one week down...
It's been a week now, and I'm still feeling like it's one step forward and two steps back... Mike and I were up till one am talking and crying (well, I was crying) and I just don't know if we're moving in the right direction, or if we're making things worse. I'll do fine for a few days, and then BAM, I'll get so upset and just lose it over nothing. Mike is saying and doing all the right things. He's being so patient with me, but we've both been a little rough on Nathan. I'm really gonna try hard to make time for us as a family, and time for Mike and I as well. Next weekend I'm gonna try to take him on a date... even though we can't afford to do anything really, even sitting on the beach (oil permitting) watching the sunset, or going to the cheapie movies would be good for us. I want to spend time with him before he leave for san antonio in a 10 days. (he'll been gone FIFTEEN DAYS!) And when he gets home, we'll be getting married!!! (July 23rd) I'm afraid he hasn't really delt with it yet cuz he's been trying to be strong for me... He's broke down a few times... once, when I was drugged up on morphine, he said I kept going on and on about us having four little kids, and we'd get the three little ones matching Mickey Mouse Clubhouse shorts, but not for Danielle, cuz she was too big (i have no idea...) and I said things about us being so excited we were having a baby... and he had to wake me up cuz he said he just couldn't take it anymore. I just hope he's dealing with it all and not keeping it bottled up inside....
And, you know, I've found that people saying something as simple as "I don't know what to say." or "That just really sucks. I'm sorry." have been the best things I've heard... I get really frustrated with people saying things like, "It was God's Will" or "You can always have another baby." While those things are true, I can't imagine them saying that to someone who had lost a child that had already been born, yet somehow, it seems ok to say it to someone who experienced a pregnancy loss. I myself am guilty of saying those things to other people also, but it make it seem as if somehow an unborn child is more easily replaced than a child who has been born. Life is irreplaceable. All life is valuable to me, born or unborn. This was my child. A living human being, with a heartbeat, and with all the potential of any human being starting it's life. Growing and changing, developing, and already a miracle.
Of course I'm not saying it's the SAME as losing a living, breathing child, that you've given birth to, named, held, kissed, ....I can't even begin to fathom that. I'm just saying that I loved this baby as wholly and deeply as I loved Nathan when I was pregnant with him. Like in the way that, at the begining of a marriage, you love someone differently than you do once you've been married for 50 years, Mike and I had already loved this baby. We made plans for our little bun, bought clothes (in sweet little pinks, purples, turquosie, and soft greens), We talked about names, started planning for the day we would meet our beautiful little miracle. And even if/when we have another baby, it won't "replace" the child we lost, but we will love it from the moment it's created, just as we've loved all of our other children from the moment they were created. Love doesn't BEGIN when a child is born and placed into our arms. It multiplies from the love that has already began months and months ago.
Well, as usual, writing in the Journal has made me feel much better, and now it's 6:15 am, so my alarm should be going off soon to get up for work. Maybe I'll try to go in a little early so I can get off a few minutes early and spend time with my sweet little family. No karate this week, so we can actually relax and just spend time together.