4 Months

I still haven't gone to sleep after the emotional roller coaster I was on earlier. Four months was finally upon me, I don't know where the time is going but I feel helpless as I watch the minutes fall away. I feel cheated, I feel like I was robbed of something beautiful. I was full of such anger this afternoon as I laid on my bed crying and thinking of how unfair this life can be. I shopped to make something for Gabriel and put it all together. I cried as we left the cemetery, feeling heart broken and full of defeat. I still get the longing to "save" him, to unbury his tiny coffin and hold him once more. I forget that he won't be who he was, that his soul is no longer inside of him. I was pretty thankful our amazing friends Dave and Tarin let us come over to their place for a few hours. I was given a chocolate bar and my nails were painted even, oh what beautiful bliss it was to just exist with my friends. To talk and laugh and joke...I don't think I've ever felt so thankful to be away from home, to be away from the over bearing emptyness that hangs in the air when I walk through the door at home.

I miss him, I just miss him so very much. I want to hold him and kiss him. I want to hear his laugh and look into his beautiful curious eyes. I just want to be a mother who wakes up to crying at night, who breastfeeds, who changes diapers...not buys flowers for a grave.

I hope he knows how much we love him, how much we miss him and how badly we want him to be here with us.

We love you Gabriel, Happy 4 Month Birthday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Play Ball!

Today my hubby and I had an amazing day off together, we had some good quality time alone. We watched a movie snuggled against each other and didn't even bother to dress till after noon. We mapped even after an early morning of marriage bliss, we just enjoyed each other spiritually, passionatly, and physically. In the afternoon we had made plans to surprise my little brother by showing up at his baseball game, it seemed harmless really. I'm looking down at the dug out, the boys all have their names on the back of their team shirts, and to my surprise there is the inevitable...all I could do was look at the sky and think to myself, of course, why wouldn't we want to take a break from the reminders? Next to my brother Max was #8, in big bold black letters GABE.

When Gary and I had decided we would name our son Gabriel, we were so dead set against the shorter nick name Gabe, but of course by the end of the pregnancy everyone was referring to him as baby Gabe and it grew on me, I loved it!

I walked down to the dug out and sat with my brother when he was sitting out an inning. Him and Gabe were both switching out who was catcher each inning. I stood outside the dug out watching quietly as my dad helped gear up Gabe for the catcher position. A couple times I heard him yell,"Time to suit up Gabe!" In that moment I wondered, would Gabriel's papa had taught him to play baseball when he was old enough? Would he have called out those words with his grandson running up to play catcher? The game could not end soon enough for me, all I could think about was how I would never hear those words pass from my dads lips to my son, I wouldn't watch him get his "game face" on in the final games of the season...I will never know what possibilities my baby's future held.

At the end of the game my brother game up to me to say goodbye, his face was covered in dirt with a smile from ear to ear....I will never see that little boy smile from my son after winning a game...never.

We left and I cried, I broke on the inside but thankfully had my friends to push away the hurt for a while longer. Now though, I reflect on my feelings with an ache in my heart. Still questioning, why? Why me? Why did my son have to die?

Almost four months old...

My dearest, how I miss you in this early morning quiet,
It surprises me how silence can start up such a riot,
I woke today forgetting that you were gone away,
For just a moment I was full again but the moment didn't stay,
Almost here, your four months old, I can't believe how time has passed,
I don't know how I've managed but the numb isn't built to last,
I'm faced with pain, reality, every moment is a chore,
Remembering you is just so hard but forgetting you hurts more,
Some days are worse but I'll survive, or so that's what they say,
But somehow when the silence comes I remember that horrid day,
It's bitter sweet, I met you son but you weren't meant for earth,
I guess God has a plan for you but it doesn't mean I never hurt,
Have faith they say, he's with God they say, but what about me?
With empty arms I'm left to cry but they turn and never see,
Some days I look at daddy and say, can you believe we made a baby,
We laugh about the sweet memories, remembering isn't always bad lately,
I hang your pictures proudly, in our tiny little home,
So maybe after all, I really never am alone,
It just isn't fair we were so close and still you had to go,
But in my heart you stay forever, I hope you'll always know,
I hope you hear me singing, and that you hear me say "I love you",
Because sweet angel, your dearly missed, though we hardly got to know you.

Could you?

Have you ever felt lonely? Forgotten? Abandoned? Yea...these long hours are torture. The silence is tremendously heavy and cruel...they are gruesome and full of self doubt. These hours drag on, endless, falling into one another. Four is becoming bigger each and every day, it is screaming at me and mocking me...four months...how is the time running from me so quickly? These hours, oh these hours are pain in every meaning of the word. I am just another forgotten soul, I am a blemish in a society that believes in perfection. How am I to survive this? How am I to keep going when it has been so hard to just breathe...my baby...my little family is separated by death. I am experiencing something I can't grasp, I can't wrap my mind around it any more than society...how does a baby die? I am fed up with this reality, I am angry that this is my story! People look away from me, they judge me for how I act, for what I feel...but what if you had to bury your child? What if you had to look at the coffin small enough to be a shoe box and know that your baby is inside of there? What if you had to go to a grave where all your hopes and dreams were buried? How would you do it? Could you do it?

Pain With No Name

I cried today, I cried until I was weak and exhausted. My heart was aching so very much. I stood in the shower and I could feel my heart breaking, I could feel my soul cracking into a million pieces...my tears mixed with the water and it took all of my might not to scream. I just sobbed, I cried out his name, I called out Gary's name...I felt lost. I felt trapped in a place where nothing made sense, where pain is so deep and hurtful it doesn't even have a name. I let the water fall over me as I leaned into the cold tile, oh my aching heart. I didn't want to move, I didn't want to carry on another second of this inhumane reality...I was side swiped, I had no idea how I became so incredibly fragile, so...broken. My baby, my beautiful son is not here. No matter how many times I say his name, no matter how many tears fall, no matter how many times I scream and beg...I can't fix this. I can't bring him to my chest and rock him to sleep, I can't....I feel defeated. I feel like I've been trying to bargain away this pain, bargain away this reality for him but nothing is changing. Why do I do this to myself? Why do I have hope that by some miracle this will all go away and I will wake to his infant cries? Why can't I accept what must be accepted?

*image of my husband at the cemetery with our son.

Are you listening?

The hours just keep falling away, I can't seem to catch up with time when it flows away from me like a stream. I think about how shockingly tiny his coffin was, just 6 days before I had been to a funeral for a church member. I remember how hot it felt to me, my husband holding on to me and our son when he was still in my tummy. I felt out of place that Monday, surrounded by those in mourning when here I was, full of life. It was determined later that Gabriel had actually passed that Monday night, which is accurate to when I last felt him move. By Thursday Gabriel was born sleeping and by Sunday I was attending the funeral of my son. Wow. As i walked up to his coffin I remember thinking how unfair it was, I was in the same cemetery I had been only days before except now I was among the mourning. How? It is a question I know contains no answer but yet I wonder, how? Why?

I was speaking to my grandma last night, she is such an amazingly strong woman and has experienced the same tragedy I have. She told me some day I will get tired of telling new people about this, some day I will only talk about it to those closest to me. I hope she is wrong about this though. How can the world become more aware of how common this loss is if I stop talking about it? How can I reach anyone if I stop? I do look at this blog sometimes and wonder, is anybody listening? Does anyone read the mourning passages from my heart?

*image of a product I fell in love with at a local store

Mixed

11 days. I have 11days to come up with something to do to celebrate Gabriel's 4 month birthday. I have a few ideas...yet something feels so wrong in the pit of my stomach. Four seems so much bigger than three, it has an air about it, an air of loneliness. It seems more defiant to go along with my fake happiness at the idea he is in heaven. (Not that I'm not thankful he is it just isn't something to be "happy" about) I am trying to let go of the sadness, I am tired of feeling so empty, so useless, so...sad. Something inside me is whispering,"Too soon love" and fills my head with memories. I cry, I weep silently or sometimes even wail as I fall to the ground in my empty little home. I don't know what else to feel, I don't know how else to feel anything other than this overpowering sadness. It hurts. I feel like others expect me to be over this, to start moving forward, to be the funny and loving girl they used to know...how can I get them to understand she isn't coming back? The girl I was has vanished, a part of my soul has died...I can feel a missing piece to me and I know it rests with the son I love and adore.

As much as I wish this upon no one there is a certain air of understanding when I am around someone who has been through this. If my lip starts to quiver and my throat starts to close they give a reassuring presence that I'm not insane. They don't tell me it's going to be okay, even though we both know it will be tolerable some day, instead they sit there in quiet. They know. I don't need to explain. Over the last few days I have considered cutting out those who don't understand and focusing on relationships with those who do. The things people say can be so so so painful...they have no idea.
I am very lost in my life.

*image from Google. "Divine Comedy:Pity"

Water

I lay on my back in the water, looking up into the dark night sky. I watch the small stars twinkle brightly, and I wonder, is Gabriel up there watching over me? Is my son dancing amongst the stars? I close my eyes for a brief moment and listen to the sounds around me, my ears submerged in the water. Is this what it sounded like for my baby? My friends voices are muffled, Gary's is too but it sounds peaceful and loving. I imagine what it would sound like with all the noises of my body, the loud thumping of my heart that would have sung him to sleep. I imagine listening to that peaceful voice reading to me...beautiful. I think back to the memories, all the times I sang to him, every secret of my love I whispered to him...he knew me. In the water I wonder if this was his little life, hearing me, hearing the world, hearing my heart beat...

Halloween Treat

A moment, it is Halloween again. There are no special plans today but my mind is over flowing with ideas for your first Halloween, I even decide I am going to go home and look up Star Wars costumes because I know your Daddy would love that. "Andrea!" I rise from the chair, making my way through the swarm of other pregnant women with their tummy's so round with life. I wonder, how will I look by the time you are ready to appear? I smile at the nurse who takes my weight and blood pressure, and soon I am sitting on the table. I always hated the sound of crinkling the white paper, but today it doesn't phase me. Daddy sits across from me, anxious and excited, will today be the day? Our doctor makes his way into the room, I lay back and pull my shirt up just above my belly button. He applies jelly, presses the wand against my tummy and there it is, your heart beat. I had heard it once before with Nona but this was Daddy's first time, his eyes lit up like Christmas. A smile spread from ear to ear and again, I found myself wanting to cry at the beautiful noise.

*image from Google

"Get rid of it, get rid of it, get rid of it"

My life is numb, I am numb but it is fading now. Reality is pressing down on my shoulders as acceptance is knocking on the door. This is to much, I am not ready to accept this...even though I know deep down I have no choice in the matter. Gabriel has passed and with every sun set and sunrise it is becoming more painful to realize the truth of my situation. It was hard to move out of my in laws house, I finally had to face all those hidden reminders that seemed scattered in just about every unexpected spot. Gary still couldn't take down the Christmas lights he had hung...

I knew it was time for us to leave, to grow up and stand on our own two feet but all my memories with Gabriel are in that house, it seems ridiculous because I know we can still go visit. But our room will now be someone else's, the room where we conceived him, where his daddy read to him, where I would lay in bed just feeling his precious movement. I regret taking down the crib so soon after his death, everyone told me to take it down, they even offered to take it all down before I got home from the hospital....but something felt so wrong about it. I remember coming back to the house on the evening of March 30th, I opened the bedroom door to collect my things to go stay with my mom and the air hit me. The silence in the room, the emptyness in my tummy...I walked over to the crib and ran my hands across the sheet as tears slipped from my eyes. In that moment nothing made sense to me, this wasn't how I had planned any of this.

I was under false hope that getting rid of everything would make me feel better, make the world seem a little less scary even...I was wrong. Even now I try to get rid of his diapers, the clothes, the bedding...but why? My heart doesn't want to but my body keeps doing it, I keep telling myself "he never got to where it so it shouldn't matter", "he won't need diapers now so it shouldn't matter", "he has his blanket and teddy bear in his casket, it shouldn't matter". What I am finding is that it DOES matter, it is the stuff of a future that was supposed to exist but somehow doesn't. It is the stuff of months and months of planning and dreaming for someone that would never be able to breathe their first breath or cry their first cry. Why am I so hell bent on getting rid of it?

Little Bird

Gary and I were driving yesterday, I was in such an amazing mood after finding the most perfect photo album to hold Gabriel's pictures. I watched the road as two small birds swooped down both flapping their wings fiercely as they fought over food. They were so distracted...Gary even tapped on the breaks to try and give them a second to move, but the inevitable happened. I looked back out the passenger side window and there lay one of the tiny birds, dead. I broke into a million pieces, tears started falling from my eyes as I screamed at my husband that he had just killed a bird. This episode was so intense and so fast, I couldn't understand what was happening with me. I felt side swiped.

After a little while I told my husband I was sorry for yelling at him, he told me it was okay. I explained to him that the imagery reminded me of our baby. The Sunday before Gabriel passed our little one had been so active, kicking and bouncing around like crazy for most of the day, just like the bird. Something happened, we aren't sure what it is but the car had represented an outside force, an uncontrolled force that left the little bird life less...like Gabriel. When talking about this incident at M.E.N.D. later that evening it truly amazed me what can be triggers for grief. After hearing numerous stories about triggers other parents had experienced I no longer felt like I was losing my mind.

I am getting tired though, getting fed up with waking up to yet another day my son isn't here...I am annoyed with life and how it is turning out for me. Most of all I feel abandoned by God, I feel he gave me a beautiful gift by giving me Gabriel for even the 38 weeks we had together, but why did I only get such a short amount of time? I watch friends with their children, with their babies and how it makes my heart ache. I wonder when I am pregnant again, if I will ever become pregnant again, will people ask me if our next baby is our first? What will I say? I will never deny Gabriel as my son but people now even seem to be unsatisfied with the response,"I have a baby in heaven." They always have to ask questions. I wonder what my future holds, will there be more little birds I lose, or can I be hopeful that they will move in time and he delivered into my arms to have and to hold?

What A Mess

It seems like no matter what I do to try and make my day go smoother or not try to be so sad I end up with a horrible melt down. It feels like every day there is a little more pain to my wounds, a deeper feeling of loss. Yesterday I was just driving home, no intention of stopping anywhere. Some how, and I honestly don't know how I ended up there, I was parked at the cemetery. It was like I was on auto pilot, my mind was yelling at me to go home but my body was taking the keys out of the ignition, opening the car door and walking up to Gabriel's grave. The tears were falling pretty hard in the short distance it took to be next to him. Surprisingly I was screaming,"Why?! Why me? Why now?" My only response was cruel silence. My heart was aching but the words were falling so fast. "I love you Gabriel, I miss you...I miss you so much...I love you so much..." I stared helplessly at his place marker and called my mom. Through streaming tears I told her I was at the cemetery, that yes, I was alone. I didn't know who else to call but I poured out my pain. "Gary won't let me unbury him mom, I tried to come back here last night when it was raining but Gary just dragged me back in the house and locked the doors." "Honey you can't unbury him."

I told her how I couldn't believe I was a mommy, she replied she couldn't believe it either. "I didn't know I would be this kind of mommy though." "No one did. But you are a beautiful mommy" I cried that I didn't remember what it felt like to hold him and she told me I would never forget that. "No matter how many times I say I miss him or love him he is still gone...he isn't coming back." "I know honey." She cried with me, convinced me to drive over to her house. As I hung up I said his name sharply,"Gabriel! Give me a sign...let me know you are okay!" To my surprise the wind around me picked up. The tears fell even harder, all I could repeat was how much I missed him and loved him, how sorry I was for all of this. The wind continued to pick up even more. I wrapped my arms around myself and squeezed hard. "Do you feel that? That is mommy giving you a hug, a great big hug for my beautiful boy." I blew kisses into the wind as I continued to hug,"Those kisses are special, just for you. Let me feel you baby, give mommy a hug too."

I closed my eyes and the feeling that came after was unbelievable, it is hard to even describe. It literally felt like someone was holding me, the wind felt wrapped around my body. I didn't want to let go but i did, I released the hug and the wind calmed again. "I love you...don't forget that."

As i left I started to feel empty again, and by the time I reached my moms house I was in need of a hug and still felt like breaking. But something happened in that moment, I believe he was there, somehow.

Weekend Surprise

Well, Saturday evening we went down with Gary's mom to Branson. His grandparents are in town staying at their time share and his older brother is also visiting with his family. It is a three bedroom with plenty of space to pull out the mattresses from the couch. His brother has a pregnant wife, she is a little over half way, and two little ones both under the age of three. I knew from the start it was going to be a struggle for me emotionally but I didn't think it was fair to deprive my husband time with his grandparents. Last night was okay, I had a little bit of a melt down in the bathroom after some misplaced jokes. It was hard watching his brother's wife though, watching her cuddle the kids and give them kisses. All I could think about was my little one and how he was supposed to be a part of these plans, instead of little girl screams and little boy giggles I wanted to hear my baby's tiny cries and heart melting coo's. I spent the entire time avoiding eye contact with his brothers wife though, I don't even think I said hello or good bye.

Being around her was like a slap in the face, a reminder of how much I have failed as a woman and mother. I don't know if I could ever be happy for them when they welcome their little one into the world...I fear I will be bitter and hateful...not openly to them of course. I don't think I will have to worry so much, they pretend that we don't exist and they have yet to acknowledge Gabriel as their nephew. To say the least I am glad to be home again. I had to bring the blanket Gabriel was wrapped in just because it was our first night being away from him, being in a different town. I hate being vulnerable....most days I still have to remind myself that I am a mother and that yes, my son has died.

Right now there is a storm with so much rain...I still get the urge to "save" him. I still get this overwhelming need to go unbury him and bring him home, I feel crazy sometimes when I think like that but I guess it is normal. I miss my baby...