Thursday, September 8, 2011

2 years 8 months and still...

A photo that I took last fall. I think I'll do another this fall on a different kind of leaf.

I spent today looking at the facebook infant loss groups I belong to. Finding comfort in all the posts. A terrible kind of comfort. In my everyday world of being I feel very alone. I can't casually talk about how I am really feeling. I can't say to the guy at the cafe, "Thanks for the tea. Have a good day. Mine will suck because I lost my son before he was born and no one knows why. My daughter is lonely and really, really wanted a sibling and I disappointed her.  We have been trying to get pregnant naturally for more than a year and a half and all I do is miscarry but there is nothing wrong with me or my husband aside from our age.". But that is what I want to talk about!

I was crushed last weekend when my daughter called from her friend's house asking if she could stay until after dinner because someone was going to be visiting and bringing their baby. I felt like... a failure. And I was jealous of this woman with a baby who could so easily catch my daughter's attention before they had even met! I want the new mommies exercise group that meets in the park across from my house to go away... or at least let me look after their babies while they exercise. I hate feeling this way. I don't like having negative feelings for people I don't know. I don't like feeling jealous because someone has a baby to coo over, love and hold and mine never made it home. I don't like feeling like I can't rely on my own body or my own mind. I know it takes time and that even with time the emptiness will still be there but it will become more a part of me. I will adapt and learn to live with that emptiness and it will become my new normal. But I have never had an old normal! Actually, my old normal was being chronically depressed for the last thirty years. I'm unsure of how to incorporate the new emptiness and sadness with the old emptiness and sadness... this is so hard... I've begun collecting words of wisdom, quotes, and inspiration on Pinterest. I read them over and over to myself. Some express how I feel (and I didn't even write them so that means someone else out there feels the same way!), some are ways in which to think, some are reminders and some just feel right. My therapist told me I should pin them up on the walls so I have begun making little quote scrapbook pages in Scrapblog. I'll get them printed as photos and put them up beside my dresser. I hope it works... if I ever finish making them.

Misery loves company.
It's true. It is no good to feel this kind of misery and have no one to talk about it with - no one to share it with who can understand and who isn't afraid to let you know or see that they understand. Yes, I have my husband and he is wonderful but he's not very good at being emotional support in terms of talking and expressing. He listens. But a lot of the time I feel like I'm talking to a mannequin. He tries... but I don't think he gets that I need more than someone who will listen and look after making sure I have tea to drink or that I've taken my meds.

Would it be incorrect or macabre to have an infant loss social club where we could get together face to face to talk and give each other hugs and tissues over wine and cheese?  I really need talking about Kai, the emotions tied to losing him, the memories to be part of my everyday world. Not just the world In my head or in my house.

One of my favourites from a photographer on DeviantArt,  ~engravedwithMusic. She's even from Canada!