Mothers who know

I had a strange experience today... we were packing up to go to a birthday party and I forgot that I didn't have a baby.  I started looking around for what I needed to pack for bottles... it only lasted a second or two, but it was long enough to make me very aware that every part of my being knows I should be caring for a little 3 month old baby right now.  My stomach turned and my heart felt like it got ripped out of my chest.  It also reminded me of how deeply this loss has affected me.  It's easy for me to forget (and everyone else for that matter) that the loss of a child isn't something you get over.  3 months really is just such a short time.  It feels like forever, but it's not long at all.

My friend Anne gave me the first outfit for the baby today.  I got a little emotional when I saw it... I'm really pregnant!  I think I'm still slightly in denial - maybe just unintentionally protecting my heart, I don't know.  I held it up and looked at it and I hate to admit this, but my first thought was "where am I going to put this if I don't get to keep this baby?"   I had to force myself into positive thinking and say "my baby is going to look so cute in this"  which (s)he will!  When I got home, I hung it on the same nail in the livingroom where I hung the first dress I bought Rachel, before I knew she was a girl or would soon die.  That dress hung there for months.  I think I will do the same with this outfit.

Anne & her husband Chris lost their daughter Rose to anencephaly and have a memorial fund in her name that they do all sorts of really good stuff with!  Today she gave me another donation towards Rachel's playground.  I think it's so cool that Rose's fund is helping build Rachel's playground!   I feel so blessed to have a friend near by that I can hang out with that truly knows what I'm going through.  We can exchange a look and know exactly how the other feels.   All the other baby loss mamas I know I have to talk through email to, but we get to go get pedicures together and let our kids play together.  Not only did we both lose our daughters, but both to anencephaly.  I am so thankful to God for putting us together.  I'm also thankful that we know that our girls are in heaven together, and they are whole there.  

I was getting some stuff together for the next playground meeting on Monday and came across the book they gave us at the hospital that serves as a baby book, but has all the places to write about the baby's death.  So sad... a baby book that says stuff like "time of your death" and "date of memorial service" and "what we did with your tiny body" - instead of things like "first smile", "what you like to eat" and "first tooth". There was a little poem and this is the 2nd time I've read it and cried so I guess it touches a spot somewhere.  There are two little lambs on the bottom (her name means innocent lamb and she was buried with one)  it says:

At unusual times,

In unexpected places:

the supermarket, the ball game, on the way home from work,

my eyes sting and my throat gets tight.

And then I know that all I want is you.

-Unknown

I guess it's the last line that does it to me...  or maybe it is just because it is a mother who knows my pain and understands my thoughts that gives her words such meaning in my heart.  Maybe it's because she needed this book too.  Maybe it is because that happens to me every day.

Last week it was when we told people I was pregnant and I heard someone say "I hope this baby is ok" as if it's a replacement for my last defective one, Last night it was when I saw the same daisy outfit at the store that Rachel wore in the hospital....today it was this book... tomorrow it will be while I do the bulb fundraiser at church.  Everyone else will be thinking that I must be really happy to be raising money for a playground for my daughter (I'll probably even be smiling)... except they are forgetting the one word that changes that: MEMORIAL.  I'd rather have her.  The playground is great, but as much as I love that I'm turning a horrible thing into something positive, I can see how it has also made some people forget where I'm coming from.  It's a hard line to walk and fortunately for them, but unfortunately for me, they aren't mothers who know...