The boys marker was placed in to the ground today (exactly 9 months to the day of Lucas's death) and I am going to go see it for the first time tomorrow. I am going by myself so that I can be alone with the boys and my own thoughts. I am so afraid of how I am going to react to seeing it? It just makes everything all the more concrete and real, like I can't pretend that this hasn't happened to us. I have to stare at this headstone and accept that I am a mother whom has buried two children. I have to accept that I am a mother of 3 even though nobody else sees me that way. Tomorrow, I will spend some time individually with all 3 of my children, it is a time that I cherish and yet it eats away at me all at once. Tomorrow will have some finality to all that has happened and all that is left is for me to deal with the grief.
Grief is so tiring. I had someone whom I work with, who is new to the building and whom doesn't know me really very well, tell me that I don't seem depressed and that I deal with all of this very well. I am always surprised by this comment because I don't know if I should feel ashamed, guilty or angry. Angry at the fact that I have learned to control my grief around others. At the fact, that she doesn't see how often I break down or at how numb I have become to the life around me. That I don't care if I stay home, go out, or stay in bed; basically, that I go through the motions of life everyday. That I don't care that I am fat, tired and looking old and I don't have any intention of doing anything about it....what is the point? Or should I feel ashamed and guilty that people see me as "over it" or as someone whom has "moved on" from burying her two children. Should I feel ashamed and guilty that I have figured out how to get out of bed, go to work, sort of take care of my family, carry on meaningless conversations and even laugh when only 9 months ago I said good-bye to my sons. I feel like she was saying to me, if I were you I wouldn't have moved on yet. You moved on too soon, you obviously didn't love them very much or they didn't mean as much to you as they would have meant to another mother. I don't know what to say any more. When I talk about the boys, I can often talk about them without crying because I have learned to talk about the facts. Talking about the facts is so different then talking about the missing, the love, the grief and the shattered dreams. Talking about the facts, allows me to stay in this place without tears, without overwhelming emotion, it allows me to be numb and not lose my composure.
Tomorrow my reality will be 10"x20" cold piece of marble in the ground. I will feel the smoothness of its surface and the cut of the letters. I will rub my hands across their names all while longing to feel their skin on mine. I will cry out there names and my tears will fall on to the ground where they lie below me. Tomorrow, my reality is a plot at the cemetery where both of my sons lay and where my heart has been buried along with them.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Friday, October 24, 2008
Panic Attack
It happened again, I had a Panic Attack. I haven't had one in months but I just have been so overwhelmed and frustrated lately. I knew I was having one and luckily, I was at the doctor's office so she knew I was having one. My resting heart rate was 97 and I was just so on edge all day.
The holidays are really starting to get to me...I just don't know how to put everything in to the right perspective. Every time, I think about them, I want cry or I do start crying. I miss the boys so much and I just want them to be here. The holidays just make it all the harder because you envision all the fun things outside of the everyday normal activities that we would have done together. I hate that I am grieving them so much everyday and yet, I feel that others forgot that they ever existed. I hate that I feel like people think it is taboo to talk about them, like I am diseased and if they get to close they will give them the dead child disease. I don't want to be sad all the time and I am not but on the days that I am sad I want for that to be okay. I want to be able to cry without people wondering why I am not all better or over it yet. I want to be able to cry and for people to not get uncomfortable. I want to be able to grieve over the holidays and cry without feeling like I am ruining everyone elses holiday. I don't want to have to hold it in but I know that is what I will end up doing.
I am tired of seeing so many happy families with multiple kids and feeling so envious. That should be us but it is not and it completely deflates me. I have teen at my school whom are pregnant and it is so frustrating and infuriating to me. Why them, why not me! Why can't I get pregnant easily, have an easy pregnancy and be taking home a healthy child. I want to know why not us?
I have started talking to my OB about trying again and it just put it all back in to perspective about how hard it is just to get pregnant. All the pills I have to take just to give us a chance. All the doctors appointments that lay ahead. All the wondering and the worrying. Knowing that if this doesn't work, it is back to more shots, even more appointments and even more risk, worrying and stress. Then comes the pain of feeling like I am trying to replace the boys. That if I bring a new baby in to this house, it will be like they truly never existed. That everyone will forget about them as if they didn't matter or as if the pain won't be there any more.
The guilt about enjoying not being pregnant right now. Want a baby but not wanting to be pregnant because it just is not enjoyable. I want to love being pregnant but when I am pregnant I am nothing but a nervous wreck and terrified. Every time, I use the bathroom I think the pregnancy will end in miscarriage. Every back ache, I think is cramping or contractions. Being on bed rest and the stress of just thinking about all that could go wrong. Now, I have experience the worst and so another pregnancy is going to be even harder because I am going to be even more terrified. I so long for a pregnancy where I can just enjoy being pregnant, enjoy getting fat, enjoy feeling the baby move and not worry about all the what ifs...but that just isn't my reality and it sucks!
If we do get pregnant, how will I really feel? Will I bond with this baby while it is inside of me? Will I be able to enjoy my daughter or will I miss out on all that is going on with her due to bed rest or complications. What will people say or how will they react when they find out? What do I do about work? Is it going to be safe enough for me to continue working while being pregnant given my history? Will be get to bring this child home? Healthy??? Will I miss the boys even more?
These are just some of the reasons for my panic attack, I could go on but right now I can't. My mind and my heart are racing. I just wish things were easier. I just wish that I wasn't so tired. I am so tired of being tired. I have to remember God never promised us a perfect life here on earth. Here I have to take the good with all the bad and make due with the cards that I am dealt.
The holidays are really starting to get to me...I just don't know how to put everything in to the right perspective. Every time, I think about them, I want cry or I do start crying. I miss the boys so much and I just want them to be here. The holidays just make it all the harder because you envision all the fun things outside of the everyday normal activities that we would have done together. I hate that I am grieving them so much everyday and yet, I feel that others forgot that they ever existed. I hate that I feel like people think it is taboo to talk about them, like I am diseased and if they get to close they will give them the dead child disease. I don't want to be sad all the time and I am not but on the days that I am sad I want for that to be okay. I want to be able to cry without people wondering why I am not all better or over it yet. I want to be able to cry and for people to not get uncomfortable. I want to be able to grieve over the holidays and cry without feeling like I am ruining everyone elses holiday. I don't want to have to hold it in but I know that is what I will end up doing.
I am tired of seeing so many happy families with multiple kids and feeling so envious. That should be us but it is not and it completely deflates me. I have teen at my school whom are pregnant and it is so frustrating and infuriating to me. Why them, why not me! Why can't I get pregnant easily, have an easy pregnancy and be taking home a healthy child. I want to know why not us?
I have started talking to my OB about trying again and it just put it all back in to perspective about how hard it is just to get pregnant. All the pills I have to take just to give us a chance. All the doctors appointments that lay ahead. All the wondering and the worrying. Knowing that if this doesn't work, it is back to more shots, even more appointments and even more risk, worrying and stress. Then comes the pain of feeling like I am trying to replace the boys. That if I bring a new baby in to this house, it will be like they truly never existed. That everyone will forget about them as if they didn't matter or as if the pain won't be there any more.
The guilt about enjoying not being pregnant right now. Want a baby but not wanting to be pregnant because it just is not enjoyable. I want to love being pregnant but when I am pregnant I am nothing but a nervous wreck and terrified. Every time, I use the bathroom I think the pregnancy will end in miscarriage. Every back ache, I think is cramping or contractions. Being on bed rest and the stress of just thinking about all that could go wrong. Now, I have experience the worst and so another pregnancy is going to be even harder because I am going to be even more terrified. I so long for a pregnancy where I can just enjoy being pregnant, enjoy getting fat, enjoy feeling the baby move and not worry about all the what ifs...but that just isn't my reality and it sucks!
If we do get pregnant, how will I really feel? Will I bond with this baby while it is inside of me? Will I be able to enjoy my daughter or will I miss out on all that is going on with her due to bed rest or complications. What will people say or how will they react when they find out? What do I do about work? Is it going to be safe enough for me to continue working while being pregnant given my history? Will be get to bring this child home? Healthy??? Will I miss the boys even more?
These are just some of the reasons for my panic attack, I could go on but right now I can't. My mind and my heart are racing. I just wish things were easier. I just wish that I wasn't so tired. I am so tired of being tired. I have to remember God never promised us a perfect life here on earth. Here I have to take the good with all the bad and make due with the cards that I am dealt.
Sunday, October 12, 2008
Tears...
The last few weeks have been filled with tears. Unfortunately, they are not just tears over the lost of my own sons but for two other mothers whom lost their little boys this week. My heart just aches for them and the weeks, months and years of enduring grief that lies ahead. After 8 months, I can still feel the heaviness and the emptiness in my arms. That ache to hold the boys and feel their weight in my arms but instead it is an emptiness but at the same time it is so unbearably heavy. The heaviness continues in to my chest, at times feeling like it is going to crush my heart. At times, I wish it would so that I didn't have to feel this pain any more. I cry for the moms that I email with and read their blogs for their pain is mine and mine is theirs. We are connected in a way that no mother should ever be and yet this bond is what helps each of us get through our days.
Today at the cemetery, I watched Kevin cry from a distance and my heart just felt like it broke in to a hundred more pieces. He misses the boys so much and I often forget that he misses them just as much as I do because he doesn't cry as much in front of me as I do in front of him. Leaving the cemetery, the tears streamed down both of our faces and we talked about the boys. The emptiness we both feel without them here and the finality of death is such a reminder when you sit at their grave site. Again, the tears are pouring as I sit and think of my wonderful, strong, loving husbands broken heart over the loss of the boys. I can't help but feel responsible for breaking his heart and that makes me cry even harder tonight. I am so sorry Kevin and while I know you don't hold me responsible. I can't help but hold my body responsible for the loss of our boys. You deserve to have them here with you...with Mackenzie....with us....
Today at the cemetery, I watched Kevin cry from a distance and my heart just felt like it broke in to a hundred more pieces. He misses the boys so much and I often forget that he misses them just as much as I do because he doesn't cry as much in front of me as I do in front of him. Leaving the cemetery, the tears streamed down both of our faces and we talked about the boys. The emptiness we both feel without them here and the finality of death is such a reminder when you sit at their grave site. Again, the tears are pouring as I sit and think of my wonderful, strong, loving husbands broken heart over the loss of the boys. I can't help but feel responsible for breaking his heart and that makes me cry even harder tonight. I am so sorry Kevin and while I know you don't hold me responsible. I can't help but hold my body responsible for the loss of our boys. You deserve to have them here with you...with Mackenzie....with us....
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