In common with many of those in my dead baby mama community, a community I value but so wish I were not part of, I find myself largely wordless this month. I wonder if October just does that; the cold, the sense of death, the bleakness. Any hope of life being sustained, of a miracle happening, seems to go. It was winter still the day I hobbled out of my front door to have Freddie; Spring and Summer have gone, Autumn is so very here, Winter is coming. And I am one of the few I know who lost their baby in April who is not pregnant again. Any hope I had has waned very fast, so fast that now I’m actually wondering, much as I did when pregnant with Freddie, whether it is even the right thing to do. Perhaps 4+1 who isn’t would be better.
I find myself looking in on my life from outside, looking in at me from outside. I’m finally, I hope, able to evaluate the truth of what I say before I say it. I find myself hearing a sentence and turning it round, seeing the hurt it could produce from the opposite direction.
“Which mother deserved a dead baby least?”
“Which baby deserved death most?”
I find myself able, mostly, not to say in retaliation “I think you’ll look back on that one day and cringe you wrote it” but not entirely able to not think it. Able to restrain myself in one place, but not in another.
Able to resist measuring pain and tragedy in one situation, but not in another.
If I look back at what I wrote initially, it seems full of light and life and clarity – and now I just feel empty and prosaic.
I’m counting up my years and thinking “yes, after Fran I’d have felt like that, but a few years down the line and I know too well that all babies are so different that to lose any of them is to lose the world.”
I cringe at my old self while knowing I was only the sum of my parts at the time. That I couldn’t help that. That to judge a young mother with no life experience such as I was is not fair.
I counted up the other week and realised that I’ve been pregnant 12 times.
I counted up the other day, thinking of the small people in my extended family and counted 5 children since I last had a baby. And then realised with a shock that I had used Josie as the marker. That without a living breathing child, even I can’t make him count quite as I wish. Only TWO have been born since him.
I did it. His mother. In that split second in Sainsbury’s, I forgot him.
I’m not sure if that is acceptance or denial. I’m so bored of the stages of grief. I wish they were laid out in a line, with tick boxes and a cash bonus at the end.
I do know I’ve done a lot of anger, these last few weeks. At myself, at Freddie for damn well having the indecency to die, at other people for not shutting the fuck up about their own problems when I’m trying to shut the fuck up about my own. I’m trying to be grateful for my dead son, because I have no idea what else to do. I have to make something of him, I have to make sure I get the healing I need from him and his little life, because otherwise, I have no idea what to do.
This is the third time I’ve been through this season as dbm and you’re right – it does seem to be the worst, even for those who don’t have specific anniversaries to face. The run up to Christmas feels very dark and bleak. Our SANDS group in real life is noticeably quieter and more sombre right now.
That cash bonus would sure be nice …
(HUGS) october has hallowe’en – samhain or all souls, whatever you want to call it… thoughts turn even more to the dead… the weather dosn’t help either xxx
I agree about October,I don’t know what it is, but yes .
I’m sorry Merry. I know it is difficult when others who lost their baby at the same time of year fall pregnant. I knew I would be behind my ‘class’ of mothers, I just didn’t realise just how far behind I would be.
I think I’ve already said my piece on ‘deserving’ over at the original blog post so I’ll spare you it here. But, yes, to lose any child is to lose the world.
October just seems to feel gloomy this year. x
Yes, to lose any of them is to lose the world. Yes. No matter what else, no matter any other circumstances, yes.
And I agree, a cash bonus at the end would be awesome.
Thinking of you Merry… I wish I had better words of comfort. I, too am looking for October to wrap itself up. I think about where I was last year at this time and cringe. I had no idea what was coming my way.
Love and grace- L
“I’m so bored of the stages of grief” – Yes – agree wholeheartedly.
I don’t think you need to beat yourself up for not counting him – this is the awful fact, that being mama to a dead baby is not the same thing as mothering a living baby.
“I have to make something of him, I have to make sure I get the healing I need from him and his little life, because otherwise, I have no idea what to do.”
– this is the hard bit – extracting the meaning. I’ve found this so hard – in the beginning I had this impression that grief would magically make me into a better person, or hit me on the head with insight and wisdom, and for months I felt ripped off because I didn’t feel any insight or wisdom, and certainly didn’t feel ‘better’ even in some kind of moral sense.
And then I gradually gave up on feeling ripped off and just came back to the harder task at hand – to accept what had happened and to stop expecting more – to just, as you say, be grateful for the time we had with Z. I’m still working on that, not because there isn’t a lot to be grateful for, but because I’m still greedy and find it hard to stop wishing for more. Hoping the end of october makes things easier xxxh
I hope that the end of October will be the end of this extra horrible phase for me. As one of those “few”, you know I get it. Let’s hope that November will be better for us on all fronts.
Yes, though I am so much earlier in this than you, yes to being bored with stages of grief (that I keep cycling through, all in the course of a minute it seems) and I’d much prefer the check for having ticked off all the boxes, thank you very much.
sending some love and hopes for a smooth ending to the month.
sarah