

Thank you for not forgetting. 

Thank you for holding him in your hearts, even if I can't hold him in my arms. 

It means more than I could ever possibly say.

Unfolding

I should be planning a first birthday party.

Instead, I'm planning a memorial/remembrance day of sorts. It's hard for me to call it a "birthday party." Birthdays are celebrations. I'm not celebrating. I'm mourning. Still, nearly a year later, still mourning. Forever-mourning, I imagine. I never wanted to be this woman.

My children, even the older ones, want to take part, so on April 1, the day William was born, we will go the park and do a balloon release. I'm bringing helium balloons and Sharpies - we can each write a message (or for the littles, draw a picture).

Then it's on to get our memorial tattoos. We are both getting his handprint - mine will be actual size, in black, over my heart. Just where his little hand would have rested when he was nursing. Just where I hope another little future-baby's hand will rest again some day. I fantasize about that image a lot, and hope I'm not just dreaming. M's will be his own handprint, in black, on his forearm, and William's handprint, in blue, in the center.

After that, it's dinner and cake. Yes, I know, it's not a birthday party, but I ordered a cake anyway. The tattoo place is an hour away - but fortuitously, it's right around the corner from the bakery that made our wedding cake. I am ordering a mini replica of our wedding cake for our 10 year anniversary (coming up this July) and decided to get a cake for William.

He should be smashing frosting in his hair on that day... I wonder if all that dark hair would have stayed? So many things I'll never know.

The woman who took my cake order had tears in her eyes when I handed her the copy of his little handprint, the one I wanted on the cake. They had just celebrated her daughter's first birthday. "You never know, do you?" she said, shaking her head. I used to be on that side of motherhood, I thought. I remember. How sad. How awful. How can you cope? I would just die...

Why did her daughter live and my son die? More useless questions with no real answers.

M. is making a memorial shelf for William's things - his picture, the cedar box with his ashes, etc.

And we have started trying again, after a two month break getting my body back to some sort of balance. I hope we have succeeded. I can feasibly take a test on what would have been William's first birthday. It would be so apropos... what a beautiful gift, to know I was carrying new life on that day.

And of course, a cruel joke if things go the other way. April Fool's. Again.

And as usual, there's nothing to do but let it unfold. 

Simple Question

The U.S. Census.

"How many people were living in your house on April 1, 2010?"

It's a simple question.

And it reduced me to tears.

April 1, 2010 would have been William's first birthday.

There's a little "Dora the Explorer" ad on the census website that says, "Children count too!"

But I can't write my son's name and birthdate down.

He doesn't count.

He was never counted.

Beautiful Damned

It never ends.

One mama puts her sweet, funny, healthy three-year-old boy with a little cold to bed one night only to wake up and find him dead in his bed. Another mama rocks and sings to her nine month-old baby girl and watches her die of leukemia in her arms.

They're never safe. It's never okay. They fall. They get run over by cars. They start driving cars and get into accidents. Every single baby that we mamas birth is going to die. We're all dying, every single moment.

The potential for tragedy is endless.

If life weren't so damned beautiful, I'd really question the point of it all. 

Stuck

Years ago, I went to see a rather unconventional sort of therapist - she was a mind-body sort, and I was trying to get more in touch with my body (and less involved in my head...) It was all very crunchy and woo-woo for me, but I did it anyway, as strange and uncomfortable as it all felt.

During one of those sessions, we did a "guided imagination" where I discovered a golden ball of light literally lodged in my throat. I couldn't speak around it, swallow around it. It was decidedly stuck. She tried every which way to get it UNstuck, but my mind wouldn't go there. I couldn't even IMAGINE it gone. Sounds silly - you should be able to imagine or unimagine anything you want. But I couldn't.

I've recently been reading up on my thyroid issues, which are in part keeping me from conceiving again, I'm sure. I've done everything I can think of to help - getting tested often, changing meds, having them adjusted, switching to an all-organic diet (including hormone-free meat and dairy), cutting out xenoestrogens in my environment. The list is huge, and it's been an enormous (and expensive!) change in our lifestyle.

And still, we're not pregnant. 

This morning I came out of a dream about William (I used to dread them, dreams about him - they made me so sad. Now I love them. I'm still sad, but I like feeling close to him again. As time passes, he can feel so far away...) and I remembered my dream about the golden egg. And that made me remember the session with the therapist.

Of course, when I read this quote today, I realized why I'd remembered it: 

"In many women thyroid dysfunction develops because of an energy blockage in the throat region, the result of a lifetime of "swallowing" words one is aching to say. In the name of preserving harmony, or because these women have learned to live as relatively helpless members of their families or social groups, they have learned to stifle their self-expression. These women may, in fact, have struggled to have their say, only to discover that it doesn’t make any difference — because in their closest relationships they have been defined as insignificant. In order for this complex, entangled state of affairs to be resolved, a woman might need to take not only supplemental progesterone and thyroid hormone, but also an unblinking look at what parts of her life and interpersonal relationships need to change."

Universe trying to tell me something?

I think I need to go for a long walk and do a lot of screaming...

Sweet William - Song and Video

"Sweet William" is written and performed by The Low Tide Drifters.

This song was written just for William, and it is an amazing gift for me to share it. What a beautiful legacy, to know someone is singing my heart and others are hearing his name every time they play it.

Thank you, Kate and Nate. There aren't words to tell you how grateful I am.

SWEET WILLIAM

Sweet William came one silent night and stole our bated breath
The image of his mother; his father’s shining best
The stillness of his body left a hole once filled by joy
Softly kiss the velvet cheek of your perfect little boy

Chorus:
So I rock your memory gently, goodnight stars and goodnight moon
Like iron to a lodestone, I’ll meet you someday soon

Sweet William wore his grandpas’ names and he twined two family trees
Mourn now for the babe in arms and the man he’ll never be
Inside the womb he kicked and thrived and dreamed the dreams of life
Cradled in his mama’s voice, he waited for the light.

Chorus

Sweet William, we’ll remember you, though we’ll never understand
Why some souls settle quickly down and others never land
Sweet William know your mama and your daddy love so
Though you’ll remain forever young, in our hearts you’ll always grow.

Chorus

Repeat Chorus

© 2009 Katherine Downing and Nathan Moore

2009 Year in Review

January 2009, I was pregnant with William. I turned thirty-nine. It looked to be a truly lovely year. 

February 2009, my father had a stroke and died. 

April 2009, William was stillborn. 

September 2009, we were pregnant again. And then we weren't. 

November 2009, deja vu. Positive pregnancy test and then...  

January 1 2010. William has now been dead as long as he was alive in my womb. Gone, really, really gone.

I don't know what 2010 has in store for us, but my resolution this year is "Accept and Surrender." I've been brought to my knees enough, I think, I should just stay there.