Perspective...

Perspective.

I know that it's all about how I look at things.

I also know that God has given me the ability to choose how I look at things.

Yesterday's "drama" was so silly and was a huge wake-up call . I get to choose in which perspective I look at things.


This beautiful girl is exactly the same size that Eli was when he was born. She looks huge doesn't she? Kind of like the mark that Eli has left on my heart. She's a beautiful, 6 inch statuette that I received from my friend J. She looks larger because of the perspective from where you're looking at her. Unfortunately, J knows the pain that I feel but she was able to see through it and think of Eli and me. "Remember" showed up at my house on February 21st, her angel son's due date.

I love that I have been given the ability to decide about how I choose to look at things. I remember saying to one of my very favorite people, something along the lines of "if I go in and they do discover the worst, they'd better hand me some 'happy pills' because there's NO WAY that I'm going to be able to function..." Truth is at that point that was 100% fact. However, I decided to pray for some peace and there seemed to instantly be a turning point. No, the pain has not gone away. It doesn't mean that I don't care, it doesn't mean that I miss my baby any less than those who choose self pity and sorrow. However, if you've ever lifted weights you know that in order to get stronger, you have to fight through that pain, you have to go back and work at it each and every day. In time, that weight is no problem and you can lift heavier and heavier weights as you get stronger. You just make sure that you have your 'spotter' near you in case you overestimated your ability that day... your spotter will carry the weight that you can't and together, you succeed. Ummm... I'm glad I know who my spotter is!

So, I have had a lot of comments about the castings of Eli's feet. They really are incredible but even more incredible is really how tiny they are and yet, they are so perfect! So, with the thought of perspective on my mind, I thought I'd share another photo that I snapped a few days ago. This one really shows how tiny they are. Even at this size they have wrinkles and toe nails and have left a gigantic print on my heart. ...miss you baby boy!

Hair-apy...

OK... so, perhaps I needed to look at today as "hair-apy".

To put things back in perspective... it's. just. hair! My cousin B (well, she's not my cousin, she's Jim's cousin but I happily adopted all of his extended family a long time ago) anyway, she sent me a message where she proclaimed herself to be the queen of bad haircuts and that she could solve my problem in two words - flat. iron. It was pretty funny and made me laugh at myself... I don't think my problem was the haircut. I've played with it a bit now and put things back in perspective, it wasn't the haircut. It was the 4 hours that I had to listen to my thoughts, then to have them drowned out by people all around me complaining about children. It was sooooo not about the hair. The hair will grow back! So without further ado... here's the "do":

When I left the house this morning my hair was down to the middle of my back but like I said, I wanted it GONE! It's so not about the hair...

Tested...

Tested... that's me today.

Today was supposed to be a day for me. Yes, I realize that perhaps it was too soon, that I shouldn't have done it on Eli's 2 week "angel-versary", that maybe I should have started with something smaller. I didn't. I have been talking for three weeks about needing to get my hair cut. The other day I decided enough was enough and I had to get it done. It was getting way too long. So, I've spent days looking for photos to show what I wanted and finally had my mind made up. I also decided that I wasn't going to go as short as I was originally thinking... my friend M said something along the lines of "just make sure you don't get 'break up hair'." My appointment was at 11 am and I should have just cancelled it... I was feeling that way when I woke up, but I didn't. I went. I explained that I wanted something around my shoulders/collar bone, at the shortest, a loooong bob that looks like it's been 'growing out' for awhile and that it had to be terribly low maintenance and long enough to pull back into a ponytail. I even showed her a picture. So, she started cutting and by the time I realized what was happening, she ended up cutting it in a short shag. Gross. No offense to anyone out there, but I've been there, done that and grew it out because it made me feel like a boy.

This was supposed to be a day of healing for me, a day to help me feel better about myself... instead I got to listen to some woman go on and on, to a pregnant stylist, about how 'boy babies are the worst', 'they're so tough', blah, blah, blah... but how her girl was perfect, walking at 6 months, potty trained at 8 months, blah, blah, blah. I just couldn't listen to her flap her jaw any more so I kind of tuned out. Then my stylist asked about my family and I kept it short and sweet. A little while later she asked if we were going to have any more kids and I just flat out told her, "well, we just had a still born son 2 weeks ago today but hopefully some day we'll have a third live baby." She said she was sorry and continued to butcher er, cut my hair. Anyway, a short while later a young mom with twin girls, around a year old, came in. They were buckled into their mall stroller and the one in front started crying... mom just continued to read her 'Star' magazine, girl continued to squawk, mom continued to ignore her. The dad came back about FORTY-FIVE minutes later and mom's next words were... "Thank goodness, I can't stand screaming kids!" Ummm, hello woman, it was YOUR screaming kid and you totally ignored her! Of course the entire time she's crying, my chest is going crazy. It was not the relaxing afternoon I was looking forward to. I left 4 hours later, feeling far worse about myself than when I walked in. I don't like the hair cut at all, the color is just ok. I can't even pull it back to get it out of my face, can't tuck it behind my ears. I guess I can hope that it grows fast... which my hair doesn't and now without the pregnancy hormones in my system, it's going to grow even slower. So, I had high hopes for today but whatever.

On the bright side, the sun is shining. I should have just followed my gut instinct and cancelled the hair appointment and taken the kids to the zoo instead. Hindsight is 20/20 isn't it?

I hope to be back tomorrow with a better outlook and be glad to have today behind me. On the upside, if I survived today without a breakdown, including having to walk through the baby section at Nordstrom, there's probably nothing that I can't handle! ...I might have to borrow some of K's way too expensive Gymboree hair clips, Goodness knows she has lots to share and they're cute!

From Head to Toe...

From head to toe, we love this little guy so.


It's hard to believe that just two weeks ago the first of my induced contractions were starting. Not enough to make me uncomfortable but just enough to get my attention and keep reminding me that my whole world, as I knew it, was getting ready to change. Even though I was terrified about what was to come I also had a very surreal sense of peace. I have no doubt about where that peace came from. It came from the the thoughts and prayers that were streaming to God's ears. I lived through it and I continue to live but how I wish he was still here with me. I think it's fair to be a little selfish about that from time to time. It really does seem like it was so long ago and I'm not quite sure why that is. I have to wonder, in two more weeks how long ago it will seem... will it be one of those days that feels like it was just hours ago? Or will it be one of those days that feels like it was in another lifetime?

His hands... his hands will be forever ingrained in my mind. I'm not sure why it's his hands. Maybe because K and R look just like Jim and Eli, well, Eli clearly had MY hands. Maybe it's because his hands weren't bruised at all or because they had teeny tiny finger nails on them and that just blew me away. Maybe it's because that was an easy comparison to make, I was holding his hands in mine, it was undeniable how tiny he was. It's pretty impressive, the impact that a tiny 6" baby can have on your heart.

I often go to Eli's memory box to remind me of his tiny face and feet. Anyway, while I was up looking through his box this afternoon I decided, obviously, to take a photo of the castings of his feet. I can't help but daydream about where these feet would have gone, where they would have traveled and when they would have returned to us. These tiny castings are one of my favorite, tangible things, that I have. They are super delicate so they usually stay in the memory box but today they ventured out. I look at this picture and dream about kissing his sweet chubby little feet. That reality will have to wait for now and thinking about it really makes me miss him but I just have to remind myself that it's only temporary.

I also felt brave and decided to snap a photo of one of the pictures that our nurse took shortly after he was born. Had I felt more of that bravery during everything, I would have just asked her to bring him and the camera over and let me take them, but I wasn't. So, I had some Photoshop therapy this afternoon. I removed the flash marks on his perfect, tissue paper thin skin, brought back some of the color in the receiving blanket but tried to leave his skin tone alone. This is much the way I remember him... it's my reality and he's still a beautiful baby in my eyes.


Thank you for letting me share Eli. I have the greatest group of friends and family that, I think, anyone could hope and wish for. Each and every one of you speaks to a different part of my heart and feeds a different part of my soul. Whether you are half a world away, just down the road or "living in my computer"... I need you all for different reasons and again, thank you for being there. I don't think there's any way that I could do this on my own.

Hope...

... edited to add... while channel surfing in the car this morning, I landed on this song coming from a University radio station that we only receive when it's overcast. After posting this entry I still had the song in my head, and being that I was too lazy to go down to our basement and dig out the "old" Shaggy CD, I decided to Google it... the name of the song is: Hope!

It wasn't my intention to start each entry with a single word... it's just kind of worked out that way. I woke up this morning with the word "hope" on my heart. I had hope that I was going to be able to drive for the first time in 2 weeks without incident, I've been very weak since Eli's birth due to blood loss. I had hope that I was going to be able to make it through the kids' dentist appointments without a meltdown. I had hope that today would be a bit more productive than yesterday. Each and every day there is room for hope.

Main Entry: 1hope
Pronunciation: \ˈhōp\
Function: verb
Inflected Form(s): hoped; hop·ing
Etymology: Middle English, from Old English hopian; akin to Middle High German hoffen to hope
Date: before 12th century
intransitive verb1: to cherish a desire with anticipation
2archaic : trust

"to cherish a desire with anticipation"... humm. To me, that means to have hope, there's anticipation and excitement along with the longing for something. I guess that's kind of the way I'm feeling today. I'm excited to see where my life goes next because, frankly, I didn't really like where I was 2 weeks ago. I mean, I can't imagine anyone liking being told that their child has passed, being checked in to a special room on the L&D floor, far back in the corner... a room with a nice big window, a bed, a tv, all the normal things that we've always had in any other L&D room but it was missing one very important item... the baby warmer. I spent most of the time there looking to my left, out the window and avoiding the right side where the warmer should have been. I didn't like where my head was at that point in time. From our room you could see the NICU rooms and we spent a lot of time hoping and praying for those babies too... getting excited about seeing the infant seats in the windows knowing that another family was that much closer to taking their baby home. I laid there praying that one of my other friends wasn't contracting anymore, 2500 miles away. I really wanted to just have a little bit of hope at that point in time. I would have loved to have been almost 30 weeks pregnant and trying to hold off labor, at least he would have had a fighting chance or, to be sitting in the NICU. At least I would have been able to hold my son and feel the life in him. For whatever reason though that wasn't our fate. I have hope that someday I'll see the rainbow and have some small understanding of why our story was written this way.

Oh, and in case you're wondering. We made it to the dentist and back, just fine. Eli was of course on my mind. I thought about how I couldn't have offered to hold little R on my lap for x-rays had I been pregnant. I thought about how the chair that I sat in while K got her teeth cleaned would have been really uncomfortable with the sciatic pain that I am "blessed" with during pregnancy. But, I didn't lose it. I didn't come unglued. I didn't cry. That doesn't mean that I don't miss him with all of my heart and soul but this is my new reality.

In addition to waking with the word "hope" on my mind, in one of the support groups that I belong to we've decided to focus on hope. Maybe I'm looking too hard for signs but the name of the group was inspired by the movie Hope Floats. The song that Jim and I danced to for our first dance after our wedding was "To Make You Feel My Love", which by the way, is the main song in the movie. It may be a stretch, but it's a comforting stretch.

I'm hopeful that my body will soon be healed and that my heart will soon follow. There will always be a scar there but I'll wear it proudly. Without hope, there is nothing.

Time...

That word keeps drifting in and out of my head today. Time. I wish I had had more of it with my son but in due time, I will have endless amounts of it with him. When you're pregnant, many days it seems like time just drags on and other days it seems to fly by. I am thankful that, with Eli, I tried to savor every ache, pain, wave of nausea, moment of heartburn, and the trips to the bathroom in the middle of the night. I didn't ever think "hurry up kid!" because we assumed that this would be our last pregnancy and I made a conscious decision to enjoy each and every part of it. Looking back, it seems like time really did fly. I suppose that's partly because I was already 6 weeks along before I realized that we were pregnant. But again, I am finding myself in that parallel universe where time can both drag on and fly at the same time.

Part of this problem is I know I'm being impatient. I want to hurry up and have my body heal. I want to hurry up and try to mend some of those fresh wounds on my heart and in my head. I want to hurry up and get my energy back so I can be the mom that my kids here need. I want to hurry up and have my crazy hormones back to a "normal" level. But, on the other had I want to remember every detail about my pregnancy with Eli, I want to remember the sensation of his kicks, the sound of his strong heart beat, the hopes and dreams that we had for our soon to be family of five. I want to remember his perfect profile on the ultrasound that I had just hours after he passed. I want to remember the weight of his tiny body as I held him and just stared at him in awe.

Only God knows why he blessed us for 16 weeks and then took Eli home. Only He knows when and IF He will bless us again with another child. Only He knows why I've been pregnant for nearly 114 weeks of my life to only have two living children. Anyway, the thought of time holds so many new meanings to me right now and they're never really in the same sense twice. I want it to hurry up, I want it to slow down. I guess I can have it both ways, it's just going to depend on how I choose to look at it.

Thanks...

I just wanted to make sure to take a moment to thank each and every one of you who have either left comments, messaged me privately, sent flowers, cards and/or gifts. I can feel strength coming from all of the thoughts and prayers but it's extra nice to know, without a doubt, that you are thinking of us. Just a quick note that says "hey, I'm thinking of you" can bring tears to my eyes but they're good tears... I promise.

Well, as I was suspecting, I woke up and yes, today is a new day. It's a new month. I'm not feeling great but I'm feeling and that's better than being numb. I'm actually hoping to be kind of productive today. I did get the house straightened up yesterday so I may actually get some cleaning done today. Exciting eh!?!

To shift gears a bit... you will find, after the loss of a pregnancy and/or child, that there's a large "underground network" of women in similar positions. Some would say that they're in the "same" position but I will not. No one will ever feel the same way I do, and I will never feel the same way that she does... who ever "she" is. But it does seem that "she" hurts worse than I do because her loss was later or earlier or her labor was longer or she didn't labor or her child was bruised or not recognizable or she didn't get pictures or her pictures were so good she couldn't believe the loss was real or because she got footprints and hand prints or she's left without anything. Keep in mind, these are supposed to be support networks. I know I'm still confused and kind of bitter that Eli isn't here with us but seriously, he's already running in the streets of Glory, how can that make me bitter? Some of these moms, who have become "pillars of strength" are so angry. It frustrates me that others who have experienced losses are looking to these bitter, angry women for support and strength. I think they would probably feel much more peace if they focused their eyes a little further beyond the here and now. I don't know, it's just something that has been eating at me for a day or two now.

Well, it feels better getting that off my chest. I don't wish for anyone to ever even have an idea of what I'm going through but the truth is that someone will, today they will be full of life and in a heartbeat, it'll be gone. It's her choice to either stand in the sunshine or curl up in the shade... I'm going to choose the sun.