after the transformation

Oh, ppphhhhhh… 

What do I do now?

She’s been gone longer than she was here, even counting the time she was inside me.

I’ve passed all of the first anniversaries: her ultrasound, the day she was born, the day she died on both the Jewish and Gregorian calendars.

We’ve anticipated her arrival.

Hoped deeply.

Said hello, welcomed our second child to the big world.

Loved unconditionally.

Taken her outside to breathe fresh real air.

Said goodbye.

Buried her fragile little body in a tiny coffin in the ground.

Her box of memories is full, her photo album is made. Her special soft things in jars, still smelling a little bit like her. Everything put away in the trunk that sits next to me in the sunroom, keeping me company.

Her quilt is coming along, something I am not in a hurry to finish… When I work on it, I feel close to her.

I still haven’t framed and hung her photos, but I will… soon.

Her headstone has been made, set and unveiled. Flowers planted with her placenta. Her DNA and ours stored at the hospital for research. Her birth and death certificate are in a safe place with other family documents, confirming that she really did exist, always a part of our family.

We’ve moved away and settled into our new home across the country.

Our new chapter has begun.

Now what?

*****

Today I watched as two cicadas completely left their exoskeletons and began a new chapter in their new skins, so bright green they were almost turquoise. They hung there from the branches of a tree, clinging still to their old shells, transparent wings spread, contemplating new destinations, new purpose.

It was stunning… I’ve never seen anything like it. For three weeks now I’ve been listening to them singing their songs outside, surrounding me with constant tropical melodies. I’ve just never seen a cicada before, not even in a photo.

Everything changes, nothing stays the same.

Impermanence... I see it when I look in the mirror. I look different than I did last summer. I look different than I did two summers ago. I think I look different than I did a few months ago. I’ve reluctantly left my exoskeleton, sometimes hesitating to leave it completely behind. Longing for it, for simpler times.

My old shell consists of all the mes I’ve left behind, said goodbye to, willingly or not.

It’s this next place I’m not so sure about. This after the transformation place. I can so easily tell you how changed I am from the person I was before I knew Tikva. I can describe in vivid detail how she transformed me, and for the better. But I’m not exactly sure what that means for me now… now that I’ve been transformed by knowing, loving and losing my child. Now that I’ve undergone a change I never in a million years would have chosen. Now that I’ve gotten kind of used to this new person that I am.

*****

How many children did you bring with you to Cincinnati? he asks my husband.

We have two children, but only one living. We’re here after a year off, since we lost our second child last summer, my husband answers.

I say nothing, look away even, let my husband tell him. Then I look at this new acquaintance and see the sadness and searching in his eyes as he looks at me then quickly looks down. I know what he wants to say. After a year, I am so aware of the sadness I’ve held in other people when they look at me after learning about Tikva. Some days I can take it better than others. This time I just notice it, allow the compassion to flow in silence. Nothing needs to be said.

*****

I hoped to be carrying another child by now, but I’m not yet. Still, I can feel that child’s spirit close, waiting. Sometimes I can’t distinguish it from Tikva’s spirit. I don’t think that matters. Baby spirit energy is one and the same. I think it comes from one big well.

I watch my older daughter and feel how powerful is her desire to be a big sister to a living sibling.

I wish I had a sister to play with who wasn’t a spirit, she says.

Me too, I answer. Me too.

She would have a sibling who would be almost two right now, if I hadn’t miscarried in between her and Tikva. Then there would never have been a Tikva… Strange.

Tikva would be 14 months now, would probably be walking. She would be so beautiful, that I just know for sure.

For two and a half years we have wanted to give Dahlia a sibling… One who can play with her.

We still do.

*****

It’s almost the new year on the Jewish calendar. The biggest time of the year. This is supposed to be a time of reflection, of going inwards, of making amends, making peace. I always find this time tumultuous inside, unsettling, unsettled. I guess that’s the point. I don’t know if I’m ready for a big time right now. I’m feeling especially un-Jewish right now, which is ironic as the wife of a future rabbi. Really, I just feel like climbing under the covers and not coming out until October. Until the new year, a new season.

Last year at High Holy Day services, less than two months after Tikva died, I alternated between sitting next to Dave in the sanctuary, crying, and running outside to cry alone. I resented everyone dancing in the aisles all around me. I felt no joy, no peace, no serenity. I felt isolated, empty, lost. Dave wrote angry messages to God in his journal. I did not fast on Yom Kippur. Dave and I got into a fight about something, I can’t even remember what. Afterwards I went with a friend to a candlelight vigil for babies who had died. It was one of the saddest days of those first few months after losing my Baby Girl.

I don’t feel especially compelled to fast this year either. I don’t feel especially inspired to do much that is Jewish, to be honest. Keeping kosher – in the limited way we’ve been doing so for several years – feels kind of trivial after what I’ve lived the past almost two years. That is not how I connect to something bigger, by eating my meat and my dairy separately… by fasting on Yom Kippur.

*****

There is a new layer of sadness churning deeply in me right now, a layer I’m not quite ready to shed. A space I just need to exist in for a while. I’m not entirely sure what it’s all about, but I do know that it’s less tidy, more raw than I’ve felt in many months.

It’s not the part of me that wondered how I would ever survive losing my child, terrified at the thought of forever having to hold that experience. I’ve survived, relatively intact. But I’m not settled. In fact, I’m feeling rather unsettled right now. In a new kind of limbo, an in between place.

Now what?

Now life goes on. Now life continues.

That’s it? It just continues? Just goes on, business as usual, except that I’m completely transformed in the middle of a world that hasn’t really changed much at all?

Yup.

How come I have to adjust to the same old world around me, and no one has to adjust to me?

Because you’re not the majority.

I’m not? I know and know of so many parents who have lost babies, our numbers grow every day, and we’re still just a minority? But this is all I know. What am I supposed to do with the transformation I just went through? With this new self I am sort of used to and still getting acquainted with?

*****

Tikva? Are you there? Are you still close? Is that you in the giant yellow and black butterfly I saw yesterday? In the turquoise under the transparent wings of the cicada? In the tiny bird eating an Oreo cookie outside the ice cream store yesterday?

What do I do now… still without you?

I will let myself cry for as long as I need. There are no rules around how long is enough before being done with the sorrow. You are never really done, are you? Here in this place, we know better than to create those kinds of boundaries. Here we feel what we need, when we need, how we need to.

I miss you, Tikva. I miss you differently now. But oh how I miss you still, my Tiny Love.

.::.

Where do you find yourself now? Are you comfortable here? Is it still new for you? Unsettling? Do you feel like an old hat? Transformed, for better or worse? What do things look like now, here, for you?

Comments

[Sally]

Oh Gal, there is so much here, I don't know where to start. I have, like you, just passed the one year mark without her, and I feel a bit lost and confused. I expected to feel.......... something. But I just feel much the same. The build up and anticipation was worse for sure, the day was relatively peaceful in itself, but the let down has been nasty. I have come spiralling back down in the last few days, to a place I haven't visited in a few months. She's been gone a year, but now it just seems there is all this time stretching out in front of us, and she still wont be here. Ever. And that is so unsettling. A year doesn't seem to change much, but that said I am glad to have it behind us and I am glad I have a new birth to look forward to, and that I can pour all of my energy in to that now. The urge to parent a live child has become absolutely overwhelming and all-consuming.
And I know I'm transformed, that's for sure. Still trying to figure out if it is better or worse. A bit of both perhaps, but it just isn't always clear. Still trying to get used to the new me in the new skin. Again, a year isn't long enough to have that fully sorted out yet.
Lots of love to you.

[mirne]

It's been three years for me. Since Freyja died. But only 18 months since Kees died. I was walking down the street yesterday (or the day before?) and saw one of our neighbours sitting outside with her daughter and her grandson. Her grandson was born at the same time as Kees. I saw this little boy, a beautiful little blonde boy, walking (walking!!!) from his grandmother to the front door of her house. It made me cry. Immediately. Not much does that to me any more. I've become so hard. My outer shell is so hard. Because I've suffered so much. And because I've had to become hard. I'm not in a better place. I've become a different person, but she's not a better person. My husband misses the woman I used to be. He said so to me just minutes ago ... that he misses my smile. And instead of smiling, I was crying (again) over my bloody leaking roof. My grief isn't new any more ... it's become a part of me. Part of the new me. The insecure me. The sad me. The angry me. The scared me. I don't actually know how I will go on. I've been stalling my life. Because I'm waiting for the new life which is inside me. And until he comes out I don't know what I will do. Until he lives, I don't know whether I'll only ever be a mother to dead babies, or perhaps I'll be a mother to two dead babies and a mother to a living one as well. There are no plans for the future. I'm too scared to make them. I have certainly been transformed, but it wasn't a transformation for the better.

[erika p]

I find myself in tears at the end of this post...very powerful, Gal, and moving, and thought-provoking. I look forward to all the comments and discussion that come from this. And big hugs to you, as you navigate your new space.

I'm in a dark place right now, seven weeks out. (My Sierra was stillborn at the beginning of July at 27w5d because of a placental problem.) I am haunted by how small and thin she was, wondering whether she suffered, what her last days were like, whether she knew how much she was loved. I'm second-guessing our decision to keep her in me and see if she could grow, rather than deliver a 12 ounce baby. The risks of that were too high for us and I thought I'd made peace with our decision. But now I find myself wondering again, thinking if we had delivered her, I could have seen her alive. Maybe she could have been saved...

I can't let go of the "should've beens" either. She had the same due date as my living son (Sept 27) and I'm constantly thinking about what a happy time this was with him and how sad I feel now, how she should still be in my belly, how much I miss her.

Like you, Gal, I had a miscarriage between my living child and Sierra. It is strange to think if that baby had survived, Sierra would never have been. My son also wishes for a living sibling. He tells me he is sad because, "We don't have any more baby to hold." He is almost three, and I'm so grateful to have him. And I guess I accepted that the miscarried baby wasn't to be (although I still sometimes miss her too)... But I want my little Sierra girl back! I just feel so stuck in this right now, this longing for something that cannot be. LIke Sally says, "...all this time stretching out in front of us, and she still won't be here. Ever." That, exactly.

[Carly]

Beautiful Gal - I need some time to think about this. Your lovely. Missing her with you friend x

[Heather]

I've been transformed, like all of us. I'm more compassionate, thoughtful, more likely to stand up for myself. I would trade all of these "positive" changes for my baby in a millisecond.

Mostly though, I feel disconnect. I go through the motions of each day as if I was watching someone else. My baby's been gone for over 16 months and I just feel empty, and even the hope of a living child in a few weeks doesn't pacify it. The last year and a half, in many ways, feels like a dream. Or a nightmare.

[Catherine]

I heard it takes a year to fully incorporate the loss of a child. It took me four years. This was the first year my Alex's birthday didn't send me into a spiral of grief. I attribute a lot of my healing to my son Myles' birth in November 2007. I feel...content...again. I can live my life again. Yet, there are still days I want to scream, "Don't you know my babies are DEAD?!?!?!" Neither feeling is completely happy...but it is, at least, much less raw.

[Erica]

Thank you for this post, Gal. There's so much here.

I'm closer to acceptance, to compassion, to being a better and kinder person than I was a year ago, but I'm not there yet. Some days I am a glaring, hard-hearted, you-think-you've-got-problems-spouting jerk, and some days I just feel so battered and bruised by it all - babies die; human beings kill each other; tsunamis, earthquakes, floods, and mudslides destroy people for no better reason than that they live where they live. The world hasn't changed, but it touches me more deeply in both good and painful ways. I don't know if I need to wait for a thicker skin to grow, or just to learn to deal with more ups and downs.

And some things just don't change. One year later, and the deepest wish of my heart is still to have him back.

[B.]

After losing our first child 20 months ago, I'm now pregnant with our second. I find myself feeling incredibly raw and vulnerable. At night, when I am alone, I weep over the death of our daughter. I compare her pictures to the ultrasound photos of our son and wonder whether he will look like his sister. I find myself staying awake at night thinking of her and wondering where she is. I prepare for my son while I long for her.

Something about being pregnant, for me, has made it more real that she isn't coming back. I guess in a way, it's moving on. And it's difficult. I don't know that I'm ready. I bought new bedding for this little boy, and it remains in the bag, because I can't bare to take her blankets out of the crib. Time is moving ahead, and I'm not okay with it.

[Lani]

what a beautiful post as usual. i am transformed from the inside out. we're coming upon a year and i just can't even believe it. i'm sad. i've never been a sad person, but i am truly just sad- even through the laughter. the longing is there, for what i don't have. i'm bitter, envious, jealous, angry. those emotions are still there, full force.

we're still trying for number 2, and that in of itself is traumatic. I get this feeling every day that i'll never be pregnant and have my living child. Its just a terrible place to be.

I like what Erica said- "The world hasn't changed, but it touches me more deeply in both good and painful ways." yes, that is me. i cry for inhumanity and injustice almost daily. i can't seem to handle any of it anymore. but when i know something is good, i feel it all over and know how good it is.

[Heather]

I feel how I have and continue to transform in the less than 5 months since losing my girls changes daily, hourly, even. It is so much to process, to think about, to not want to think about, to feel, to not want to feel. As you described, I certainly have issues with my faith, and religion. I do believe there is something more, that there is a spiritual world, but the version of God and heaven and spirituality that I was raised with seems to be a lie to me right now. I find myself hating God, cursing at him, out loud at times even. I am not usre where I will end up in this area, for better or worse.
In some ways I feel I am stronger, if I can get through burying my 2 baby girls, I can get through anything. The "small stuff" really doesn't mean anything to me anymore, I feel I know more about what's really important in life (to me, anyway). But I also can't stand to listen to others complain, about anything, unless it's involved with losing a child. Which unless Im blogging, it never is. I'm trying to be more empathetic, and remember that everything is relative. And I'm hoping I don't lose friends because I have no patience for certain things, and they will see that I'm not a good listener anymore, see that I don't want to hear it, see that, as another poster put it, I have hardened, I'm profoundly saddened, I'm not so much fun to be around, I'm mad as hell.
In other ways, I feel weaker. I worry more about losing my husband or only child. I feel guilty, I often blame and dislike myself for what happened. I wonder if, deep down inside, my husband does too. I feel I cannot handle much on my plate, and become overwhelmed easily. I can start out as Supermom at 7 AM, and by 7 PM I'm a disaster. I find myself enjoying some nice weather or time with my son one minute, and sobbing thinking of my girls the next. Two steps forward, one step back? I feel I am on a continuum of change, where I bounce back and forth from one place to another, never really getting anywhere. Maybe one day I will see more definate change, when this isn't as new. I so much want to feel better, but know part of me will always ache for them, want them, miss them,; part of me is gone forever.

[Julie]

Right after we lost Beckett I could visit this place and identify with EVERY single post. Now, 11.5 months out I can read over a few at a time, reflect and walk away with a tidbit of myself in one or two lines.

But this...this post caught me. I'm here and I'm emerging and AM a better person with so much more perspective on life as a whole. And yet that new person -- the new person who I mostly recognize in the mirror -- is still completely broken deep down. I see our amazing landscape begin to draw her clothes up closer as autumn approaches. I welcome my favorite time of year in northern Michigan with so much anticipation!

And then I see the birds. Literally hundreds and hundreds of blackbirds caught up in their ballet calling me to enjoy a favorite sight. But all I can see is his face and his little body that I struggled to keep warm. I knew I was pushing a boulder up a hill that would not allow it to rest, but I was willing to take it on. I fought the Grim Reaper that beautiful fall night in room 19 as I snuggled skin-to-skin with my baby that I knew wouldn't get to see our vivid leaves or smell the crisp air at the pumpkin patch. And yet it was right there! There outside the window were those birds and the colors.

Yes, months 8-11 have been really okay places for me to rest. But now with his birthday looming within arms reach I'm overwhelmed -- struggling for a baseline. Somehow I'm okay with that. Maybe because I really have no choice.

[bon]

Gal...i'm late to this. but oh, it caught me too. the beauty in it, the sheer raw love and want that shine through it.

and the recognition. because i've been struggling myself, this summer, with "what do i do now?" for four and a half years, my whole life has been focused down to the narrow primal goal of getting my two living babies safely here and getting through the wonderful wild colicky isolation and discovery of the first year with each of them. and now i am back at work and there will be no more babies and for the first time i can look ahead more than three months or so, beyond hoped-for pregnancies and grief and bedrest schedules, and i am baffled by the experience. i have almost forgotten how to imagine a life not ruled by babies and the desire for babies. and so even all this time later, i am again, as i have at every threshold, standing here going "what do i do now?"

and i wonder if this one is the end of it, the last thread of grief, of healing. and i doubt it.

love to you.

[eliza]

I am not quite a week from the loss of our son, though it has been 10 months since the loss of our baby in the fall - a missed miscarriage or a blighted ovum. It didn't matter to my heart. God, I thought then I knew what pain was. That was followed in a cycle by another pregnancy, abnormal and hurtful - a cervical ectopic pregnancy, so rare that most medical personnel raise their eyebrows and ask how they determined that. Wait three months they said, and I waited some time.

Then came our son, and I knew this was meant to be. Difficult pregnancy, but he was always healthy and perfect. We passed 20 weeks and then relaxed.

And then he was born and now he is gone.

I am lost, bewildered, hurting, sad. People ask if I am ok and I think I will never be ok again. I wonder how my friendships will end - two of my friends delivering in October, two in November, one in December and one in January, within two weeks of Gabriel's due date - both having boys. How can I see them and support them and not ache for my son?

I am alone, groping in the dark, still begging the cold universe (because surely God cannot exist and take my son from me and leave me aching and empty not only again, but far worse now, broken beyond repair) for it not to be real or true.

I only can see now that I will never be the same and I do not know yet who I will become.

[gal]

Oh Eliza... I am so sorry to welcome you here. So close to the loss of Gabriel. I am speechless, except to say that you are not alone. Even when you feel you are - and I know that feeling well - remember that you have a community that holds you through this, for as long as it takes, years even. I am thankful you have found us here, and so sorry that you had to. Be gentle and patient with yourself and your journey. Just know you are held.

[red pen mama]

It's been weeks since I read this, so if I am less than coherent, forgive me.

I am definitely old hat. And it's funny because I think the world has transformed, not me. At first -- maybe that first year or two -- it WAS me; I was different, changed. But six+ years out... Now I feel like the world has changed instead. The world without my son, but with my daughters, and a niece, and a bunch of nephews, and other children close to us.

I don't know how to explain it. The world looks different to me, started looking different a couple of years ago. not in a negative way. Just... not the same world I had been seeing since Gabriel died.

Maybe I finally saw that I will be a mother without a live son in this world. Which is sad, yes. My husband and I have been tentatively talking about one more, a son we would hope for, a daughter we would welcome. And maybe that's how it changed. Or when.

ciao,
rpm

[aliza]

beautiful post gal. just catching up here.

i feel transformed as well. not necessarily for the better, but more real maybe. still the anger, bitterness, envy are not pretty. my heart is still hardened most of the time. i am waiting for a time when i can come into balance. where my heart will soften a bit. being on the road and in beautiful places has helped to bring back a sense of wonder and gratitude for this world. but i am still in the aftermath of the huge tragic loss of my first born. i am in a metamorphosis.

i too am not sure how to deal with the jewish holidays either. i have felt angry and god and the judaism of my heart. over the past year i've felt quite un-jewish too. i think i'll be out in nature alone- or under the covers. i'd like to open myself to something, write in my journal, yell at god....wherever i am i will be thinking of you and dave and tikva.