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Release from Grief Blogposts

I wrote a series of blog posts about my path through grief. I called it a Release from Grief, because in many ways I feel I'm beyond it... I don't grieve the loss of  my precious babies anymore...I'm in a new place with no name...but I've found a way to release my grief and move to here. It might not be for everyone as we all walk very different, very personal paths, but I wanted to share :) Here is the complete blog series together in one post:

Introduction

A Seed

Changes

What Ifs

Nature

Share

Release

Release from Grief: Release

The Flowering:

Your seed has grown, become something new, something different than the see it started. It may wilt on occasion, but with some TLC it will come back full bloom, facing the sun and ready for bright tomorrows. It won't leave you. Even if the flower wilts and seemingly dies, a seed will always remain for it to regrow.

Release

I've written this just to share my own personal thoughts, feelings and ideas while struggling with the loss of a child. You might agree or might not. Thats alright. We live in a huge world full of different kinds of people. Different types of people. My way is NOT the way for everyone. My way is merely a suggestion on how you might find your way. I have in no way perfected this method. But I have found a release from grief. Let me explain.

From my experience I seems like many drown in their grief. They hold on to the grief thinking they are holding on their babies and I feel there is a great separation between the two. Your grief is sadness, anger, isolation while your baby is love. How are they something to be kept together? They are opposites (in my eyes). As soon as you find a way to come to this reality and truly focus on JUST the love, just the bliss you felt when you found our you were pregnant, seeing you baby's face, etc...then the grief can start to crumble and break off. Use that love as a shield against the grief. Now this isn't something that will work right off. Everyone needs to go through the stages of grief. I just find there are some that seem to live in a stage forever and I would for them to find the same release I have found and that is where I feel this method comes in to play. There is no time frame for grief and I know it can last years. But at some point I know I realized I was tired from it. The pain was too much and hard to bare and I wanted to find a way out. I stumbled and fell a few times, but this is just merely what helped me, and I truly believe it CAN help others.

I more often than not feel at peace with my losses. I don't spend weeks dreading their angelversaries. I don't even dread their days as much as I used to. I found a release as I surfaced from drowning. As I felt the sand on my toes I stood, walked and felt surrounded with love and warmth. Your angels don't need you to celebrate their day if you don't want to, you celebrate them everytime you think about them. Somewhere in my stumbling and falling I discovered there is a place with in me where Kaitlin and Sage are always celebrated, loved and cherished. As long as I live that place will forever live on. There is my release. I don't grieve the loss of them, I instead celebrate the life they had and the life they gave me. This wasn't an overnight process. I still might fall on occasion, but mostly I now know how to fly myself. Falling is okay, but don't give yourself permission to stay laying there. Rest for a moment but always sit, stand and walk again. Their memories rely on us to keep them alive, keep them experiencing life as well. Someday I hope you find your release from grief :) How you get there is yours to find. Use my words as a guide or find your own, but I truly with my whole being hope those who have been touched with infant loss can find a release.

Release from Grief: Share

hare

This section might seem redundant. But It's from a previous portion I wrote and felt it needed to be said, it's something I encourage EVERYONE to do. Share your loss, share your experience, just share.

You don't have to share them with the world, you don't have to talk and talk about your few days pregnant until those around you think you've gone mad. There are so many different way to SHARE that don't seem like “sharing.” Lets start with one simple fact, don't hide them. They are apart of you, the new you. In order for people and you to understand that new you, they need to KNOW why you changed. No all people will NOT agree with it. They've probably never experienced it. If they did it might have been in a time they weren't allowed to process and deal with those feelings...so understand you will not find acceptance with all of those around you. I try to accept the comments they make as just ignorance. And not ignorance in a negative way... just they don't KNOW. It's like telling someone you understand what it feels like when their house burns down. You can't unless you've experienced it. Have you lost everything you had accept the clothes on your back? Have you stood by and cried seeing the place you felt the safest turn to rubble? If the answer is no, then you CAN'T relate. You think you can so you say things like I understand, but you truly can't. Just like a person who has never experienced a loss can't help but think they have the best advice, but they don't. And honestly NO ONE has the best advice, you need to stumble around and figure out what your new path is. Talk to people, get opinions...something will work, somethings won't...but you will find your footing again. So this is why I say share.

Even with future people. As you go on to make new friends, don't afraid of talking about your loss. It's apart of you just like all of your other life experiences. It has molded you into who you are, it's nothing shameful. It's not meant to be swept under the rug. If you had a child that died at the age of two you would talk about them, but for some reason an infant loss isn't supposed to be. I'm not saying shout it from the roof tops (even though I don't think there is harm in that either), but we often get a pit of our stomach worry when someone asks how many children we have, or brings up pregnancy. Then the struggle in your in mind begins... do I say something? Do I just stay quite? Do I omit my angels? I'm all for honesty. Say it, say you have so many losses, say you have had that experience. I can tell you in my 6 years of being honest, I rarely come across a rude person. Sadly most of the rudeness comes from family not strangers.

Sharing also empowers. It empowers other women and men to be willing to say HEY ME TOO! It's scary, but honestly our world is changing and people are realizing that loss happens. It's not a comfortable topic so many stray away from it, but they know of it and most have sympathy for those who deal with it.

Confession. I once was exposed to someone who was talking about a miscarriage and how worried she was about the current pregnancy. How scared she was, etc. I remember thinking why it's just a miscarriage. That was my being ignorant. It was before kids for me, before I realized what it was like. It's just like when people talk about their house flooding... like mine did. People on the outside think we got tons of money from the insurance company, that we were recovered with in months of it happening, and that we are back to normal. In reality, we didn't even get enough to put the downstairs back to how it was before the flood, not to mention the countless personal items we lost. We are still recovering 3 years later as you can only do so much. Yes we use the basement again as a living room, but it's not a “finished” room. Then the back to normal.. HA! We lost all of our baby items that we saved from baby one, so we had to rebuy them all when we got pregnant again. People don't step up and help you as much with baby two as much as they do with your first...so it was on us. People don't get how we talk about a plan on IF we ever get a the flood warning like we did before. How we worry when it rains. How we still try to find things we lost in the flood forgetting we LOST them in the flood. So many things are not normal now... but it's our new normal. I couldn't have understood what flooding was like, until it happened to me. But I am honest about the flood too.

You sharing will empower someone else to share and perhaps even help them realize they aren't alone. However I do understand not everyone is comfortable with this.

Maybe you're not comfortable sharing verbally. Share on paper. Journaling for some can be a very powerful tool. Something they can turn to, write in and just have that release. Kuddos to you if you can, I envy you. I never could. It wasn't my outlet. It seemed to easy to do, but it wasn't for me. I felt awkward writing, clumsy and just plain not into it. So I abandoned it. I tried it...because at first I was worried my feelings weren't normal, that I would be laughed at, it still didn't work for me. But over time I've realized that I'm not normal, I'm ME. My grief and feelings will be different and the same in many ways compared to others.

But I stress don't stuff your loss down deep inside of you like your trying to “forget it”. Share it, even if it's ONLY with yourself.

Still Birthday

I work on and off with Still Birthday, the wonderful creator of it all Heidi holds a special place in my heart. Her kind words, encouragement and patience helped me through my at home miscarriage in ways she will never even realize. She was my go to and I appreciate it with all my heart.

I like to donate when I can so when she asked me if I would be interested in making the scarves for her Love Wildly event I jumped on board!

The photo isn't the best, but here are some of them :)

They are made of fleece. Each one has a machine embroidered appliqué on them of three hearts. One in pink, one blue and the larger one purple. The fabric used on the appliques are from scraps I have from making outfits and blankets to be donated in my kits. So they have a special meaning.

Want to learn more about Still Birthday? Check our her website here:

Still Birthday

You can find more about the Love Wildly event there as well :)

Release from Grief: Nature

Nature

Oh boy, did I ever resentment my two angels from time to time. I will be honest sometimes I'm downright mad at them. If Kaitlin could have just developed properly I might have my three children right now. (Not that I realistically think SHE had any say in matters either). Sage too, I wouldn't have had to spend another 5 months of disappointments if she could have just stuck around. Sounds awful of me right? It's normal. It's part of playing a victim, but I try to remember they are a victim too. If only MY egg/body could have worked right they would be here right?

Oh and then resenting the medical staff, my doc for not seeing what was going on, the NICU nurses for maybe missing something. The NICU doc for maybe throwing in the towel too soon...etc. Even though I kno they all had her best interests at heart, that they were fighting WITH us and not against us. This kind of thinking will just sink you. And to be honest we all sink some before we learn how to float. Then you sort of do this bob on top thing on occasion. Or take a few steps back towards the water during your life before you turn around and walk forward again. Really though loosing Kaitlin and Sage is nature.

Nature took a hold of my children and took my children from me. Nothing to really blame there. We as a human race save ALOT of babies that shouldn't be saved. (I'm not saying I want that to end). From Nature's standpoint we are going against genetics. Now the weak survive along with the strong. A child born at 24 weeks for example is given about a 50% chance of survival... they normally walk out with lots of complications, but they live. 100 years ago... a baby born at 24 weeks would have been treated like a baby born at 20 weeks now. A baby born to soon to be helped. (Listen don't quote me directly on the numbers I use, this is just a food for thought sort of thing). Now fast forward 100 years and perhaps a baby born at 20 weeks will be able to survive too...but as humans we are supposed to carry our young in womb for 9 months. Born a little sooner might work out alright in general, but we keep our young alive when they are born drastically earlier than planned.

This way of thinking has helped me immensely. How can I resent the medical system for giving me a chance to carry Kaitlin to term. Kaitlin should have died around 20 weeks. We stitched my cervix closed so she stayed within until 29 weeks. Then she should have died shortly after birth, but because someone knows how to perform surgery on such a tiny being she lived. Because we have antibiotics, can give blood transfusions, and have meds that help preemies she lived for two weeks. Sage isn't immune to this either. In the past I would have realized I was pregnant and thought all was well, up until the day it wasn't. But with Sage I got to have an ultrasound (well a few of them). I got to prepare. I knew she wasn't going to stay around and I got plan for that. I knew why I lost Sage. Medicine tells us that babies just stop developing for genetic reasons. Before I can only imagine a woman's pain in wondering why her pregnancies didn't stick. I can imagine the blame one might have felt. It's a small comfort in knowing that it's just nature. It's nothing I did, its nothing the baby did, it's just how things happen.

In the end though it nature. It goes back to the why me question. I am a product of nature so it's the reality my children are also prone to nature's laws. Not every egg with be perfectly fertilized or grow the way it should. Not every person's body is a perfect host for babies to grow. All we can do is be thankful for the technology we posses to help fight against it.

Release from Grief: What Ifs

The What ifs

Oh those what ifs, things you wish you had done differently at the time of your loss, things you think if you went back and changed it would change the outcome. There is no changing, no going back, etc. Your angel is your angel, it's harsh, but true. It takes awhile to realize this...I used to wake thinking Kaitlin was still in the NICU. I used to hope and believe Sage was still growing in my and what I had passed was just a large clot and all was well. Then I played the what ifs. Was it the fact I touched Christmas lights that caused Kaitlin to have issues, I colored my hair I should have never done that. What if I hadn't? What if I wasn't taking certain medicines could that change if Sage would have lived or not...I drove myself mad...but it didn't change anything. It didn't bring them back. Nothing will. So you have to face reality, Your baby is GONE.

Then there is the how you would have done it differentlys. How you might have dressed your angel yourself, how you might have not flushed that clot down the toilet. How you would have made the experience more special or just different. That can't be changed either. But it's okay. It YOUR experience. At the time it was what you needed to do. Sometimes we are medications that hinder us from seeing things clearly, sometimes your just so caught up in the moment you don't know what more to do. Hindsight is always clearer. Your angel though feels the love you have for them NOW and thats all they need. They are balls of energy and light...feelings I truly believe help nurturer them, just like breastmilk might a newborn. Share your feelings with them. You can speak out loud or in your mind, they hear you. They know you love them without having to put on a grand show of things. You don't need to release 1000 balloons, or light 100 candles, they know cause you feel it. I've told people many times that if you feel you didn't get to say something to a passed loved one, say it NOW. They hear us, they truly do. I know this only based off my own experiences... cause I feel it. You can take me on my word or not, but it goes back to memory. Even if you didn't love how the last moments you had with your child went, the love is still there. You love your child no matter how horrific their birth was, let that LOVE be what you choose to focus on. Remember it, hold on to it, and keep it with you on the surface. Let it float and the bad memories sink a little out of focus. You can't get rid of them, but you can choose what you want to keep upfront.