Tuesday forecast: Crying with a chance of dinosaurs.

Yesterday my Partner and I had a long emotional talk. 

This week is a shit storm already. Whoop de do, we both have exams and our lost baby would be due. Great.

Yesterday I pretty much hibernated. I got up late and watched Dr.Who and the episodes of Poldark I had missed. Should have revised more but I don’t have any motivation this week. I did three hours in stead of my usual 6-9. I’d say I average about 7 hours most days but I just couldn’t yesterday. 

I’m trying to pull it together today. 

I was up till one last night. I don’t feel that bad on it. I can’t tell by this point what is body tired and what is brain and emotional tired. I’m just exhausted putting one foot in front of the other. 

My Grandma told me one that

The first year of grieving is always the worst. You have to endure all the firsts without them. When you’ve done it once you know it is survivable. 

Which seems pretty truthful so far. She was talking about loosing my Grandpa,  

Yesterday I asked my Partner if it was totally stupid that I think of he and Emmet as my boys. Even though we could never know their gender. 

Turns out he thinks pretty the same way I do about them and so I was Happy/Sad crying half the night. He thinks of them as a tiny boy playing in the living room with plastic dinosaurs. We’re not gender stereotyping. I am a dinosaur freak. Of course we would have dinosaurs in the house. We already have them everywhere. 

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Before Emmet we talked about kids, what we imagined. Only we never factored in a pregnancy and a loss. We both knew my health has genetic implications. We thought we would build a family, years from now with adoption. Nobody plans a surprise baby, that’s why they are surprises. Despite precautions we found ourselves here, with a baby, but also without one.

But do you know what, the only thing I would change is how long they stayed for, and as I can’t change that, then I don’t wish to change anything. 

Both my boys mean everything to me. 

I would say ‘I was a mess’ last night, but I am still a mess this morning. Only now I am pretending not to be, and trying to engage with the world. I am a just a tiny bit happier, less crying kind of a mess.

I should stop blogging on my phone and do revision. But also I don’t think I will get anything done unless I do some venting. 

All I can think about right now is that he said he thinks of them as a boy. We both do. It probbably seems mad to anyone who isnt a loss parent to be happy about that. 

They both think of their dead baby as a son…

Congratulations?

But yeah. After loss we have a new normal and I will not appologise for that. 

If our new normal is happy crying because the only type of parenting we get to do for our son is sharing what we imagined, loving and remembering them and honouring their memory. So be it. That is how we will parent.

If our new normal means that we cry at baby adverts and some types of dinosaurs. So be it. Thatis how whe will parent.

If our my new normal is scaring off women who ask if I have kids when I say ‘yes, one, but we lost them to early miscarriage ‘. So be it. That is how I will parent. 

If our new normal means that instead of labour and a baby on the 22nd June, we partake in a labour of love and remembrance for all the losses that have touched our lives. So be it.

If our parenting includes grief for the rest of our lives. So be it.

We have collected 156 names for the #Foreverloved balloon project to remember Emmets due date this June 22nd. 

Why do we live in a world where over 156 babies are loved and missed. That’s just how many have touched  our lives, and/ or who have asked to be included. I have connected with 156 families, either through this project or because I knew them already. That is a tiny fraction of this whole crazy club none of us asked to join. 

I thought most of the names would he family members or friends I knew about who had lost a baby, as I never expected to receive so many contributions. Nearly all our contributions come from the WordPress community or Whisper support groups.

When I realized just how many lives I have connected with, just because of loosing Emmet I am staggered. I never imagined the large numbers of people who deal with loss every day, often with no support or open acknowledgment before we had and lost Emmet.

His brief life opened ours up to a world of people we barely imagined existed. Both of us have members of our immidiate and close family who have suffered from babyloss. Yet we to, were totally oblivious to it. 

If Emmet taught us anything at all, it is how many people in this world we were blind to. 

Emmet, and those I have connected with while grieving his loss, taught us love, and strength, and the need for a compassion that doesn’t know borders. 

Starting this blog I thought I would connect with maybe 2 or 3 people. I didn’t imagine followers. I just wanted somewhere to vent, and if I could also help people then great. I just planned to post reasoures as I found them, and write as I needed. 

Our comunity here on this blog isn’t huge, there’s less than 50 of us, but if Emmet’s brief life touched only one more person than my partner and I, then starting this blog was worth it. 

I didn’t want sympathy or comiserations. I didn’t want ‘I am sorry’s. I did not write and do not write so people feel bad. I miss Emmet but I don’t feel bad about it in the way most people would expect. What little time we had with them is cherished.

I wrote and write because I have to. Because it keeps me sane.

I wanted to hear that they mattered. That all our babies mattered. 

And I am here to say to everyone reading this that they did matter. Those lost to miscarriages and abortions matter(- Because no one ever want to make that choice.) Those lost to still birth and neonatal death matter. Those lost to SIDs matter. All lost babies matter. All losses matter.

Any loss of a baby at any stage, for any reason, for any type parent is no less of a heart rending loss. Loss of a baby is no less than a child, and we openly grieve children in western society. 

So what is it about babies that is so taboo? Is it the loss of a future? Is it because no one can imagine it? Is it be a they were on the earth for less time? Or because some never made it to earthat all?

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If we can help just one person feel less alone then this is worth it. 

474 people who have been touched by loss, either personally or through reading about ours. That is more than I imagined. 

Stay strong. And a big fuck off to anyone who bellittles your right to grieve.

Love and support always,

Surviving Miscarriage Together x