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!

My answers

Yes. I know that at age 44 the chances of me having a totally healthy baby is not great. I know that my chances of getting pregnant at my age are not good.

No. I don't think that I would be putting my child at risk because of my age. There is always a risk no mtter what the age.

Yes, I realize the chances of my child having Down's Syndrome are much higher at me age.

Yes. I know I have a wonderful, healthy daughter and yes, I do love her with all my heart. Just because I want another child doesn't mean I would love her less. Do people who have a second, third or fourth child love their first born less?

Yes. I know that some people don't even have one child. Does that mean no-one should have a child or want a child?

Yes, I'm being selfish for wanting another child. There are pretty much ONLY selfish reasons for wanting a child. But that is not necessarily a bad thing. WHo says to themselves, "I don't want to give birth to a child but I'll do it anyway to populate my country or because it's my duty!"?

If Kai had lived would you still be saying these stupid things to me about trying to have another child?

Yes, I will be an older parent and the odds of me dying of old age are greater... but I unfortunately know young parents who have died of illness or accident and left young children behind as well. I've learned the hard way that for death age doesn't matter!

Why are people so quick to point out all the bad things about me having another baby? Do they really think it helps? Do they think that all these things haven't already gone through my mind hundreds of times? My healthy baby died for no known reason! Of course I go through everything that might happen... I weigh the pros and cons... but in the end it comes down to, - in ten years, if I didn't try to have another child because of whatever reason (fear of what may happen), would I greatly regret my decision? Yes, I would and my husband agrees as well.

So, please don't ask me questions as if I am naive about having a baby. I am not.  Once you have had an infant loss there is no way that you can be naive about pregnancy and childbirth! I actually wish that I could know a little less about all the things that can and do go wrong!

What I need from my friends is support and encouragement. I've already got all the negative stuff in my head! I need my friends to help me keep a balance.

Being strong

I found this in Pinterest. How true. I never thought I could be strong enough to go  through a natural birth knowing that my son was already dead just two weeks before he was due. I also didn't think I would be able to deal with living without him. But I'm still here. trying one day at a time.

Sailing

This is so beautiful. Hugs, tender human contact is so lacking in this world. 

I grew up without hugs and I always wondered if I was loved. I hug my daughter every day at least once. I miss being able to hug my son. Hugging Kai's photo just didn't work for me. Recently we bought a Dick Bruna stuffed toy. It's his little sailor character from one of his stories. The sailor is about the same size as Kai was when he was born. The plush sailor was really difficult to find. 

I think they discontinued making the plush little children characters a while ago. I first saw them 12 years ago when we lived in Japan. At that time I jokingly asked my husband to buy one because then we would have our own little care free baby! 

When Kai was stillborn I thought of the little plush Dick Bruna kids from Japan. We looked all over for such a long time and then we found one at an asian toy collector's store in an asian mall in Toronto. They only had the sailor which was amazing since Kai's name means "the sea" in Hawaiian! He was almost $100.00! but I'm so glad we bought him. I hug my little Dick Bruna sailor and hope that he sets sail on the ocean of a universe and delivers my hugs to Kai.

I miss you SO much sweetpea!!

Dark, Dark, Dark.

I keep trying to get ahead of, and run away from the Darkness that always seems to be stalking me. I've been doing this most of my life. I can never seem to hide from it;  outrun it; it won't go away; It won't give up or die. The Darkness is always just a few steps away, waiting for weakness so it can mess with my head ... and then I believe everything it tells me...

Getting back

"There is no tragedy in life like the death of a cild. things never get back to the way they were." - President Eisenhower
This is a part of a signature dedicated to Kai that I letterpress printed for an anthology. 

Well, I haven't really written anything for a while. Mostly because I don't know what to say... my mood has really gone down and my head is in an incoherent fog most of the time. I just keep thinking... I'm 44... maybe I'm too old to have another baby... I'm never going to get pregnant... Kai was the last... I shouldn't have waited after he died... I've failed... my daughter would be such a great big sister and I've failed her... maybe I should just stop trying... and so on, and so on. I know. Not good. but I can't get these thoughts out of my head.
My period has been off  for the last 5 cycles and I cannot seem to really figure out when I am ovulating. My husband and I discussed going back on Clomid but I didn't think the fact that it made my period two weeks late was going to be helpful. As well, my immune system seems to be not working very well... stress doesn't help.  I've gone back to my acupuncturist and I have made an appointment with my naturopath to try and get back to being healthy in order to get pregnant - maybe - hopefully.
I waited a year before trying to conceive. I thought it was a good idea to get my head back into a relatively good space before I got pregnant again. Now I just keep thinking that I made a big mistake. I should have gotten pregnant just after Kai's death like I wanted to. What scared me at the time was that I only thought about having another baby boy. Not a healthy baby whatever the gender. That's when my 20 years of therapy kicked in and I thought that maybe now wasn't the best time to get pregnant. Did I make a mistake?! I don't know. I do know that not being able to have another child after losing one is making me feel like I'm a failure as a wife, mother and woman!
All the infant loss mothers that I know had healthy babies after their loss ... but they were all younger as well. I wish I knew someone who wasn't able have a child after losing one. How did they get through it all? How did they stay sane?

Life...it goes on.

Kai's name on the beach made from gathered sea shells and sea weed.
Sunny Isles, Florida.

Kai's big sister writing his name in the sand at Turtle Beach.
Sarasota, FL.

She had to write his name so many times because they kept getting washed away before she could finish and have a photo taken! This one finally worked!