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Monday, October 24, 2011

Crazy Town



Sometimes I feel like it was all a dream.


None of it seems real, like I was never never pregnant at all. Like my babies never existed.

And other times...I feel like I am still pregnant and the labor and death never happened.

The first week all I knew was my loss. My only reality was that my son and daughter were gone and I was without children again.

Now? I feel a numbness and a sense that I was only dreaming. It is such a strong feeling. I forget sometimes and think that maybe it never really happened.

And then I absently put my hands on my tummy or look down and realize with a sharp pain, that my belly is gone. I am thrown back into a reality that I could never imagine, let alone understand. The life I saw and felt only 12 days ago has vanished.

Was I ever pregnant with two babies?

That confusion doesn't last long however. There are signs of them everywhere. Signs that I have refused to eradicate. I won't pretend that they didn't exist or that I wasn't anticipating them with all the joy a mother could conjure. I won't erase them.

But this also means that as soon as I start to exist in a moment without the pain of their loss, I am reminded that they are really gone. That they were real and at one point thriving.

There are the flowers, candles and sympathy cards. There is the pile of baby items we collected recently stored in the garage. Their footprints and stuffed bears (that our nurse gave us) are sitting in the living room. I have a pile of ultrasounds in the guest room to be put into a memory book (as soon as I get up the courage). When I walk up the stairs, the first thing my eyes move to is the half put together nursery. And of course, the babies' ashes are usually nearby because I can't stand for them to be alone.

And those are all the things that remind me - at home - that they are gone. When I am out, my body reminds me. The cramps, the blood, the sore boobs, and the pants that no longer fit me. When my body fails to remind me, I have the teller at the bank or someone at work who is out of the loop.

I try to forget when I can. But then, I feel so guilty. We will talk about guilt another day as it's a big, long topic I can't get into now.

I think to myself at least daily...'why couldn't this have happened earlier?' Why couldn't I have miscarried at 15 weeks before I celebrated at my gender reveal party? Why couldn't I have lost them when I bled and had to go to the emergency room at 12 weeks? Why couldn't I have said goodbye to my twins at 7 weeks instead of seeing their heartbeats? What was I supposed to learn from all of this?

Not for one second did I take them for granted. I loved them the moment I saw them as a mass of cells. I wanted them before I even started trying to conceive. I waited and waited for Michael and Alena to find me.

Instead of miscarrying early in my pregnancy, I was given time to grow attached to them and get to know them. My body decided to wait until they were big enough to be delivered to take them away.

And now I am stuck in this surreal limbo. One moment I think I am still mid-fertility treatments and haven't gotten that positive test yet, and the next I think I am still pregnant.

I feel a little nuts honestly.

It's a disorienting place to be when you don't know what is real and what isn't. Granted it's only for small amounts of time, but boy does it throw me wildly from one emotion to the next.

I know that this is all part of the grieving thing and it will feel less dramatic as time goes on. I know that reality will always return to stare me in the face.

But I hate when it finds me, because it's so much easier to dream that they are still with us.

5 comments:

  1. Alissa, my dearest daughter. I wish just a little bit that you weren't such a good writer, because that makes this post all that more difficult to read.
    Even if I weren't your mother and heartbroken over the loss of my beautiful little grandchildren, I would be shedding tears over this post, even if I didn't know you.
    You know I would do anything to turn the clock back, anything.
    No doubt there will be days that will just feel impossible to get through, I feel it too.
    I'm always here for you, day or night.
    You've put into words exactly what I feel too.
    Love you always

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  2. I read this a few hours ago, but needed to get my crazy head straight before commenting.

    I can't say that I understand what you are going through. I can imagine what it must be like, but I know no one can truly understand until they've been in your shoes. I can empathize with feeling your stomach and the pain of knowing there is no baby/babies, I've actually been avoiding doing that because it emotionally hurts so much.

    I'm trying to put out of my head all the daydreams I had about having my baby here next spring. Trying to not think about the nursery ideas we had, the vacations we wanted to go on with Dane and the new baby, my good friend's wedding in may where we thought we'd be out on the dance floor with the new baby in our arms. Ugh.

    I am so ready to start trying for another baby, but instead it's blood tests and the waiting game. I am still living in the moment with everyday life now, and trying to enjoy all the good things, but my desire for that baby is always on my mind.

    Soon the time will come when other people no longer mention the little ones we lost (I am already there, and it is hard since I still think about it so much), but I will always be here reading anything you want to write about Michael and Alena, I will never get bored or not care about them.

    Please keep writing, it will help people understand just a little bit more what you are going through.

    Yikes, sorry, this looks more like something I should have posted on my own blog :-/

    ReplyDelete
  3. It's to be expected that you'd feel a little nuts. Who wouldn't?? It's such a terrible thing to keep reliving, it's surreal - it's understandable that you're feeling the way you do.

    And I totally agree with Kiara. Keep writing and talking about it as much as you need to. Michael & Alena will never be forgotten. I will never stop thinking about them. I love those babies, and I love you!

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  4. That was my big question; what was I supposed to learn from all this? What was the point? I hope you find your answer and if you do, please share!!!

    I will tell you that my mom went through an ectopic pregnancy before I came along, and she told me that she just now realized that she had to go through her's to help me get through mine.

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  5. I asked myself those very same questions-- why did I carry my son past full term until 38w5d for him to be delivered stillborn? Why couldn't he have been taken much sooner to spare us from having EVERYTHING prepared and celebrating his life that would never know a single breath outside my womb? Not that miscarriage is a welcome event (as I had one of those too, lucky... I tell ya), but the preparations and months and months of preparations all ended in a closed nursery ready for baby. It's beyond earth-shattering. :/

    ReplyDelete

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