I always hoped New Year's Eve would be some magnificent and incredible night of romance and fun when I was a teenager. Usually it would be a group of us in someone's rec room and I was the one dating the gay boy (his cover) so the romance didn't really work out too well either until university when I met the fella who is now my husband.
When we were dating and then newlyweds we often worked New Year's Eve. As a junior reporter in the newsroom that meant overtime for me and being the only one on the night shift, all by myself listening to the police scanner. I was never sure if I wanted something terrible to happen so I could have a crack at a big front page story or if I wanted it to just be quiet as it was.
We moved back west after university and embarked on parenthood so our hogmanay celebrations were home with a movie and some treats for ourselves. Romantic enough for this homebody. And now, after losing our baby George in May, I find myself longing for ordinary and not really wanting to let go of 2009. In some strange way I feel that in ticking over to 2010 I'm moving even farther away from what little time we had with our George. I don't want to have only the memory of my child - I want him back in my arms - and the more time that passes the more that reality of only having the memories of him hits me I guess.
I'm hoping and praying for everyone to have a kinder and gentler 2010. So many of the babylost mothers I've met through blogs are particularly on my mind and in my heart as I know they are struggling not only with grieving their lost babies, but some with infertility and subsequent babyloss. For all of you especially I pray for miracles and healing and hope.
I'm going to miss hearing all the ships in Burrard Inlet off Vancouver blaring their horns at midnight tonight. Now that we're in the Fraser Valley I guess it will be shouts of jolly neighbours as we peer out toward the mountains in the darkness. Here's a song I've been listening today from one of my very favourite bands, Great Big Sea, that seems to be exactly my hope for 2010. I want ordinary days back and I need to keep the faith and be proud that I might fall, but I won't lie down:
Wishing everyone peace, hope, joy, and love from our house to yours. Christmas 2009 was a happy time for our children, but bittersweet for this bereaved mother. In everything that we've done as a family, I'm so aware that one of us is missing. But we remembered him and my sister and her family remembered George and my father and his wife gifted our children with $100 to spend on Lego as an extra special present in memory of their baby brother.
It's been a green and sunny (instead of rainy West Coast weather) Christmas:
The school Christmas concert, "Shepherds, Sheep, and a Saviour" was a musical treat that we enjoyed for the afternoon and evening performances. Memorable moments include not only my grade four boy who was so chuffed at getting a cast role (not just a part as his grade's song number) as a sheep, but the poor head shepherd boy who threw up during the stinky sheep song, bless his heart, and the jazzy song with the disco ball and lights. I have to say that a nativity that features a disco ball and sunglass wearing sheep and shepherds brings a lot of joy to everyone in the cast and the audience alike:
We walked Albert dog to see a nearby full-size Nativity set on Christmas Eve day as we waited for my husband to finish work and come home to join all of us:
Christmas Eve we went to the 7 p.m. Mass and our oldest boy was an altar server for the second time. The children enjoyed the homily where all the little ones got to go up front and decorate the trees with meaningful ornaments, our five-year-old standing out because he wore his favourite Batman cape over his little dress shirt and pants. Then it was home to bed and they were all exhausted. They were asleep in no time and my husband and I got things wrapped and under the tree, St. Nicholas filled the stockings of course, and I gave George's ashes a pat where they sit on the shelf above our well-protected Nativity set. You'll notice that the Holy Family has nothing to fear because Spiderman is protecting them all from Herod:
Christmas day saw us up at 8 a.m. for stockings, then breakfast and Lego building, then opening the rest of the presents:
Several times the children mentioned their baby brother, happily wishing he was with us for the merriment and fun. I made our turkey and all the trimmings and had a few moments of tears on my own while the children played games with their Daddy in the rec room downstairs. The afternoon and evening saw us all relaxed, as evidenced by the furry member of our household:
So while I was the crazy lady imagining dancing by the Christmas tree with a seven-month-old babe in my arms, I was happy and thankful for the rest of the blessings in my life, including the reason for all the happiness and feasting here the last few days:
I have no sense of direction at the best of times. Fuddle my brain with grief and I think I could get turned around in a room with one entrance.
On Monday I got everyone ready and we headed out to get my oldest son's friend from a daycare in Burnaby. Now, while I know the North Shore quite well I'm still figuring our our corner of the Fraser Valley and not at all experienced with the streets and byways of beautiful Burnaby. Traffic was horrendous (thank you 2010 Olympic road expansion and bridge enhancement projects) and then, you guessed it, I couldn't find the "easy to find" daycare. And as always when we drive my mind goes to George, probably because my other children love car rides and sing along to the music playing and happily watch out the windows. I often end up fighting back tears, which when you're lost and trying to figure out where you're going is decidedly not an asset.
It was like an episode of Sponge Bob when the odd voice says: "Two hours later." Only not funny. We were all getting grumpy, despite the Christmas tunes cranked in the van, and why do I always end up with an impatient tailgater when I'm trying to read the signs on cross streets? Oh, and my cell phone battery was dead again so I couldn't even call to find out why the streets on my Google map and the regular map that were supposed to be accessible off Gagliardi (how does one say that by the way?) were not in this reality feasible roadway options.
By the time we finally got to the daycare I think my son's friend had abandoned all hope of us picking him up. I warned him we were all happy to see him but grumpy after three hours driving - one into the city and then two trying to find the daycare. I also cautioned him that the van stank because our Albert dog is, well, massively stinky and needs a bath and of course we'd brought him along with us for the little road trip.
And so we hosted this borrowed boy for an overnight stay. I found myself getting frantic and snappish as they played and I tried to wrap things I had to mail out of province. Constantly I'm reminding myself to breathe and step back a bit, not get so anxious. It's not like me. Or it wasn't like me until this babyloss blindsided our family. I'm so easily overwhelmed and I'm still trying to do the things I would have done or did before dealing with grief.
The things got posted. The children did well in the post office and there were no brotherly brawls and nothing got tipped over. They sat on the floor and giggled away. And I've been beating myself up ever since for getting impatient with them over my list of things to do and accomplish that had nothing to do with them.
So today, after a lot of time outside on an unusually sunny and not rainy winter day, we made treats. Chocolate, milk chocolate that is, can do a lot to lighten the mood for five little people and an up and down babylost mumma.
I can't take credit for the creative genius behind little cookie puddings that children will eat and that look so darn cute they're perfect for little Christmas giveaways of baked goodies or for dessert tables or place settings. My friend Megan, who moved back to her home city of Melbourne, Australia last year, made them with her children while they lived here in BC to share with their classmates.
Imitation is the highest form of flattery of course.
You just use those little marshmallow puff cookies, top them with stiff icing for glue (I used just icing sugar with a few drops of milk), small red candies for berries, and spearmint leaf candies for holly leaves. Easy. Fun for everyone. Sticky yummy bliss without too much cleaning up.
I wear my special George bracelet all the time now and found that every time I thought of how I wished George was with us for the festive merry-making I would look at my bracelet or play with the medals:
My husband gave me this crystal rosary bracelet for our 16th wedding anniversary. I recently got the name saint medals for our baby boy's names and added them to it so that it looks rather like a charm bracelet. We named George for three saints because we think he'd have been a triple threat to his bigger brothers and sister. He was supposed to be Tim for my father but we couldn't name him that when he died during my labour because my Dad has been widowed twice. So he's named for the saints for the countries our families came from: Saint George for England, Saint Patrick for Ireland, and Saint Andrew for Scotland. I also have a medal for Saint Therese of Lisieux, whose little way to Jesus inspired me as a young girl (a small cup and a big cup when full are both full - we can do small things with great love....) and a tiny crucifix.
We made molded chocolate lollies, which was a huge hit both in the process of making them by squishing melted chocolate into the molds and in the actual eating of the treats.
And now, long after our guest went home with his mother, our surviving children fell asleep, and my husband also turned in for the night, I'm here with a cup of tea, my memories of my George, and a Cadbury Dairy Milk.
Everything can be sweeter with chocolate. Even grief.
****
Here's a fun rendition of the Carol of the Bells. My friend Ellie, who is raising five boys and has seven little souls waiting for her in heaven (you can imagine she has been a constant support to me and source of such strength), sent me this link to her husband (who is a high school teacher) and two of their sons performing at the school Christmas concert:
George should be seven months old today. How I wish I were complaining about sleepless nights as he cut teeth and delighting in his baby babble as he watched his older siblings and the Christmas tree.
I've been playing holiday music in the house on the TV music channels (no picture, just music). This one by Loreena McKinnett is played frequently and I love it. It's called The Seven Rejoices of Mary so of course it seems full of meaning to me as a bereaved mother of a seven-month-old angel baby.
I want to rejoice that my boy is in heaven, but I'm not there with my whole heart yet. The very human mother in me, unlike Mary who submitted so humbly and completely to God's will in her life, wants my son back with me.
When people ask me how I cope with our baby's death I *always* say one of the biggest supports to me is other babylost mothers I've met through blogland.
I first found Sally at Tuesday's Hope through a desperate Google search for something like, "stillbirth, mother, coping" in the wee hours one morning. I read her blog with tears streaming and thinking, I'm not alone. Oh, God, I'm not alone. Look at all these women commenting. It gave me solace and pain all at once to think of all the grieving mothers out there. And then Mirne was the first mother to reach out to me on my blog with a comment. When I was lonely, sad, moved to this new community and isolated in my grief, Mirne was there for me when I was floundering and barely coping. To have someone reach out at a moment like that...I have no words but a heart full of thankfulness.
I am grateful and will be forever to the women who have shared their stories of loss while they listened to mine. The support and understanding is incredible to me. I don't have a lot of time online most days (unless I'm up overnight not sleeping and then I read through as many blogs as I can) but I have tried to add every mother who has ever commented on my blog to my blog list. If you have and don't find yourself it's just because I'm a turnip - or our computer is - and sometimes it doesn't work for me straight away.
It's a beautiful tribute that I treasure. My Grandpa Murphy's favourite hymn was Abide With Me and that runs through my mind as I look at Franchesca's collages and the one she did for my boy. There's something so comforting about seeing my dead child's name written down and remembered.
Here is George's butterfly from sweet Bree, who cannot have known that the day she left me the comment telling me she'd done this for me was a really rough day for me. Seeing her note and then George's butterfly was like a little message from heaven:
To scroll through all the baby names on Bree's blog where she has her Ella's parade of butterflies is beautiful and overwhelming. I never knew how many babies died before we lost our George.
And then one night after I'd slept fitfully I checked my email and got this lovely image from Nimoli at Aaajaa Akul:
She's added our George to her Akul's Fairyland. I love to think of our children playing happily in the hereafter and to connect with Nimoli through our blogs and today on the phone has been a real blessing. Her voice on the phone is every bit as kind as I thought it would be!
The mail this week brought me two lovely items from other grieving mothers. First was this stocking from Ashley, Mackenzie's Mama, who took the time to make this keepsake for our family:
What's interesting is that when we unpacked the Christmas things recently my two oldest boys both commented that we were missing a stocking for their baby brother. When they came home and saw that I'd hung this one from Ashley on the mantle they were so happy! They love it and it made them smile. Danno, who is seven, kept going over to touch it. He smiled and said, "You know, I really wish George was here to see this." We all do.
Then yesterday we got this pretty hand-made heart in a parcel from Jeanette, Florence's mum at Lazy Seamstress:
We immediately put the heart in a special spot out of reach of Albert the dog who was determined to swipe it - do you have pets Jeanette?! - on the Christmas tree. My children were over the moon to find a packet of Cadbury chocolates tucked into that parcel for them. That was so thoughtful and they thoroughly enjoyed them before we went out to their school for the evening performance of their big Christmas pageant. Look at this happy chocolate face and accept a big thank you from all of us:
She would happily come live with you if you let her believe you will always feed her Cadbury chocolates! We don't have the froggy or the fudge ones here unless we pay about six times the cost per bar at a British import shop so they were actually eaten slowly and savoured as extra, extra special.
So a big, big thank you to all of you, named and unnamed, for support and companionship on this sad journey. And special thank you to the mummas who have gifted me with remembrances of our George....and chocolate.
Here's another Newfoundland Christmas carole to end this post on a happy musical note (forgive the cheesy images but I got this off Youtube because it's easy for me to figure out and the song is lovely):
When George died during my labour in May and was stillborn, we were weeks away from closing on the purchase of our first home. We've been married for 17 years but we've always been at the wrong-end of the real estate market wherever we were living. This time, we bought when the market was low, when the mortgage rates were low, and when our family was set to grow again.
We had rejoiced thinking that 2009 was going to be our year. And then we lost our fifth child and what should have been a happy, busy, crazy move was insane and sad.
So there we were the Friday afternoon I was sedated and discharged from hospital, carrying my box of baby mementoes instead of our son, driving from the hospital to the funeral home to make arrangements. We had to get things sorted because my father had booked a flight out the next week for a few days (military fathers like things done chop-chop; he didn't realize that this tight timeframe of his visit was a huge obstacle for us, bless his well-meaning heart).
We sat like stunned robots in the rich wooden chairs with the kindest funeral director. We liked him straight away. He told me he was born in Saskatchewan (I was, too!) and he is a bagpiper (that sold my husband). We suddenly realized that we didn't know where to bury a child because we didn't know where we were going to end up ourselves. The remains of my husband's family members are all in the UK and he's always wanted to have his remains rest with his late father's. My family members are scattered across Canada, some here on the West Coast, some in the prairies, and some back east. We agreed we didn't want to leave our baby buried away from us and then there was the very real consideration that we'd just sunk every single bit of savings into our new house.
As Christians in the Roman Catholic tradition, we have the body of the deceased present in the church for a funeral Mass. If the body isn't there it's a memorial service, not the funeral rite. So while we were going to have George cremated, we needed his little beautiful still body present for the service. And so we selected a casket. Even now I shake my head thinking how surreal it was to admire the tiny little boxes and decide which was the one for our boy. We looked at the urns briefly that day but it was too much for me. I wept uncontrollably and nearly fainted. My husband cut that short and we went home, leaving urn selection for another day.
Fast forward through the funeral and to the day I went to pick up George's ashes. Our older children were at school and the younger two being cared for by a friend. I decided that I would drive over and get our baby's earthly remains. As I pulled up to the funeral home there were picketers out front. At first I couldn't figure out what these people were doing and then I realized they were the funeral home workers. On strike. Out front of the gates with signs, lawn chairs, and a sun tent. The former card-carrying newspaper guild woman in me wanted to stop and sing "Bread and Roses" with them, but the bereft mother in me was conflicted to see people picketing outside where my baby's ashes were waiting for me.
I went inside and was met by a woman who was obviously management covering for the regular front-line staff. It all felt wrong. She ushered me into a side room and went to find George's remains, which were in a plastic bag settled into a neatly labelled plastic container with a twist-on lid. I asked if I could look again at the urns and she walked me over to the display room.
There are, it turns out, only two styles of urn available in all of the Lower Mainland for full-term cremated infants. More options for babies lost earlier in pregnancy, but only two for full-term babies. Others for larger children, but ridiculously large for a baby. Neither my husband nor I cared for the two available styles that first visit when we had been making arrangements. I asked her about some little pewter urns that were simple.
"Oh those? No. Those aren't available any larger. But if you wanted, you could buy a few of them and we could break him up into say three or four of them."
She did. She offered to break up my baby. The room shifted and I felt ill.
"But surely we're not the only parents who've had to cremate a full-term baby? Aren't there other options?" I asked, trying not to get hysterical.
"Mmm. No. Most people bury babies. Maybe you could get a teapot or something."
She did. She said that. That I should put my baby in a teapot. I laughed and she looked at me oddly. I thanked her hastily and left wishing that the nice, caring, normal staff members weren't on strike because surely they wouldn't have offered to break up my child or stuff him into a teapot.
When my husband came home and I cried telling him that there wasn't an urn available to fit that we liked, he went online and began looking. We're Canadian and it turned out that of course in the much more populated United States there are many more options for urns for full-term babies. We browsed around and did find a lovely Japanese-inspired urn but it turned out to be meant for an older child as well. There wasn't anything else that we both felt strongly about and I was beginning to go from crying quietly to losing it. I began to putter and my husband kept searching.
I'm usually the granola-loving, crunchy, recycling and composting, all-natural and back-to-basics kind of gal. My sweet husband, knowing this, found two urn options he announced triumphantly would be perfect. He brought me over to the computer and showed me an all natural and biodegradable paper urn, returning the ashes to the earth. The second option, which he thought was the better choice, was a lovely hand-made wooden birdhouse urn that you hang outside for the wind and the elements to slowly scatter the ashes in a special spot.
I began to weep and shake. He was thinking, and showed me as he explained, that we could place George in a little nook in our new home's backyard. He was imagining birds singing, the older siblings playing, and sunshine in a peaceful sanctuary. I was thinking rainy and cold West Coast days and my baby being left outside, alone. It was too horrible.
I felt awful but I told him how I felt. He was so understanding and I reassured him I totally understood why he'd think these options would appeal to me. I do. He knows me so well. But in this instance, well, I need George with us until we know where we're going to end up some day.
We moved and the question of the urn hung in the balance. My husband found a potter online who makes lovely ceramics, but it's never quite worked out to go and see his shop. I've suggested it a few times but it's not the right time for my good man.
So our George is in a plastic container on a shelf in the built-in cabinet in our dining room. I feel like a bad mother that my baby is in plastic. On a shelf. It's too terrible. But it is. And so I wait and wonder, but trust that we will find something suitable in good time and remind myself that George's soul is safe in heaven. These are just his earthly remains. And it was a tremendous consolation to hear from so many other babylost mothers who commented on an earlier post I made hinting at something bothering me about George's lack of an urn that they also took a while to get things arranged for the final resting places for their babies. I love all of you for your support and kindness. I really do.
:: ::
Here is a favourite lilting, quiet, Christmas song from Newfoundland - from that lovely CD my friend Wanita gifted to me. I found this version on Youtube. I'm sorry that I think you have to scroll down to pause the CD of George's songs on the left of my blog to hear this one, but I think it's worth it. The visuals are a bit cheesy, but have a listen for a lovely song that you likely haven't heard a thousand times (but we have now!):
Most days our children remember their little baby brother, who died in May, with cheerful thoughts. They bring George into conversation, imagining what it would be like had he lived and thinking about including him in things like decorating the house or drawing pictures. It’s rare for them to cry when they mention him now, as they did over the summer and even into early autumn.
The two oldest boys regularly leaf through the Baby George scrapbook, which has a place of honour in our dining room. They still pick up and read the We were going to have a baby but we had an angel instead book. They always include George in their nightly prayers and light a candle for him at church every week.
Our five-year-old boy is fixated on death now, causes and means of death becoming almost an obsession. I don’t know whether to be alarmed or maybe start dressing him as a baby Goth, this little mini-man of ours. He had a very difficult time understanding death and the finality of it at the time our baby was stillborn at full-term, relentlessly asking over and over how his baby brother died. He needed to hear why the baby was dead countless times in the months right after George died, which could be at times excruciating not only for me but for his older brothers who started to get really upset when the repetition started: “We’ve been OVER this!!” or “Why do you want to know that AGAIN?!”
I’ve got to say that our little death-obsessed kindergarten boy is an interesting addition to any social function. With bat-like hearing and a steely gaze that will not be put off, he pounces on any mention of death or loved ones passing, immediately offering that his baby brother died and how before asking a bazillion questions as to how others passed on from this life. He can’t get enough of the details. Photos of grandparents? He’ll ask if they’re living or dead, and if they’ve died, he interrogates like a seasoned journalist. Baby born? He’ll ask if it lived. Mention of a death? Hoo ha does this boy know uncomfortable questions to throw at the bereaved. Other deceased family members of ours? He's got the facts committed to memory now and will rattle off how the great-grans and others died.
I’m hoping it’s a phase.
And then there’s our wee girl. The big sister without her baby on earth, who will now that I think of it sometimes still well up with tears when she tells me she wanted to change her baby’s diapers but never got to help me with that. She amazes me sometimes, how she has come to figure out death and its meaning for her at the tender age of three.
We were at a local playgroup recently and she was playing with the doctor kit, which delights her no end. Another little girl and her mother joined in, helping us examine and treat sick dollies. The other mother said to the girls, “Oh, and hospitals make people better, don’t they? Yes, they do. All better.” My daughter sat back and looked at this other mother quietly, her blue eyes solemn. I watched her as she thought about what had been said. I could see that she was carefully thinking this statement over.
“No. Not always,” she said quietly. Not argumentatively and without any feeling really. She was stating this fact to set the record straight.
“Why sure they do,” gushed the other mother. “Doctors and nurses fix people and make them better!”
My little blue-eyed preschooler met the woman's gaze and said matter-of-factly, “No, not always. Our baby George was born at the hospital and they couldn’t fix him. He died. He wasn’t breathing and they couldn’t help him. He's dead and in heaven. He won't ever live with us.”
Now that, my friends, is a conversation stopper. As sad as it is that my little girl doesn’t have a happy belief that doctors and nurses can fix everyone and cure everything, I’m comforted that she does understand that our baby is gone and not coming back. It’s hard to know what these little surviving siblings comprehend, so to get a glimpse and see that they seem to be coping and adjusting is reassuring that we’ve done something right as we’ve tried to help them understand the stillbirth of their baby brother.
Even if events like this, the morbid next-older brother, and the mumma who is very quick to tears make us the wet blanket trio of dark news and sad tidings to avoid at free community drop-in playgroups.
:: ::
Here is a beautiful advent wreath my oldest son made at art club recently:
It’s such a pretty way to mark the wait for Christmas: Hope. Peace. Joy. Love.
Four weeks in the liturgical year to prepare me for Christmas when really these are four things I long to find in balance in my life again. Is that possible after baby loss??
:: ::
I finally finished the Stolen Moments Wrap for the 25 Day Giveaway. My oldest boy took photos of it draped on my shoulders so I could share it:
It will be packaged up soon and on its way for sweet Margaret at She’s Come Undone. There was one slight glitter glue incident with it…one of my daughter’s crafts from playgroup got, erm, really stuck to the shawl in one spot. I cannot get it off. But gold glitter just accents black wool, right????
Whoa. I love a beautiful Christmas CD my friend Wanita gifted to me a few years ago that is full of really pretty Christmas songs from the eastern provinces of Canada. My mother took her parenting style from the script of Mommy Dearest but she grew up between the West Coast and the East Coast because my Grandpa was in the navy. So while she was a troubled soul she did inspire in me a love of the Celtic-inspired songs from the Maritimes and the Rock.
We all love this particular CD and I play it in the van for most of the Advent season actually. The first song is this beautiful one and listening to it this year these lyrics really hit home in a different way as I face Advent and Christmas after losing a child this year. It's very pretty, and fiddle by Cape Breton's own Natalie MacMaster always bring tears to my eyes. If you want to have a listen, I do have George's CD mix playing and you can pause it by scrolling down on the left before you play this one.
It just spoke to me this morning and I think it's going to be my special song this month. My mantra. Get me through December. Get me through without breaking down.
Please Lord, get me through December. I want to remember our George but keep the holidays sweet and special for our older children. Help me, like Mary, be aware of all these things around me and on my mind, but ponder them in my heart (Luke 2:19) and not as a sobbing mess at some school or church gathering.
Get me through December. Lyrics are under the Youtube link.
GET ME THROUGH DECEMBER
Vocals: Alison Krauss Fiddle: Natalie MacMaster Lyrics: Gordie Sampson & Fred Lavery Based on the melody 'Neil Gow's Lament For The Death of His Second Wife'
How pale is the sky that brings forth the rain As the changing of seasons prepares me again For the long bitter nights and the wild Winter day My heart has grown cold my love stored away My heart has grown cold my love stored away
I've been to the mountain left my tracks in the snow Where souls have been lost and the walking wounded go I've taken the pain no girl should endure But faith can move mountains of that I am sure Faith can move mountains of that I am sure
Get me through December A promise I'll remember Just get me through December So I can start again
No divine purpose brings freedom from sin And peace is a gift that must come from within I've looked for the love that will bring me to rest Feeding this hunger beating strong in my chest Feeding this hunger beating strong in my chest
Get me through December A promise I'll remember Just get me through December So I can start again
I should be finished knitting the wrap this week (again, sorry it's not done but last week had me hopping to get the trivia all formatted....if anyone wants or needs seven rounds of trivia and a tiebreaker round for any events just let me know!!). If you could email me at westcoast3m@yahoo.ca, Margaret, we can make arrangements for me to get the Stolen Moments Wrap to you.
Thank you to everyone for commenting on how people have helped or continue to help you as you grieve the loss of a baby or babies. It was very interesting to read everyone's posts, particularly the day after fighting so hard to stay composed at the school fundraiser.
I think that if I had met this mother anywhere else it wouldn't have been so hard. I would have liked nothing better than to go and meet her again and see her beautiful boy. If I could have talked with her and cried without feeling like I was making a spectacle of myself, it would have been fine. I'd love to have asked to hold him, which definitely would have made me tearful thinking about my George....but holding him would have been healing, too. But to be up in front of the whole room as head judge at the table of judges, well, I couldn't very well be swinging from smiles to tears without appearing completely bonkers to everyone. The adults at this event were having a riotous time with trash-talking and hilarious banter so I just couldn't be the wet blanket on everyone else's good time.
So thanks for listening to my internal monologue about how wistful I was last night. I survived it, numbed sad edges warmed slightly and sponsored by Kokanee and my hand held by my loving husband. It was our first social function at the school and I also didn't want to completely derail the evening for my good man.
I survived. And I am so thankful to everyone who left such nice and consoling thoughts for me to read through today. I have been knitting like crazy since George died and I decided to do a second random.org selection for a pair of Toast arm warmers I did in a lovely blue wool with little flecks of colour. The pattern for these is free and I found it posted on this blog.
So the runner-up Toast knit is for comment 16, left by Franchesca from Handprints from Heaven. If you email me I can pop them in the mail to you because unlike the wrap, these are done and sitting on a shelf in my cupboard.... I'll take a photo of them later and post it up.
And now I guess it's on to another day of the Giveaway! Day Four is sponsored by a fellow Canadian blogging bereaved mum, the lovely Lea at Nicholas' Touch.
I like to knit and so I searched for something that would be meaningful and easy to knit in a few days. I stumbled across a lovely pattern for a wrap called the Stolen Moments Wrap by Amy M. Swenson. I've been knitting a lot since our baby was born still; keeping my hands busy has helped me cope when my arms are empty and shouldn't be.
I think that all of us who are grieving the loss of children have a very deep understanding of Stolen Moments and so the name naturally resonated. Plus, I liked that it is a knit creation that could be worn by mums in freezing winter or in the warmer climates of places on the other side of the world that are heading into their summer and not our winter. I chose a black wool (75% wool, so it is washable and not itchy) because it is elegant and goes with most things.
I don't know about you other babylost mummas, but I have been freezing cold since losing our baby George in May. I'm not usually a warm person, but I am icier than usual. Freezing. Even in the heat of summer I was chilled to the marrow, I think from the shock of losing our baby. So that's the other reason that I thought a wrap would be appropos. I hope that it will warm the heart and extremeties of some other babylost mumma.
I'll choose a winner using the random gizmo that Jeanette at Lazy Seamstress used yesterday. I'll wait till the wee hours of Monday morning, after 12:00 a.m. Pacific Standard Time, so that people both sides of this globe have a chance to enter if they wish.
I have to confess that I'm not finished knitting yet because I was helping with a fundraising trivia night for our children's school. I have written a weekly trivia column for a daily newspaper for nearly 20 years and so I was in charge of all the trivia for seven rounds, plus a bonus round in case we had to have a tie breaker. I also prepared the scoring sheets for the judges and all the answer keys of course. Here is a photo of the wrap so far, at about 1/3 of the way finished:
I'm just home now from my duties as head judge at the fundraiser, held in the parish hall. It was all adults - no school kids - but there was a shadow baby there, a baby born the day after our George was stillborn at full-term.
The mother is a teacher at our children's new school. We had met just days before George was born when I'd driven out to this city to get school uniforms for the older boys for the coming school year at the new school; we'd bought a house and were getting ready to move after the arrival of our baby. In the hallway this woman and I compared very pregnant tummies and talked about our babies. She lives where we used to live and so she wondered if we'd meet at the hospital in a few days.
I'd been hoping for a home birth with this baby but when there was no heartbeat when my contractions were 20 minutes apart we dashed the few minutes to the hospital only to have our worst fears confirmed.
Wouldn't you know that the day after our son was born, this other mother laboured outside my room on labour and delivery while my boys came in to the room (where I'd been kept) so they could hold their baby brother's body, brought up from the morgue. She and her mother and husband saw my children in their school uniforms for their old school and she recognized them. They asked excitedly, "What did your mum have? A boy or a girl?" My husband didn't know who they were exactly, but smiled wanly at them and shepherded our sad little boys out of the labour and delivery ward. My oldest son told me later, "Mum, I didn't mean to be rude but I didn't answer her. I didn't think a new mum would want to hear our baby died." Children have way more insight than we give them credit for at times.
So meeting this lovely little baby boy has made this a hard night for me. Seeing this boy just one day younger than our George was bittersweet and brought what should of and could have been right to the forefront of my brain. The other judges selected this family's table as best dressed (it was a western theme) and our priest asked if I would crown everyone with their prizes of 2010 Olympic toques. I couldn't do it and told him why. When they came up and the crowd went wild applauding for this darling little baby dressed in cowboy duds, I was in the ladies room having a cry.
I've had four Kokanee beers, more than I've had to drink in ages after so many years breastfeeding and being pregnant. But while I did cry, I didn't break down in public and I was able to smile at that little shadow baby and his happy, proud mother. I'm not angry or upset their baby lived, I am just longing for George. I did drink enough to take the edge off my pain but I didn't drink myself silly. Watching them carrying him, his sweet little self smiling in delight at the crowd gathering in the parish hall and being passed from one person to another, wrenched my heart because I thought of the little soul who should have been in my arms, nestled in the sling, with us at that event as a breastfed nursling, too.
I'm grateful to the mothers I've met at the new school who know about George who saw this baby and realized it might be hard for me. They came to me quietly during the night to ask how I was and to give me a hug. It means a lot to me to have that support. And it goes without saying having my husband beside me at the table of judges was an enormous reason I got through the night. He held my hand and loved me through the rough patches.
So if you leave a comment to win this Stolen Moments Wrap, I'd love to know what special things people did or have done or continue to do for you and your husband or family to help you through the grief of losing your baby or babies. Several things come to mind for me, most of which I posted about for the September Secret Garden Meeting so I won't rewrite them now.
Sorry for the rambling post. That's what happens when I'm up alone in the wee hours, sad and slightly tipsy.
What I wanted to post about, what's on my mind, is just too sad for me still. I have to mull it over some more I guess. It's about George's urn, or lack thereof, and how it troubles me that his ashes are in the plastic container from the funeral home.
But I can't. I'm sitting here while my two little ones play, and I can't.
So instead, like I seem to be all the time lately, I'm trying to push away the dark thoughts and concentrate on the little moments of joy during my day.
This FAMILY ornament that Danielle sent me as a giveaway for blogging about her trying to get a birth certificate for her baby boy, Wyatt. I have it in our sunroom and it fits in with all the natural woods and green tones. We love it. Thank you.
It's rainy and cold here so I'm thankful for my lululemon hoodie and underwears (the softest, cosiest leggings - also lululemon - I'm living in them till spring) - but need a bit more warmth so hence the wool socks. Or Nipigon nylons if you please.
I'm happy with this straw bag I got at a thrift sale at our parish. I went late and it was $1 to fill a bag of whatever you like (that's my kind of shopping!). I love this for carting around my knitting and my tea mug. I still have to put it up very high when I'm not using it because our Albert dog likes to steal my wool. I guess he is an Old English Sheepdog....
I'm looking forward to participating in Tina's 12 Days and more giveaway. I'm trying to find a fun pattern to knit up. What to do.... After so much sadness in 2009 I'm thankful to Tina for her inspired idea to spread some cheer.
Remember Nana in Peter Pan? Our Albert dog is always nearby, watching over us, his human flock. I can't help but smile at his goofy face (I'll have to get a photo of how he sits with his rather huge tongue lolling out one side). He's stinky and my kindergarten boy and preschooler are lobbying hard to have Albert take a bath with them this afternoon. They think I'm being mean and impractical holding firm that they may *NOT* bathe with the dog no matter how stinky he may be. That's why he's beside the tub, not in it with them.
I'm wearing this skirt today, which was part of my $1 finds at the church sale. It said dryclean only, but I didn't see why the cotton and lining needed drycleaning. I took a chance and washed it in cold water and it's fine. I love it. And there is Albert's nose in the photo.
Good and bad. Happy and sad. Up and down. That's the day-to-day of a babylost mum I guess.
Life changes so quickly, in good, sad, tragic, or happy ways of course.
Shortly after I wrote this post about my perhaps completely crazy decision to work a night or two a week overnight at a nearby coffee place, I suddenly got a lot more work to write content for business websites. The web designer I write for hadn't had work for me much over the summer (probably a good thing given I was in the trenches of dealing with babyloss) so I decided if I wasn't sleeping anyway I'd go out and work a little bit.
Well, I gave my notice two weeks ago. I'm sad to leave those lovely women I worked with those nights for a few months. I really am. They were so nice and kind when I needed to be around supportive women. I had time to grieve as I went about the work in the quiet of the night and they let me be. They asked about George and his story, and I am so full of gratitude for their compassion.
Oh, and the zany car of mean-spirited women I'd written about? They did come through the drive through another time before my final shift. I didn't have the intestinal fortitude to ask what had happened after they'd enraged the man behind them in the line-up that one night and he took off with screeching tires and blaring horn after them....but they were as meek and kind as painted up kittens on that subsequent visit (that's catty of me to say - hah - intentional pun - I'm lame, I know). No monkeying around with their order, no insulting remarks, no adding to the order at the window. Interesting the paths that cross in life sometimes.
I have more work, it seems like more coming in the months ahead, and just today accepted an editing job for a wonderful friend who is doing PhD work. So I'll still no doubt be up in the wee hours, working when I'm not remembering or thinking about my George. I'm thankful for the diversion and the added income. And being able to work from home of course.
Six months since his heart was beating. And incredibly, despite the pain, mine still beats on, clocking the 19th of each month.
Six months since George was in my arms. And still. And then I got to hold him a little while the 20th, the day after his stillbirth, so his brothers could meet their baby brother.
Remembering our last contact on this earth, baby boy, at the visitation and then your funeral. How I longed to pick you up from that casket and cradle you in my arms just once more. But I didn't. I unwrapped your little fingers and held your cold little hand and admired your long fingers. I touched your soft cheek and peeked again at your downy brown hair, trying make the most of our short time together.
Love to the sky and missing you so much sweet boy. Thinking of you always despite the tide of opinion that a mumma with other children should not feel sad. How stupid can anyone be that they think I would not miss your sweet self? That I would not mourn your death bitterly? Despite the joy your siblings bring, you are missing. Having surviving children does not negate your presence in my life and the crushing sorrow that your absence from it has left.
Six months post-partum with an angel baby is a sad and crazy place to be. I pretend now I'm managing but I'm not. Not really. Inside, I'm crumbling and fighting to regain a bit of how I used to be. Clinging to faith. Hoping you'll come to me in my dreams.
Not just any crackers, and not all the time. Though I often feel as though I teeter between dancing on the edge and complete disbelief and numbness I haven't completely lost my mind yet. But like everything, it seems, babyloss has even made my biggest craving from pregnancy a bittersweet reminder of my stillborn baby boy.
While expecting George I craved WASA bread crackers. The original whole wheat ones. Plain.
Oh, they tasted so good. Like magic, only better. I munched on them constantly, loving not just their taste but the satisfying crunch. These WASA crackers were the first thing I would reach for in the morning, my constant snack of choice, and preferred for night-time nibbling over anything else including potato chips or chocolate. Yes, that's true. I would choose to eat a plain whole wheat cracker over chocolate. Even Swiss milk chocolate. My husband tried to tempt me but failed where WASA triumphed.
I ate these crackers so much that my husband teased me that my incessant munching and crunching made me sound like a demented rodent. He thought I'd get tired of the plain original kind and brought home rye and multigrain. I ate those as well, but they weren't as good as the plain whole wheat. Not by a long shot. I was eating one package or, ahem, more a day.
I thought this baby, our fifth child, would be a true little West Coast granola child. I envisioned him eating these crackers with me one day, spurning unhealthy snacks as he balanced his love of whole grain goodness with fresh, locally grown produce.
But he died during my labour and I'm devastated by this loss. So now thinking of this craving makes me sad and wistful. I haven't eaten these crackers since George was born silent. I don't know if I will some day again, but I do know that even thinking about eating them is making me cry.
I'd heard good things about Pixar's new animated movie Up! in the summer but then a friend told me she heard there was a pregnancy loss involved in the film and we might not want to see it with the children. I didn't know enough about it at that time to make a decision.
It's a beautiful movie. We rented it over the weekend. My husband got it and I decided to keep quiet about what I'd been told about the possible babyloss element. Near the end of summer I had read a news story about a dying girl whose last wish was to see the film and Pixar got a DVD to her home and she watched it before she passed away. I figured if her mother let her see it and found it helpful, well, that was good enough testimony for me and our grieving family.
****spoiler alert****
The movie starts with a little boy named Carl, crazy for an explorer on the silver screen, who meets his match in another little adventure fan named Ellie. They become fast friends and ultimately wed. Their romance and relationship is portrayed very sweetly and then they are decorating a nursery. Our children watched happily as things unfolded.
It then cuts to the couple in an obstetrics office, with Carl comforting a crying Ellie. Immediately our children related to this and our oldest son said, "Oh. Their baby died."
My husband, interestingly, immediately said, "They didn't lose a baby. They can't have babies." I had thought as well that they'd been pregnant (or why start to decorate a room?) and had a loss, only to find out subsequent pregnancies weren't going to happen.
Either way, it's loss and we know first-hand how babyloss hurts. It was poignant and sad and I got quite choked up with the next few scenes of Ellie mourning this new reality she's found herself in.
Then things move along and the main part of the movie chronicles Carl's life after Ellie's death. It's an inspirational tale of grief and sorrow for love lost and how to cope as life continues. Amazingly, Pixar strikes this delicate balance of being comforting without being preachy or saccharine (I'd feared that now that it's Disney-Pixar I must confess). And while it's a message full of hope, it's a message for all ages and all backgrounds and all faith traditions really because it's not about religion or healing. It's about continuing to live while missing what you've lost.
If you like dogs, you'll probably love the character of Dug the dog as much as we did and all the rest of the canine-inspired comedy.
We needed to see this film. It was beautiful for each one of us and it was so wonderful to feel so sad about that moment in the film - a moment that really normalizes things for our surviving children - and then laugh uproariously through the rest, always knowing that Carl's love for Ellie endures.
I'm up in the wee hours, thoughts swirling, having just settled our feverish little daughter to sleep. She is the latest one hit by the H1N1 in our house, bless her wee heart. I had intended to bundle up the children and take them to the Cenotaph this morning for the Remembrance Day Ceremony here. I'm still not feeling well, but my cough and discomfort seem small in comparison to the agony suffered by so many of our soldiers in the First and Second World Wars. But now that our preschooler is sick and the rain is pouring outside I'm thinking we'll have to watch the Remembrance Day coverage on television today. Or one of us stay with our little sickie and the other take the boys to the Cenotaph.
But however the morning unfolds, we will remember.
My thoughts are with my grandfathers, who both served our country in the Second World War and survived against all odds. Our maternal Grandpa was a navigator aboard a Lancaster Bomber that was shot down over German-occupied France. He and another flight officer were hidden by an American actress living there, along with other Allied soldiers, for months. She had married a Frenchman and worked with the Resistance, saving my Grandpa's life. Our paternal Grandpa survived his naval ship being torpedoed twice and then lived through horrendous conditions in a Japanese prisoner of war camp. He returned to Canada with his 6 foot 5 inch frame much emaciated but somehow his gentle nature intact.
One of my favourite memories is of a time both grandfathers visited us where we lived on a tiny radar station in Northern Manitoba. The two Grandpas were wonderful storytellers, and never more so than after a visit one Friday night with our military father to the Officers Mess. The three of them returned home, three sheets to the wind, the Grandpas glowing from having been properly toasted as retired military men and war heros. It was grand. They were grand, always making us feel so loved.
Naturally this year, having lost our infant George at birth mere months ago, my thoughts are with my maternal Grandmother. She had lost her baby Dan and was expecting her rainbow baby, my father, during the war. I can't imagine her anxiety as she mothered her preschooler, my auntie, mourned her baby and had no idea whether the telegram informing her Grandpa was missing in action meant he was alive or dead.
I think of all the men and women who served, and of all the wives and mothers and sweethearts and families left to mourn.
World War One saw 628,736 Canadians serve and of those 66,573 died. An additional 175 merchant seamen died by enemy action.
Not long after 1,031,902 men and 49,963 women served Canada in the Second World War. Of those, 44,927 were killed and another 1,146 merchant seamen died by enemy action.
Korea, the second war in which my maternal grandfather saw combat, had 26,791 Canadians fighting, 516 of whom died.
The Gulf War had no Canadian casualties despite 3,837 men and 237 women serving. The last count I saw for Canadian casualties for Afghanistan was 133.
That's a lot of sorrow for our nation alone. Think of all the others lost from all the other countries, of all their loved ones. Of those still fighting and their families. I pray that our soldiers get to come home from the current conflict soon.
When I was a teenager I made the military men in my life unbelievably happy when I joined Air Cadets one year. They were thrilled to see me, my alternative girl, dyed-burgundy hair scraped back and my usually flamboyant eyeliner tamed considerably, in uniform and awarded Best First Year Cadet. I never admitted to them that this enrolment had more to do with a certain boy wearing combat boots than it did with military tradition. No matter.
So that rainy November 11th as a corporal in Air Cadets, I got to march with my Major Dad and my maternal grandfather in the Remembrance Day parade. It was cold and sombre, as it should be. Then after the ceremony the three of us joined the ranks of many at the Legion. Remembrance Day was also that Grandpa's birthday, which he loved as he always had the day off and the afternoon to spend with other war vets. That year I got to be one of the boys for the afternoon, listening to war stories and raising a glass to fallen men and women. Celebrating that Grandpa's special day with him and toasting my other Grandpa on the West Coast. It was lovely.
As corny as it sounds, I picture in my mind my grandfathers with our baby George today. I hope they share with him their stories of war, of why our world needs an end to conflict. May they have a wonderful post Remembrance Day party with all their buddies up there, with George at their side. My boy who will never see battle or hardship, who will never have to realize first-hand the extent to which seemingly ordinary people can be so inhumane.
Well, Murphy is at it again. I have this theory that Murphy's Law hits me harder because I am a Murphy.
This week I was planning to take the children to get the free H1N1 vaccine. I know many people are conscientious objectors and I'm okay with that; we all have to make the choices we can live with for our own families. Interestingly, my husband has always been against the flu vaccines until this year. I suspect because, although he hasn't said, he can't imagine the worst case scenario of losing another child.
They've got us on fear. Had George lived, we would have qualified for the vaccines last week. But he didn't and so this week was the week for children over five in our province. I could have had our daughter vaccinated last week but I thought I'd wait and do the group thing. And this brings me to Murphy's Law.
Our five-year-old boy got very sick Saturday night. This is the non-stop action mini-man who doesn't ever cease talking or moving from when he wakes till he falls asleep. He sat on the couch staring at us and spiked a fever of 104. Poor little guy had fever chills and the cough started. We loved him through the night and he was worse Sunday. The vomiting started and he could not keep anything down. A few sips of liquid had him heaving till there was nothing left. We'd bring the fever down and it would spike again. He took to his bed and slept fitfully.
I called 8-1-1 to talk to the BC healthlink nurse and went over his symptoms. She advised I have him assessed and so we bundled him up and I took him to the ER at the local hospital, which is brand new and very nice. We didn't have to wait long in the swanky new waiting area of the ER.
Forget TV. We live in an interesting city, one where university students, biker gangs, farmers and Mennonites, a huge Sikh population, and all manner of other folk mix and mingle. Morris was suitably horrified and impressed with the awful wounds of an older gent who was attacked by a pitbull. He noticed the black bonnets of Mennonite grannies and the turbans worn by two Sikh men. He watched a man hop into the ER because he hurt his ankle on the soccer pitch.
And then the S&M gang came in. Ah, life is not dull when you have watchful children who adore eavesdropping. A rather geeky looking trio came in and the injured man had a very badly dislocated shoulder. His friends supported him and sat him in the only available chairs, across from us. He thanked them for getting him and bringing him to hospital and then proceeded to describe, in great detail, how he got injured while at a huge S&M party in town. By the time he got to, "You should have seen the guy they had over the sawhorse" I decided Morris needed to visit the bathroom.
There are some things I just don't want to explain to my boy right now.
And of course while we were in the bathroom they called for us. Naturally. We wait nearly an hour and in the five-minute window when we're in the bathroom, that's when they call his name. Fortunately they checked for us again and off we went to paeds. The doctor was fantastic and the nurses very kind and he was rehydrated successfully. We're home and he's feeling much better, thrilled to stay home from kindergarten and have Daddy stay home today and tomorrow.
Because now I'm sick.
I guess on the bright side we'll have our immunities the old-fashioned way now and I don't have to go stand in any queues for vaccine.
There's not much comfort for bereaved parents. But I have to say that when I was left alone on the labour and delivery floor after they took our baby George's body to the morgue and my husband left to break the news to our children that George had died, I kept thinking, "He went gently."
He died while I laboured and I didn't know.
But he went gently.
He died and he's not in my arms. He's not coming home.
But he went gently.
This isn't how it was supposed to be. It was a beautiful labour.
But he went gently.
Oh, the lamentation and shock of that first night. Remembering it now makes me shake. The next day, before my husband got the boys from school to come and meet their little brother and hold his body to say hello and good bye, I stared at the TV mindlessly. I wasn't really watching it. Then a story about a little girl named Tori abducted in Ontario came on the news and I watched, sobbing for her parents. This little elementary school girl was taken by a woman from her schoolyard and police felt now that this was a murder investigation. They were right, by the way. It is.
My boy went gently. He went gently.
I worked in a newsroom during the infamous Paul Bernado and Karla Homolka trials. I was far too junior to cover anything related to these horrendous cases, where a young couple abducted, tortured, and murdered young girls. But I sat near editors who talked over every single detail of the case, including parts that weren't allowed to be published but of which reporters were aware. It was dreadful. Awful. Too horrible for words what those girls went through in their final minutes on this earth. I cried for those young girls and their families then and think of them now, of other families of missing and hurt children, but now with the rawness of being a grieving mother myself.
George went gently. So gently that I had no idea his life had slipped away from us. He was surrounded by love. As I laboured in those early hours I smiled at my tummy through contractions and told him how excited everyone was going to be to meet him. I remember saying, as the rushes of contractions became stronger and I was in the shower, feeling him move gently in my womb, "Not too long now, little guy, till we meet face to face."
For nine months we had loved this little boy and he had been told countless times by us as we patted and rubbed and wondered at my growing belly. I treasure the Sunday I spent before he was born, resting with my daughter as we slept and talked to her unborn sibling as he moved and stretched within me.
A friend from high school I haven't spoken to since we were teenagers asked on Facebook if she could call me during the summer. Shontelle and I spoke that day for ages and she was such a comfort and has continued to be in this journey of grief. I didn't know, because I'm a military brat and moved every few years so I didn't grow up knowing Shontelle, that her next oldest brother disappeared when he was five and she was two. She and her other two brothers have grown up, and her parents have continued raising children and living day to day, never knowing what happened to their son Adrien. Nothing has ever been found and they don't know if he was lost and drowned or abducted. She understands grief and loss and I think often of her mother. An aged photograph of her brother was recently released and I hope and pray they do find out what happened to him. I can't imagine the horrible limbo of not knowing. Did he die as a young boy or is he out there in this world somewhere, a grown man of 42?
There is some comfort in knowing that my son died quietly and surrounded by love. I know where he is; his ashes are with us in our house until some day when my husband and I have our final resting place. Then George's earthly remains can join ours at that spot.
Yesterday was a hard day for me. It started off all right and then at kindergarten we parents were asked to help our children write the name of a deceased loved one in a special prayer book for them to remember as we've just had the feasts of All Saints and All Souls. It caught me off guard and I had to gulp back tears as I tremblingly wrote out George's name in the book. I kept it together when we said good bye to my kinder boy but I lost it by the time we got to the van.
I was trying to get my preschool daughter buckled into her seat and the tears were flowing when another mother I don't know well came up to offer me a pair of hand-me-down boy shoes. I couldn't hide that I was crying and she was so kind. I could barely speak I was crying so hard, I just managed to squeak out that since we're new to the city and school I didn't know if she knew that we'd lost a full-term baby boy in May but I was having a hard day.
She had this look of complete understanding. Her eyes filled and she whispered, "I know. It's hard. I lost a baby girl at seven months along in my pregnancy two years ago." She opened her arms and hugged me as we wept together. I cried as I haven't for weeks, sobbing and snorky (why oh why cannot I not cry without my nose pouring????). We talked a bit more, sharing our stories of loss as my wee girl listened, looking very sage for a little one of three, and the mother gave me her number. She also pointed out her sister-in-law across the parking lot who lost a baby boy last year.
I came home, still weepy and sad and sniffing. I told Mairi we would play on Poisson Rouge (Red Fish), which is a brilliant website for preschoolers full of art and pre-reading and pre-math and music and NO ADS. Our homepage is for CBC news and I immediately saw a story about Madeleine McCann, the little British girl abducted from Portugal. Her parents still don't know if she is alive or dead or where she is.
These images of missing and murdered children keep resurfacing, as if to remind me it could be worse. My heart aches for these poor children taken from loving families, and for their siblings and parents left behind wondering and sorrowing.
If I had to choose my circle of hell, I would stay as a babylost mumma because I know my son went gently and I know where he is. It's a small consolation, but it is a comfort knowing what I do know about my child's death. I cannot imagine the nightmare for the McCanns and other parents of missing children and I pray they find their girl soon.
Halloween is interesting for us because - and no I'm not kidding - it's our wedding anniversary.
Yes, we knew it was Halloween when we decided on the 31st as a lovely date to be married in October. We just didn't think it was a big deal. It was the only date that we could get the church and the Officers' Mess in October. We wanted October, I wanted the parish church I went to weekly, and my father was hell-bent on the Officers' Mess for the reception and open bar. Open bar was a huge deal to him.
So. This year made it 17 years since that Saturday we were wed on Halloween, that date when friends went from our reception (drunk from the open bar) to Superpub at university. When our Chinese best man wearing a kilt didn't get the attention he had wanted because passersby just thought he was dressed up for trick-or-treating. He stood on that downtown street in Ottawa screaming, "People! I'm a Chinese man in a kilt! And I'm wearing it properly!"
I can't believe in some ways that it's been 17 years. In other ways, after all we've been through, it seems it should be longer. The biggest shock for us was realizing that we were 19 when we met and started dating, and if we've been married 17 years that means we've been together 19 years. Oh my. We've been together as long as we were old when we met. I think I just got more white hair on my head.
We spent our anniversary day getting our little trick-or-treaters ready for a party in the afternoon and then the good-food-before-candy-gorging before we headed out to trick or treat. We were well protected by Obi Wan Kenobi and young Anakin, menaced by Darth Vader's Secret Apprentice (our five-year-old boy is so the Dark Side), and a princess who said she was Princess Leia but really had funky boots and a witch's dress on. And Albert dog wore pink fairy wings because he is secure in his masculinity and looked very cute in them.
My oldest son sidled up to me as we were just about ready to head out into the night to go door to door and asked me, "Mum, if George were here, would he wear the elephant costume?" I said, "Oh, definitely. That's tradition. Every child in our family has to wear the elephant costume as a little one." He smiled and that was that. I find it interesting that the children, just as I do, seem always to think of what should have been or what might have been. Their little brother is in their thoughts without my prompting, which gives me a sad joy.
Sunday was the Feast of All Saints and today is the Feast of All Souls. I think of our George constantly any way, but naturally every special occasion is bittersweet. I went to Mass with the children on Sunday (my husband stays home and watches NFL football) and we lit candles for George and other dead babies. I'd been worried about teaching the children's liturgy during the service, fearing I'd think about George and start to cry.
What was interesting was that several children in the group of about 50 asked to pray for dead siblings. There are many children who, like ours, have lost siblings. It was a bittersweet moment to watch these little kids turn to each other and say, "Oh, you too? You've lost a baby?" and share their stories of death and grief with simple honesty. I did get teary, but I kept it together as I listened and led them in prayers for angel babies and family members left to mourn. Truly, I think a couple of the other children started to feel jealous as we prayed for these little angel babies and I'm not sure but I think one little girl made up a dead baby sister just to fit in - her mother wasn't in the room but she looked as though she was fibbing and her friends looked at her funny. But who knows? Maybe there is an angel in her family and I certainly am not going to question that. We prayed and I thought that even if she didn't have a sister who died there are many other babies who have so so our prayers are lifted up for them and their families.
Life with babyloss is so paradoxical; all these moments of sorrow interspersed with joy and laughter. But always an awareness of what is missing.
If I could have a different birth outcome, and our sweet boy in my arms now.
But they don't, and I can't. George is gone and not coming back. Something I have to keep, painfully, explaining to our youngest two children who can't quite conceptualize the finality of death. Every time I think they understand, they ask when we get to see him again.
Generous friends and family donated enough money in George's memory for there to be a star added to the memorial wall on the labour and delivery and maternity floor at the hospital where he was born after he died suddenly and inexplicably during my labour. I haven't seen it in person yet; we've moved about an hour away and honestly I think I'd be a sobbing mess to be that close to it and so near to where we delivered our stillborn child. But a kind woman at the hospital named Gillian generously took photos for me. I'm so grateful because I never worked with this woman when I worked for the health authority years ago. She took photos for me out of genuine helpfulness and compassion when I was arranging a gift certificate donation to nursing staff from my friend's spa.
The photo above is a glimpse of the tribute wall, with many little stars signifying donations made in memory of babies born who lived and memorial stars for babies who died. This photo below is our George's own little star. It says "In memory of George Patrick Andrew..." and notes that he was born and died on May 19 of this year:
I couldn't bear the thought of useless flowers piling up in our house, just weeks before we were moving into our new house. While flowers are pretty and the thought behind sending them kind, what practical use are blooms and petals amid packed boxes and mourners? I know personally that I was in no state to appreciate botanical beauty. Truthfully I gave flowers sent with love from friends and family to our church and to neighbours and mothers who were generously helping our family because I knew that other people could appreciate the scent and loveliness of what we could not.
Within days of George's death we asked instead that people consider putting the money they would have spent on flowers to work to help other babies and children:
IN MEMORIAM: We would really appreciate, if you'd like to do something in our son's memory, that you donate to a charity instead of sending flowers. Please donate to the charity of your choice or consider one of these three ideas for people to consider that we feel would be meaningful to us, our wee angel, and his four siblings:
* Because we've had such exceptional, loving care from our midwives, the Midwives Association of British Columbia - http://www.bcmidwives.com/support.htm Address: #204-636 West Broadway, Vancouver, BC V5Z 1G2; Phone: ( 604) 736-5976; Email: mabc@telus.net
* Because the staff at Lions Gate Hospital labour & delivery and maternity are so compassionate, the Lions Gate Hospital Foundation - https://www.lghfoundation.com/files/donations.html You can ask for funds to be directed to labour & delivery or maternity and in memory of George Patrick Andrew.
* Because our children love soccer - and we're Canadian and family outings often involve a treat from Tim Horton's - and we're sure our little son would have delighted in Timbits soccer and eating actual Timbits like his big brothers and sister, the Tim Horton's Childrens Foundation for soccer, hockey, or camps - http://www.timhortons.com/ca/en/goodwill/childrens_about.html
I'm so thankful to the people who took the time and made the effort and actually made a donation in our son's memory.
I don't have my baby, but his memory lives on. And instead of flowers that turn brown and die, their contributions have helped people and soothed this sad mumma's heart because now her angel baby has his own wishing star.
I am the mother of three lively little boys, one little girl, and a beautiful baby boy waiting for us in heaven. We lost our fifth child, who was full-term and stillborn, in May 2009 and are still struggling through grief as a family. We live on Canada's west coast and I try to fit time in every day to write in some capacity. I am a former staff writer for a daily newspaper, now freelance. I also do transcription for university profs, PhD, or Master's candidates. I'm Catholic and love being a mum. Someday I'll get a novel written.
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