A blessed year

As the end of 2011 approached, I truly could not wait for the year to end. Good riddance to a very bad year. I am so ready for 2012, bring it on! A fresh start. Goodbye old hurts. Hello new blessings. 

That was until I read my beautiful friend, Nat's thoughts on this time of year. You have to know what Nat's been through to understand why her words inspired me. When I read her reflections on 2011, I realised that I had been looking at the year solely through a lens of regret and sorrow. 

Yes, my baby is dead. 

No, I will never get to meet her (not on earth at least). 

No, I still haven't figured out how you grieve for someone you love with all your heart but haven't met.  

Slowly and surely as I sat here reading Nat's words and hearing her perspective, I felt like a veil had lifted and for a moment my heart and my spirit felt lighter. 

Yes all of those horrible, awful and painful things are still true. Nothing can and will ever be able to erase that part of this experience. Even so, no matter how godawful losing my baby was, I still had her. 

What an incredible blessing! I feel like such an idiot because for so long, I'd allowed myself to forget what a huge honour and privilege it was to be Pip's mummy. Being pregnant with her was truly one of the happiest times of my life. I felt like I was floating on a cloud. With every moment that passed, I loved her more and more. My words cannot do justice to just how happy, special and blessed I felt to be carrying her. 

If someone were to wave a magic wand and give me the opportunity to well and truly erase my pregnancy with Pip out of my life, I wouldn't do it. I would never, ever give those 11 weeks back. Even though she only really lived for 6.5 weeks which is little more than half of that time. The rest of the time I was willing her to live, praying for a miracle and hoping against hope that this was all a horrible nightmare. Still, I would do it all again in a heartbeat even if I were to know in advance that she wouldn't make it.

In my hurt, I was only looking forward to new blessings. I'd turned my back on all the other good things that had happened in 2011. Family, travel, love, joy and peace. None of that mattered after Pip was gone. The hurt is so big sometimes that I can't look past it. And in that hurt, I'd lost sight of the the single biggest blessing of 2011. My beautiful baby girl.

I don't know what 2012 will bring. I know that my experience is nothing compared to the scope of what so many other people go through and have to live with every single day. Yes, this hurt feels so big right now. So big that some days I wonder if I will ever not feel broken anymore. 

Yes, 2012 could be worse, without a doubt. But I'm hoping that it won't be. I'm hoping for another wonderful year. Another year of amazing miracles, blessings, joy, laughter and most of all hope. 

I don't want to lose sight of the beauty of my dreams. I don't want to ever be so caught up in my hurt that I forget what a beautiful blessing my little Pip was. We wanted her so desperately. Then we found out she was here. She grew rapidly in the short time she was here, then she stopped. I didn't want to give her back. I fought, I willed her to live, I raged, I cried and I pleaded. I held on to her for as long as my body allowed me to. Then she was ripped out of me. The emptiness came and I never thought I'd get past that darkness. Most days I'm still empty and it is still pretty dark. But now I know in my heart that she is transformed and I know she lives on. Somewhere, somehow, I know she is okay.

And maybe feeling that in my heart is giving me the permission I need to continue living my life, one broken day at a time. At this moment, there is only the now. My life right now is a collection of moments. One moment after another, one day at a time, one foot in front of the other. Maybe someday those baby steps will grow into bigger steps. Who knows, one day when I'm not looking, it might even mean feeling as okay again as possible. 

I don't know when, how or what that day will be like. But there is a small part of me that is hoping that maybe that day will come in 2012.

Here's to the new year, may it bring us all peace, love and joy.

So this is Christmas

Hello my girl,

So today was Christmas day. Daddy and I spent it with the family at Nanna's place. I was expecting it to be a very difficult day and it was in parts, but on the whole I was surprised that it was relatively good. The blur of activity helped and the chaos and madness of children, Santa and presents helped it go faster too.

Both your Nannas remembered you in very special ways. Daddy's mummy gave us little crystal angel ornaments for our tree. Mine is a pink one and daddy's is a bright blue one. Almost aqua! I think you'd like them. She also gave me a lovely little angel candle and when she did, she sang a little song about angels looking down from heaven over us. That made me a bit sad because I thought about you and wondered if you were there with us in spirit. Nanna and I had a little cry and daddy gave me a big cuddle which helped me feel better.

Your other Nanna, my mummy, gave me two little angel pendants for you. One is silver with white crystal stones that I will wear with your other pendant and the other was a little gold one with a tiny golden angel. I love them both.

The Christmas tree was up today and there were special ornaments on it for everyone. My special friend sent me some beautiful ornaments for you and kept one of the same on her tree to remind her of you. I feel so blessed to have such beautiful and thoughtful friends. She sent me a silver apple and an angel ornament for you. An apple for my Pip and an angel for my angel. Even so, I couldn't bear to put up a real Christmas tree in our house. Putting one up this year was hard enough, so I simplified and stuck some branches of Christmas berries in a vase, which looked pretty enough to pass as our make-shift tree.

Nanna (my mummy) also rescued some red apple ornaments from a friend who wanted to find new homes for them and put them on our tree for me to discover. I've been looking everywhere for red apple ornaments like the ones I remember from when I was a little girl, but I haven't been able to find them anywhere. I had the biggest smile on my face when I saw them hanging on the tree. Two little red apples for my girl. They were old and one had lost it's stem, but they were still perfect and beautiful to me.

Mummy's friend Jeanette, whom I'm sure would have been like another Nanna to you, gave me a golden yellow shooting star ornament. It was perfect and I loved it from the moment I saw it. Daddy said he saw a shooting star on Christmas eve. Did you send him one? I didn't ask him what he wished for because his special wish may not come true if it was no longer a secret. How perfect that all your colours somehow found their way to us.

The strangest ornament for you this year is perhaps the tiny little angel figurine I found in a charity shop many years ago. Before you my lovely girl, I never really understood angels, I liked them of course, but I was never really drawn to angel things. Yet one day, many years before you were even here, I found this tiny little angel in a purple dress, with green wings, who's holding a red ball in her arms and knew that I had to bring her home. She wasn't worth much money, but I loved her from the moment I saw her. I found her the other day when I was trying to be brave about hanging up our christmas ornaments. Then it struck me that it looks like she's holding a red apple. It made me hope that you are with angels who are keeping you close and safe. I love her even more now and despite parts of her missing some paint, you guessed it, I love her all the same.

Were you watching when Santa arrived? Your cousins were so excited to see him walk through the door to deliver presents! I'm sure you knew that it was secretly Uncle Matty dressed up as Santa, but it was fun all the same. I hope someone will tell you someday about Santa. Maybe one day I will get to tell you myself? It made me sad to think that every year there would have been a photo with Santa and you would have been able to tell him what you wanted for Christmas if you'd been a good girl. Does heaven have a special Santa for the children without their families there? I really do hope so. 

I wonder if there would have been presents under the tree for you if you'd still been here. I'm sure there would have been. There still were, but they were presents of a different kind. Presents for me to remember you, not presents for a baby to play with. Although this wouldn't have been your first Christmas, it would have been our first Christmas with you. It seems so wrong that now it's our first Christmas without you.

Maybe if you'd still been here, I would have had an excuse not to have gone climbing on the rocks with Daddy, your cousins and Mika. I was so very careful when I was pregnant with you, doing everything I knew of to keep you safe. I don't think Daddy would have let me go with him if you were still here even if I wanted to, because he was very over protective of you and me. He called us "his girls" and always hovered over me (and you).

I would have stayed far away from the Christmas drinks. Also not safe for you, my love. But since you're not here, I had a little champagne and white wine. It was nice enough, but I would have rather had you here and not had any at all. 

The big hole in my heart was still there today. Having everyone here and being surrounded by love and family helped to make it a little bit better. I never stopped thinking of you, but somehow my heart found a little bit of peace.

I thought of all the other angel mummies and their babies. Are you all friends in heaven because we are friends on earth? We think about you everyday and talk about you with each other. You will always be our children and today especially, you were missed so much. 

I hope you felt a little bit more loved today, because we were all thinking of you, my little love. Christmas will never be the same for me again, but just like my new normal, I seem to have found my new Christmas. So this is what it's like. This is Christmas without you.  


I miss you my beautiful girl.

I Love You, always and forever, all the way to heaven and back,

Mummy xxx

Our first Post-Pip Christmas

Every story has a beginning and an ending. Most stories usually have one significant event that changes the course of the lives of all affected by it, or many little events that make up the story itself. Whatever the story, I think that most stories also have a "pre" and a "post" and so it is that our story of Pip has a pre and a post to it also.

I've always loved Christmas. There really is no two ways about that, Christmas has always been an event in our household ever since we were married. It's a time when our family comes together, or while we were living overseas, it was a time we spent with close friends usually alongside a Christmas feast which takes almost ten times as long to cook and prepare as it takes to eat it all. We love our presents, not for what is contained in the gifts themselves, but mainly for the fun of going out and picking or making something that will give the other person joy, a laugh or two and something they may even treasure for a while.

All of the above is of course Pre-Pip.

I remember hoping last year when we'd first started trying for a baby that I would have some lovely news to share at Christmas time. What could be a better gift than knowing that a beautiful little person is growing inside you and will soon join your family? December 2010 came and went without that news I was hoping for, but despite the disappointment we had a great time together as a family and I took it in stride. 

So when I found out that we were pregnant in July this year, I was so excited about what this Christmas would be like with our little one this time. If everything has gone well, I'd be around about 5 months pregnant at Christmas time. It would also have been around the time when our baby would have started to move, dance and kick in the womb. I couldn't wait to feel that for myself and I know my family would have fawned over every little thing with this baby. 

In a Post-Pip world, Christmas will come and go as usual. There will be the usual Christmas feast with the usual suspects. But there will be one little person missing from the picture. I don't think Christmas will ever be the same again for me. For the first time in what feels like forever, I'm not looking forward to Christmas. At all. Where before there was a feeling of excitement and anticipation, now there only seems to be an empty bleakness.

Loosing Pip was like being hit by the grief and loss freight train. Most days I'm surprised that I have barely survived. At first there is nothing but numbness. Then comes the incredible pain which is all consuming. Then slowly by slowly I've started to learn how to take that pain and live with it. Now I feel like I'm getting ready to start doing all the things I've done normally before, only knowing that life will never be the same again. This is my new normal.

And so as Christmas rolls around this year, somehow quite by accident I've just realised that I'm part of 4 different Secret Santa's. One for work, one with a bunch of my special girlfriends and the other two are for two separate baby loss networks I'm a part of. The handmade holiday gift exchange with the girls at Grieve out Loud (GOL) and the other is a baby loss mama's group on facebook.

The handmade holiday gift exchange appeals to me because it's handmade. These past few months have had the recurring theme of handmade. Pre-Pip I'd lost my connection with handmade, but Post-Pip I've slowly started to rediscover that connection and how much I truly love making things with my hands. 

Now I'm both excited and scared about what I will be making to exchange which I joined at the last minute by the grace of my lovely penpal at GOL. But therein lies the miracle. Where before I wasn't looking forward to any part of Christmas, now there is a little glimmer of hope and something different. Maybe Christmas will never be the same again, but maybe like my new normal, it may just take a little bit of getting used to.

Learning to live with the pain

Hi baby girl,

These past few weeks have been different. I'm starting to find that these days I have more good days than bad days.

When I say "good days", that doesn't mean a day when I don't think about you, because I can't see that happening anytime soon. I think I will always find you in the little things - a pretty flower, the flutter of a butterfly's wings, a rainbow... There isn't a day that has gone by when I haven't thought about you. The difference is now I can think of you and begin to smile, knowing that you are transformed, living a life that is pain free, I hope you are living it up in Heaven and rocking with the angel baby family you have up there.

At first, not feeling the same deep, deep sadness that I felt at the start made me feel guilty and sad. But I know that everyone grieves differently. Just because I'm not a sobbing mess anymore doesn't mean that I love you and miss you any less. It's not like any of this makes any more sense. Not at all, I still don't get why things had to happen this way. I still wish with all my heart that you were here and growing bigger and stronger every day inside me. I don't think that wish will ever change.

How do you grieve for someone you've never met, yet love with all your heart? I don't know, so I had to find my own way. My way has been to honour your memory by talking about you to anyone and everyone who will listen. By finding other mummies who live everyday without their precious babies, just like daddy and I live everyday without you.

My way is to pour all the love I have for you into creating something special and beautiful just for you. My way is to dream about you while I sew another little stitch into your very own quilt. Do you like the colours I've chosen for you? Do you like the patterns and the shapes? I hope so. Maybe one day you can tell me exactly what you think of it.

I know that you wouldn't want me to be sad forever. Daddy said that to me the other day and so did some of the other angel mummies I speak to often. Most days are good, but some days are still bad.

The other day I drove past the hospital where I went to see the doctor for you. The thought that if everything had gone well, I'd still be going there for you brought tears to my eyes. Then another day, a lady I work with brought her newborn granddaughter in to work. It broke my heart to hold that tiny, beautiful little girl and know that I will never get to hold you like that. Nor will your grandmother, who was so very excited about being a grandmother, get the chance to introduce you to her friends like that. 

Yes, some days are still bad. But most days are good. I still love you and miss you every single day. I still wear the necklace I had made for you and it helps to know you are symbolically near, even though I know you will always be in my heart.

Another angel mummy said that this means I'm learning to live with the pain. I want you to know that while that learning process is still hard, painful and awkward, I'm getting better everyday. I don't like the thought that you may be worrying over me or daddy, because you're a beautiful child of heaven and should be happy and free without worries. So know this my love, I will never stop loving you but very, very, very slowly I think that great big gaping hole in my heart is starting to mend - ironically, with the very thing that makes it hurt so very much. My love for you. 

It's a swelteringly hot day here today, I hope heaven has ice creams with chocolate sprinkles for you. 

I love you always and forever my baby girl.
You are always in my heart.
mummy xxx