Saturday, September 24, 2011

Silent Dreams

Finally.  I sit here tonight with tears streaming down my face.  My heart hurts.  Tom and the boys are sleeping and I sit here weeping and crying out to God. 

I have so much support around me, yet I feel so alone.

I wanted our baby boy so much.  I miss him.  I really do. 

There are so many moments that I had pictured in my mind that will never be:  I will never see Jeremiah's first smile or his first tooth.  There are no diapers to change.  I will never hear his sweet giggle or see the twinkle in his eye.  I will never hold his sweet little hands as he takes his first steps.  There will be no bubble baths.  No spills to clean up.  No first haircut.  There will be no games of peek-a-boo that end in fits of laughter.  There will be no first day of school. 

Gavin and Gabe will never get to teach their little brother how to roll over, sit up or learn to crawl.

All of these moments and many more flashed before my eyes within minutes of finding out that we were pregnant.  As I carried Jeremiah in my womb, these moments became more and more vivid and tonight, sitting here in our quiet house, they flash before me once again.  Etched and echoing in my mind.

My dreams for Jeremiah have been silenced.

It hurts.

I hurt.

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Dear God,

I place my wounded heart and my hurt in Your hands.  I know that You did not cause the hurt in my life, but I know that You have the power to heal it.  Take my weaknesses and turn them into my strengths.  Heal my heart and help make me whole again! 

Although I will always carry these scars, I know that You have a purpose for me and for my life… and it is not to walk around with pain and sadness.  God if you can use me, I am willing.

Help show me the way.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Our Boys

Aiden and Jeremiah~

I remember you and I love you... yesterday, today, tomorrow.  Always.  You were in my arms for only moments, but I will carry you and you will live for an eternity in my heart. 

You are two amazing little boys and I am so very thankful to be your mommy.  I will forever wish that we had more time together.

But for today, I will be thankful for the time that we had.  I look forward to the day that I can hold you in my arms again.  What a glorious day that will be!


Our joys will be greater
Our love will be deeper
Our lives will be fuller
Because we shared your moment.

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I sit here and stare at the pictures of my two precious boys.  I so fully expect to be filled with grief and sadness, but instead, I just stare at the little features of their faces.  I am in awe of the beautiful lives that we created.  I admire every precious inch and curve of their face. 

I wonder what color their eyes would have been.  I wonder what their laugh or their cry would have sounded like.  So many things to wonder and dream about.  Oh, how I wish I knew the answers to these questions.  

I would give anything to have all of my boys with me- Aiden, Gavin, Gabe and Jeremiah.  I can picture it so vividly... all snuggled together on our couch.  Laughing and wrestling- just me and my boys.  It is truly a perfect image in my mind.

My heart aches.  It's not very often that I let my mind wander to these moments.  

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I have felt more today than I have in recent days... and I survived.  I smiled, I laughed and I cried.

As I was driving today, I was thinking and I realized that I have expected Jeremiah's life and death to really change who I am.  But, I am still me.  Although I may carry around a little more sadness and fear, I am still hopeful.  I still look to the future and all of its possibilities.  I still trust the Lord with all my heart and all my soul.   

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I'm trying not to fear the emotions that are within me.  God is with me and if I should fall, I know He will carry me.

Listen to this:




Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Rain drops

I'm still struggling with letting myself feel and releasing my emotions:  So, my goal for right now is to let the tears fall and to let my emotions out.

So much of my identity has been connected to the healing that I have experienced in the years since Aiden died.  My life has finally felt purposeful and beautiful again.  I have been filled with hope. This has been such an amazing gift!  It was a gift from God and a gift from Aiden- a gift to myself that I searched high and low for.  It was a gift that after years of heartache and searching, I found.

It is so hard for me to let go of this.  I am in a bit of denial because, let's be honest, this isn't something that I have the ability to hold onto or let go of in this moment.  It's already been ripped away from me.  The person I was two months ago, is not who I am today.  I can try to be in denial of this fact, but it's true.  As much as I resist where my life is right now, it is what it is.

I need to remember that this moment is temporary.  I need to just be and try to be okay with that.

I seem to have decided somewhere along the way since Jeremiah died that my tears are a sign of pain and only pain.  I seem to have forgotten the healing and beauty that tears carry with them.  I literally take a few deep breaths when my eyes fill with tears and usually push the rush of emotions away.  I rarely am able to let my body just release them. 

I am holding on.  Keeping all of the pain inside me.  Buried.  I've lost my son and in order to grieve this loss I feel like I lose my identity too.  I know that there is so much more to me than being a mother to two little boys in heaven, but being in the midst of my grief, I don't see clearly or truely remember what more there is to me. 

I keep asking myself what is wrong with me.  Why can't I feel more?  On one hand I want to feel and on the other I feel like I refuse to feel. 

I can't have it both ways.

Is it because of fear?  Maybe.  Because of denial?  Probably.

It is not because I think tears are a sign of weakness.  It's the opposite really.  In other situations in my life being able to cry and release is a sign of intuitiveness, a beautiful vulnerablility and a sign of strength.  Maybe I don't trust myself to be strong enough to deal with the pain that surfaces with the tears???

But again, I must remember that tears are active.  They are a process.  They are a release and a cleansing.  They are God's gift to us.  My tears are not pain.  They are a release of the pain.

So, when I feel a rush of emotion come over me and I instinctively push it away, I am going to ask myself:  Is Jeremiah worth these tears?  The answer is so simple.  Yes.  Absolutely.


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A couple nights ago, some dear friends of ours shared the exciting news that they are expecting a baby.  As I told Gavin and Gabe this, I could see the wheels spinning in Gabe's head.  A look of excitement, confusion, and sadness swept across his face in the matter of seconds...

As he tried to process what I was telling him, he asked if we were going to get the baby.  Sadness filled his eyes as I told him that their baby would not be ours.

I continue to hope that someday we will have another little baby to join our family.  Someday we will be able to give that gift to Gavin and Gabe.

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Gavin said to me the other day: "Mom, I'm glad that I got to meet Jeremiah."

Me too, Gavin.  Me too.  You are and would have been an amazing big brother to Jeremiah and someday you two will run hand in hand together in paradise.  It will be a beautiful sight to see.

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Another Gabe comment:  "Mom, I didn't die in your belly, but Jeremiah did."

Sunday, September 18, 2011

Conflicted

I don't even know where to start with my thoughts today.  Although I've been doing a lot of thinking, my mind still feels blank.

So, I've started seeing a therapist- a much needed therapist! 

She is helping me confront feelings and thoughts that I don't necessarily want to.  She has helped me realize and helped me find the words to explain and understand that I have a huge disconnect between my head and my heart right now.  She also thinks that I have unrealistic and unfair expectations upon myself.  Hmmmm...

So, I've been trying to do a lot of reflecting, feeling and thinking this past week.

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I heard a line from a song and it said something like this: Did you ever think that maybe God gave us tears to wash away the pain?  I like that idea.  So, when tears fill my eyes, I am trying to let them fall.  I need to let my tears try to cleanse me and wash away the pain. 

In doing this, I realized something rather odd:  While I was singing and worshiping at church, tears filled my eyes and I let them fall or I should say tears filled one of my eyes and I let them fall. 

Seriously, who cries from only one eye?

Conflicted.  I think even my eyes and tears are conflicted!  But, it's a start and I'll take it~

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The hope and desire that healing will come eventually is an intense and persistent one. 

Thursday, September 8, 2011

In This Skin

I am so uncomfortable in my own skin right now. 

I wish so badly that I could just run and hide.  Hide from you.  Hide from me.  Just run and hide from this pain and brokenness that I feel inside that is consuming me.  I hate feeling this way.  I'd like to believe that I am a happy and optimistic person, but not these days.  These days the feelings I have brewing inside of me are so far from the 'normal' me that I don't know how to swallow or digest them.  I am reminded that I must find a way to let joy and sadness sit side-by-side in my heart and my being.  I have achieved this before, and I have the belief and hope that I will get there again.

But for today, I am moving through each day in slow motion, with deep resistance.  I don't want to move.  But again, I know I have to.  I have two beautiful boys in front of me that need me and two beautiful boys in heaven that I hope to make proud.
 
"For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future."  Jeremiah 29:11

As difficult as it is, I will continue to TRUST in this.

Yesterday as Gavin and Gabe played downstairs, I cooked dinner and let the tears roll down my cheeks.  It hurts beyond comprehension to do every day normal things.  So tonight, in an effort to escape a repeat of last nights dinner preparation, we went out to eat.  Unfortunately this simple act brings with itself another difficult, uncomfortable task.

As we entered the restaurant, I wondered if our favorite server, Sam, would be there.  Last time we saw him, Gavin and Gabe excitedly shared with him that they were going to be big brothers.  Part of me hoped that he would be there so that we could tell him our sad news and get that uncomfortable conversation out of the way.  I definitely breathed a sigh of relief when we saw that Sam wasn't working though.  I guess we can save that conversation for another evening.

As I type these words, I feel empty.  My brain is on over-drive, but there are no clear thoughts running through my head. 

What should I be doing? 

What should I be feeling? 

I don't know the answers. 

'My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.' So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me -2 Corinthians 12:9

I hear this and I believe it. 

The difficult part is feeling it. 

I am trying.  But with empty arms and an aching heart, I'm here to tell you, it's hard...

Sunday, September 4, 2011

Please Just Listen

Before I vent, let me first say, I know that you don't know what to say to me.  And I know that what you do say comes from a caring place.  I know that you are trying to make me feel better, but just as my sweet little Gabe can't fix my broken heart by putting his stuffed animals up under my shirt, you can't fix me either.  Please. Stop trying.  Just listen and tell me you care. 

Please stop telling me how blessed I am.  Believe me, I know I am.  But that doesn't lessen the anguish I feel.  Having living children does not lessen the pain or the emptiness I feel over the loss of the two little boys that I will never know in this lifetime.

Please stop telling me that God has a plan.  I don't think there is a 'plan' good enough for any mother or father in the midst of their grief to justify having to bury their child.  What great lesson do you think I am suppose to learn from this?  Did I not learn enough after I buried my first son? 

Please stop asking if I'm depressed as if the answer is something unexpected.  What do you think the answer is?  There is no quick fix for the state of my being. 

I watched and felt two perfect, little boys die in my arms because my body couldn't protect them.  Can you imagine wondering if your child, the child you promised to protect, was in pain as they died in your arms? 

Can you imagine praying and pleading with God to not let them suffer and hurt?  There is no pill that can erase those memories or those fears from my mind or my heart. 

Can you imagine having to tuck your crying child in at bedtime because their heart hurts from missing the little brother they will never, on this earth, get the chance to play with, laugh with, fight with, or get to know?  That was my evening.  And to say it was hard doesn't even begin to capture how it feels.

Please don't try to figure this all out for me.

Please just listen. 

Please tell me you care.

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Today, as I picked tomatoes from our over-grown, jungle of a garden, I tried to hide my tears behind my sunglasses, but my sweet, 6 year old Gavin, busted me. 

He asked, "Momma, are you crying?"  As I wiped the tears from my eyes, I said "Yes, sweetie.  I'm crying."  He asked me why I was crying.  He asked if something happened.  I just told him I was sad.  My sweet Gavin then said, "I know why you're sad.  You're sad because we lost our son..."

I wish I could shelter our boys from this pain, but at times, I simply can't.  Today was one of those days.