Anecdote

Sometimes after the passing of time, someone you love can sort of be turned into an anecdote. “Grandpa in heaven,” or “so and so always liked this,” or “I bet Ella is so happy in heaven.” The tenderness and quiet honor that people once observed seems to be a thing of the past. Now, when people talk about Ella…it’s just so matter of fact. I do not harbor any bitterness or resentment towards people, but I do not know how to react. I cannot feign the indifference that time has brought to others. I cannot feign the acceptance that others have chosen to embrace. I am still her mother, and I have not accepted her death.

The other night I felt the clouds of grief descend upon me, and the tears would not stop. I don’t know why it’s difficult for me to admit these feelings and tears to others and even to my husband. The words struggle to come out. The truth is–at times I am completely submerged in a sorrowful anguish. My heart breaks open anew continually, and all of my memories, regrets, questions and broken hope come spilling out. I feel lost again, when all I want is to feel found and safe..even for a moment.

I thought that after Beck came, I would feel infinitely more grateful to God. I thought that that gratitude would somehow propel me to a greater intimacy and closeness to Him. Beck is here, and although I am grateful–I still struggle with a faith that is to me, so fragile. Sometimes it even seems a facade. I don’t know why I am still ignorantly trying to “figure God out.” Trying at times to stuff him back into the box of my past understandings…how I long for that child like trust and naiveté. I am trying. Trying to do the things that I think I should, and the things I think God wants me to do. Read my bible, memorize and meditate on scripture. The truth is, I do not know what the truth is..and I don’t think thats good enough. I wrestle with God on lots of fronts, but I really desire peace. I wait vainly for a prompt or secret message that will suddenly make life and all it’s tragedies “click.” I know that Jesus is the answer…and that He was a man of suffering and sorrows. I know this. I like this Jesus. But I still don’t understand Him.

A relationship without trust must not have any love in it, and that scares me. I cannot reconcile my former faith and foundation, the death of my daughter, and the birth of my son. I don’t know why this is so challenging for me, but it is. I can pin-point the time of my doubts and the start of the extreme testing of my faith.

After Jason and I found out that Ella had no heartbeat, we were required to go to the hospital and get an ultrasound for a second opinion. We called my entire family, and had everyone praying. As we went into that room, the ultrasound tech searched, but found no heartbeat. My dear family…sisters, brother, mom, dad and brother-in-law all came in the room. My mom asked the tech to leave so they could pray over me and Ella. She left, and my family prayed the most fervent prayers I have ever heard in my life. They begged God, petitioned God, recited scriptures to God, rallied their faith, wept their tears and asked. Then the tech came back in and checked again….and still no heartbeat.

Before Ella died I had made the habit of reciting the Lords prayer everyday…”Our Father who art in heaven hollowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven…” I cannot pray this prayer right now. I am afraid of Gods will. I wish I was more godly, and a stronger person…but I am shook to the core, and my foundations are laid bare. All I can cling to is that God is doing a work in me, and that He will finish it. I cannot change my own heart, and this current excavation is incredibly ugly and broken to me.

24

Tomorrow we are at 24 weeks. I have been avoiding my blog the last few weeks like the plague. Afraid I’ll go on another rant, or find myself sobbing at the computer screen as I try to figure out how I feel. In fact, I’ve been avoiding a lot of things in my life lately. Avoiding awkward situations that I simply don’t feel capable of handling. Avoiding writing my feelings. Avoiding talking about them. Avoiding looking at little girls. Avoiding dreaming about the good things that can come from this new baby. Avoiding listening to the songs I have written about Ella. Avoiding watching the music video that is plainly our life. Avoiding her empty room. Avoiding opening up these very present and real wounds again. I’m sure it’s normal. All I can say is that I’m tired of being broken. Tired of being afraid. So damn tired of crying and missing Ella so bad it hurts every fiber of my being. I am avoiding myself…

So much of this pain is psychological…my last post was about the doppler. Well I have only used it a handful of times. This might be surprising but I find that since I have it, I don’t need it. When I have a moment of dread and panic I simply wait. I don’t do anything really. Just sit and breathe with my hands on my belly and wait. Baby always complies..usually within minutes. I feel bad sometimes for putting so much pressure on Him. I think that this whole charade is something about the control. If I at least have the illusion of control then I don’t have to use it.

Anyway…back to the avoiding. From 19 weeks to about 22 may have been the darkest time for me. I felt like I was “relapsing” which sounds ridiculous because I definitely should know by now that grief comes in waves, and you just keep going around and around. But it surprised me. The anxiety came back…and the sorrow…the sorrow so heavy I felt like she had been ripped from me yesterday. I think grief is so odd and beautiful.

Within that time period I also released my first single off of my new EP called Climbing Clouds. The single was released with a video that is entirely and incredibly autobiographical. Releasing that into the world so to speak was incredibly freeing, terrifying, healing, disappointing, and a myriad of other emotions. To say that things have been a bit tense with exposing myself in this way is a huge understatement. The need to retreat and hideaway has been the primal instinct ruling most of my avoidances. In between releasing the video I have also been touring a bit more, and with that–playing my songs for the public about Ella. Make no mistake, being an artist–someone who writes and communicates to connect is exhausting. I feel so burnt out and tired of being up front. I feel like I am exposed, needy, weak, naked, broken, and that I must continue to be these things in front of everyone regardless if I feel like it. This is my life. To share songs, and my life with others who are lost and hurting. Lately though, I really wish it wasn’t. The bottom line is I’m tired of being vulnerable. It’s getting harder. I am tired of being so blatantly honest to the many, many people who ask me if this is my first child. I’m tired of having bad days. I’m tired of sharing my story and I don’t know why. Other than the fact that being vulnerable is scary. Sometimes vulnerability and honesty are met with awkwardness and rejection. That’s a really hard pill to swallow when all I really need is love and acceptance. I know that by putting this all out now, at midnight no less–I am uncorking myself again. Opening up again. Releasing. Unclogging. Speaking honestly…but even as I type this I don’t want to go there.

Every morning for the past few weeks when I wake up and go to the bathroom I look across the hall and see Ella’s room..with the door wide open. Jason keeps opening the door every day…and every day I close it. It’s actually physically hard to close–the door gets caught on the carpet every time, but I close it every day nonetheless. I don’t want to look in that empty space. I don’t want to look my loss in the face. I don’t want to think about what could have been. And I don’t. I angrily close the door. I know that this action is a small manifestation on what is happening in my mind and heart internally. I don’t know what to do about it at the present. I don’t feel like sharing will make it better…but I guess it can’t make it any worse. My mom came over today and asked me how I was doing, and I just brushed her off and said I was fine. I might have been fine, but I don’t really know honestly how I am because like I said..I am avoiding myself. You know how I avoid myself? Distraction and busyness. I make sure there is never a moment I am alone with my thoughts and feelings. There is always constant noise, constant stimulation, constant fixation. Online shopping…work….pinterest…emails..facebook…youtube…cooking shows. It all leaves me feeling terribly empty and dissatisfied. Come to think of it, I’m avoiding God too. I don’t really want to think about Him at all. I don’t want to talk to Him, and I don’t want to tell Him how I feel, or what I want, or even what I need. Every prayer I have uttered for myself since Ella has died has felt like a small victory to me. It’s hard to talk to God. I don’t feel like I know Him anymore, and at times..most of the time I don’t feel like He is safe anymore. I’m afraid to admit this…but I think I must diagnose my true beliefs and be honest with myself..and probably with God too. Life has really lost its luster. The small things that used to bring me joy now seem pretty meaningless…with the exception of my husband and this baby. Baby has brought me little folds of joy…little quiet glimmers. I don’t think anyone but God knows how special they are to me, and how feeling him move inside me really brings me a little piece of heaven. I need that heaven, and with every day I abandon myself to the joy as much as I can. I’m pretty sure that is all I can do for now. But it’s all so sacred still. I really can’t be free to rejoice and smile and laugh and plan and think about the future with the world, family or even friends. We haven’t bought anything yet, decorated, or signed up for any classes…we will cross these bridges when they come. I know at some point I will no longer be able to avoid doing those things..but maybe avoidance has a time and place. I will try to avoid worry about the future and be content with the day I have been given. Ha, way easier to say than do. Anyway, I am going to share the video with you..because this is the time and place. One thing I can’t avoid is my undying love for my daughter…here is Ella’s first song…one of many.

The Mail

Keeping this blog has been such an emotional release for me. Every time I go to write something I usually have stewed on it for awhile. The challenge with this stewing method is that grief is a stew of a million ingredients, and pin pointing the one I want to write on is often overwhelming. As I am sitting here on this gray day I’m not even sure of what I want to write about. My love for Ella has once again brought me here to share. Missing her has compelled me to share my heart, and to continue to be vulnerable. I could be unloading my dishwasher, doing chores, working on my music, but I want to be here. Maybe this process of writing my feelings makes me feel closer to her. It reminds me of how much I love and miss her. Writing and sharing with the world at large is saying her life still matters very much to me. She is my beautiful baby girl. 

If things had ended differently I would be posting pictures no doubt, and archiving and wondering at her little life. I don’t see a reason to not carry on with her in my heart and life in any way that  I can. 

Today I got a fetal heart rate monitor in the mail. Jason and I are expecting again and tomorrow we will be 19 weeks. I will talk about the beginning of this pregnancy in a later post–for now I want to focus on the last few weeks and the next three. I have been swimming in an ocean of emotions. Waves of grief, waves of joy, waves of sorrow, waves of longing, tidal waves of fear. Taking the little doppler out of the box and practicing finding the babies heartbeat did bring a certain sense of relief once I felt it, and I am hoping that this little device will offset my panic attacks in between fetal movement. 

The dread that has been plaguing me these last few weeks is unlike anything I have ever experienced. The thought enters my mind “what if the baby has died,” and sure enough the warm burning all encompassing poison of my reality and experiences proves it true. There is almost no room for hope when you are in the depths of dread. There is no way to see around it. It’s a wall impossible to climb. It shuts out faith. It shuts out light, and it is one of the loneliest places to be on earth.

Leading up to the last few weeks the pregnancy has been in the back of my mind. I don’t plan on buying things, I don’t have a pregnancy plan, there are no showers planned, and I’ve been taking it one day at a time. It was possible for me to do this because it was almost like the reality of this new baby hadn’t set in yet. That is a luxury as well as a curse that I no longer have the privilege of controlling. This precious baby is moving everyday, and the movements are unmistakable. The little kicks are so special to me. But they remind me of what it feels like to not feel anything. Ella died around 22 weeks, and I remember for the two days leading up to my appointment I was incredibly paranoid. I honestly had no idea what stillbirth was and I thought there was no way that she had died…but I knew she wasn’t there. I NEVER want to feel that again. 

The only thing that is different between that time and this time is that I now know what could lay before me. Before I was naive, and I believed in miracles to a certain extent, maybe I believed I was immune, and invincible. Now I know how weak I am. Now I know how much losing a child hurts. Now I know what it feels like to deliver a stillborn baby. Now I know what it looks like to see my husband pass out from grief. Now I know that an empty room is such a painful reminder. Now I know how much love hurts. 

It’s inevitable for me to think like this when Ella was my only child. I’ve never had a baby alive in my arms. I’ve never had to worry about nursing or diaper bags. Instead I made funeral plans, and look at a tiny ribbon that was on her head after she was born–the only tangible thing I have of her is a little spot on the ribbon where her skin touched. 

There has been an unspoken count down in my head leading up to 22 weeks. I know that anything could happen after that, and I will just have to continue to live one day at a time. But until then, I am just waiting, holding my breath, trying to love and cherish every minute. That’s all we can do anyway.

Well I guess these are the words that have chosen to come out, and these are the words and thoughts at the top of my heart.