11 Months

Today marks 11 months since Asher & Evan were born and died. The day kind of snuck up on me, and then hit me like a pile of bricks. I can't believe it's been 11 months. In some ways it feels like just a few days. In other ways it feels like a lifetime. I am a different person than I was that day, and yet here I am at about the same place. Same job, same house, same weather... different heart.

I know I posted this song once before, but it came on my Pan.dora station today and it gets me every time. I can't listen to this song without crying. It's one of those songs that (obviously) is not about losing a child, and yet, it seems to speak right to my situation. Oh, how my heart aches for them.


"The Scientist" by Coldplay

Come up to meet you, tell you I'm sorry
You don't know how lovely you are.
I had to find you, tell you I need you,
Tell you I set you apart.

Tell me your secrets and ask me your questions,
Oh lets go back to the start.
Running in circles, Comin' in tails
Heads on a science apart.

Nobody said it was easy,
It's such a shame for us to part.
Nobody said it was easy,
No one ever said it would be this hard.

Oh take me back to the start.

I was just guessin' at numbers and figures,
Pulling the puzzles apart.
Questions of science, science and progress
Do not speak as loud as my heart.

And tell me you love me, come back and haunt me
Oh and I rush to the start.
Runnin' in circles, Chasin' tails
Comin' back as we are

Nobody said it was easy,
Oh it's such a shame for us to part.
Nobody said it was easy,
No one ever said it would be so hard.

I'm goin' back to the start.

"Courage doesn't always roar. Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, 'I will try again tomorrow.'"
-- Mary Anne Radmacher

The Valley Song

by Jars of Clay

You have led me to the sadness
I have carried this pain
On a back bruised, nearly broken
I'm crying out to you

I will sing of Your mercy
That leads me through valleys of sorrow
To rivers of joy

When death like a gypsy
Comes to steal what I love
I will still look to the heavens
I will still seek your face

But I fear you aren't listening
Because there are no words
Just the stillness and the hunger
For a faith that assures

I will sing of Your mercy
That leads me through valleys of sorrow
To rivers of joy

Alleluia, alleluia
Alleluia, alleluia

While we wait for rescue
With our eyes tightly shut
Face to the ground using our hands
To cover the fatal cut

And though the pain is an ocean
Tossing us around, around, around
You have calmed greater waters
Higher mountains have come down

Alleluia, alleluia
Alleluia, alleluia

Oh, Lord sing of Your mercy,
Mercy
Your mercy

from a post by Chris, at Glow in the Woods....

That's the pit in my stomach. It is the sensation of endlessly falling into another day that is filled with the absence of what I want most.

"The Scientist" by Coldplay

Come up to meet you, tell you I'm sorry
You don't know how lovely you are

I had to find you
Tell you I need you
Tell you I've set you apart

Tell me your secrets
And ask me your questions
Oh, let's go back to the start

Running in circles
Coming up tails
Heads on the science apart

Nobody said it was easy
It's such a shame for us to part
Nobody said it was easy
No one ever said it would be this hard

Oh take me back to the start

I was just guessing
At numbers and figures
Pulling the puzzles apart

Questions of science
Science and progress
Do not speak as loud as my heart

Oh tell me you love me
Come back and haunt me
Oh and I rush to the start

Running in circles
Chasing our tails
Coming back as we are

Nobody said it was easy
Oh, it's such a shame for us to part
Nobody said it was easy
No one ever said it would be so hard

I’m going back to the start

I've got my heart set on anywhere but here

I think I just found the theme song for my life right now. It made me cry because this is exactly how I feel lately, in so many ways.

Stop and Stare by One Republic

This town is colder now, I think it's sick of us
It's time to make our move, I'm shaking off the rust
I've got my heart set on anywhere but here
I'm staring down myself, counting up the years
Steady hands, just take the wheel...
And every glance is killing me
Time to make one last appeal... for the life I lead

Stop and stare
I think I'm moving but I go nowhere
Yeah I know that everyone gets scared
But I've become what I can't be, oh
Stop and stare
You start to wonder why you're here not there
And you'd give anything to get what's fair
But fair ain't what you really need
Oh, can you see what I see

They're trying to come back, all my senses push
Untie the weight bags, I never thought I could...
Steady feet, don't fail me now
Gonna run till you can't walk
Something pulls my focus out
And I'm standing down...

Stop and stare
I think I'm moving but I go nowhere
Yeah I know that everyone gets scared
But I've become what I can't be, oh
Stop and stare
You start to wonder why you're here not there
And you'd give anything to get what's fair
But fair ain't what you really need
Oh, you don't need

What you need, what you need...

Stop and stare
I think I'm moving but I go nowhere
Yeah I know that everyone gets scared
But I've become what I can't be
Oh, do you see what I see...

I will never be the same

This blog post is so achingly true, I had to save it forever. It really touched my heart to read. And it is true that it is SO comforting when someone acknowledges that I will never be the same, and that is OK. It's probably only genuinely happened once or twice. I feel so uncomfortable in my own skin sometimes, like the elephant in the room. I want so badly to be "back to normal" so that I won't feel like I'm making others uncomfortable, so I won't feel so awkward in group settings. For someone (even an internet stranger) to tell my that I will never get over this, and that is just fine, is such a calming reminder. I can feel my anxiety lighten a little bit. I often feel like on top of "getting over" the death of my babies, I am also "expected" to "get back to normal" and become my old self again. The truth is, that person is gone. I really appreciate the validation that it's OK to stop looking for her, and the reassurance that someday I will be comfortable with my new self.

Reprinted from Glow in the Woods, a site for babylost parents (bold mine):

Even in the first, fresh few days, I knew that I would feel better some day.

But I didn't want to feel better some day.

The first time I didn't feel absolutely beaten down by the fact of my baby's death, I felt terrible. I was the mother of a dead child, and that was wholly my identity in those first days and months. I wasn't a daughter or sister or a writer. I was a wife—wife to the father of a dead baby.

That dead baby, my son Gabriel, was my whole world. I couldn't believe it. I could not wrap my head around it. I thought it was a dream. I would wake up at night with aching breasts, expecting to hear him cry. I simply could not fathom how this was my life.

I did not want to feel better. But eventually, I did.

I can't tell you if it was six weeks or six months later, but I started freelancing again; I went to a concert or two (which was extremely disorienting); I made love to my husband; we traveled to San Francisco with his family, including my pregnant sister-in-law.

I was still the mother of a dead baby. How could I be more than that? Despite my best efforts to not move forward, I was. It was not easy—it was terrifying. But it was forward.

+++

The kindest thing someone said to me in the days after Gabriel's loss came from my uncle, my father's brother, who had lost his 22-year-old son in a car accident years and years ago. You will never get over this. It was such a balm. I didn't have to try to get over my loss, put it behind me, pretend to "be okay". It was never going to be okay.

You will never feel as good as you did before you became the parent of a dead child. That woman, that man, is lost to innocence, lost to the pure joy and miracle that is making babies. Even sex will be fraught for some time. I suggest wine. Not too much.

Every pregnancy you hear about—even (I hope) your own—will be shadowed, sometimes so darkly you will wonder what you are doing in a world where people want to have babies. It's madness. Madness you may recognize someday as your own.

Though you may need help to heal from such devastation—therapy, medication, a vacation someplace far from everyone you know—you will never get over it.

But you will feel better.

~ Red Pen Mama

"We are programmed to focus on what we don't have, bombarded multiple times throughout the day with what we need to buy that will make us feel happier or sexier or more at peace. This dissatisfaction transfers over to our thinking about God. We forget that we already have everything we need in Him." - Francis Chan in Crazy Love

"I'm gonna get out of bed every morning... breath in and out all day long. Then, after a while I won't have to remind myself to get out of bed every morning and breath in and out... and, then after a while, I won't have to think about how I had it great and perfect for a while."
- Tom Hanks, Sleepless in Seattle

This quote has been running through my head ever since we lost our boys. It perfectly describes how I feel more often than not. I long for the time when every day won't have to be SO. HARD.

Excerpt from the book, Calm my Anxious Heart, by Linda Dallow

God does not demand that you and i have blind faith,
but abandoned faith, a faith that trusts Him fully.
Through His Word, God willingly reveals much about who He is, what His plans are,
and what He requires of us.
As we come to see Him and know Him he urges, "Trust Me."
Hundreds of times in the Bible God implores us to trust Him.
We tend to make trust a gray area, but with God the issue is black and white.
We either trust Him or we don't.
We're for Him or we're against Him.
We're in the game or we're on the sidelines.
As i think about true faith, heartfelt throw-yourself-in-with-complete-abandon faith,
two things come to mind:
*faith is rooted in God's character.
*faith is based on God's Word, not on our feelings."

Love is stronger than death.
So I must be content to know that
love is not affected by death--
it doesn't end, it doesn't diminish,
it doesn't change.
Instead, love is immortalized
and eternalized through death.
And the possibility of that love ever
being damaged or broken
is eliminated forever.
I'll put my trust in love.

Mary Hollingsworth