Death To All Bunnies!

I planted William's garden back in April, just after he died. I was looking forward to watching the little seedling grow tall, and they have! 

The past few weeks I've been waiting for the flowers I planted to actually bloom. I wasn't going to post pictures until we actually had flowers, because otherwise it's kind of just boring green stuff. :) I usually go out and check on it every day. The poppies have been our first bloomers. 

But today, I went to look, and guess who had been in the garden?

The left side of the garden was just as tall and lush as the right side yesterday! Apparently the bunnies have been feasting!


If I could get my hands on Peter Rabbit today, he'd be stew!

Rebirth - Part One

I did a lot of soul-searching when I first discovered the idea of “reborn memory dolls.” I saw someone else’s, actually, another baby-loss mama who’d had a doll made to look like her little stillborn girl.

If you don’t know about or haven’t heard of reborn dolls… well, there’s a wiki for everything isn’t there?

According to Wikipedia, “reborning,” as it’s called, started back in the 1990’s. At first, they used already-created vinyl dolls, stripped them down (took off all the paint) and then painted them again, rooted hair, and created a doll that looked incredibly lifelike and real. Nowadays, artists actually create pre-made doll kits, which include the vinyl doll head, arms and legs, and a soft body to be stuffed, that are designed to be “reborn.”

Here’s a picture of a reborn doll.

There is a very large market for these dolls among collectors, although if you look at the comments here, there’s also a lot of controversy. Lots of people clearly think they’re creepy and “wrong.” The media coverage has focused a great deal on people who use reborns for emotional or therapeutic purposes. Those people, usually, who have experienced some sort of infant loss, or perhaps struggle with infertility.

In my former life, even as a psychologist, I think I would have judged this as morbid and even a little unhealthy. Of course, that was before I had a dead baby.

From the outside looking in, I can still feel the judgment, even my own. But when I saw a reborn for the first time, I knew I had to have one of William. I didn’t know why I felt so strongly… and I struggled with the feeling. Was I crazy? Would I turn into one of those sad women who carry around a fake baby everywhere?

I talked about it with M, who was, thank god, totally supportive. I’m so loved. :) I also talked about it with a girlfriend, who collects reborns. (Okay, so maybe she was a little biased…) But she reminded me that if we still lived in close community or in tribal cultures, I’d be holding other mamas’ babies all the time,  probably even nursing them, and it would be part of the mourning process.

My arms ached to hold a baby. And if I couldn’t have William… of course, I couldn’t… why not have a facsimile I could rock and cry over now and then? Something tangible to remember him by?

So I started looking into it, doing research, and found an artist (Marilyn Kangas of "Miss Marilyn's Orphanage) who had experience doing "memory" or "portrait" reborns. Basically, you submit pictures of the baby you want “reborn” and then together you look for kits/sculpts. The reborn artist suggested some, and I looked for some myself, searching for the best sculpt to match William. I found one, with the eyes closed, that I thought was very close. I spent hours comparing the pictures side by side, and meticulously chose this one.

But it wouldn’t be available for two months (it was still in production.) Still, I decided to wait. Because it reminded me so much of the pictures we have of William.

Then I found this sculpt, and I knew it was William... with his eyes open.

I’d never seen him with his eyes open, but my heart melted the moment I saw it and I knew I had to have him.

So now I was in it for not one, but two reborn dolls of my dead baby. Was I crazy!?

The artist was totally understanding… she ordered the eyes-open kit and started on that one right away. She sent me pictures of the progress as things went along, and I chose his eye and hair color.

There are all sort of extras you can purchase with these dolls - things like beating hearts, a magnet inserted so baby can have a pacifier, a spine, a "squishy belly" that feels more real, a belly or bottom "plate" for posing for pictures (reborns generally have soft suede bodies which makes for better cuddling.) They also have voice boxes, breathing mechanisms, heat packs, magnetic umbilical cords... it’s amazing.

The artist took about a month to finish the eyes-open sculpt, and it was just in time – the eyes-closed sculpt had just come in. She had intended to send them both to me at once, but I couldn’t wait, and had her ship him.

Here he is, home in my arms:

I have a slideshow of pictures I took, but they honestly can't do this doll justice. 

SLIDESHOW

You truly have to experience it. My husband and my oldest son (fifteen) were just wide-eyed at how real he looks and feels. (I could barely get him away from my eight year old daughter!) He is totally like holding a real baby. I felt weird leaving him alone in a room, he's so real-looking and feeling. I actually ordered a (much much cheaper) reborn on Ebay for my daughter so she could have her own to carry around. But already, so much healing has happened just in the time she's held our reborn William.

I know it's not for everybody... and I know lots of folks both in and out of the loss community might think it's creepy... but I'm glad I did it. I've already done a bit of mourning with him, and I imagine I will do a great deal more. It's almost shamanic in a way... very symbolic.

My friend who collects them warns that they're addictive! They actually use them therapeutically with folks who experience anxiety and depression... and artists have donated them to senior centers, too... just holding a reborn can lower the heart rate and calm your breathing and it releases natural oxytocin and seratonin in the brain.

I look at this reborn, and I know it’s not William, but just a memory doll. But my fears definitely resurfaced when I saw him. I wondered if I wouldn't be able to resist him, constantly, that I would project all of my feeling about William onto him, that I would pretend it really was William and that William wasn't dead.

But the truth is I don't find myself doing that. What I do find is that it brings William back into focus for me. Over time, I've found William fading around the edges, and I hate "losing" him like that.

I think the less we remember over time, the less we will be able to remember, at least that's been my experience so far. I can still recall William and my memories of him, but they're nowhere near as clear as they were, and I know they're going to fade even more.

My mother lost a child - it was before I was born, and my sister was three when she tried to cross between two parked cars and was hit and killed. So a few weeks ago, we were talking about William and she said, "I got lucky with you kids, really." I was just stunned by that. "But Mom, what about D.?" She was quiet. "Well... I mean... all of the rest of you survived." Again, I said, "But Mom, how can you say you're lucky, if you lost one? There are women who have eight kids and get to keep them all. That's lucky... losing one... that's not so lucky."

I think she just forgot her for a minute, or maybe she didn't want to remember.

But I don't want to do that. I don't want William to ever not be a part of our family and not be remembered. That's all I have of him is that memory, and if this little doll will help me keep him close in my heart, it's so worth it to me. I know there are lots of women who wouldn't "need" it... I've heard some say they don't even want or need pictures, that the memory of their baby is clear as day and won't ever fade.

But I think because of my mom and watching her dealing with the loss of her child the way she has, I'm defended against that sort of forgetting or denial. I want every bit and piece of him I can manage to hold onto. I don't want to do it the way my mom does, and if I have things that are physical and tangible, it will be harder to push away like she does.

Now, if I need to, I can pick this doll up and remember him exactly, down to the weight of him in my arms and the cradle of his soft, downy head in my hand. And it's a comfort to know he's here, just like having his urn here in my room. I have a little doll cradle he now "sleeps" in at night next to the bed, and it's really kind of calming to look over in the morning and see him there.

Crazy as it all sounds in this "new normal" world...

I know I would have passed judgment on me at one time. But once you’ve held your dead baby in your arms, your new normal doesn't differentiate anymore. The "line" you thought you wouldn’t cross just doesn't exist. I'm the crazy woman who was desperate to run from the funeral home with my baby, dead as he was, I could have cared less. I think we all know, once we've held the lifeless bodies of our babies in our arms, that the line between what's "okay" and what isn't just isn’t clear.

Having some tangible thing to remind me of William is what always sends me immediately back into the grip of grief. Sometimes I open the tiny little Ziploc bag of his hair and I can still smell him, and when I touch his hair... I know, he was real, he was here. It's the tangible things, the stuff I can see and smell and touch, that bring him back to me.

This reborn is that, for me. Not a way to bring William back, but a way to keep his memory, to bring it back to me when I need it - not the rebirth of my baby, which is impossible, but the rebirth of my memory...a sweet and longed-for touchstone. 

Hovering

I've never been a helicopter parent - you know, the kind that hover around their kids constantly, making sure nothing bad ever happens? I've been pretty okay with letting the kids learn by making their own mistakes, falling down, getting scrapes.

And I don't hover even now... but I do push my inner panic button a lot faster than I ever used to.

A few days ago we went to a picnic, and the kids were off playing with all the others on the equipment, in the sandbox. At eight and almost-seven, they're pretty self-sufficient in those situations. We give them clear boundaries, and they've learned over the years to respect them. So when I did my every-five-minute cursory look-over of the playground and couldn't find my son, I didn't panic. I just kept looking, my eyes sweeping over the playscape, the sandbox, looking for his striped shirt. 

"Honey, have you seen D.?" I asked my husband. Was my voice as scared as I felt? My heart was beating fast now, visions of him being snatched dancing in my head. Before William died, thoughts like that might occur to me - but the physical reaction, the sheer panic rising in my throat within moments of discovering him missing, that was new. Because now I knew - we weren't in some plastic bubble. Bad things happened, and they could, indeed, happen to us. They could, in fact, happen to us again... and again.

My husband stood up, doing what I'd done, scanning the park, his brow furrowed, and I knew I'd pushed his panic button, too. We both have hair-triggers lately. 

"No," he replied after a moment, shaking his head. "Where did you see him last?" 

Last... the last time I saw him. That phrase made me turn cold. It couldn't possibly be, and yet the fear catches you, freezes you, makes it hard to breathe, like sucking in broken glass. Please, god, let there never be a "last time" I see my child, ever again, unless I'm the one whose number is up, okay? 

A friend of ours started looking too, sensing my panic, I think, and my husband took three steps toward the playground before he stopped, pointing, "There he is!" as my son stepped out from behind the huge tree trunk that had hidden him from our view. Oh my god, the relief. I sagged against the picnic table, my heart still in my throat. 

"Like I need another thing, right?" I joked to my friend. 

She smiled sympathetically and nodded. "Right."

But I knew better... I didn't get a free pass. Just because one child was dead didn't mean I couldn't lose another one. 

Then, last night, the girl-child was playing with her brother's Legos and decided to try to take one of the pieces off with her teeth. Suddenly she stood up, her face a mask of fear: "I can't breathe!" she choked and then nothing... 

My husband and I both lunged for her at once and she coughed and gasped and spit a yellow Lego brick into her hand, "I got it!" 

M. yelled, "If you ever put anything like that in your mouth again, I'll kill you myself!" 

He was scared, and I think trying to scare her a little. But he didn't need to scare her - she was already pretty scared. He didn't really need to scare any of us. We don't need events like that, anymore, to tip the scales. We're already scared, all the time. We're the walking horrified. The risk is real, too real, the fear beating like a pulse at our throats. We check on each other more often, get panicked when we're home late or things happen that are out of the ordinary and out of our control.

William taught us that life is both precious and precarious. And still, I wish we'd never had to learn that lesson. I wish William were still alive and we were still blissfully ignorant, solid in our belief in that invisible force field surrounding us that never really existed. I don't know if William is watching - it's a nice thought, but I don't quite really believe it, just as I no longer have faith that we're all gonna be okay. It would be sweet to think he's an angel protecting us now... but that thought goes logically out the window for me when I wonder... where was his angel, then? What lazy-ass slacker angel was on watch the day William died, huh? I'd like to get my hands on that fella...

So no... I'm not sure we have an angel watching over us in the form of my infant son. But I am sure that we don't take each other for granted in the same way we used to. Life's moments are bittersweet now but we taste them fully, appreciate them a great deal more. And our eyes and ears are sharp, tuned in to danger, as much as they can be. Even knowing we're not in control. Even knowing we can't always prevent tragedy.

I don't know if William's spirit is here and hovering over us. Sometimes I wish it were true. Days when my children defy the laws of physics or nearly send me into heart failure, I wish I could rely on some guardian angel protecting us. But I can't know that. 

There may or may not be someone or something looking out for us, I don't know. It's the not knowing that keeps me watchful and wary. It's the not knowing that pushes my panic buttons. Because if there are such forces, well... there was clearly no one on watch when William died. Someone fell asleep at the switch and my son paid the price. It's hard to rely on such arbitrary protection. I'd rather keep my eyes and ears open and do what I can... even if it's not enough.

And hold my children close. I've been doing a lot of that lately. We all hold each other tighter these days. A lot tighter.

Knowing

I've been pregnant five times. And all five times, I knew. Somehow, I knew the moment I conceived that there was a life forming. I have no idea how. But all biology obviously aside - the sperm hadn't had anywhere near enough time to travel to meet the egg yet, and there was still fertilization and implantation to contend with - still, I just knew.

There have been times that I've been hopeful that I was pregnant and times when I was paralyzed by the thought and dreaded the possibility, but those feelings are different from this "knowing." Those thoughts and feelings were rooted in space and time, contingent upon one thing following the other in linear progression. My conception "knowing" feels outside of that. (And yeah, it sounds weird and woo-woo to me, too... but after five times, it's hard to deny!)

It reminds me of my knowing William was going to die. Of course, I didn't believe it. Of course I mistrusted myself, that feeling. I told myself that internal gauge was just off. Nothing bad was going to happen. There was nothing to be anxious about. That's what I tell myself when I get that "knowing" feeling when I conceive. It's silly, I can't possibly know I'm going to get pregnant. I have to wait to weeks for my period, I have to take a test. But in reality, those things just end up proving what I already know. Like the Doppler and ultrasound were just final proof of what my heart already understood.

I knew I wasn't pregnant this cycle. Because I didn't have that "knowing." I remembered and realized the lack of that feeling a day or two ago, and I knew this wasn't going to tbe the month. My cycle rebooted this morning, and while the blood in my hand was disappointing... it wasn't, really. Because I already knew. There had been no spark, no divine touch this month. I had known already and forgotten. Hoped against hope, like I always do, that my feeling, my intuition, was wrong.

Just like I hoped that William would make it. I hoped he was fine, that my worry and anxiety and completely-irrational-outside-the-context-of-the-coming-circumstance-fear, were just silly mama thoughts. I hoped my feeling was wrong. I hoped. But I knew different. Somewhere, somehow, I knew.

And speaking these feelings out loud, well... it's hard to tell yourself or someone else what's going to happen in the future and get any measure of belief. And it's anticlimactic and just elicits disbelief again to look back and say, "I knew it." It's quite a catch-22.

Sometimes I really hate already knowing. 

Babies, babies, everywhere...

I didn't mind babies at first. Pregnant women either. I saw my neices' babies during the first holiday (Easter) just weeks after we lost William, and I was fine. It didn't bother me. I didn't begrudge them their babies. I didn't want their babies - I wanted my baby. If I couldn't have William, nothing else mattered. I could hold someone else's baby forever and it wouldn't make a difference. That baby wasn't William, and William is who I wanted. 

But now... now babies bother me. They bother me a lot. I took D. to wrestling today and there were two babies there, one a little younger than William would be right now, one just a little older. I was surprised by the wave of sadness that overcame me as I stood there looking down at someone else's baby sucking on his little hand in his carseat. That should have been me - although my baby probably would have been in a sling, and I would have been trying to figure out how to discreetly breastfeed in the midst of a room full of wrestling boys instead of bottle feeding... but still. 

I should have a baby, and I don't. I really don't. There's no going back, no do-overs. I will never ever get that time back. And I stood there, looking at that baby's chubby little feet, wondering what William would look like now - another thing I'll never know - and I realized how angry I was. He almost made it - someone wrote that in a letter to my husband the other day, and the phrase made my heart just ache. He almost made it! It's like running a marathon, getting two inches to the finish line and then falling down dead of a heart attack.

Oh the irony. The horrible, bitter irony. Every time I think about it, I feel like I'm chewing on tinfoil. It leaves a terrible taste in my mouth. 

So I stood there at the wrestling practice looking at other people's babies, filled with jealousy and longing, and I realized I didn't want William anymore - I wanted a baby. Somehow the awareness had finally settled into my consciousness that I could never, would never, hold William again.  He was really gone from me, forever. I don't know that I'd ever wholly accepted that fact, or realized I had, until that moment. And of course, if someone came in and slapped me on the back, laughing and saying, "Just kidding! Here's your baby! Here's William, it was just a joke!" I'd take him back in a heartbeat. It's a fantasy I've unconsciously entertained, I'm sure. 

But my son is dead. There's no monkey's paw to make wishes on. He is ash and bone and memory.

And still, my womb aches. I want another baby. I can't have William, I can't ever replace William, but the longing for another baby is agonizing. It's so great I can barely stand it. I keep thinking of those fibromyalgia commercials - have you seen them? "If I looked how I felt, then would you believe me?" If my face and body reflected my pain and longing, I'd be writhing on the floor, screaming in agony.

So while before, facing a baby didn't bother me because I wanted William, who couldn't be brought back to life, no matter what I or anyone wanted or did... now, looking at someone else's baby reminds me not of the unrecoverable past, but of the potential future... of the possibility of some future child, someone not yet here, someone waiting to be born. It reminds me of my empty womb, my empty arms. It reminds me that I've lost one and don't yet have another.

Maybe this feeling will ebb a little, when I get two lines on a pregnancy test. Even knowing what I know, that there are no guarantees... I want to feel alive. I want life growing in my womb again. I want to share my body and my life with someone new, some unknown but so very wanted and already loved presence, some impossibly beautiful and mysterious conglomeration of our genetic soup cooking in my belly.

I don't know. Maybe I'm being selfish. I don't think this is the month, although I'm 9-10 days past ovulation and due to start cycling again in two to four days, if I don't get a positive test, anyway. Frankly, I'm feeling discouraged and I don't think a + test is likely. Aside from all the pre-period symptoms I'm having, I think the universe just doesn't think it's time.

The universe has pinned me and now just seems to think turning the screws - making me wait 11 weeks for my cycles to return, forcing me to sit in a room with other people's newborns, and this time, most likely, a negative pregnancy test right out of the gate - yeah, that will teach me, that will really send the message home.

I'm not in control. It's not up to me.

Thanks for the reminders, universe.

Thanks a lot.

Washington Post Brings Awareness to Stillbirth

Washington Post staff writer Alan Goldenbach lost his baby to stillbirth, and hosted a Q&A session about stillbirth today. One of my questions was featured! 

(And just an aside, I love that William's name was mentioned... okay so I was the one mentioning it, but still... ;)

Results

Well... everything came back within the normal range. So, no real answers. The only not-really-elevated but just-in-case was a homocysteine of 11. (Normal is anything under 13) So extra folic acid and B6 and B12 for me - "just in case."

The uber-OB didn't think it had been a factor with William... but a study I found said:

The researchers found that women with the highest levels of homocysteine (greater than 10.7 micromol/L) had an adjusted risk for preeclampsia (pregnancy-related hypertension) which was 38 per cent higher than the risk among the women with the lowest levels of homocysteine (3.6-7.5 micromol/L). The risk of giving birth to a very low birth weight baby (weight less than 1500 grams) was 101 per cent higher among high homocysteine women and the risk of stillbirth 103 per cent higher.

So who knows?