Thank you all for remembering us. I have been so touched by the outpourings of love and compassion sent to us from so many sources. Emma's birthday was gentle and went as well as it could overall, I think. If anything, the 13th was probably harder as I kept reliving my lovely labour and remembering when I felt so excited about meeting our baby, before I knew it was all going to go wrong.
Dave had the day off work. Over breakfast, we all had a little present each to unwrap in memory of Emma - which the kids thought was great! We dropped the children off at school and then went to Emma's grave to plant daffodils and narcissi around her headstone. Hopefully, they'll bloom in the spring (we're not very accomplished gardeners so we're crossing our fingers). We came home and I baked a birthday cake for our little girl and then DH and I went out for a pub lunch together. We spent the time after school playing with Lucy's new baby guinea pigs, who are both very sweet and made us smile. I imagine Emma would have loved tormenting them! Then we all ate birthday cake. It was hard but it was special too - I'm glad we managed to do some things that marked it as "her" day.
Friday, 16 October 2009
Wednesday, 14 October 2009
Monday, 12 October 2009
Gideon
Rachele, when we were using the same due date club, neither of us could have envisioned that our paths would deviate so completely from everyone else on the same forum. My heart aches that anyone should have to live through this but I have been so grateful for your love and support on this journey.
Today I remember you and Garrin and, of course, Gideon. Happy birthday, sweet little boy.
Friday, 9 October 2009
Thursday, 8 October 2009
My art
I did it. I took a deep breath and made this for Emma. I'm quite pleased with how it's turned out - it looks something like I imagined looking in my head. If you click on it, you can get a clearer view:
Wednesday, 7 October 2009
Play acting "normal" pregnancy.
... that's what I've been up to this week. I decided to head to aqua natal classes at the local pool. I have been doing a salsacise class at our local community centre but Jurgen is no longer a willing participant in being shaken about like that - not even the sedate sort of shaking that I am able to manage. Aqua natal is perfect - all jiggling goes on beneath the water, which acts as a wonderful cushioning pillow to poor, saggy (non-existent, possibly) tummy muscles like mine.
I knew it would be unsettling the first time I went. The last time I went I was 20-something weeks pregnant with Emma. But I thought it would be okay. I mean it isn't as though I was a regular aquanatalist the last time - the classes didn't coincide with nursery pickups so I had many good intentions but not much in the way of actual exercise. I think I managed 3 classes all told.
And the class was fun, once I got past the initial weirdness of the same swimsuit, the same instructor, different, but still bumplicious, other participants - I got to pretend cycle up the pool on an green latex noodlely thing - what's NOT fun about that I ask you? But, it was like being hit by a brick. I am NOT a normal pregnant woman.
Normal pregnant women don't wonder if they are killing their baby by doing (very gentle) exercise. Normal women don't pause and wonder how much information is absolutely essential when the instructor asks if there is anything she should know about this pregnancy. Internal answer: Yes, it's a blessing, it's a miracle, it's fragile, it might end at any minute for absolutely no reason, don't you dare do anything that might cause my uterus to erupt or my cervix to melt or my baby to die, d'you hear me? External answer: No, everything is fine thank you. Normal pregnant women don't almost fall of their green, latex noodle when the instructor (who is also a midwife) tells us all, during the relaxation phase of the class, that S. - the tall one with bobbed hair - had her baby last week. A nice, straightforward labour. You see, says the midwife joyously, it does happen, even with first babies. We need to focus on the positives not the horror stories because it's mind over matter. If we think positively, it'll all be fine. I was in the deep end so I couldn't throw my noodle at her but the temptation was there. I was an all singing, all dancing advert for the power of positive pregnancy. I LOVED pregnancy and I LOVED all things birth related. I was the Little Miss Sunshine of the positive birth community. Guess what, my baby died. I don't want to broadcast this fact to a group of women I've never met before but I don't think I'm unreasonable to think that a midwife, of all people, might recognise that there might just be someone in her class for whom those sort of comments might just be a little bit on the sensitive side.
So, I think I can safely say that I'm not really, truly a normal pregnant woman this time around. I think I'll still go back though - I DID like the green noodle and I might get a pink one next time.
I knew it would be unsettling the first time I went. The last time I went I was 20-something weeks pregnant with Emma. But I thought it would be okay. I mean it isn't as though I was a regular aquanatalist the last time - the classes didn't coincide with nursery pickups so I had many good intentions but not much in the way of actual exercise. I think I managed 3 classes all told.
And the class was fun, once I got past the initial weirdness of the same swimsuit, the same instructor, different, but still bumplicious, other participants - I got to pretend cycle up the pool on an green latex noodlely thing - what's NOT fun about that I ask you? But, it was like being hit by a brick. I am NOT a normal pregnant woman.
Normal pregnant women don't wonder if they are killing their baby by doing (very gentle) exercise. Normal women don't pause and wonder how much information is absolutely essential when the instructor asks if there is anything she should know about this pregnancy. Internal answer: Yes, it's a blessing, it's a miracle, it's fragile, it might end at any minute for absolutely no reason, don't you dare do anything that might cause my uterus to erupt or my cervix to melt or my baby to die, d'you hear me? External answer: No, everything is fine thank you. Normal pregnant women don't almost fall of their green, latex noodle when the instructor (who is also a midwife) tells us all, during the relaxation phase of the class, that S. - the tall one with bobbed hair - had her baby last week. A nice, straightforward labour. You see, says the midwife joyously, it does happen, even with first babies. We need to focus on the positives not the horror stories because it's mind over matter. If we think positively, it'll all be fine. I was in the deep end so I couldn't throw my noodle at her but the temptation was there. I was an all singing, all dancing advert for the power of positive pregnancy. I LOVED pregnancy and I LOVED all things birth related. I was the Little Miss Sunshine of the positive birth community. Guess what, my baby died. I don't want to broadcast this fact to a group of women I've never met before but I don't think I'm unreasonable to think that a midwife, of all people, might recognise that there might just be someone in her class for whom those sort of comments might just be a little bit on the sensitive side.
So, I think I can safely say that I'm not really, truly a normal pregnant woman this time around. I think I'll still go back though - I DID like the green noodle and I might get a pink one next time.
Thursday, 1 October 2009
October
So here it is - with a twist of the calender we've got here. THE month. It's an absolutely perfect, beautiful, crisp autumn day here. It won't be long before the kids and I can stop on the village green on our way home from school and fill our pockets with conkers - we didn't do that last year. Firstly, because at 39ish weeks pregnant simply waddling home was pretty much enough excitement in my day and then - well, a lot of "normality" went by the wayside through October and November and beyond.
I read Jay's beautiful meditation as she approaches Josie's first birthday too. I've known and followed Josie's story since the beginning. She and Emma were born and died just four days apart so our paths have coincided many times. Jay's musings on grief and acceptance resonate very strongly with me right now. It's true for me too - although I am sliding into a quiet melancholy, I don't feel the same rawness now as I did at the beginning and I don't feel compelled to try and recreate it for her birthday. There is a gentleness about my grief now that I'm content to live with.
Unlike many babylost parents, I'm not dreading Emma's one year day. I almost feel a sense of relief that I'm reaching that point, that I made it, that I have survived a whole twelve months without her sweet babyness here on earth. Last October I couldn't have told you I would. I don't feel as though I am passing through some portal that will separate us because I know that nothing could. I carry the essence of her with me into this second year and forever more.
Almost eleven months ago, I had an idea for a piece of art. It has remained unexecuted because I'm afraid that I lack the necessary skills to execute the fabulous idea in my head! I wanted to draw a mother's face and upper body with an outsized tear falling from her eye and an outsized heart bursting from her chest. I wanted to draw a tiny baby nestled in her tear and one in her heart and inscribe it with the words "In my tears and my ever pregnant heart" because she is. She is there, always and eternally, whether it be one year or eleven or one hundred and one. Maybe I'll screw up every tiny ounce of my limited artistic ability and actually make it one day soon. Watch this space.
I read Jay's beautiful meditation as she approaches Josie's first birthday too. I've known and followed Josie's story since the beginning. She and Emma were born and died just four days apart so our paths have coincided many times. Jay's musings on grief and acceptance resonate very strongly with me right now. It's true for me too - although I am sliding into a quiet melancholy, I don't feel the same rawness now as I did at the beginning and I don't feel compelled to try and recreate it for her birthday. There is a gentleness about my grief now that I'm content to live with.
Unlike many babylost parents, I'm not dreading Emma's one year day. I almost feel a sense of relief that I'm reaching that point, that I made it, that I have survived a whole twelve months without her sweet babyness here on earth. Last October I couldn't have told you I would. I don't feel as though I am passing through some portal that will separate us because I know that nothing could. I carry the essence of her with me into this second year and forever more.
Almost eleven months ago, I had an idea for a piece of art. It has remained unexecuted because I'm afraid that I lack the necessary skills to execute the fabulous idea in my head! I wanted to draw a mother's face and upper body with an outsized tear falling from her eye and an outsized heart bursting from her chest. I wanted to draw a tiny baby nestled in her tear and one in her heart and inscribe it with the words "In my tears and my ever pregnant heart" because she is. She is there, always and eternally, whether it be one year or eleven or one hundred and one. Maybe I'll screw up every tiny ounce of my limited artistic ability and actually make it one day soon. Watch this space.
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