So I have this scar…

It is at the base of my left leg, down near my ankle, right in the front of my leg. It is raised and red. It looks like a bug bite that hardened, and stayed put rather than fading away.

This scar came around at the same time I lost my daughter two years ago. Inside me, her placenta was clotting. Her cord was twisting. The Wharton’s jelly around her cord was melting away. The blood vessels that made up her web of life support were clumping together and they weren’t getting her any of the things she needed: oxygen, nutrients, blood, the juice of life itself.

While this was happening inside me, the scar was forming on the outside. A scratch from nowhere grew a thick, fibrous cover and refused to heal. It remained inflamed. It stayed a big bump. I have had two caesarian sections and my abdominal scar is not as raised or hard as this bump on my lower leg/upper ankle. As we went through ultrasound after ultrasound trying to learn why our dear girl was not growing as she should, this scar got more and more apparent, harder and harder.

Nearly two years later, it is still present. I sit and contemplate a midsummer evening, my feet up in front of me.  I stare at it, my constant companion since my daughter’s death, my reminder that my body was not OK, was not functioning as it should. I have no proof that this scar and my daughter’s death are connected, but I cannot let go of the notion.  Every time I see it, run my fingers over it, I am reminded of my body’s failure. Of how it failed her.

In 30 days we celebrate (?) Chiara’s stillbirthday. 30 days of remembering that terrible time two years ago, all the fear and anguish of the bad news piling up around us. This weekend, I had my toes painted pink to start this month off. Pink for my girl. Tonight the sky is pink, too. Already darker than just a few weeks ago at this time. It’s the thick of summer, but my heart is heavy. Strange to grieve at this time when the world is so lush with life.

Gravity- the story of a loss Mom

Spoiler alert: I describe many key parts of the film Gravity in my post below.

The Chaplain at the hospital where my daughter was stillborn told me about the movie Gravity when I saw her at the annual service of remembrance last October. She said that yes, it takes place in space, but that ultimately, it's the story of a grieving Mother. I finally saw it on a plane on my way back from California a few weeks ago, a few weeks before the 7-oscar sweep the film made. I watched it with my 4-year old on one side of me, my husband on the other, and our 8-month old rainbow baby in my arms asleep. I knew what I was getting into, watching a movie that I'd been warned was really about loss, not space, in the public/private location of a plane cabin. I figured there would be some crying, and I was right.

As someone who has lost a baby, I see parallels between my grief journey and the journey through space that Sandra Bullock's character makes. I can relate to what she's experiencing at so many parts of the film:

-she comes "untethered": the disorientation that grief brings is like this. You no longer feel connected to your everyday life and the world. You drift.

-she is physically pummeled by space debris: facing grief again day after day is like banging into space debris REALLY HARD, over and over again. The pain comes at you, out of nowhere, when you least expect it.

-she talks to herself: grief, and the story of your grief is always running in the background of your mind, sometimes the foreground as well There's a lot of talking to yourself, a lot of reworking the loss, reviewing your child's death over and over from every perspective. Wondering if some small change could have led to a different outcome.

-she is not afraid to die: I felt this way after my dad died and even more so after losing my daughter. I can't begin to imagine what happens to us after death. But maybe, just maybe, there is this possibility of reunion with our loved ones who have gone before us. That prospect is a balm to all of us left behind. It makes me much less afraid of dying.

-she decides to live: she overcomes her desperate situation and makes a decision to survive. After everything, she decides to live. She has no plan, there is no promise that anything will be OK, but she does everything she can to survive and then at the very end, she crawls out of the capsule, through the water, and onto land. She has nothing, but she steps towards her unknown future.

Gravity is a powerful allegory about grief, and what it takes to overcome it and survive. As a traveler on this path, I was grateful for a film that captured so much of the experience. See the movie, it's worth it for so many reasons. If you're a babylost parent, see if it speaks to you about aspects of your grief. I'll be curious to hear.

What Can Happen

You can lose it all, in the blink of an eye. You’re zooming along, ticking things off your lists, feeling pretty good about getting things done and then, slam! The sound of your child falling, or the sound of the phone ringing, or the screech of tires. You hear a clear sound that signals the end of your life as you knew it, and the beginning of a terrifying new reality.

As a loss Mom, I know what this is like. I have heard the doctor tell me my child no longer had a heartbeat. I birthed my stillborn daughter. I held her close and memorized her. I long for her. It’s been 19 months since we lost her. We have a rainbow baby, he’s now 8 months old. 8 months! We also have an almost 4-year old. Time flies. Lists get made and things get crossed off. Life chugs along. The grief is woven into the fabric of daily life.

I woke this morning at 4:30am, got dressed, nursed the baby in his sleep, and snuck out of the house to drive to Boston to catch a plane to Newark, heading for Nashville for a work meeting. I’ve been a regular traveler in my career, but have slowed it way down since having kids. This was my first trip since our 8-month old was born. It was to be my first night away from him.

After pumping some milk at the sink in the women’s bathroom in Newark (glamour!), I took a work call and then called my husband to check in and see how things were going. He sounded breathless, agitated, scared, “you’re going to hate me, ” he said. He said it again and again. Then he launched into a story about how our baby fell off the table, in his car seat, unbuckled, and fell onto the floor. Our baby fell off the table onto the floor. He hit his head. He was bleeding and at the emergency room. “Tell me he is ok,” I said. “TELL ME HE IS OK”.  “They think he’s ok,” my husband said. My baby fell off the table and hit his head and he is bleeding but they think he’s OK.

And so I went to the ticket counter and booked a ticket home. No meeting in Nashville for me. When your child is hurt, the only place you really want to be is by his side. All I could think is that he needs his mama. In my gut, I felt that he was going to be OK, but I couldn’t wait to find out, and I couldn’t fly further away.  I needed to get home asap.

Probably any parent would respond this way. Probably you don’t have to be a loss parent to be the kind of parent who takes no chances with your child’s health. I really try to not be an alarmist. But here is a moment when it is all crystal clear. Your priorities are visible, and you see the true fragility of life before you. You know what can happen, and so you go home. You skip the meeting, you spend the afternoon consoling your husband, “it was an accident…”, rocking your baby, kissing your almost 4-year old, and feeling extraordinarily grateful. You know what can happen, but this time, it was OK. Thank you, world, thank you, spirits, thank you, luck, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Poem After Visiting Friends Who Have an Infant Daughter

Feb 2, 2014

I wrote this poem after we visited friends on a trip to CA. They have 3 living children. We have 3 children, too, 2 living, 1 dead. 


It's a perfect moment
Raining outside, but we're warm inside
Sweet Honey singing sweet songs
One boy asleep with Gramma
One boy asleep in the middle of the bed
Pillows protect him from rolling off in either direction
We check
Check again
Make sure his chest rises and falls
Make sure he hasn't mastered a roll over
Make sure he is alive

My husband finishes some work
I chart our afternoon
Exploring San Francisco
We rest

We recover from this morning
Spent with dear friends
Spent listening to squeals of children
3 boys wrestling on a trampoline
It can't have been a good idea,
But boy was it fun
2 babes in arms, our boy, their girl
Laughter, comparing notes on preschool, sleep habits, tv rules
Staying far away from the difference between raising boys and girls
They will know what that's like, be able to compare
We will not
They will know how it feels to hold a daughter, living, in their arms
We will not
We will not know how it is different
We will only know the pain of missing out on this
The pain of missing you

I had prepared myself
My husband,Caught up in the morning's chaos and being late, had not
We got in the car to go home and he was so sad
Holding their little girl made it all very real again
What we lost
What we should have but do not
Our little girl

Conversation with our almost 4-year old in the car on the way home
They have 3 kids and we have 3 kids
Yes
We have 3 kids but one is dead
Yes
We will answer this question
Do this sorry math
Over and over
Your big brother, trying to make sense of things
Just stating the truth about our family in a public setting
Makes others squeamish
Shocks them
Makes them sad
But he doesn't notice, not yet
And so, in the obstetrician's office, at the birthday party, at day care, out to dinner, while exiting the airplane, at the playground
He states these facts about our family
2 babies
1 big boy
1 dead
We are honest
We are matter of fact
We clasp hands, out of sight, squeeze
Say yes, that's right
We wish it was different
If only it was different

New Year, Same Grief

My daughter weighed 6.5 oz when she was stillborn in August 2012 at 22 weeks gestation. She was tiny. She's now been cremated and the ashes are in a plastic bag inside her urn. If you held the bag in your hand, you could close your fist around it almost all the way. Even though she's just a couple tablespoons of ash and bone at this point, she takes up a lot of space.

It's the new year. You're doing OK: eating right, fitting in the exercise, being late to work less often, getting things in order. And then, suddenly, the grief appears, it grabs your ankles and pulls you under. 17 months later and it is still raw. You are still reduced to a sobbing puddle. You repeat, "my baby, my baby, my tiny love". It's the song you sing to her, it's all your brain can produce when the grief comes on strong like this, when you get pulled under. This does not happen every day, but it happens more often than you'd think. It renders you helpless, exhausted. You are adrift.

No matter that I have read enough articles and books to know that grief is not linear, the suddenness with which it can run me over like a freight train is still surprising. I get into this space where I think I'm me again. I feel like a normal person. And then whoosh! Nope. You're a person with a baby-sized bag full of ashes on a little altar. A precious, tiny bag. In there are what's left of your dreams and hopes for this daughter, perhaps for any daughter.

The new year has brought a lot of sadness with it. Lots of hope, lots of joy, but still the sadness, the missing, the wishing things were different. I will always wish things were different.

Right Where I Am: 365 Days Later

This post is part of the Right Where I am Project, created by Angie at Still Life with Circles. Please check out her post from this year and all the great responses from other babylost parents through recent years:

Right Where I Am


I've been meaning to write this for a while. I've been busy with our new babe, born June 9, 2013, 299 days after his big sister died and was born. Where I am right now is plain worn out. I am not the open wound I was last year at this time. Tears are not streaming like an open tap down my face. Instead, they seep. My sobs are softer, muffled. I can't quite believe that it all really happened. I had a baby, felt her move inside me, fell in love with her, and she died. Then I was fortunate to get pregnant as soon as I could and I now have a living baby, a year later. This new baby would not, could not be here unless we lost our dear Chiara. This is a lot for a brain to process, for a mother to get her heart around.

I yearn for my daughter. I ache for her even as I count my blessings in my two living boys. I ponder another pregnancy even though I am terrible at pregnancy. Hyperemesis with all 3. Callouses on my knees during this last one. Honestly. Another pregnancy won't bring her back though, a daughter won't make this longing go away.

When I think about myself, and how this loss has changed me, I'm amazed. I didn't think I could survive a loss like this. I still reflect on what happened to us and I can't believe we're still putting one foot in front of the other each day. But we are. There are lots of tears, lots of sighs, but also there is laughter, there is joy, there is hoping and dreaming for the future. There is a knowledge that we have faced something truly horrific, something unthinkable, and survived. And we have done it together. I am so tired, some due to grief and some due to mothering this new living baby and my 3 year old. In the midst of the exhaustion, and the sadness, there is also some pride. I have not let this loss define me. I have endured a great sorrow and I have pressed on. I am not the first woman to have done this. I will not be the last. We are a sorry sisterhood, but a strong one. We know things we should not know: how it feels to hear that your baby is dead, to make decisions on parenting a dead child, how it feels to give birth to death, to hold a tiny baby that was to be your daughter, to watch your dreams extinguish, to explain death to a 3 year old, to endure the communications that entails ( such as: "yes, a baby did die in mummy's belly" and "no, hopefully this new baby won't die like the last one did"), and to endeavor to make a new life even while fiercely grieving one that was lost (there is nothing more serious than sex after your baby dies).

Now I am part of the lucky sisterhood that has welcomed a new baby after a loss. I marvel at his perfection, his breath, his heartbeat, his placenta and cord that functioned as they should and brought him safely here. I hope that he will stay a long time, that he will outlive me and his father. Tonight I nursed him as we lit candles to remember his baby big sister. We sang a tearful happy birthday. We ate cake. We'll do this each year to celebrate her brief life. She did live, inside me, for 22 weeks. I felt her move. I fell in love. I miss her so.

Capture Your Grief: Days 6 and 7

Day 6: What NOT to Say

I've been pretty lucky. People have been mostly kind. The worst thing that's happened to us is that a colleague I ran into 2 days after losing our daughter said NOTHING. She acted like nothing happened at all. I was shocked. She'd signed the office card. I knew she knew, but for whatever reason, she couldn't acknowledge our loss. It was very painful. We were in a public park, taking a walk before a support group meeting. I went under a tree and cried, and thought, so this is how it is going to be: people will pretend it didn't happen. I'm pretty sure that I knew this before, but now I will never forget: all you have to say is, I'm sorry for your loss. How hard is that?

Day 7: What to Say

My friend Tania said this. It was over a month after Chiara died, and as she said it, she burst into tears. Then I burst into tears. It was the most beautiful, kind thing that someone has said to me. I will always be grateful to her for being brave and sharing my grief. 

Say Her Name

A friend emailed me last week to say that she had had a dream about Chiara (sounds like: Key-are-uh). I was so grateful to read her name: Chiara. We don't say it often. When I do say her name, it makes me cry. It opens the wound. But still, it feels so good. It is proof that she was here with us, that someone else besides us remembers her. I am so afraid anytime someone asks her name, I have to muster my strength to reply, and it always comes with tears. It makes me feel very vulnerable.

But I do love it when someone says her name to me. I love it when Justin and I use her name with each other. Stellan, our 2 year old, doesn't know her name yet. We have not been brave enough to tell him, have not progressed beyond "baby sister". I just haven't been ready to hear her name on his lips. We have weathered the questions about where she is, does she like to eat blueberries, does she drive a car, and why can't she be with us. I have watched his face, which used to light up with the mention of his baby sister, used to shine with the wonderful secret of her impending birth, change to reflect the confusion he feels. Why no baby sister? She wasn't growing. Why not? Why not, indeed. I want her, he says. I want her too, I tell him.

This coming weekend we'll attend a walk in remembrance of lost babies and I think that's where we'll introduce her name to him. I'm really looking forward to seeing other couples and families and being able to just be who we are, be sad, and to remember our beautiful girl: Chiara.

Integration: the work of grief

I'm 41 years old. I've had some grief in my life. I lost my Dad at 56 years old, 2 uncles, 4 grandparents, numerous friends and classmates. I've sought counseling when the going got hard. I hadn't heard about integration, though. Now I hear it from my therapist, from the support group leader, in books and videos about losing a child. Integration: this is a familiar word that I am now learning has another meaning.

As time passes and the weeks as a babylost mom add up, the starkness of the situation fades a bit. If I'm not paying attention, it can seem so normal, so much like life before, at least in the macro sense (and if you don't count all the wailing and sobbing). I am checking off tasks each day. Some mundane: laundry, groceries, mother our son, go to work, feed the dogs, pay the bills. But then, some things that we are only doing because we lost our baby girl: confirm the minister for her memorial service, go to the post mortem meeting with the maternal fetal medicine specialist, book a room for the service and dinner afterwards. Next I'll be searching for readings and finding a suitable invitation for the service. All of these I am glad to do. They are all I can do for Chiara now. But as I click through the list, feeling somewhat productive, it occurs to me how awful it is, that these are the tasks I am focused on this fall. In between the therapist appointments, the support group, the acupuncture, the doctor's appointments, there are all these little details borne out of wanting to honor her memory.

I see that charting my path through these tasks begins the work of integrating her loss into the fabric of my life, of my being. This means accepting her death, while still craving her presence inside me.