What I wish I could tell you...

My Sweet C,

I wish I could tell you that I miss your smile.  

That every time I wake up in the morning, I tiptoe by your room and whisper a silent prayer that today will be the day.  Today you will see your value and find your strength.

I wish I could tell you that it hurts me.

Hearing that you feel sad and that I can't take that away pains me.  To see tears roll down your face and hear you apologize for worrying me hurts me because I can't make it better but I would give anything to be able to.

I wish I could tell you feelings aren't right or wrong, they simply are.

Please don't ever mask your feelings for me because I want to know.  Sharing the weight on your shoulders helps (you AND me).

I wish I could tell you I know this is BIG.

Friendships are important.  They are important through life and learning that someone is not your friend or is not the person you thought they were is hard at any age.  Clarity can hurt but it can also help you see better things ahead.

I wish I could tell you I'm sorry.

Searching my brain for words that will somehow help you is exhausting and frustrating because I am failing miserably.  I sometimes say things I don't want to and I wish I could take back.   To be better is something I'll keep striving for.  I feel like I'm failing miserably and I'm sorry for that.

I wish I could tell you that it will be OK.

Because I know it will.  There have been times when I was 8, 10, 12, 16, 20, 24 and 27 when I thought I would die.  I didn't think I'd make it through and somehow I took a breath in... and out... and in... and time gifted me wisdom. I know it will you too.

I wish I could tell you how beautiful you are.

I love your kind heart, the way you can weave a beautiful story with your words.  I love watching you dance and being able to feel your emotion by just watching you.  I love seeing how effortless you make soccer look and noticing you try to suppress a smile when you score.  I love your quiet observations and your loud laugh.  Everything sweet and flawed about you is perfection to me. It makes you, YOU!

I wish I could tell you it's important to fail.

Not scoring well on a test, forgetting a dance step or falling down in front of everyone will not break you.  It will grow you.  You will be smarter, dance stronger and walk taller than you ever would have imagined.

I wish I could tell you that failing does hurt.

But being able to pick yourself up off the floor will help you see the world from a different view and an important one.  You will see others through an empathetic lens.  A lens I wish the world could look through.

I wish I could tell you I love you more than you will ever know and that you'd understand.

I don't know that this will ever be possible but I'll keep telling you anyway.

I wish I could lead you down every right road and safe path...

But then I would be doing you a great disservice.  For I know that it is in times like these that we truly discover WHO we are and how amazingly strong we are.

You will get through this and I will be here waiting.

Oh how I wish I could tell you how I miss your smile.  Your laugh. Your care-free ways.

But I know that life is a complicated place and you're finding your way.  

I wish I could tell you I'm always with you, because I am.  Part of me is always in you and part of you is always in me.  We are linked forever.

I won't be able to tell you these things until you're back.  Until I see that sparkle again and we can look back on this time, smile through shared tears, and know we made it.

And then I will brace myself for the next time and pray (like I am now) that you'll come out of it a strong and even more amazing person!

Life is hard. Life is beautiful.

Your flawed but trying,

~Mom

It's not easy...

A little warning that this post is about one of my rainbows and if your loss is fresh, please don't read this post.  I know after you lose a child the last thing you may want to read is about how someone WITH a child is having a difficult time.  I also know though that sometimes we (the Secret Society) give a little leeway when it comes to a Rainbow or a mom who gets loss because she's walked these shoes.

My first Rainbow has been having a tough time lately.  It (what she's going through) has been running through my mind so often that it has been difficult to sleep or focus on other things that need my attention.  I've been looking back at my parenting to see what it is I could have done to have this happen.  Reminds me of when Andrew and E died... how could I have done this... What could I have done differently.

My daughter has been suffering from some pretty major anxiety.  I'm not quite sure where it has come from or why, but what I am now certain of is that she's going to be OK.  I don't know when, but I'm certain of it.  I have that hope.  I have that truth.

My daughter loves to write (imagine that) and I feel has been so strong because she's perhaps learned a lesson that takes most of us (me included) a lot longer to figure out.  When you ask for help or tell someone what you're going through a little of the weight you're carrying gets shared and the journey become bearable.  She has been able to write about her feelings and while I don't like hearing how she feels that she will be "swept away in a hurricane of tears," I am glad that she did share that with me. I have felt that way.  None of these feelings is unique to one person... in fact, when you start talking, you realize that we're more the same than we are different.

Taking her lead of sharing, I have sought out my own weight carriers.  The members of the Secret Society who walked with me ~carried me even sometimes~ when I couldn't go it alone.  I shared and realized that I am not alone in this... my child is not alone in this... There are many who are sitting alone wondering where. how. when. why.

I feel like that happened today.  I shared our story and my friends shared theirs and somehow this weight we've been carrying just got lighter.  My time is now.  Her time is now.  It's not easy but nothing worth having ever has been.  I'm getting up.  We're putting one foot in front of the other. We'll get there.

Together.

I Can Only Imagine

Andrew~

As we get closer to that day, I can feel it coming.

That aching, paralyzing pain that comes with the knowledge that you're not here.

And I wish you were.

It would have been a big year for you, starting middle school and I can't help but wonder what you would have wanted to do?  Band? Sports? Drama? Art?

A week ago, Joe started middle school.  

The night before he was up in the night because he felt sick.  After some talking, he admitted that perhaps it was just a little nerves not knowing what to expect.  I wrapped him in my arms (which felt so good) and told him he'd be just fine and I wanted to believe it, but I was so angry with you.

I was so angry you died.  How nice it would have been for him to have someone to go with. Someone who felt his same nerves~ Someone who could reassure him (other than mom) that it was going to be just fine.  I tried to imagine how it would have been...  How it could have been...

Eventually he felt better and drifted off to sleep,

but my mind was all over the place with worry... Could he get his locker open again? Would he find his classes?  Would he make friends?

I felt sick.

And angry.

And then I took a moment to pause.  A moment to breathe.  I always think about you but especially in September.  I remember that day when you were born and somehow I knew you were there and I felt that perfect indescribable peace. You and God.  It was so real.  So right there I still feel like I can reach out and touch it.  I did all I could to close my eyes and imagine. To be back there.  In that room.  Almost 12 years ago.

Somehow I knew it would be OK.

And it was.

I have a feeling you were with him.

He had an amazing day.

Thank you my sweet, sweet, boy

& happy (almost) 12th Birthday.

I sure miss you more than you will ever, ever know.

All my love,

Mom

The Truth about MY C-Section

Photo credit to Andrew's twin

So there has been this post that I have seen popping up on my facebook page, The 3 truths about C-Sections.  I've been so busy (gosh, I haven't written here since forever) but it got me to thinking.

And thinking.

And thinking...

About mine.

Well I finally read the post.  It was very nice.

1. C-Section mamas are brave

2. C-Section mamas are strong

3. C-Section mamas are beautiful

Ok.  I'm lying right now.  I read the three bolded numbered headlines that I listed for you above but I skipped the nice writing in between.  I assume it is nice (and promise to go back to read it) but again- those three points got me thinking.

And thinking...

And thinking...

About me.

1. C-Section mamas are brave.

Well, my truth be told, I didn't have a choice. I was just going in to be induced when suddenly I was being poked and prodded~ my limbs moving violently (without me commanding them to). I was taken to a room without my husband where I hugged someone I had never met, felt a poke in my back and my entire body went numb. Was I brave really? Did I have some sort of choice?

2. C-Section mamas are strong.

Well, my truth be told, I felt very weak.  A failure really. Sure I had carried my babies to 39 weeks but I couldn't deliver (excuse the pun). I didn't get the opportunity to even feel what a contraction was and whenever I say that part of my story I hear, "Oh, you're not missing anything, trust me!" I really hate that. Because I DID/do feel like I missed something. I didn't feel strong.  I felt like my body had failed me.  That I certainly had failed my boys. And when they told me to get out of bed that first time after surgery, I really thought I would die. Maybe 20 steps is all I took but I felt each and every one of them was going to be my last. Was I strong really? 

3. C-Section mamas are beautiful.

Beautiful is not a word I would have used to describe myself after having had my first c-section, though I certainly wouldn't have known it because I don't recall really looking in a mirror much and when I did, I didn't know who was looking back at me.  She was someone new and foreign and I wasn't sure if I was going to like her much.  I was VERY angry with her. She killed my son. She should have known better.

She failed! Beautiful??? Hardly...

Sigh.

But now I'm a dozen years out (almost anyway- wow)

And maybe I can see it the author's way...

These things take time, but time I have had~

1. C-Sections mamas are brave.

When I went into that hospital to deliver two babies, they/he told me they had both died. I am not someone to question a doctor or any authority (ok~ so I don't like to rock boats), but I did. I questioned that (a-hem) man and because of it, he found out that one of my babies WAS alive. Had I not been brave enough to tell him, would I have labored?  Would my Jonasen had died during delivery because like his brother, he too was wrapped up in cord? MY doctor had said herself had we gone that extra week he wouldn't have been here.

Hell yes, I was brave!

2. C-Section mamas are strong.

Those 20 steps?  I made them. And I took many, many more in new shoes. Shoes I HATED that I had to wear! Shoes that took me to places I didn't know existed- other people's places and stories and sorrow. I still walk those shoes to meet new people each month.  To learn of their strength. To let them know that while they may not feel it yet, they are strong~ I'm comfortable now in my new shoes.

Hell yes, I am strong!

3. C-Section mamas are beautiful.

I've looked in that mirror so much since that first September when I was born (the new me).

I went from hating the woman who killed my son, to thanking her.  

Thanking her for being so damn brave~ being the strongest person I know. 

And yes... maybe even beautiful... scar and all!

As usual with this blog, I turn on my computer, sip some wine and never know where my therapy writing will take me.  I think that for me, my c-sections weren't JUST a way of delivering new babies, they were a way of delivering a new me.

Brave. Strong. Beautiful

And now I'm off to go and read that article!

Hugs,

L