"I will praise the one who's chosen me, to carry you"
-Selah: I will carry you

Sunday 25 August 2013

Obligatory sympathy

I have noticed recently, on social media, that people have stopped commenting so much on some of my posts- specifically the difficult, sad, grief loaded ones.  Me being me, I decided to observe as much on my latest status.  I got the expected reassurances from friends who are "still listening just not commenting" which is fine, but in amongst them was an honest, not unkind, comment that took me by surprise: "unbroken humans get bored/tired of hearing about the despair of others after the obligatory sympathy period"*  The words themselves didn't surprise me, I had figured that much out for myself, but the fact that someone would actually say it suprised me. And it's made me decide to write about this concept of the "obligatory sympathy period".

I understand, now I am here, what people mean when they say the second year is in some ways harder than the first. People have by now expected you to move on, stop sharing your grief, it's making us all uncomfortable.  Be British about it and pretend it never happened. The "obligatory sympathy period" is over and we don't want to hear it any more. Nor will we remember when we wake up on September 18th, why it's a difficult day for you,  we have gone on with our lives, our worlds have carried on, and they don't include your son. Sounds harsh, doesn't it? But I do believe it is true. Good friends will reassure me that they don't feel this way...yet. But I expect there will come a time when they do. It's human nature.  People don't want to keep witnessing and being reminded of horrible pain/misfortune/despair. It's easier to hide it, turn a blind eye, forget it and go back to whatever they are up to at the moment.  

I wish I could.  I wish my life, my whole life, would not now be tempered by this cataclysmic event. I wish my life weren't divided into "before he died" and "after he died" But it is.  I can't feel momentary sympathy, then forget it and go back to my cornflakes. This is my life, forever.   I wonder if I will ever reach the point of wanting to not talk about it? Of wanting to pretend he didn't happen?  I have family members who I believe have reached that point already. Maybe it's a generational thing, maybe it's because I'm his mum...but I don't believe I ever will. Maybe though, just maybe, I will at some point feel able to keep a lid on it, to not feel the need to remind everyone else that he DID exist and it DOES hurt like hell that he isn't in my arms now.  Until I reach that point, thankyou to those who still feel able to listen, and a bigger thankyou to those who still talk to me about it.

I don't want obligatory sympathy, or generic responses of condolence and platitude. I want friends, true friends, who genuinely care about me and my life....and most of all, my son. 

I just want him to be remembered.

* I am not using this post to have a go at the person in question at all, I have included the comment purely to show the context of my writing today.

Thursday 22 August 2013

Insanity?


"Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again, and expecting different results"
-Albert Einstein 

No wonder I feel like I'm going crazy. This is what we are doing, the same thing over and over and hoping the result will be different. But what else is there but to give up? When does "I'm doing everything I can and still this isn't happening" become "I am not going to put myself through this any more"   When do I depart the crazy train? Would I ever? Could I ever? The desperation is not going to go away. I can't decide to stop trying and be at peace with that decision. And yet, I am doing everything I can...there is nothing different I can try now....so I am stuck in insanity, doing the same thing over and over and over again....until, I suppose, the end of the line. Only, I don't know where the line ends. 

Tuesday 20 August 2013

Prince George



Earlier today I opened the BBC news web page to be greeted by a beautiful photo of Prince George and his proud parents beaming into the camera. It's a relaxed shot, not the typical stuffy "official" posed photos. It's beautiful actually, and it triggered a meltdown. And now I am asking myself why? Why is this baby, who I will never meet, such a trigger? When I've been getting better with baby photos lately. They dont make me cry, sometimes I even smile. I can even stop myself muting the TV when certain adverts come on, and I'm ok....so why this baby? why today?


Is it because I'm feling fragile anyway, with September looming? Is it because there's been so much media coverage of this particular birth? Is it because it makes me think of my own son, who was conceived just before they got married? Maybe it is all of those things in part. But the main thing, I think, is not the baby himself. It's the parents. Their beaming faces are the picture of parental happiness and pride.....the feelings I have been cheated of and so long for again.  I do not resent them, or any other new parents for that matter, their happiness. But, sadly, their happiness reminds me of my own lack of it. And that is what makes it so hard.  Particulaly right now, as I am losing hope that I will ever feel that happiness again.

"Every new parent knows how this feels" An innocent remark from a new dad as he leaves the hospital with his wife and son. No your Royal Highness, they don't. I don't. Nor do countless other stricken families who are suffering the same torment I am. I feel such sorrow for the parents of the babies lost the day the prince was born.  It must be unbearable for them right now.

Sunday 18 August 2013

How do you find hope when hope is gone?

18th August 2013. One month to go until Bertie's second birthday. Another year has passed, and I am still in the same place.   I still cannot believe I am here, that this is my life. And yet, I can no longer imagine any other life, any alternative path. It has been so long now that I can no longer imagine myself with my rainbow.  I cannot picture the scene, I have no idea of how it will feel. I have an overwhelming sense that it won't happen. That I am never getting my rainbow.  I feel no closer, even though we are being treated, as nature has given me her monthly slap in the face, we've been knocked back three squares on the game board, again.

I am losing hope.

I know people try longer than me, I know miracles happen, I know it has "only" been twenty months of trying for this baby.  I know. But, it's been four years of wanting to be a mum, four years of committing myself to bringing my baby home, and I have nothing to show for it but grief. A forever bed to tend. A memory box. Will it ever be anything more? Will I ever be anything more than a grieving mother?

Hope is fading fast that I will. And, my faith is being stretched beyond endurance. After two years of desperately trying to cling to my faith, I am but a snapped thread away from declaring "I am done with You!"  I feel God has answered my prayers with a resounding NO! Not only that but I am tormented every day by other families, other pregnant women, people in that alternate universe of success.  Rubbing salt in my wounds, through no fault of their own, simply by receiving what I am being denied. My faith is not as strong as Job's. I am failing the test. And that is just as big a loss as the loss of hope. As the loss of my son. As the loss of me.

I don't know where to go from here and I don't know how to get through this.  In the words of Audrey's song: "People say that I am brave but I'm not....truth is I'm barely hanging on."

Sunday 11 August 2013

Second year grief

"To have a child is to forever have your heart go walking around outside your body"
-Elizabeth Stone.

To lose your child is to have your heart break, and for half of it to go forever to Heaven....

Grief, the ever present, but usually now quiet, companion has turned back into the all consuming monster today.   Missing him never goes away, but today missing him has taken up a bigger part of my consciousness.  It seems the build up to his birthday, and angelversary, has begun in earnest.

I am finding myself back in the hospital, holding him, saying goodbye.   I'm walking away like a zombie, another mum touches my shoulder, she knows.  It's like it was yesterday.

And I am still in the same place. Life has not moved on for us. Many people must think, it's been two years, they forget, they move on, their world still turns. Our worlds stopped turning, our lives were put on hold, and two years on, life has not begun again yet. 

It's true that on the face of it I am functioning, I enjoy life more than I did, I'm a healthy weight and I'm for the most part, out of depression. But, I'm still a shell of the woman I was. I'm still striving for happy. I'm still waiting for life to begin again.

Next month, I'm another year older, then a week later my son....isn't.  I'm so afraid people won't remember.  One day soon I will make a second birthday decoration for his forever bed.  I will wonder for the millionth time if I will ever celebrate a birthday with a living child. 

And I just want to scream. Still. I MISS HIM.....I miss me.  I want life to begin again.....I want what my friends have.  I know I can't have Bertie back.  I want my rainbow. I want to walk forever away from the edge of The Pit. I want peace, joy and above all....happy.

Sunday 4 August 2013

Absconditus dues

The God who goes missing

It's Easter Saturday in my life, has been for approaching two years now.   Easter Saturday is the day between Jesus' death on the cross, and His resurrection.  It's the time of disbelief, of not understanding, of despair, of "where is God now?"  It's a time that Christians who are going through a time of trial are reminded of.  The difference being, of course, that the original Easter Saturday only lasted for 24 hours, not 24 months, or longer. 

I can tell you, Easter Saturday really sucks.  It's a time of testing, of asking "what are You up to?"   but, it is also, paradoxically, a time of being closer to God.   My faith, that for years I took for granted, suddenly made me sit up and pay it attention. I am talking to God more than I ever have before.  And that, I suppose, is exactly what God is up to.  Doesn't make it OK that my son had to die.  But, is it ok to accept that sometimes, it doesn't make sense? Do we really have to show our faith by steadfastly looking for, and convincing ourselves of, God's work in amongst the crisis?  Can I be allowed to be angry, to question why, am I being singled out? Why did I have to lose my son, and why am I being denied my chance to be a mother again? What have I done to deserve it?

Sometimes, He takes a step back, and makes us seemingly go it alone, in order for us to reach spiritual maturity, as the father who takes his hand away from the child learning to ride a bike.  It doesn't make it any less frustrating and it sure doesn't make Easter Saturday any easier.

CS Lewis write: "When I lay these questions before God I get no answer. But a rather special sort of 'No answer.' It is not the locked door. It is more like a silent, certainly not uncompassionate, gaze. As though He shook His head not in refusal but waiving the question. Like, 'Peace, child; you don't understand.”  Too right  I don't. 

Isaiah 49:14-16

14 But Zion said, “The Lord has forsaken me,
    the Lord has forgotten me.”
15 “Can a mother forget the baby at her breast
    and have no compassion on the child she has borne?
Though she may forget,
    I will not forget you!
16 See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands;
    your walls are ever before me. 

One last thought on this topic. A song, which when I heard it made me cry in it's appropriate answer to my pain.  The Fray- Be Still

Easter Saturday. I don't know what God is doing, all I know is this is really ****. I can trust that Easter Day will come, but not knowing when is so very hard.

Helpful Books

I have read many books in the 23 months since Bertie died, all coming at the problem in a different way, but I was drawn to each in my search for answers: for help, for "how do I get through this", for "am I crazy?" moments and "can I put myself through this process (trying to conceive) again?" feelings.   I feel that maybe it's time to compile a list, for others in my position, of titles I have found helpful and why.  Over the months, I have come very many times back to a feeling that I want to write my own book. I want to create a sort of "survival guide" I suppose, a practical I wish I'd known this then.... sort of thing. I don't know what has stopped me so far. Maybe it's the fear of rejection, of people hating it or not even noticing it.  Or perhaps it's the dread of knowing that to do such a book justice I would have to willingly throw myself back into The Pit.  I would need to re-visit those dark feelings and remember how it was in the beginning.  I am not sure I am ready to do that just yet. So, for now, I offer you my recommendations. I hope you find something that helps you as they did me.

I will come back and add to the list as my journey progresses.

Empty Cradle, Broken heart: Surviving The death of your baby Deborah L Davis

This is the first book I read, in the very early weeks after Bertie died. It was a comforting read, because it made me realise that I was normal. the feelings I was having, that I couldn't make sense of, that scared me because I felt out of control, they were Ok because I wasn't the only one feeling them.  In amongst well meaning family members trying to make me go back to work, to try to get back to "normal", this book was a welcome reprieve that said "nothing's normal any more".

Thomas: A Lifetime Denied Shelly Wilkinson

This book is the story of a mother and her stillborn son. She bravely tells her story of loss, in her case due to medical negligence, and how she coped with the months and years that followed.   To be honest, I didn't find this so helpful, as the story was very different to my own, and focused more on how she coped with the fact her son's death was down to medical negligence. But, I want to include it here, as it will be helpful to others, and also because it  of what it represents: Reading anybody's story. In the early weeks, I wanted to read and read and read about all these other families, all these other babies who had died. It helped me feel less alone.

When Bad Things Happen to Good People Rabbi Harold Kushner

This is a very comforting book, and I read it at a time that I needed to read it. Rabbi Kushner lost his son to a terrible illness, that the family knew would take his life at a young age. The book is his way of trying to make sense of how a loving God could allow this to happen.  A little further along in my journey of grief, and faith, I no longer agree with his conclusions, but at the time, they were what I needed to hear to enable me to continue on in a relationship with God.


God on Mute: Pete Greig

This is a helpful book for Christians going through a tough patch of unanswered prayer. It explores many reasons why we face these times; some of which struck a chord, whilst others didn't.  I particularly liked his section on "Easter Saturday" the time of despair between death and resurrection, the time I feel myself living in at the moment.

The Shack William P Young

Another one for Christains,  this book tells the story of a little girl who is abducted and murdered, then follows her father through "the great sadness" to a weekend with God.  It doesn't offer any real answers, but it is faith enhancing and comforting to read.

 The Dance of Fear Harriet Lerner

This one is a self help book on overcoming fear, anxiety and shame.  It doesn't speak directly to baby-lost parents, but it does help with practical advice on coping with the emotions that follow.

Job The Bible

An essential book to read for any christian who is suffering.  It's a frustrating book actually, in the responses of Job's friends to his situation "well God is good so you must have deserved this..." and in the non-answer Job eventually gets from God himself.  But, there is comfort at the end, when Job is blessed even more richly than he was in the beginning.  He still paid one enormous price, as have I, and all baby lost parents, but Job teaches us that whilst we won't be exempt from suffering, if we persevere, we will eventually be rewarded.


Disappointment with God Phillip Yancy

Another good book for suffering Christians.  I found myself nodding along to a lot of this book, "yep I feel that too" moments. Again, its good to know you are not alone in feeling the way you do.  However, he tries to remind us that "Faith means believing in advance what will only make sense in reverse.” And that sometimes there are no answers, but, like Job we must try to endure patiently.