Sunday, October 2, 2011

A Friday Post

This week kinda sucked. That is just the only way to describe it. There were a couple of high points, but man, what a week. Frustrating work days, draining clients, my first post-partum period (aka niagra falls) and two nights of no sleep due to crying all night, missing my Bremy girl. So hard.

Overall I'm doing much better. I don't think about losing her every ten minutes. But this week, the nights were just hard. Hard to fall asleep without picturing the day we lost her. Hard to fall asleep without worrying about the future for me and B. And for some reason on those two nights that I lay awake in tears, I just could not stop. I had to get up and sit in the hall bath so I wouldn't wake up B. This week was the first week I wanted to open her memory box from the hospital and look at the tiny footprints they took of her feet. I needed to feel something of her. I needed the tangible card stock in my hands with her ten teeny toes in black ink. I cried over her little feet and mourned her loss. Those were two ugly nights for me. My eyes were practically swollen shut I was crying so hard. I just could not stop.

Thankfully the last two nights have been tear-free. I've drifted to sleep without being haunted by this experience. This is something I'm learning: grief really comes in waves and is totally unpredictable.

The high point for my week was my 6-week post partum Dr. appointment where we got the green light to start trying for baby2 in December. Even though we had planned on December no matter what, it was very satisfying to hear my Dr. tell me she thought it would be perfect timing and to hear her say how excited she was for us. We all know it's going to be a very, very scary experience, but we agreed it will also be part of the healing process for us. We talked about what we'll need to do next time around and it made me feel so much more hopeful than I had been feeling.
To have your Dr. give you a big, long, tight hug and look you in the eye and be genuinely hopeful for you meant more to me than I ever could explain. I left the appointment on a high, reminding myself that it is possible we will have a baby next year. It is possible we will be very happy at this time next year.

I'm the type of person who loves to day dream and visualize things I'm looking forward to. I want to imagine a child in our lives. I want to imagine how happy we will be at that time. Part of the problem this week was that every time I'd visualize a healthy baby, my mind would just go back to the day Bremy was born. And then those images just can't be shaken. And then I picture Christmas without her, I realize that she is really, truly gone and will never be.I worry about how we would handle any complications in the next pregnancy...and then the tears

But since my Dr. appointment, I've been able to have happy thoughts about the future. I've been able to daydream about being pregnant again. About a successful delivery at full term. I've talked with Bremy without breaking down. I've discussed the future with B without being completely terrified.

This post has taken me so long to write. It's becoming hard for me to express my emotions as they are so all over the place. It's now Sunday evening, an I'm feeling ok. We had a lovely weekend together and I'm ready to have a happy week.

3 comments:

  1. I'm so happy you had a good dr. apt. And I send you all my good thoughts to help in your healing.

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  2. I stopped by to check in on you, as your name popped into my head tonight. I'm glad you're feeling better. I'm so happy you have such a wonderful doctor!

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  3. Amy, I have read back through so many of your posts and my heart is hurting for you. Another of my "blog friends" lost her baby before he was born as well. I just read last night about someone giving their family a "Molly Bear". They make the bear so that it weighs exactly what your sweet baby weighed at birth so you can feel the weight of your sweet babe in your arms again. Such a thoughtful thing I think. Anyway, don't know if that would be helpful to you but here is her post about it: http://mcjacobsjournal.blogspot.com/2011/10/thoughtful-gifts.html

    Also, here is her story from the beginning: http://mcjacobsjournal.blogspot.com/2010/06/chases-storygods-story.html

    Kelly

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