What to say?

As I was driving to our counseling appointment today, I kept reliving the moment that I gave birth to Henry over and over in my head. I remember so clearly the pressure, the need to push, and telling Emily, Aaron's sister, that I felt something. She got the doctor (Emily is a Labor and Delivery nurse at the hospital where we delivered) and they told me to go ahead and push. I passed a large blood clot (sorry) and I remember that Emily, the other nurse, and the doctor all looked at each other. Then I told them that I felt more pressure, more need to push. They told me to go ahead, and with one push and a lot of sobbing, I gave birth to Henry.

It's the sobbing that I keep remembering. My mom was at my head, Aaron was holding my hand. And as I felt the need to push, all I could think about was the fact that my baby was dead, that this was the end of the journey for him. All I could do was sob. I didn't REALLY want to give birth, not to that end. But I didn't have a choice.

I'm reading CS Lewis' "A Grief Observed," and it's good. In the very first part, Lewis questions where God is when we face this grief of losing someone we love. Here are some exerpts that I wish I could have underlined. But we don't underline books in our house :) I don't know that I'll always feel this way, but sometimes, in my darkest moments, these are the sort of thoughts that go through my head. I'll leave you with these words from CS Lewis. But know, I haven't given over to my grief. I am merely trying to find the way to flow with it, without being swept away.


Meanwhile, where is God? This is one of the most disquieting symptoms [of grief]. When you are happy, so happy that you have no sense of needing Him, so happy that you are tempted to feel His claims upon you as an interruption, if you remember youself and turn to Him with gratitude and praise you will be- or so it feels- welcomed with open arms. But go to Him when your need is desperate, when all other help is vain, and what do you find? A door slammed in your face, and a sound of bolting and double bolting on the inside. After that, silence. You may as well turn away. The longer you wait, the more emphatic the silence will become. There are no lights in the windows. It might be an empty house. Was it ever inhabited? It seemed so once. And that seeming was as strong as this. What can this mean? Why is He so present a commander in our time of prosperity and so very absent a help in time of trouble?

I tried to put some of these thoughts to C. this afternoon. He reminded me that the same thing seems to have happened to Christ:'Why hast thou forsaken me?' I know. Does that make it easier to understand?

Not that I am ( I think) in much danger of ceasing to belive in God. The read danger is of coming to believe such dreadful things about Him. The concusion I dread is not 'So there's no God after all,' but 'So this is what God's really like. Deceive yourself no longer.'

I'll be buying stock...

in helium balloons.

So Ethan and I got to talking about his baby brother yesterday. We talked about how his baby brother had to go to heaven and would grow up there. We talked about how we could go outside and wave up to heaven so his baby brother could see us. Then we talked about drawing a picture for his brother, and Ethan wanted to know how we would get the picture to heaven. So we decided that balloons that fly would make it up to heaven and we could use those to get stuff to his baby brother.

So we're going to be buying lots of helium balloons for the Hethan. Perhaps we should invest in one of those helium tanks. :)

Buried

I'm at my grandmother's. I'm showered. Dressed. Teeth are brushed. I've been upstairs to check on Gma and to spend some time with her. I know she knows that I'm not well today, because I didn't sit in my usual place or talk her ear off. Usually when I come home, I sit on the bench at the kitchen table, with a glass of water or sweet tea (TEE, April, not TAY) and talk talk talk talk talk. Even when I've been sad before, I can always talk talk talk talk to gma.

But I feel buried today. My chest is crushed down. It is so hard to breathe. I might take gma's Mustang out and drive for a while.

But I can still breathe.

Off to Heal

I feel a little guilty. I'm leaving Aaron alone for 7 days.

I'm flying to Georgia tonight. Staying the night with some friends, then hitching a ride up to my hometown, two hours north of Atlanta. I'll stay at my grandmother's house until Sunday or Monday, and then hitch a ride to Columbia, S.C. to be with Aaron's parents and the Hethan. We'll all fly back to Ohio on the 15th.

For me, it will hopefully be a time of healing. Going to my home in the mountains always soothes my soul. I look forward to seeing my childhood best friend (still my best friend today), my grandmothers, my mom and step dad, my step-siblings, and my brother and his wife. Most especially, I look forward to Mom, Gma, Jenni, and Jon. I don't have to pretend in front of them. And then I can get my Hethan hugs and cuddles in S.C.

But back to feeling guilty. Aaron will be all alone for 7 days. I worry about him, though he reassures me that he needs some time alone to grieve. So I'm going to trust him. But I still feel guilty.

Incompatible with Life

I have come to hate that phrase. Let it be known.

First Post

Most of my Musings readers know what we've been dealing with lately. Making the choice to end our pregnancy because our child was not viable was a hard choice. Though I know it made sense logically and humanely, it made no sense emotionally.

I like writing about my thoughts. I don't do so well when it comes to speaking about our loss just yet. Everyone has offered to be there, to be an ear, a shoulder, whatever part of the body we need. And I really love that. I wish I could take them up on it. The problem is, I find that I have no spoken words to express my grief. When I begin to talk, I start to cry. And when I start to cry, I just kinda lose it. So I can write, and if I cry, I can take a break.

People want to know how we're doing. All I can say is that we're breathing. Aaron says that we're doing as well as can be expected. It's true. I don't necessarily want to be honest when people ask me how I'm doing. If I answered every person honestly, it would be something like this: "I start each day wondering if everything was a dream. By the time I've showered and gotten dressed, I realise that it wasn't a dream. By the time I get some food in me, I've come to terms with my loss for a while. By the time midafternoon rolls around, I'm starting to feel confused. By the time 6 pm rolls around, it's an effort to breathe, much less speak. By the time I get to bed, all I want to do is cry." That's the honest answer. Each moment is different.

I get sick of crying. I get sick of thinking about everything. It just makes me mad. I just want to kick someone or something. I just want to be finished with this whole process. I don't want to cry anymore. I want everything to be ok again. I just don't know how to make it ok again.

I hope someday that they come up with a cure for Potter's Syndrome. I hope they can identify the genes that cause it. I pray that no one else that I know ever has to go through this heartbreak. Losing a child, whether it is a "live" child, or a child in utero, has got to be the hardest thing on a family ever.

Breathe.