5.24.14
The previous weekend, there had been a lot of buzz on Facebook about this new movie on Lifetime called "Return To Zero." It is the true life account of a couple who has a stillbirth at 37 or 38 weeks, and the husband is actually the director of the film.
Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep had posted repeatedly about the film because the organization as a whole was excited that there would finally be a semi-documentary about stillbirth widely released on a major network. The lead is played by Minnie Driver, and she ultimately gets nominated for an Emmy award because of the role she portrays (at the time I'm writing this, the Emmy Award Winners haven't been announced, so I suppose she could actually win an Emmy and not just be a nominee).
Part of me really didn't want to watch the film because I was afraid it would hit way too close to home. But the other part of me was morbidly curious (this is even why I started this blog in the first place: I am nosy about details and I figure everyone else is, too).
Early Saturday morning, I settled in to start watching the movie. Read that as I got a box of kleenexes and my trust lapdog was sitting right next to me. Alex had gone to the gym, which was not unusual for him on Saturday mornings. Plus, this is a complete chick flick so I had doubted he would have wanted to watch it with me anyways.
The synopsis of the movie is fairly simple: couple is in love, they get married, they become pregnant with their first (a boy), then the mom has some slight bleeding (blown off by her doctor as one of the very first signs that your body is preparing for labor), and then she goes into the office where they can't find the baby's heart beat. "Your baby's dead" is the phrase the doctor uses, and I absolutely cringed. I am so thankful our doctor and nurses didn't have to use that sentence to get across to us that Kaitlyn was gone.
Throughout the rest of the movie, the couple goes through the ups and downs of grief, one of the low points being that the husband has an affair with a woman from work (I could have watched this movie without that little twist in there, thank you very much), and they eventually conceive their second child, which ends up being a little girl.
Most of the movie is pretty accurate for what we go through as parents when you lose a child, but there were a couple of scenes that I have to write about because I disagreed with them so much.
The first is that the husband buys the wife a little necklace to remember their son by. He says to her that he thought she would like something to remember the birth by, to which she replies, "Who wouldn't want a reminder of the worst day of their life?" This just irritated me really badly. I pray that I was never this rude or callous to anyone that offered up a gift to us to remember Kaitlyn. I still wear several pieces of jewelry that was given to us to remember her, and Alex still wears his gift from Jan (a dog tag with a cross on one side and KSO with her date of birth and weight on it) every day. They aren't reminders of losing her, but that she lived.
The second scene that bothered me was where the mom ventures out to a baby shower for the first time. In one portion of this scene, a lady comes up to the mom and says (boldly... boldly), "God is a light for each of us to follow to find our way to His plan, His plan that is perfect, perfect in every single way." The mom responds with, "So, God's perfect plan for me was to suffer a loss so great, so devastating, that I would lose my faith in God. Is that right? Because that is a mystery."
Ugh. Where do I start. First off, this is a great example of what not to say to a grieving family. Any family, I don't care whether their loss was a parent, a child, or a grandparent. Part of me just wanted to yell, "STOP TALKING" at the TV as I listened to this lady blather on trying to console someone she really had no business talking to (from the interactions, she was a distant friend of a friend).
Secondly, God's perfect plan. That phrase just drives me nuts and has driven me nuts since I watched this movie. I don't believe that God ever intended us to live this way. His perfect plan was to never be separated from us by sin. His perfect plan was to walk freely with us in the garden of Eden and never have us question his goodness or even his existence. God longs to be with us, but we walked away from it, thinking that we knew better. Thinking that we had a better idea of what was best for us. I don't know if we get to be pregnant in heaven, but I can guarantee you that if we do, not a single baby will die or have a disease. That's promised to us by the one who made us.
Lastly (like I said, this scene really irked me), if we take the word "perfect" out of what the mom says back to the Bible thumper (sorry, its true), "God's plan for me was to suffer a loss so great, so devastating, that I would lose my faith in God." Phew. Okay. That is a lot of meat in one sentence. To start, God's plan for everyone on this earth is restoration to Him. So no, His perfect will would not drive a wedge between you and Him.
But it would cause you to draw close to Him. I believe that God allows challenges in our life to draw us close to Him, for us to become so desperately lost in the explanations of this world (these things just happen; you must have done something awful in the past; etc) that the only way we find peace is to dive head-first into His Word and read the things that were written nearly 2,000 years ago but seem like they were written for us yesterday by a friend. I know that God uses these difficult moments to wake us out of our sleepwalk and make us reevaluate our lives and what we consider important. Like my friend Jenn said very early on, "God gives us more than we can handle so that we constantly turn to Him." I couldn't agree more.
The last scene of this movie that I'll write about is the very end where she gives birth to a daughter (spoiler alert?). After the baby arrives and is crying, the mom holds her for less than a minute and then hands her off to a nurse shaking her head.
Holy. Cow. Now I haven't been through this yet, but I can say that my stomach turned at that moment. I know that when this baby gets here, he/she will be so spoiled and probably won't put down for the first three months of his/her life. I can hardly wait to have a squirmy bundle of love in my hands, and it is going to be so hard for me to let anyone else (except Alex) hold him/her. Because I want to. Because I have loved this child since before I knew they were even promised. I loved this child since the instant that Kaitlyn left us. I am ready to feel the weight of a newborn in my arms again, but this time with their own source of heat. I'm ready to see if they have hair, because the heartburn has already started. Most of all, I'm ready to hear a voice that I haven't heard yet: a combination of me and Alex all bundled into one person. I'm ready to hear that giant gasp of air as they prepare to make their presence known.
I'm ready to have sleepless nights as I watch a little chest move up and down with rhythmic breathing. I'm ready for kicks that happen outside my body.
As much as I appreciated the Return to Zero movie for finally documenting something that happens so frequently in our world, I couldn't help by feel drained by it. I felt sorry for the parents. They had no hope, no joy even in the birth of their second baby. There was no happy ending for them. I doubt that they know or understand that their baby is safe in heaven with the One who created him. They don't understand that in just the absence of a breath they could be reunited with him and their creator.
I honestly don't know how people who aren't believers can breathe after losing a child. To not have the hope and promise that we will see our loved ones again, I can't imagine the darkness that would overtake your life. Always the sadness of what could have been, instead of the joy that comes with the divine promise of life with Christ.
Kaitlyn
Saturday, July 26, 2014
Let's make a commercial
5.23.14
One of the many benefits of social media is that you can network people that would normally have no way of meeting each other.
There is a guy that goes to our church that has his own video production company, and one day I was posting about Hope Mommies and Hope boxes and he sent me a request for more information about the ministry. He wanted to do a free commercial for the group, he said, and I had seen him do a video for Amber Rhoads (see her video here) so I was really excited to see what he would do for Hope Mommies.
I hooked Devin up with Erin and we settled on shooting the commercial at our house since Erin would becoming from out of town and our house is relatively central to North Dallas. Erin had asked Elyse and I to help film it, and to prepare a short version of our testimony about Hope Mommies and our daughters.
Another reason we decided to shoot the commercial at our house was because I still had Kaitlyn's nursery set up. I never took anything down because I was extremely hopeful that God would give us a second baby quickly. I had sorted through a few things that were distinctly hers- like the headband that Jenny had picked out for her that was beautifully vintage and a few onesies that people had decorated specifically for her at our baby shower. Other than that, though, the nursery was largely untouched. The diaper cake that a friend had given us was still sitting on the shelf, and the bed was still made and ready for its next (first?) inhabitant.
After work that Friday, we all met at the house and got down to business. It was weird to have Devin and his wife film the nursery, mostly because the door has been kept shut the majority of the time. I didn't follow him in there or ask him to not video certain things, and I have to say that it still makes my heart smile to have some of Kaitlyn's things be so permanently documented.
It took a few weeks, but here is a look at the final commercial:
One of the many benefits of social media is that you can network people that would normally have no way of meeting each other.
There is a guy that goes to our church that has his own video production company, and one day I was posting about Hope Mommies and Hope boxes and he sent me a request for more information about the ministry. He wanted to do a free commercial for the group, he said, and I had seen him do a video for Amber Rhoads (see her video here) so I was really excited to see what he would do for Hope Mommies.
I hooked Devin up with Erin and we settled on shooting the commercial at our house since Erin would becoming from out of town and our house is relatively central to North Dallas. Erin had asked Elyse and I to help film it, and to prepare a short version of our testimony about Hope Mommies and our daughters.
Another reason we decided to shoot the commercial at our house was because I still had Kaitlyn's nursery set up. I never took anything down because I was extremely hopeful that God would give us a second baby quickly. I had sorted through a few things that were distinctly hers- like the headband that Jenny had picked out for her that was beautifully vintage and a few onesies that people had decorated specifically for her at our baby shower. Other than that, though, the nursery was largely untouched. The diaper cake that a friend had given us was still sitting on the shelf, and the bed was still made and ready for its next (first?) inhabitant.
After work that Friday, we all met at the house and got down to business. It was weird to have Devin and his wife film the nursery, mostly because the door has been kept shut the majority of the time. I didn't follow him in there or ask him to not video certain things, and I have to say that it still makes my heart smile to have some of Kaitlyn's things be so permanently documented.
It took a few weeks, but here is a look at the final commercial:
By the way: that background music is also by Amber Rhoads!
Devin also took the time to do short testimony videos for each of us.
Elyse's story:
Erin's story:
**Devin's production company is called Ethos Media, and he obviously does excellent work. Plus he has a big heart for giving back to different companies that are just getting started.
PTSD
5.19.14
The following Monday, I had to drive to Fort Worth to Cook Children's Hospital to cover a case for work. I was really excited about getting to work with a pediatric patient because it was something I had asked about repeatedly at my previous job but had never been able to cover. So I got up pretty early and started the 45 minute drive over to Fort Worth.
Cook Children's Hospital is located just south of downtown Fort Worth, and the building is shaped like a castle. The inside is filled with brightly colored benches and tables, with a very wide open atrium where you can look up at the spires of the castle through a glass ceiling.
My case ended up getting delayed a few hours, so I migrated to different points of interest in the hospital: the Starbucks with all the sleep-deprived parents; the atrium where families quickly came and went, headed to their appointments in other parts of the hospital; and finally, a row of rocking padded chairs outside of a cardiac specialist's office. I sat on the second floor in my newly found abandoned cove (the cardiac office was closed that day), and worked on some work things while I waited for the lab to be ready.
The next thing that happened I can only describe as PTSD (or some form of it). Since I was sitting on the second floor, the open atrium was just on the other side of a railing from where I was sitting. From down below, I heard the cry of a newborn. I'm not sure why I knew it was a newborn, but it was definitely that early-life cry, not the boisterous cry from a baby that has been here a few months.
Immediately, my mind went back to the operating room where we delivered Kaitlyn. I remembered laying on the bed, the blurred image of red streaks in the reflection of the lights, and the blue drape blocking my view of the rest of the room.
I remembered how quiet it was. I remembered watching Alex as he watched them clean Kaitlyn up and attempt to do CPR on her. I remembered that first moment when he was handed her lifeless body carefully wrapped in a swaddling blanket just like any other baby.
I remembered the first time I saw my daughter's face, and how my heart broke. I remembered her sweet face and how the only thing I could do is keep apologizing to her for not saving her; not protecting her from passing away.
"I'm so sorry baby, I'm so sorry," was all I could get out between gasps as the tears ran down the side of my face. I remembered sobbing so hard I felt the rest of my body shake, and then telling myself that I had to breathe and calm down otherwise I was afraid that they would have to put me under general anesthesia in order to close me without excessive bleeding.
I remembered the quiet.
I felt like the entire room stopped when they handed Alex Kaitlyn. I'm pretty sure that Dr B and her assisting doctor stopped sewing so that I could sob. I wasn't aware of what the CRNA was doing less than a foot from my head.
The world stopped when we first saw and held our daughter.
In the last few weeks before Kaitlyn arrived, people would ask me questions about our birth plan and why we chose the hospital we did. I remember that I use to tell people that I wanted a very "boring" birth. What I meant is that I wanted it to be routine. I wanted it to be boring in that it was "just another healthy delivery." We had chosen our hospital because they did over 200 births a month. What I didn't mean is that I wanted it to be quiet. I didn't want the room to stop when her weighty body made its way into my husband's arms. I wanted tears of joy, not tears of unimaginable pain.
So this time, I am telling people (especially when they ask about the gender and which way I prefer) that I just want a loud birth. I want to hear my child take that first deep breath and scream. Scream until we leave the room, I don't care. Let us know how pissed he/she about being taken out of the warm cocoon that had always been the norm.
Just cry.
So that we can cry with you. But ours will be tears of joy and happiness and healing. Tears of how faithful God has been to us. And yes, tears of what might have been with Kaitlyn, your sister, who came into this world silently and never said a word. Tears of how she changed us to be even better parents for you.
So, little one, cry until you fall asleep. You won't bother us at all.
Because when you cry, we know that you're here, and that you're breathing.
The following Monday, I had to drive to Fort Worth to Cook Children's Hospital to cover a case for work. I was really excited about getting to work with a pediatric patient because it was something I had asked about repeatedly at my previous job but had never been able to cover. So I got up pretty early and started the 45 minute drive over to Fort Worth.
Cook Children's Hospital is located just south of downtown Fort Worth, and the building is shaped like a castle. The inside is filled with brightly colored benches and tables, with a very wide open atrium where you can look up at the spires of the castle through a glass ceiling.
My case ended up getting delayed a few hours, so I migrated to different points of interest in the hospital: the Starbucks with all the sleep-deprived parents; the atrium where families quickly came and went, headed to their appointments in other parts of the hospital; and finally, a row of rocking padded chairs outside of a cardiac specialist's office. I sat on the second floor in my newly found abandoned cove (the cardiac office was closed that day), and worked on some work things while I waited for the lab to be ready.
The next thing that happened I can only describe as PTSD (or some form of it). Since I was sitting on the second floor, the open atrium was just on the other side of a railing from where I was sitting. From down below, I heard the cry of a newborn. I'm not sure why I knew it was a newborn, but it was definitely that early-life cry, not the boisterous cry from a baby that has been here a few months.
Immediately, my mind went back to the operating room where we delivered Kaitlyn. I remembered laying on the bed, the blurred image of red streaks in the reflection of the lights, and the blue drape blocking my view of the rest of the room.
I remembered how quiet it was. I remembered watching Alex as he watched them clean Kaitlyn up and attempt to do CPR on her. I remembered that first moment when he was handed her lifeless body carefully wrapped in a swaddling blanket just like any other baby.
I remembered the first time I saw my daughter's face, and how my heart broke. I remembered her sweet face and how the only thing I could do is keep apologizing to her for not saving her; not protecting her from passing away.
"I'm so sorry baby, I'm so sorry," was all I could get out between gasps as the tears ran down the side of my face. I remembered sobbing so hard I felt the rest of my body shake, and then telling myself that I had to breathe and calm down otherwise I was afraid that they would have to put me under general anesthesia in order to close me without excessive bleeding.
I remembered the quiet.
I felt like the entire room stopped when they handed Alex Kaitlyn. I'm pretty sure that Dr B and her assisting doctor stopped sewing so that I could sob. I wasn't aware of what the CRNA was doing less than a foot from my head.
The world stopped when we first saw and held our daughter.
In the last few weeks before Kaitlyn arrived, people would ask me questions about our birth plan and why we chose the hospital we did. I remember that I use to tell people that I wanted a very "boring" birth. What I meant is that I wanted it to be routine. I wanted it to be boring in that it was "just another healthy delivery." We had chosen our hospital because they did over 200 births a month. What I didn't mean is that I wanted it to be quiet. I didn't want the room to stop when her weighty body made its way into my husband's arms. I wanted tears of joy, not tears of unimaginable pain.
So this time, I am telling people (especially when they ask about the gender and which way I prefer) that I just want a loud birth. I want to hear my child take that first deep breath and scream. Scream until we leave the room, I don't care. Let us know how pissed he/she about being taken out of the warm cocoon that had always been the norm.
Just cry.
So that we can cry with you. But ours will be tears of joy and happiness and healing. Tears of how faithful God has been to us. And yes, tears of what might have been with Kaitlyn, your sister, who came into this world silently and never said a word. Tears of how she changed us to be even better parents for you.
So, little one, cry until you fall asleep. You won't bother us at all.
Because when you cry, we know that you're here, and that you're breathing.
Monday, July 21, 2014
Illegal
5.12.14
On Monday, I was at one of the hospitals (I won't tell you which one) and sitting there, in the middle of the hallway, was a sonogram/ultrasound machine.
Just sitting there.
Complete with the probe that I had seen used a thousand times on different cardiac tests.
The probe that could also be used on my stomach to take a look at the baby I was growing.
I was a little hesitant because part of me worried that I would see something was wrong (like no heart beat), but in the end I gave into the temptation and took a peek with the machine at the little bit growing away in my stomach.
I hadn't been able to feel anything as far as movement (which was not unusual at this point), but there on the screen little bit was kicking away and doing flips left and right. I stood and stared kind of blankly as the little one changed positions about four or five times, and reassured myself that even though I couldn't feel anything little one was growing along just fine.
Later, I confessed to Alex that I had peeked at little one that day and he got upset with me because he didn't like that I was doing something outside of the doctor's office. He didn't want me doing anything with this baby that might cause him/her harm, and I told him that I wouldn't look anymore, but that I just needed the reassurance that morning.
On Monday, I was at one of the hospitals (I won't tell you which one) and sitting there, in the middle of the hallway, was a sonogram/ultrasound machine.
Just sitting there.
Complete with the probe that I had seen used a thousand times on different cardiac tests.
The probe that could also be used on my stomach to take a look at the baby I was growing.
I was a little hesitant because part of me worried that I would see something was wrong (like no heart beat), but in the end I gave into the temptation and took a peek with the machine at the little bit growing away in my stomach.
I hadn't been able to feel anything as far as movement (which was not unusual at this point), but there on the screen little bit was kicking away and doing flips left and right. I stood and stared kind of blankly as the little one changed positions about four or five times, and reassured myself that even though I couldn't feel anything little one was growing along just fine.
Later, I confessed to Alex that I had peeked at little one that day and he got upset with me because he didn't like that I was doing something outside of the doctor's office. He didn't want me doing anything with this baby that might cause him/her harm, and I told him that I wouldn't look anymore, but that I just needed the reassurance that morning.
Mother's Day
5.11.14
Mother's day.
Last year was suppose to be my last mother's day without being a mother. I was suppose to be a "real" mom this year, complete with the cute baby on my hip in the cute outfits.
Nobody knows what to say to you when you lose a child, and even more so when these milestones roll around. I got one card from a family member for the "soon-to-be" mom. I know, it's one of those really great intentioned things that just feels wrong when you receive it. I didn't know what to say when I opened the card. I just kind of put it back in the envelope and left it on the desk.
I struggled so badly when we first lost Kaitlyn with the term "mom." I couldn't identify with that description of myself. I wouldn't allow myself to be called a mom because I didn't have a child here. I never changed a dirty diaper or soothed a teething child.
But I am a mom. Even without the little one growing inside me, I am a mom. I grew a child, I nurtured her every day. I felt her movements and knew the idiosyncrasies of her personality. I could tell you that I knew from very early on that she was going to change the world, but I didn't know how. I could never picture her as a doctor or a lawyer or anything distinctive, but I knew there was something different about her.
I knew that she was going to be tall. I knew that she was going to have a full head of hair because of all the heart burn she gave me starting almost as quickly as my morning sickness stopped. I knew that she was stubborn, but that she loved to remind me of her presence by rubbing that sweet hard head up against my rib cage. I knew that she was more of a roller than a kicker: I didn't have near the number of kicks with Kaitlyn as I do with this baby, but I would feel these huge rolls and my stomach would shift as she got into a new position.
I didn't know how I wanted to spend mother's day. I didn't want to be ignored, but I also didn't want to make a big deal out of it. After all, Kaitlyn's life wasn't written for her to be here on mother's day. So instead, I spent the day writing. I wrote about my daughter and all of the things she had meant to me. I wrote about our second baby and how this pregnancy has been in comparison to Kaitlyn's.
I just remembered my daughter. I took the time I needed, which was pretty much all Sunday afternoon, and remembered all of the things that made me a mom. And I was extremely glad that it was just me and Alex. We just took the day hour by hour, and talked about our sweet girl and all the hope we had for the next baby.
Mother's day.
Last year was suppose to be my last mother's day without being a mother. I was suppose to be a "real" mom this year, complete with the cute baby on my hip in the cute outfits.
Nobody knows what to say to you when you lose a child, and even more so when these milestones roll around. I got one card from a family member for the "soon-to-be" mom. I know, it's one of those really great intentioned things that just feels wrong when you receive it. I didn't know what to say when I opened the card. I just kind of put it back in the envelope and left it on the desk.
I struggled so badly when we first lost Kaitlyn with the term "mom." I couldn't identify with that description of myself. I wouldn't allow myself to be called a mom because I didn't have a child here. I never changed a dirty diaper or soothed a teething child.
But I am a mom. Even without the little one growing inside me, I am a mom. I grew a child, I nurtured her every day. I felt her movements and knew the idiosyncrasies of her personality. I could tell you that I knew from very early on that she was going to change the world, but I didn't know how. I could never picture her as a doctor or a lawyer or anything distinctive, but I knew there was something different about her.
I knew that she was going to be tall. I knew that she was going to have a full head of hair because of all the heart burn she gave me starting almost as quickly as my morning sickness stopped. I knew that she was stubborn, but that she loved to remind me of her presence by rubbing that sweet hard head up against my rib cage. I knew that she was more of a roller than a kicker: I didn't have near the number of kicks with Kaitlyn as I do with this baby, but I would feel these huge rolls and my stomach would shift as she got into a new position.
I didn't know how I wanted to spend mother's day. I didn't want to be ignored, but I also didn't want to make a big deal out of it. After all, Kaitlyn's life wasn't written for her to be here on mother's day. So instead, I spent the day writing. I wrote about my daughter and all of the things she had meant to me. I wrote about our second baby and how this pregnancy has been in comparison to Kaitlyn's.
I just remembered my daughter. I took the time I needed, which was pretty much all Sunday afternoon, and remembered all of the things that made me a mom. And I was extremely glad that it was just me and Alex. We just took the day hour by hour, and talked about our sweet girl and all the hope we had for the next baby.
Wednesday, July 16, 2014
The Gender
5.9.14
Alex had asked that he know the gender of baby #2 and be able to surprise me with it that week. I told him that was okay, but he was on a time limit of 48 hours (because it is a very strange feeling to have people other than yourself know the gender of the baby you're carrying). Well, he didn't exactly last that long.
We were sitting on the couch when he let it slip. I can't even remember exactly what we were talking about, but the next thing I know he says, "Well when (he/she) gets here, we'll have to do..."
My head jerked up from whatever I was reading and I said, "Did you just say (he/she)?!"
He gave a huge sigh and disappeared into the garage. A few minutes later, he came back with the envelope that Dr. Z had sealed with our baby gender picture inside. I opened it, and there on the post it covering the sonogram picture confirmed what he had just said.
To be honest, I didn't care either way. I just want a screaming child in that operating room. With Kaitlyn, I use to tell everyone that I wanted a very "boring birth" with "nothing exciting." Strange how those words came true in a very morbid way. There wasn't any excitement with her. There was quiet. Silence as she was lifted from my stomach and carried over to the warming table. No screaming, no gasps of air as she found her way into the world.
Silence.
So this time, I want excitement. I want this kiddo to take a full breath of air and scream until everyone's ears bleed. Because that means that he/she is alive. It means that I will get to feel his/her chest move as those screams come out of his/her mouth. It means that I will get to sleep with one hand on his/her back and feel the rhythmic movement of breath and sleep.
I'm ready. Past ready.
After we gushed for a few minutes over the confirmation of our baby's gender, we talked about if we were going to tell people. For starters, if you haven't figured this out by now, I am a numbers girl and I like data and statistics. We were told when we first went into Dr. Z's office that there was only an 85% chance that the gender they predicted that day would be the correct gender. Now for me, that means that 15% is a fairly big chance of them being wrong. To Alex, it might as well have been 99% accurate. Plus, he said that Dr. Z was very confident when she mouthed to him across me which way the baby was showing. But even at much later stages of pregnancy sonograms have been wrong. In fact, my cousin was first told that she was having a girl and the day before her gender reveal she went back in for a confirmation sonogram and they switched it to a boy. And along came Sir William.
Another concern I had with telling people so early is that people are going to want to bring us gifts. It all comes from a very nice and caring place, but I just don't want any gifts. Seeing all the things that people had bought for Kaitlyn that would never be used really hurt after we lost her. It was almost like a wedding that never gets to the altar: do I have to send these gifts back? People were still sending gifts all the way up to our delivery date, so I was still writing thank you notes for gifts at the same time I was writing acknowledgement cards for flowers and plants from the memorial service. I didn't want to have to do that again. Plus, the majority of the stuff we registered for with Kaitlyn was gender neutral anyways.
So I told Alex I thought we should wait until we had another sonogram to confirm the gender. He wasn't super happy, but he understood and respected where I was coming from.
For now, Alex and I (and the sonographer and Dr. Z) are the only people in this world that know our baby's gender.
Alex had asked that he know the gender of baby #2 and be able to surprise me with it that week. I told him that was okay, but he was on a time limit of 48 hours (because it is a very strange feeling to have people other than yourself know the gender of the baby you're carrying). Well, he didn't exactly last that long.
We were sitting on the couch when he let it slip. I can't even remember exactly what we were talking about, but the next thing I know he says, "Well when (he/she) gets here, we'll have to do..."
My head jerked up from whatever I was reading and I said, "Did you just say (he/she)?!"
He gave a huge sigh and disappeared into the garage. A few minutes later, he came back with the envelope that Dr. Z had sealed with our baby gender picture inside. I opened it, and there on the post it covering the sonogram picture confirmed what he had just said.
To be honest, I didn't care either way. I just want a screaming child in that operating room. With Kaitlyn, I use to tell everyone that I wanted a very "boring birth" with "nothing exciting." Strange how those words came true in a very morbid way. There wasn't any excitement with her. There was quiet. Silence as she was lifted from my stomach and carried over to the warming table. No screaming, no gasps of air as she found her way into the world.
Silence.
So this time, I want excitement. I want this kiddo to take a full breath of air and scream until everyone's ears bleed. Because that means that he/she is alive. It means that I will get to feel his/her chest move as those screams come out of his/her mouth. It means that I will get to sleep with one hand on his/her back and feel the rhythmic movement of breath and sleep.
I'm ready. Past ready.
After we gushed for a few minutes over the confirmation of our baby's gender, we talked about if we were going to tell people. For starters, if you haven't figured this out by now, I am a numbers girl and I like data and statistics. We were told when we first went into Dr. Z's office that there was only an 85% chance that the gender they predicted that day would be the correct gender. Now for me, that means that 15% is a fairly big chance of them being wrong. To Alex, it might as well have been 99% accurate. Plus, he said that Dr. Z was very confident when she mouthed to him across me which way the baby was showing. But even at much later stages of pregnancy sonograms have been wrong. In fact, my cousin was first told that she was having a girl and the day before her gender reveal she went back in for a confirmation sonogram and they switched it to a boy. And along came Sir William.
Another concern I had with telling people so early is that people are going to want to bring us gifts. It all comes from a very nice and caring place, but I just don't want any gifts. Seeing all the things that people had bought for Kaitlyn that would never be used really hurt after we lost her. It was almost like a wedding that never gets to the altar: do I have to send these gifts back? People were still sending gifts all the way up to our delivery date, so I was still writing thank you notes for gifts at the same time I was writing acknowledgement cards for flowers and plants from the memorial service. I didn't want to have to do that again. Plus, the majority of the stuff we registered for with Kaitlyn was gender neutral anyways.
So I told Alex I thought we should wait until we had another sonogram to confirm the gender. He wasn't super happy, but he understood and respected where I was coming from.
For now, Alex and I (and the sonographer and Dr. Z) are the only people in this world that know our baby's gender.
Saturday, July 12, 2014
Grief Verses
5.8.14
Since I had learned about Tate, I felt helpless to do something for Allison. So I took it upon myself to send her a verse every morning just to have something positive for her to look at. One of my friends on facebook was doing this when we lost Kaitlyn (not because we lost her, but it "just happened" to work out that way), and it really helped me refocus and keep my mind and heart straight.
Here are the verses I sent to her:
Monday, May 5:
"I'm worn out from groaning. Every night, I drench my bed with tears. I soak my couch all the way through. My vision fails because of my grief; it's weak because of all my distress. Get away from me, you evil doers, because the Lord has heard me crying! The Lord has listened to my request. The Lord accepts my prayer." Psalms 6:6-9 Common English Bible (CEB)
Tuesday:
"I'm poured out like water. All my bones have fallen apart. My heart is like wax; it melts inside me. My strength is dried up like a piece of broken pottery. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; you've set me down in the dirt of death. Dogs surround me; a pack of evil people circle me like a lion- oh, my poor hands and feet! I can count all my bones! Meanwhile, they just stare at me, watching me.
But you, Lord! Don't be far away! You are my strength! Come quick and help me! Deliver me from the sword." Psalms 22: 14-17, 19, 20 CEB
Wednesday:
"In the same way, you have sorrow now; but I will see you again, and you will be overjoyed. No one takes away your joy." John 16:22 CEB
Thursday (the day of Tate's funeral):
"Be merciful to me, Lord, for I am in distress; my eyes grow weak with sorrow, my sould and body with grief. My life is consumed by anguish and my years by groaning; my strength fails because of my affliction, and my bones grow weak.
I am forgotten as though I were dead; I have become like broken pottery.
But I trust in you, Lord; I say 'You are my God'"
Psalm 31:9-10, 12, 14 NIV
Friday:
"Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy. Those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them." Psalm 126:5-6 NIV
Saturday:
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." Matthew 11:28 NIV
Sunday (Mother's Day):
"You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book. My enemies will retreat when I call to you for help. This I know: God is on my side! I praise God for what He has promised; I trust in God, so why should I be afraid? What can mere mortals do to me?" Psalms 56:8-11 New Living Translation (NLT)
Monday:
"The Lord will guide you continually, giving you water when you are dry and restoring your strength. You will be like a well-watered garden, like an ever-flowing spring." Isaiah 58:11
Tuesday:
"Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying." Romans 12:12
After those verses, I eased off on sending Allison messages. I just remember I reached a point in my own grief that I just wanted people to get out of my space and let Alex and I be alone. It helped when it was only the two of us because Kaitlyn was such a part of him, so being with him in a way helped me grieve Kaitlyn better. It's still so strange how well you can know someone without them ever taking a breath and telling you things.
Since I had learned about Tate, I felt helpless to do something for Allison. So I took it upon myself to send her a verse every morning just to have something positive for her to look at. One of my friends on facebook was doing this when we lost Kaitlyn (not because we lost her, but it "just happened" to work out that way), and it really helped me refocus and keep my mind and heart straight.
Here are the verses I sent to her:
Monday, May 5:
"I'm worn out from groaning. Every night, I drench my bed with tears. I soak my couch all the way through. My vision fails because of my grief; it's weak because of all my distress. Get away from me, you evil doers, because the Lord has heard me crying! The Lord has listened to my request. The Lord accepts my prayer." Psalms 6:6-9 Common English Bible (CEB)
Tuesday:
"I'm poured out like water. All my bones have fallen apart. My heart is like wax; it melts inside me. My strength is dried up like a piece of broken pottery. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth; you've set me down in the dirt of death. Dogs surround me; a pack of evil people circle me like a lion- oh, my poor hands and feet! I can count all my bones! Meanwhile, they just stare at me, watching me.
But you, Lord! Don't be far away! You are my strength! Come quick and help me! Deliver me from the sword." Psalms 22: 14-17, 19, 20 CEB
Wednesday:
"In the same way, you have sorrow now; but I will see you again, and you will be overjoyed. No one takes away your joy." John 16:22 CEB
Thursday (the day of Tate's funeral):
"Be merciful to me, Lord, for I am in distress; my eyes grow weak with sorrow, my sould and body with grief. My life is consumed by anguish and my years by groaning; my strength fails because of my affliction, and my bones grow weak.
I am forgotten as though I were dead; I have become like broken pottery.
But I trust in you, Lord; I say 'You are my God'"
Psalm 31:9-10, 12, 14 NIV
Friday:
"Those who sow with tears will reap with songs of joy. Those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow, will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them." Psalm 126:5-6 NIV
Saturday:
"Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest." Matthew 11:28 NIV
Sunday (Mother's Day):
"You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book. My enemies will retreat when I call to you for help. This I know: God is on my side! I praise God for what He has promised; I trust in God, so why should I be afraid? What can mere mortals do to me?" Psalms 56:8-11 New Living Translation (NLT)
Monday:
"The Lord will guide you continually, giving you water when you are dry and restoring your strength. You will be like a well-watered garden, like an ever-flowing spring." Isaiah 58:11
Tuesday:
"Rejoice in our confident hope. Be patient in trouble, and keep on praying." Romans 12:12
After those verses, I eased off on sending Allison messages. I just remember I reached a point in my own grief that I just wanted people to get out of my space and let Alex and I be alone. It helped when it was only the two of us because Kaitlyn was such a part of him, so being with him in a way helped me grieve Kaitlyn better. It's still so strange how well you can know someone without them ever taking a breath and telling you things.
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