Hello November

Hello.

I am fairly certain that I am pretty much talking to myself here. I checked, and I haven't posted since February. That's 8 months. Yikes! This year has flown by, and I seriously don't know where it went. For a long time, this blog was pretty much the only thing in life that I was consistent with. I think I posted over 100 times in 2010. I have no idea how I would have gotten through the year after Livie died without this blog and the community that I became a part of because of it. I have no idea where my life would be.

So I'm back! I've been thinking about it a lot lately... and maybe it's because it's been fall which is always a not-so-subtle reminder that it's almost the 20th of November and we're getting close to another birthday.

I've said it before - that I want to start blogging consistently again... and even though I would like to say that this will be the year that I'll stick to it (I measure my years from November to November now, I just realized. I'm not sure if that's good or bad), who knows if I actually will! Consistency and comittment are two things that I really need to work on right now. I have a hard time sticking to anything, and I always blame it on the business of working 50+ hours per week, and working on my Master's degree at the same time. But then, I look around at people around me and realize that somehow, others are able to keep it together and participate in all kinds of things outside of work, and
there's no reason why I can't do the same thing.

I just skimmed through the last 20 posts or so, and realized that this blog makes me look like I have some absolutely CRAZY mood swings! For whatever reason, I pretty much have only blogged when something amazing happened, or when something bad happened, if I was extremely happy or at a very low point. I'm actually a pretty normal person, in case anyone has been wondering.

Earlier this year, I posted about wanting to participate in the One Little Word Project, and chose the word "Focus" as my One Little Word. Well... not only did I not participate in the project, I didn't focus. On any of the things that I wrote about in that blog post when I talked about how I desperately needed focus in my life. Here's the paragraph I'm referring to...

"Not only did that make me start to get burned out on work, but it also meant I wasn't doing anything I love or NEEDED to do/get done. I wasn't having as many quality conversations with my husband, cleaning wasn't getting done, laundry piled up, I stopped scrap booking, blogging, and weeks went by where my camera didn't move from it's bag. It also meant that months went by (seriously) where I didn't go to the gym, AND I didn't take the time to care what I was eating. And don't even mention my shitty communication skills - my friends probably thought I fell off the face of the earth. Thank God for texting, twitter, and facebook, because without those three things, I don't think I would even have friends anymore since I haven't had time to see them.

The result? More pounds, less energy, more stress, a messy house and a bazillion unfinished projects.

 

Anyway, this is too much of a coincidence to be a coincidence. I took this as a sign that I needed to start focusing on what is really important in life. On myself, my husband, our family, God, and what makes me happy and healthy. And yes... I will still have to focus on work :(. But I am going to have to learn how to balance. So, that's my New Year's Resolution - to focus on what's important. I am not sure how it will take shape just yet, but we'll find out.... and the result can only be a good one.

And obviously, in case you haven't figured it out, my One Little Word is {Focus}."

aaaannnddd pretty much absolutely nothing has changed. :). Well, I suppose that's not completely true. Kurt and I have been spending more quality time together and we've been able to hang out with friends a little more often. Also, I've had a bit more time to go to the gym. But other than that... pretty much no change. I'm not going to say that I'm going to participate in the project or anything like that, I'm just reminding myself to start focusing on what's important.

So, it's November 1, which I feel like is a fitting time to start over. I used to have a couple hundred followers that I know read regularly.. but like I said, I'm fairly certain that I'm just talking to myself now. But that's okay. It makes me feel good, and that's the point. I need to re-incorporate the things that make me feel good back into my life, and I think blogging will help me stay focused on that. If I can remember to actual write like I say I'm going to.

Happy Sweet November everyone!!

Our first BIG snow - finally!

Weight Watchers Weigh-In #3

This week, I gained two lbs.

So, I've lost 3 lbs total. In 4 weeks. That's not very good!

Am I irritated? YES. But I am not going to be one of those people that just gets mad and says, "this doesn't work"! I know it works.... I just sucked at it this past week.

I think there were two or three days where I didn't track every single meal. After doing some reading and talking to friends at work who are also doing WW, I learned the importance of tracking BEFORE you even take a single bite of whatever you're about to eat. Otherwise, while it's great that you're being honest and tracking everything... you don't know if you've gone over until after you've done so.

I do awesome for breakfast and lunch - I eat both of those meals at work, so I portion out the exact serving size of whatever I'm eating, and don't have the option of eating anything more. Dinner and after dinner snacking are what get me.

Also, I didn't track one single activity point this week. I worked until 7 or so most of the weeknights, and had no desire to go to the gym when I got home or get up the next morning at 5:00 to go early.

I will be working on that this week.

Today was a hard day.

{This post was written sometime in June, and has been saved as a draft ever since. I have no idea why it was never posted. So here it is now}

Well.

Today was rough.

I'm still in training at my new job, which includes a few months of mandatory classroom training. Today, we talked about Shaken Baby Syndrome so that we can recognize the signs of it. That actually isn't the part that was hard. I knew when I applied for this job that I would see some awful things happen to kids. The part that really got to me was when we spent a long time talking about grief and mourning. I actually hadn't really thought about that being a part of my job. After talking about it for a while it makes a lot of sense - a lot of parents will mourn the loss of their children from their lives even when their own actions might be the reason that their children were removed from their homes. I can talk about grief - obviously. No big deal. The hard part came when the trainer wanted us to talk - in detail - about what grief felt like...because we'll be more empathetic etc., if we can kind of know what they're feeling. He asked if anyone in the class who had recently lost someone would be willing to talk about the physiological effects that it has on your body... like what it physically feels like to grieve. I knew that I would lose it if I raised my hand to speak, so I just kept my mouth shut.  A couple of other people raised their hands and shared their stories... but I could very well be the only person in the room who knows what it's like to actually have to hand over their child to someone knowing that it's the last time I'll ever see her.

Talking about grief and mourning isn't the problem, but because of the discussion, I felt like I was actually reliving the moment we placed Olivia back in her basinette and walked out of the NICU over and over and over in my head. I haven't actually let myself really think about that moment in a very long time. I didn't cry though... and I don't think anyone could tell that I was getting shaken up.

Afterwards, the trainer read two poems about grief out loud. To the group. By that point I was just thinking, COME ON!!

The good part was that after we finished talking about those issues, talked about attachment and watched a video of kids seeing their military dads for the first time after a deployment. I think ALL of us (at least the girls) were crying... so that was a good little emotional outlet for me!

I also would like to say that I really hesitated before writing this post. Then after I started writing it, I erased it and started over a few times. Talking about hard days makes me feel like I'm complaining too much. I struggle with worrying that people will think I'm grasping for sympathy from others - like I want people to feel bad for me. But I know that when I was a "newbie" to this baby loss thing, I found so much comfort in reading the blogs of women that were candid and honest about their pain - and happiness. It's so much easier to write about the good days than it is to write about the bad ones, but I think it's important that I'm honest with myself and with you guys. Because even after posting just yesterday about how well I'm doing, it's okay to have a bad day too.

Weight Watchers!!

In my last post, I said that I needed to start focusing on myself more, and what makes me happy - and healthy.

SO. After much debating, I joined Weight Watchers Online. My mom and I have joined WW together in the past, and I never had much success. We did it the traditional way - I'm not sure if the online tools even existed yet... and I remember feeling like tracking points was way too much work and I always forgot to do it. But that was when you had to look them up in a book, OR, add up everything yourself and do a little math equation when looking at the food label. Now that EVERYTHING is online.... it's so much easier! I also love that when I'm eating breakfast and/or lunch at work - or wherever - , I can use the app on my phone to track my points. That was the biggest problem before, remembering to come home at night and put in all of my points for the day. I am LOVING being able to use the WW App on my phone to add my points to my tracker while I'm eating my lunch at work.

I want to blog weekly about my progress. I really think it will help keep me even more accountable. I really need to put things in place for myself to make sure I don't stray from the plan too much. I've never been able to commit to any kind of weight loss plan for longer than a month or so. I owe it to myself to do better than that! 

My regular post day will be Thursdays, but I'm 2 weeks behind so I thought I'd do a quick post now, and post again in a couple of days.

I am in my third week. My weigh in days are Thursdays, so I've weighed twice so far. This past Thursday, I was down FIVE POUNDS! I lost 4lbs in the first week, and 1 the second.


This week, I'm nervous that I'll have stayed the same, or possibly gained a few. I went WAY over my points this weekend - we had a birthday dinner for my dad at my parents' house. I knew that I would be going over, but figured it wouldn't be too bad. WW gives you a certain amount of "extra" points that you can use however you want - either spread them out over the week, or use them for a big splurge.


Uhh... FYI - Village Inn french silk pie has 22+ points...................... in case anyone was wondering.


I totally should have known better than to even take one single bite! Because once I did - there was no turning back.


I really need to work on this will power thing....

new years resolution, and my One Little Word.

Focus.

Experiencing this second loss, for whatever reason, really made me stop and think about my life. I haven't been paying enough attention to myself (or my husband, like I should be), and it took this miscarriage to make me realize that.

I had been working non-stop. My job requires me to work later into the evenings sometimes because I have to visit kids and foster families at home, and because it's the school year... that means going after 5:00pm when people are home from work, daycare, and school. I was finding it hard to "turn off" when I got home from work, often spending a few extra hours on my work laptop when I'd get home. Of course, I would stop for dinner, and kind of half-watch TV shows while I worked sometimes. We do have a lot of expectations, and a workload that is impossible to complete within a normal 40 hour work week... BUT, what I was doing was definitely excessive. I don't even think I was being that productive, it just felt like it because I had my laptop on my lap for the entire evening. 

Not only did that make me start to get burned out on work, but it also meant I wasn't doing anything I love or NEEDED to do/get done. I wasn't having as many quality conversations with my husband, cleaning wasn't getting done, laundry piled up, I stopped scrap booking, blogging,  and weeks went by where my camera didn't move from it's bag. It also meant that months went by (seriously) where I didn't go to the gym, AND I didn't take the time to care what I was eating. And don't even mention my shitty communication skills - my friends probably thought I fell off the face of the earth. Thank God for texting, twitter, and facebook, because without those three things, I don't think I would even have friends anymore since I haven't had time to see them.

The result? More pounds, less energy, more stress, a messy house and a bazillion unfinished projects.

Right about the time I started feeling like I needed to make a change, Kurt and I went out to dinner. I was telling him all about how much I loved my job, but that I kind of miss being paid hourly (we were hourly at my last agency), and that I think that if we somehow could switch from salary to hourly, I would feel a lot better about "shutting off". Sometimes, I think being salaried makes you feel like you are supposed to be working constantly.

And I am not kidding you - the next day at work, we got an email telling us that my position, along with several others, were being changed to hourly as of January 1st. CRAZY, right!?!? 

Anyway, this is too much of a coincidence to be a coincidence. I took this as a sign that I needed to start focusing on what is really important in life. On myself, my husband, our family, God, and what makes me happy and healthy. And yes... I will still have to focus on work :(. But I am going to have to learn how to balance. So, that's my New Year's Resolution - to focus on what's important. I am not sure how it will take shape just yet, but we'll find out.... and the result can only be a good one.

And obviously, in case you haven't figured it out, my One Little Word is {Focus}.

I plan to blog often about my progress, and what I'm doing to change my life for the better. Hopefully, this will lead to some more positive blogging, as opposed to the non-stop grief related posts from the last several months. Although, as always, there will be some of those too.

Ps: I actually didn't think I was going to participate in One Little Word. I have read about it before, but I've never done it. I wrote this post about focusing, and then realized that I had just accidentally chosen a word for myself. So... why not?  Maybe it will help me focus? You can learn about Ali Edwards' One Little Word course here.

defeat

Tomorrow, it will have been one month since the ultrasound appointment where we found out that there was no  heartbeat. 

Honestly? I feel pretty much completely normal. I am not sure if that's good or bad. The pregnancy started and ended so fast, it barely had time to register. I was really trying to hold off on getting too excited or thinking about baby stuff "just in case". I wasn't pregnant for long enough to get attached to that particular baby. I am grieving, but it's completely different this time. 

Right now, I'm just feeling defeated. I feel like I have no enthusiasm to try again. Obviously that means that now isn't the time to try again, and I'm hoping that feeling will go away eventually. But I think both of us are really wondering how much more we can handle. How many more bad things have to happen to us before we get to bring home a healthy baby? 

Trust me, I'm really not trying to throw a pity party - just being honest about my feelings. Actually, what I want to do is throw the complete opposite of a pity party. I am so sick of being the people that everyone has to feel sorry for. Even though we told the world SO early about this pregnancy, it was really nice to have a couple of weeks of "Congratulations!" before the, "so sorry for your loss" comments kicked back in again. I know some of you are probably thinking, "you probably shouldn't have broken the news so early". And maybe you're right. But at the time, all we were thinking was that we were so excited, and we didn't want to waste a single second. I honestly don't have any regrets. Yes - it was hard to tell everyone so fast that we miscarried - but it was nice to have the support, rather than having to keep it all inside. 

That's pretty much all I have to say about this right now. I'd like to start blogging about some positive things again.:)

A very late, and not very happy update

As usual, here I am, apologizing for not keeping up to date with my blog. This time, I can say with complete honesty that I have been thinking about writing every day, just couldn't bring myself to do it.

I have officially become one of those women who falls into the "multiple losses" category. You would think that after losing Olivia, we would have learned to be a little bit less naive. I guess somehow, both of us just hoped that after going through such excruciating pain after her death... There's no way we would have to go through losing a baby again... Right? Wrong.

We found out on the morning after Thanksgiving that we were expects again. We made the decision after we lost Olivia to never waste a single second of a pregnancy, so we called and told our parents immediately. We were, of course, SO excited.

We went to the doctor almost right away. I wasn't sure if I needed to be seen faster than normal because of the "high riskiness" of this pregnancy. When I called and talked to the nurse, she made an appointment for us for the next week, which would put me at 5 weeks or so.

We went to that appointment, which was with the same OB that I had when I was pregnant with Olivia. We talked a lot about how things would go once I got further along. I would have had ultrasounds twice a month. One at her office, and one at the perinatologist's office. She also said that they would have tested around 37 weeks to make sure the baby's lungs were strong enough, and do the c-section then.

But at that appointment, when we talked about dates, she said that she thought it might be too early to see anything on the sonogram. She said that we had been through enough, and we were the right at the time period where we may be able to see the heartbeat, or we might not be able to see anything at all. The decision was left up to us, but she suggested that we come back in two weeks. Her concern was that we had seen enough "bad news" ultrasounds. And if we ended up seeing nothing, we would just have to come back in two weeks anyway to find out if there was really any cardiac activity.... Or not.

So. December 22nd, we went back for our ultrasound. Kurt was supposed to work, and I had asked my mom to go with me. The day before, he told me that he was going to call in to work, because he felt like he had to be there. I also had a gut feeling that he should be with me, and that I absolutely could not go alone (which is why I asked my mom to go).

When she said that there was no cardiac activity, I wasn't even surprised. It was like I somehow knew. But she kept telling us that she wasn't positive, and that she wasn't getting a very good view. She had us go upstairs to radiology to have another one done on the HUGE machine, rather than her little portable one on a cart. Her nurse took us upstairs, and then that ultrasound confirmed it. Baby was measuring 6w2d... Which is exactly how far along I thought I was based on the day we are 99% sure we conceived on.

My doctor's nurse came back up to get us, and asked us if we'd like to take the "back way" downstairs. I'm not sure why, but I said no, and we rode the elevator back down with a bunch of other people. My doctor wanted to see us before we left. She gave me a huge hug and then gave us our options. We could go home and just wait for my body to do its job on its own, or we could take the misoprostol right away. She also said that we could do nothing and come back in a week to see if anything had changed... But then said that there was no doubt in her mind, or the radiologist's that based on the measured size, cardiac activity should have been very obvious.

At first, I sid I'd like to go home and wait. Kurt jumped in - which he never does during appointments - and said that he didn't think that sounded liked the best idea, and asked if I was sure I wanted to put myself through that over Christmas. After we talked about it, I completely agreed, and we got the prescription. We filled it, and ate lunch at Subway together. The whole thing felt like a dream. Like it wasn't really happening. How could it be happening. To us. Again.

Don't get me wrong, I know lots of women who have had multiple losses. But I guess, just like i said above, I somehow talked myself into believing that losing Olivia was bad enough, and we had reached our maximum loss capacity.

It was the last day of work before we were off for the long Holiday weekend, so the first thing I did after taking Kurt home was get in the car and call my supervisor. She is awesome and super supportive, and knows Olivia's full story, and was one of the first people that I had told about this pregnancy. She knew that I had been at an appointment, and told me to just go home and rest, and not worry about anything work-wise. BUT I had Christmas presents for several foster kids in my back seat.. So I spent the next couple of hours delivering those.

Finally, I made it home at 5ish, and took the pill. Our friends Tony and Alicia came over and brought us dinner, which was nice and took our mind off of everything. I had ben told to expect unbelievable pain.. And I felt nothing. I took the second pill, and still felt nothing. I called the office the next afternoon, and was told that I was just going to have to wait it out. And that I should call on the 27th when they were open again. I spent all of Christmas weekend waiting for something to happen, but trying not to think about it. And nothing happened. I called on the 27th, and they scheduled me for a D&C for the 29th.

My doctor called me that morning and had me come in for one more ultrasound just to be on the safe side. Of course there was still nothing, and baby was measuring the same as it was on the 22nd. The procedure went very well, and I was feeling 100% normal (physically) by that evening.

Okay - I have made this post long enough! I am going to post again with more about how I'm feeling, but this is long enough for now.

As usual, I want to say thanks for all the wonderful support that we've gotten from the people who already know about this - where would we be without you guys?

Pink Cookie Day

Last year, I made cupcakes with pink butter frosting on Olivia's birthday. It was supposed to be pink buttercream frosting, but I read the recipe wrong or something, and it just basically ended up tasting like butter. I took them to our annual "Friends Thanksgiving" that evening, and everyone was really nice to me and said they were good, but I know that they absolutely were NOT good. I loved the idea of having a tradition where we bake something pink each year...but I needed something easier that would both look good and not taste like crap. I searched and searched on Pinterest, and finally found this recipe. It was SUPER easy and they were way better than regular chocolate chip cookies. They are more like shortbread.

I really like this tradition of baking something pink on her birthday. I'm hoping to get more creative with it in the years to come. There's only so much you can do for the birthday of a little girl who isn't on earth anymore. I don't want to go over-board, but I don't want her birthday to ever get forgotten either. I love to bake, and sweet treats are easily shared with family and friends. It makes me feel good to be doing something for her birthday other than just bringing flowers to the cemetary.

Recipe via



Ingredients:

2 sticks (1 cup) butter (see directions below for softening)

red food coloring gel

1 pouch Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix

2 cups powdered sugar

2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

Directions:

1 - Soften hard butter in microwave at HALF power for 30 seconds just until slightly soft, not at all melted. With a hand mixer, beat the butter just until smooth, being careful not to over-soften it. Using a toothpick, add the food color gel one dab at a time, mixing after each, until the desired pink color is achieved.
2 - Add the dry cookie mix (do NOT add the other ingredients called for on the cookie mix package). Add the powdered sugar. Beat only until the ingredients are fully incorporated. Dough will be crumbly, not smooth. Stir in the chocolate chips by hand.
3 - Drop dough by rounded tablespoon onto ungreased cookie sheet. (1-1/4" cookie scoop works well too.)
4 - Bake in a preheated 325° F oven for 12-14 minutes. Remove from oven when cookies are slightly brown around the edges and soft but not squishy in the center.
5 - Cool cookies 1 - 2 minutes on the cookie sheet before removing to a cooling rack to cool completely before serving. These aren't typical chocolate chip cookies. They aren't cakey -- instead, they are super sweet, slightly crunchy and a bit chewy. A sweet treat with coffee or milk!



We delivered the cookies to our parents, and then went to the cemetary to visit Livie. A guy on stilts gave me a frog balloon animal at an adoption event for work the day before her birthday, so we brought that for her. Our moms;dads/sisters had already visited that morning and had left some flowers and pinwheels for her also.

Happy 2nd Birthday, again, sweet love. We miss you every day!

Happy 2nd Birthday Livie Bean.

Happy second birthday to my sweet girl!!

 I read through several of my old posts this morning... specifically the ones right after Livie was born, and the ones right around her first birthday. I realized that I've never shared any pictures of my favorite thing of hers. The one thing that I would probably grab first if our apartment was on fire.

The bag of her things that the hospital gave us!

Before we removed her from the life support, one of her nurses was explaining how everything would happen. She said that after they removed Olivia from all of her leads and cords, we would get to keep them. I remember thinking how nice that was of them, but I had no idea how much effort they would put into putting everything together for us. Each item is wound up perfectly with a little pink tag explaining what it was used for. The nurse even wrote the explanation as if it were Olivia explaining it to us. I remember crying and crying the first time I really looked at everything, which wasn't until we got home from the hospital.

This is actually the first time I have ever taken any of it out of the bag. I think I was worried that I would mess something up or ruin it before. It felt good to hold the things that touched her and made her feel comfortable. My favorite things are the little diaper and the tiny sunglasses that she wore while she was under the phototherapy light.

(it says: "phototherapy mask to protect my eyes")

(Seeing the diaper in my hand puts into perspective how teeny she was. It's a preemie size diaper, but the top of it had to be folded under so that it would fit her, otherwise it would go up past her belly button.)

I ordered myself a present for Olivia's birthday:





(front)

(side)

(front)

It's a memory keeper from Paper Coterie. If you haven't seen these before, you should definitely check them out. Their stuff is gorgeous. We have been keeping all of Olivia's things in four flowered boxes that stack up. Honestly, it takes up a lot of room. I was reluctant to put any of her stuff away at first, but lately, I had been thinking about how we should pack everything into a tub, and find some way to keep out only the most important things. I had been seeing other bloggers post about these memory keepers, and decided to just order one and see what it looked like. They are BIGGER than I expected, like 9.75x13 inches. It fit the bag of all of her hospital things, her footprints, lock of hair, and the cards that we received.

I love that it fits on the bookshelf, and I can order another one for the next little bambino that we might have some day. I think it will be cool to have them all lined up next to each other on a shelf someday.

I also ordered one for our wedding stuff, but I haven't put anything in it yet.

We are celebrating in a very small way today, but it feels right. To be honest, so far, this feels like an ordinary weekend morning... but who knows if it will stay that way.

Can you believe it's been two years? I definitely can't.

Thanks to all of you for two years of support and love. We couldn't have gotten to this point with out all of you - I'm sure of that.

Veterans Day

Just wanted to take a quick second to say Happy Veterans Day!

I will be forever grateful to all those who serve, have served, or will make the choice to serve our country. Without our veterans, who knows what America might be like today.

I am especially grateful for MY veteran - and grateful that he made it through two tours in Iraq and was able to make it home safe and sound. :)

Somewhere Over the Rainbow

It's fall again. The season that makes me think of Olivia more than any other time of the year.
Now that it's been almost two years since she was born and died, it's become a lot easier than it used to be to just go about my day without really thinking of her. I pass her photos several times each day - especially at work where a framed scrapbook page of her pictures since on my desk - I tell people about her all the time... but I don't even remember the last time I actually sat down and let it completely sink in. Until today.

This afternoon/tonight after pretty much everyone else was gone from the office, and I was packing up my cubicle (Moving to a different office) and trying to organize everything into several different boxes. I was listening to Pandora on my desk computer, and had it set to the Micheal Buble station.

Apparently, it could also be called the Somewhere Over the Rainbow station.

Three different versions by three different artists played within a time period of about 45 minutes. Somewhere Over the Rainbow, the Faith Hill version, is the song that we played during the photo slideshow that we made for Olivia's memorial service. I never realized before how common that song is until recently. It's really hard for me to listen to, especially the slower versions of the song.

For some reason though, I didn't skip the song today. By the third time the song played, I was sitting at my desk staring at the pictures of her in the frame. An awful feeling came over me while I was looking at her. I'm sad about her all the time, but this was the first time in months that I really let myself feel the loss.

I just kept looking at her face thinking,"holy. crap. that baby in the picture is MY daughter. MY daughter is dead".

After that, I couldn't really get a whole lot of work done. I moved very slowly, and didn't end up coming home until almost 8:00pm.

How in the world is it possible that we're coming up on her second birthday? I can't even imagine what it would be like with a 2 year old little girl running around here. I don't really even want to let myself think about it. It's just too hard.

We miss you, little one.

I am lame.

I don't know what my problem has been lately. I feel like I have a thousand things that I want to post about, yet I still haven't posted any of them.

Thanks for checking up on me to make sure I'm okay!

I'm still here, I promise. Things are crazy 'round here right now.

I'll be back! :)

Illuminate Week #3

This one will be very short and sweet...



I am thankful for...

the ability to see the beauty in the little things in life.

I am thankful that I've learned the importance of taking nothing for granted

and always stopping to appreciate what's going on now instead of always planning for the future

illuminate, week #2

The focus of this week's illuminate assignments is "light". As soon as I read the assignment, I thought of a beautiful song that my friend Meredith shared with me a couple of months ago. I'm sure some of you have heard it by now, Christian radio stations play it pretty frequently. She sent the link to the music video to me in a Facebook message, and said that the Livie had been on her heart recently, and that when she heard this song she thought of us. It's sung by Addison Road, whose song "Hope Now" really helped me get through some dark months.

This Little Light, by Addison Road

There's a little flame inside us all

Some shine bright, some shine small
The rains will come and the waters rise
But don't you ever lose your light
In this life you will know
Love and pain, joy and sorrow
So when it hurts, when times get hard
Don't forget whose child you are

This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine, gonna let it shine

May you live each day with no regret
Make the most of every chance you get
Let your eyes get wide when you look at the stars
With the same sense of wonder as a child's heart

With the ones you love treasure the time
And for those who are gone keep their memories alive
Hold on to your dreams don't ever let go
There's a fire inside you burning with hope

This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine, gonna let it shine

There will be days when you want to give up
When the clouds settle in
But after the rain comes the sun
Don't you ever forget

One day there will be no more pain
And we will finally see Jesus' face
So until then I'm gonna try
To brave the dark and let my little light shine

This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine
I'm gonna let it shine, gonna let it shine

There's a little light inside us all

Illuminate Post #1

The following post is a part of a self portrait assignment for "Illuminate: Lighting the Path to Photographic Healing" course I'm taking. It's offered by Beryl of Be Young Photography.
Click the link above if you are interested in learning about the course!

Sweet Livie,
It's been a long time since I've written you a letter. I have written about you on this blog so many times, but I guess writing about you is a little bit less emotional than writing directly to you... so maybe that's why I've avoided it. I can tell already that this class is going to break me out of my comfort zone in so many ways - and that's a really good thing.

I don't even remember the last time I wrote you a letter. I do remember the first time though. Your Grandma and Grandpa told Daddy and I that they each wrote a letter to Katie after she was stillborn to put in her casket at her funeral. We loved that idea, so the night before you funeral, we stayed up late handwriting you letters. I typed them up so that we would have copies to keep for ourselves... but I still haven't been able to look back at them. I don't know if I'll ever be able to, but I like knowing that they're there for someday.

I remember crying the whole time I was writing. Now that it's been almost 20 months since that day, I am able to write about you and your story without completely losing it... but I remember the days when I could barely say your name without tearing up.  But just because I don't cry as often as I did then doesn't mean I love you any less. I worry that becaue I appear to be "back to my old self" to most people, they will think that I've "gotten over you". I wish everyone could understand that it doesn't work like that. I will never be over you. I might be able to go out and have fun, and wear a smile on my face all day long... but that doesn't mean that my heart isn't still broken. I know it always will be to some extent... and I'm okay with that. I don't want to feel "normal". Or at least, not the old normal... because the way I felt before you was worse than the way I feel now. Because then, I hadn't met you yet. And I wouldn't want to change that for the world.
I still think of you every day, and I know Daddy does too. Now, instead of being sad every time you cross my mind, most of the time I am happy. Happy that you blessed our lives for the thirty-some weeks that we knew you were in my tummy, and the three days that we knew you "on the outside". But even though I am so happy that I knew you, my heart will always ache. I know that until we meet again someday, a piece of my heart will always be in heaven with you. Someday, you will have siblings who will hold their own pieces of my heart, but there will always be a part of it that is solely and uniquely yours. I am so proud to be able to say that you were our first baby, our first little girl. (Okay, maybe I lied about being able to write without crying).

Do you know how many gifts you have given me? I don't know if I can even count them all. You made me a mommy, and taught me how to love in a way that I didn't know existed. In my opinion, that is one of the biggest gifts a woman can receive. You taught me to see beauty in the little things, and to cherish every second of life and never let it pass me by. You death was the biggest tragedy of our lives, but because you died, I will never be able to take life, or time, for granted again... like I'm sure I did before you. Because of you, I met some of the most amazing women and formed friendships baby-loss mamas all over the country. They never would have come into my life without you.

I always knew that Daddy and I would love each other forever, but because of you, we have a closeness and an understanding of each others emotions that probably would have taken years to discover if we hadn't had to deal with losing you so unexpectedly. And on that same note, your Grandma and I were able to grow in our relationship because of you. Two first born daughters, who unexpectedly lost their first born daughters at the very end of their very first pregnancies. My mom and I were always close, but now we understand each other in a completely different way.

I could go on and on listing the ways you've blessed my life, sweet girl, but I think I've made my point. I hope you know how glad I am to be your mama, and that I as awful as those months after your death were for me and your Dad, I wouldn't trade them for anything in the world. I can still feel the weight of you in my arms, and if I close my eyes and breathe, I can smell your shampoo and the detergent that was used to wash your blankets and little pink sleeper.

I love you more than the moon and all of the stars in the sky. I miss you every single day.

Love,
Mama

The one self portrait that I liked enough to post: This is the pink bear that sat on Olivia's casket in the middle of a huge flower arrangement at her memorial service. The priest handed her to me just before her casket was lowered into the ground. He told me to take her home with me and hug her every time I needed to feel Olivia. It's hard to see in this picture, but her face is kind of smashed up because I slept with her for months after that, and still do sometimes.

I'm just throwin' this one in for good measure. I sat outside and hand wrote the above letter with a glass of wine the other night.

I'm back!!

Hi friends.

Sorry for alarming some of you. I've gotten a couple of e mails and comments asking me if I'm doing okay, since I wasn't in the best place at the time of my last post, and I haven't written since then. Thank you all for the sweet messages :).

I sort of let myself fall away from the blogging world for a few weeks. Kurt and I moved into our new apartment about two weeks ago, so between working and packing and unpacking, and having family in town for the 4th, I haven't had time to even think about writing.

Also - my computer has a ridiculous virus and my hard drive is completely shot. My laptop is the only computer we have that has Photoshop on it, and since I haven't been able to edit my pictures, I kind of let my photography stuff go by the wayside too!

Things are good though. I'll post again VERY soon. Sorry for being so lame and boring! Right now, my very tired, sore, sun burned body is going to sleep!

Where I am...

Kristin from Dear Stevie recently posted about the Right Where I Am Project, which was started by Angie, another blogger. You write about your grief, and what it's like right now, so that new baby loss mamas who stumble across your blog can get an idea of what the grief experience is like further down the road, and so that people who are further down the road can reflect on how far they've come in their grief. I've been having a difficult time writing about grief related things lately, so I thought maybe this would be a good starting place.
So, Where am I right now, this very second, in my grief?
It's been one year, six months and seventeen days. Most days, I really can't believe it's been that long. Other days, it seems like it has been a lifetime since we last held that tiny little girl in the "transition" room at the hospital.

I definitely still have moments where I think, "this is bullshit, I can't believe it happened to us". But it's in a different way now. Don't get me wrong - I still miss Olivia SO much it hurts. But it's different now, because in the beginning I couldn't even imagine having another baby. I wanted that baby. Now, I'm able to miss her and still be hopeful and excited about having future children. I remember in the beginning, feeling like that day would never come. But it still doesn't feel fair. I guess that's because it isn't, and it never will be... no amount of rationalizing or talking about the positive things that came as a result of losing her will ever make it feel "okay".
Kurt and I were talking last night about how losing her makes almost everything more difficult and complicated than it should be. We were talking about having kids, and about how scared we are to try again. I have said this before, but because my pregnancy with Olivia wasn't planned, we weren't exactly ready to have a baby - we weren't even living together yet when I got pregnant. If she had never existed, we would have probably not had started "trying" to have kids for another few years. Because we know that's what's smart financially for us {even though our hearts may think otherwise}, we're waiting. It's been unbelievably hard to watch almost every.single.one of my blog-friends who lost babies right around the same time that we dod go on to have babies. Several of them are pregnant now, and several of them have had babies in the last couple of months. I am SO happy for them, but it's been difficult to find women to relate to. I'm in this weird in-between stage where I want to have another baby more than anything, but I'm not trying to concieve like half of the BLM community, and I haven't had a second baby like the other half of the BLM community. I haven't found anyone else who wants a baby, but isn't trying to have one - and not because of a medical reason, just because it's not practical. We had to scramble {and if you know us in real life, you know that we really were scrambling} to get everything in order for Olivia. We had to find a two bedroom place that we could afford when we weren't really quite ready to move in together anyway, and scrape together as much money as possible to afford all of the things she would need. I never want to do that again. I want to be completely prepared next time. I have said that to a few friends who have had babies in the last year or two, and they all tell me that you're never completely prepared, and that if I were to get pregnant now or whenever, it would be the right time. I agree with that... and obviously I know that anything can happen and we could be pregnant again before we're "ready", but I would like to try and be a little bit more responsible this time.

And there aren't very many newlyweds who have lost a baby. We don't really fit in with any of our friends, and that's a lot harder than you'd think. On one hand, we sort of fit in with our newly married friends who don't have kids yet. But they either aren't planning on having babies at all, or not for several years. I think both Kurt and I really feel like parents, because pregnancy and especially dealing with our loss made us grow up quite a bit faster than we probably would have otherwise. Lots of newlyweds are still going out to bars and getting drunk on the weekends with their friends... and we really don't do that. And then on the other hand, we don't quite fit in with our friends who have kids either. I've only been pregnant and had a baby for three days... so I don't know what it's like to have a baby at home to take care of. There are two couples that we're really close with. One of them was pregnant while I was, except I was a several months ahead of her. I had Olivia in November, and their baby was born in April. Then, coincidentally, the day their baby was born, the other couple found out that they were pregnant! Their baby was born on Christmas. So for a full year after Livie died, I got to feel like part of the group, talking about pregnancy pains and c-section scars. But now they both have their kids at home. I love their kids, to them we are "Uncle Kurt and Aunt Betsy" - they feel like family, and I can spend time at their houses and play with the babies without getting overwhelmingly sad or upset, but it is still hard to hang out with them without thinking that we should be a group of 9 - three guys who were best friends in high school, and their wives and babies who are all only a few months apart. Our kids should be growing up together, and now they won't.

So that's where we are. We're stuck here in this kind of limbo area, and it's a very strange feeling.

I should say though, that for the most part, we're very happy. That's something that I want new BLMs to know. Yes, we are still sad and probably always will be in some way or another, but it really does get better. Despite the hard days, life has already gotten so much better than I ever thought it would be in those first dark weeks and months.

It does get better.

The Wall That Heals

Happy Memorial Day everyone!

Yesterday afternoon, Kurt and I went to watch the "Wall That Heals" come into town. It's a replica of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial Wall that travels around the country, and it was escorted into town by about 300 motorcycles. Almost all of the riders were veterans, and their motorcycles all had American flags on the backs. Their route to Memorial Park, where the wall will be displayed, was published online, so we went to watch it from a pedestrian bridge that goes over one of the streets they rode down. We were actually pretty surprised, there were only about 8 other people watching. Kurt filmed it with his phone, and the motorcycles came continuously 2x2 for over two minutes.

Kurt was wearing his veterans hat. The yellow letters against the black fabric and the bright ribbons in the middle are pretty recognizable, especially to other vets. Several times just before a bike would pass under the bridge, the driver would look up and salute Kurt and the Vietnam vet who was standing next to us, who was also wearing his hat. By the third or fourth time Kurt saluted back, I was in tears. I was overwhelmed with such a feeling of gratitude. So thankful for those who gave their lives so that we can all know freedom, and so thankful that my husband stayed safe through two deployments to Iraq and was able to stand next to me on that bridge.

I hope that everyone enjoyed their long weekend resting, spending time with friends and family, and grilling out to kick-off summer! Never forget the reason for Memorial Day!

Preach it, Oprah!

I just stayed up way too late watching the last couple of Oprah episodes that I didn't have time to watch this week. I wrote down these two quotes from her final episode that I really wanted to remember, and really wanted to share them here. They are both absolutely beautiful. I love Oprah, but I know that a lot of people don't.... so read them anyway, and if you don't like Oprah, just pretend that they were said by someone else that you really like. I think they're amazing pieces of advice that I never want to forget.

“We often block our own blessings because we don’t feel inherently good enough, or smart enough, or pretty enough, or worthy. You are worthy because you are born and because you are HERE. Your being here, your being alive, makes worthiness your birth right. You alone, are enough”.


"I know I’ve never been alone, and you haven’t either. I know that that presence, that flow, some people call it Grace, is working in my life at every single turn. And yours too, if you let it in. It’s closer than your breath, and it is yours for the asking. I have felt the presence of God my whole life. Even when I didn’t have a name for it I could hear a voice bigger than myself speaking to me. All of us have that same voice. Be still, and know it. You can acknowledge it, or not. You can worship it or not, you can praise it, you can ignore it. Or you can know it. KNOW IT. It’s always there speaking to you, and waiting for you to hear it. In every move, in every decision. I wait and I listen, I’m still. I wait and listen for the guidance that’s greater than my meager mind. The only time I’ve made mistakes is when I didn’t listen.

So what I know is… God Is love. And God is LIFE. And your life is always speaking to you."