Toward a New Year

The holiday season is gone again, and I made it through with more grace and joy than I ever expected.  We had fun as a family.  We did a lot of fun things.  We did service and put slips with the things we did in a bottle as the present for my angels.  I don't know whether to feel good or bad about the fact that we had such a good season without a lot of thought about our losses.  We've even had fun with babies without a lot pain.

I think I will choose to view this Christmas season as a triumph.  It has been a season of joy, a season to celebrate the One who gave us a reason to hope and a way to hold our angels again.  I choose to cherish the memories and look forward to making more.

Forgiving Symbols of Christmas

Two years ago, even last year, songs surrounding Christmas about the baby, the angels, birth were hard for me.  Tears would spring to my eyes at unexpected moments.  One of my favorite songs, "What Child Is This?" was off my menu for a while because it talked too much about my triggers.

This year, I've held a beautiful 2-month-old baby and older little ones, sung and listened to Christmas songs, put the angel on the Christmas tree, and sought ways to serve so I could put those acts of service on little slips of paper to put in my angels' jar to be opened on Christmas, and involved myself in any number of former triggers and felt little to no pain.  I hope this is a sign of healing.  I'd like to think it is.  I've thrown myself into this ordinarily painful season with abandon.  It's not a perfect time.  I still look at the photos and other reminders of my angels on the tree and feel a moment of sadness.  But it feels okay because other symbols on the tree, those of the Lord who overcame death, have come to mean a little bit more to me.  It still hurts to ponder my losses, but I know it's not forever.  I will hold my angels again.

Another Holiday Season

Anyone who has lost can tell you holiday seasons are hard.  You tend to feel the absence of the one you have lost more than most times.  We haven't gotten very deeply into the holiday season, but so far, this doesn't seem as bad as some of the other seasons.  It doesn't seem as painful.  Maybe it's because I'm busier than most times.  Maybe it's because other events going on in my life or the world make my pain seem small by comparison.  It's hard to say why.  I just hope my pain stays this muted for the whole season.

As I have done for previous years, I will seek out opportunities to serve.  But I feel less compelled to do so for my sake.  I'm not having to bury myself in service to survive.  The things I do this year are for others and for others alone.  I will still write down services we as a family do and put them in a jar as a gift for my angels to be opened Christmas morning.  Alli and the other angels are still part of the family and always will be.  I'm not sure what's different about this year, or if the emotion hasn't stricken yet.  I guess we'll see.  In the meantime, I will continue to search for ways to make others' season just a bit brighter as I go about my own                                                                                                          

Gratitude

I have had some hard days recently.  But I know that I have to focus on gratitude for what I do have rather than on sorrow for what I don't or for what I've lost.  When I think back over all we've been through with my baby's death and five years of miscarriage, I'm tempted to fall into a dark place of pain and sadness.  It would be easy to do.  

However, this week is Thanksgiving in the US.  It's a time to reflect on all we've been given.  It's time to invite joy in by showing my living children how much I appreciate them by spending more time with them.  It's time to hold my husband and those two sweet kids close to my heart and focus on the joy that comes with counting my blessings.  Thanksgiving is about more than food.  It's about cherishing the moments with those we love.  It's about making memories.  And this week, I am determined to cherish every moment and make wonderful memories.   

Deja Vu

6 1/2 years ago, we went through hell with the state after my baby's death.  They tried to blame us for her death, even though it was clearly an accident.  I want to say it was a nightmare, but you wake up from a nightmare.  I am still scared of knocks at my door.  As I said a few weeks ago, they committed multiple crimes and lied in multiple ways in an attempt to frame us for negligent homicide.  For ten months, they could knock at any time and take our kids away just because they had the legal right.  And we could offer no proof nor defense that they'd accept, even upon the admitted and proven lies of one of their workers.  I'd rather face a firing squad than face losing my kids.  All of this is a big reason we have struggled to heal from my baby's loss.

This last week, I had a representative of the state show up on my doorstep unannounced.  Why?  Because somebody in the cafeteria saw my boy eating cold ramen and my girl expressing frustration about being hungry.  Did that busybody bother to ask why?  No.  She assumed it was because they didn't have food at home.  So she reported us to DCSF.  And my kids were interrogated in their school because we hadn't yet filled out the Reverse Miranda paperwork that would protect them from the state and give them the rights they should have to only be interrogated in the presence of parents and a lawyer.  That paperwork is now in place, so my kids don't have to be made to feel insecure in their school and pitted against their parents by people who pretend to care.

Later the day the DCSF worker showed up most recently, I made the inquiries that busybody in the cafeteria didn't bother to make.  My boy was eating the cold ramen he packed himself because he decided he preferred cold ramen over waiting for the lunch monitor, an upper-grade kid, to cook his food for him.  He figured it took too long.  Why did my girl complain about hunger that day? Because a lunch monitor screwed up the food my girl packed for herself then threw it away.  And to top it off, the person who made the call to the state was in charge of lunch monitors.

So basically, this woman blamed me for her negligence, thereby making my kids' school feel less safe and launching me back into the nightmare that was the ten months following my baby's death.  And it did feel like we were launched back in hell for the days that followed that knock on the door a little over a week ago.  Over cold ramen and a misunderstanding of the reason for a nine-year-old's histrionics.  This is called jerky behavior on the part of that school employee.  The reps of the state disappeared when we proved conclusively the latest call was based on misinformation and that they had no grounds.  But will there be any negative consequences visited on the cafeteria worker for a false report?  There should be since it's illegal to misreport, but there won't be.  Instead, we get to live with the thought that there is a dangerous person in the cafeteria, one who thinks trivial items like one day's unsatisfactory lunch and cold ramen sound like abuse, one who would rather sneak around and conduct witch hunts rather than ask questions and communicate openly.

For 6 1/2 years, I feared the state's visit since the first time, when they showed how unethical they could be in a legal system that validates anything they want to do under the false assumption they wouldn't lie.  I should feel triumphant that we fended off their attack.  Instead, I feel insecure in my home, in my kids' school, everywhere because the illusion of safety for me and my kids is gone again.  And the memories of those tragic days of loss and victimization have resurfaced.   I'm trying to regain my peace.  But it will take a long, long time.

Filling the Hole with Fluffies

I've thought a lot about my love of pets.  When I was a kid, I think I loved cats so much because I never got enough attention from Mom.  There were seven of us, and I always felt a little lost in the middle.  So I turned to cats to fill that hole.  

Now, I'm older.  I don't think I'm filling the parental hole in my life.  I think what I've done instead is fill the hole not having a baby has left in my life.  When my husband and I first got married, we had a rational two cats.  Okay, the cats weren't rational, but the number of pets was.  For the first few years of our marriage as we had one child then another, we added a few more here and there, mostly to entertain the kids.  The cats were the love of my little girl's life.  The hamster was to keep my boy happy when we were about to have another girl instead of a boy.  [It took us pretty much the whole hamster's life to finally admit that whereas we had tried to get a boy hamster, so he didn't feel the imbalance in the force quite as much, we only ended up tipping it female just a bit more.]  We got a bearded dragon because my boy was all about dinosaurs, and that was as close as we could get.  We got fish because the kids found them fascinating and pretty to watch.  

But then, after Alli died, our pet population exploded: cats [now five], rats [several, now down to zero], dogs [one then two then three and back to two again], guinea pigs [two, though that phase passed quickly when the stunk up the house and woke my girl every morning with their squealing], snakes [several at one point because my boy loves snakes], ducks [sold], bunnies [we've gone through several over the years and are now down to two that we rescued], chickens [12 at one point, but the raccoons wiped out so many that we only have a few left], lizards [still have two], frogs [all gone], goats [sold as soon as they ran away one too many times], and I'm sure I'm missing one or two more.  But we've had an insane number of pets.  Part of it was because the kids wanted to try out this animal or that one.  

But I think a bigger part of it was because I was filling a hole.  I couldn't go out and buy a baby, but I could go out and buy a baby, but I could go out and buy something else to care for like a snake or a bunny or a chicken.  But none of them scratched the itch.  None filled the hole.  So I slowly pared down to a few cats, two dogs, a couple of lizards, two bunnies, and a handful of chickens.  That still may sound like a lot, but it's sane compared to what it was, and the greater part of the population stays outdoors.  The cats do the best job of filling the hole left by babies because they're snuggly and warm and like to be held.  But I have had to come to terms with the idea that animals just cannot be what I want them to be.  However, I can be what they need me to be, which is their caretaker who gives them the attention/food/water/etc. they need.  It's good to identify what's happening, so I can seek my solace elsewhere and let the animals be whatever they want and need to be.  

Greeting my Nephew

So far, I think I've done pretty well with being happy for my sister's baby.  I truly am happy for my sister.  She wanted this baby and she's delighted to have him.  It's just hard not to also feel and undercurrent of--what? jealousy?  pain?--something.  A sense that the world is moving on without me as I'm surrounded by women who can happily and without effort--or with little effort--have a baby simply because they want to, it's time, or their body just works that way, whether they want it to or not.

Every time one of these women whose body actually works starts to complain about the horrors and pains of pregnancy, I want to shake them and remind them that at least they get those symptoms, and those symptoms don't go away until they have a baby to take home.  At least they will get a reward for going through all of that.  I want to remind them to be grateful for the swollen ankles, the back aches, the nausea, the tiny bladder syndrome, and even the violence of the unborn upon their internal organs because at least that means a baby is coming, and they will be able to hold and love that baby instead of bury it.  I understand being uncomfortable.  It isn't fun to be pregnant.  I get that.  I've been pregnant 19 times.  I just wish I had more than two live children to show for it.  I imagine if you put all of those months of pregnancies cut short together, I'd have at least nine months.

But at least these women with swollen ankles and pain generally look forward to holding that baby.  I have a hard time contemplating those who decide that they'd rather intentionally kill than hold their baby.  I know there are reasons, and some of them are valid.  It's just hard for me when I naturally go through what other women pay for.  Like someone may envy me for this inevitable result to any pregnancy.  I just can't imagine that mindset.  And I don't wish to.  It all makes me very sad.

I guess I can remind myself to be grateful that, unlike many women with fertility issues, I can actually hold two live babies.  I can remind myself that I'm fortunate to have faith that I will hold my unborn one day.  I can be grateful for the fleet of angels who watch over us and sometimes even help in the answering of our prayers.  There is much for which I can be grateful.  But there are times when it's hard to remember all I have when I'm focused on what I don't.  I just can't let those times last.