Pi Day's Eve

March 13, Pi day's eve, as I was told by a friend this evening.  Two years ago on this very night, I was sitting in my bed, just as I am now, writing on my iPad.  I was thinking and reflecting and finding just the right words to use in my goodbye letter to Miri.  And here it is two years later, and I'm still sitting here, thinking and reflecting and realizing just how far I've come.  Two years ago, I was anxious about spreading her ashes.  I cried a lot that evening in anticipation of how that final goodbye would go.  I had no idea how liberating it was going to be and how that Pi Day would be the first day where I felt unchained from my sorrows.  One year ago, I was still sad about all those milestones I missed during her first year, I still cried a bit, but I was proud of myself for how much emotional healing I had done. I was pregnant and still anxious, and I wasn't quite ready for Pi Day.  This year, there are no more tears.  I'm not fooling myself--there's still a small lump in my throat--I do wish she was here and that I could celebrate her birthday.  I was thinking about it a lot tonight. If Miri was alive, I wouldn't be typing now.  I would be blowing up balloons.  I would be hanging streamers.  I would be wrapping presents.  I would be scrambling around the house trying to locate that rogue roll of Scotch tape that I know we have but has gone missing just at the wrong time.  And as I'm searching, I would be having a conversation with my husband (who by the way, would tell me that I was crazy for going all out with the balloons and streamers) about how the decorations ARE important and I don't care if she won't have any memories of going to bed in a normal room but waking up to a fully decorated birthday surprise.  I would explain to him that it would be fun for her and it would set the tone for her special day.  But I'm doing none of that tonight.  She's not alive. 

My life has gone down a different path.  And that's okay.  Even though I feel like I can see just what could have been as if it were, I'm not lamenting the fact that that isn't my life.  I am truly happy with where my life has ended up.  I love Annalie.  I love that I got the chance to meet her and raise her.  I love that my kids are 4 years apart, not two and a half.  I love that our loss brought my husband and I closer together.  I love the new friendships I have made.  I love the wisdom I have gained.  I love the perspective on life that I now have.

And this year, I set my alarm to go off slightly early so I can make it to the store and buy some pies for my math class tomorrow.  I'm going to celebrate Pi day with a nod to the birthday that almost was.

My Story--Still Getting Caught Off Guard

There are days when I'm laying in bed at night, watching tv, and I feel something, like a gentle kick or a rolling over, and I get caught off guard.  Obviously it must be gas, or my dinner digesting, but it does make me stop for a moment.  I wonder if this is similar to amputees, who tend to feel their limbs after they've been removed.  I never had these moments after Whitney, but I do now, and it just reminds me that I miss her.

Whitney and I were watching the movie Annie, as we had many times before, but this time was different.  I am still getting emotional surprises from time to time, and today, as we were watching the film, I had to turn away from her as tears were streaming down my cheeks.  It was the part of the movie where Miss Hannigan, Rooster, and Lily kidnapped Annie from Mr. Warbucks.  They sang a song and when Mr. Warbucks sang, "And maybe I'll forget how much she meant to me...and how she was almost my baby...Maybe." I just lost it.

It's now been nearly 5 months, and everyone who was pregnant or has become pregnant in that time has had a girl.  At first this was really hard to deal with, because I was supposed to have one too.  And every time I heard about a girl, it was a reminder that I was missing one.  For months, I kept wishing boys on all my friends (but it didn't work).  Luckily, I'm at the point now where it's not so bad to hear.  I have convinced myself that this is the way the universe is being kind to me...the more it happens, the more numb I am getting and the less it bothers me.  And, I am hopeful that I'll have the opportunity to have another girl in the upcoming months.

I was watching Dr. Phil the other day, and he said something that struck a chord with me..."We remember the days that changed who we are."  And that's very true.  As I am writing this, with a few months' perspective, a lot of what happened has grown fuzzy.  But certain parts are vivid...like they happened yesterday.  And those really are the moments that forever changed me, for better or worse.  Those are the moments that broke me and the moments where I learned or grew.  They changed the way I viewed myself and my world.

I am just two days shy of the 5 month mark.  I have been feeling really good and really positive for a while.  I am able to talk about my experiences and tell people what happened much easier now.  But just when you think that you're alright, something will happen and remind you that emotionally you're still frail.  Tonight, I got a phone call from one of my best friends to tell me that she was moving to Texas.  She got offered a job and the opportunity was too good to pass up, so in 3 weeks, she'd be leaving.  We've been friends for more than half of our lives and in all that time never lived more than a few miles away, except while she was in law school.  We were roommates in college, and we bought houses within walking distance of each other.  We were each other's maids of honor.  And tonight, when she told me her news, I was truly happy for her, but sad for me.  I was fine throughout most of our conversation, but then when we hung up, I started feeling like I wanted to cry.  About 10 minutes later, after thinking, "Jenny...she's your friend.  It's not like she's your spouse or child.  Your schedules haven't meshed in a while and you  hardly hang out with her anymore, so nothing is really going to be changing on a day-to-day basis.  What's with all this emotion?"  And then all of a sudden, it hit me...It's just another person I love that was being taken out of my life.  And that was it.  Even though we don't see each other a lot, even though our kids are different ages and don't play together, even though we live different lives, she is my one friends that I can always count on to be there, to support me, and to drop whatever she is doing at a moment's notice if I needed her to.  She is the closest thing I have to a sister.  She was the one person I called when I was in the hospital to come keep me company at night.  And, although she had worked a full day and had two kids to take care of, she found the time to come sit with me when I needed someone.  And even though she'll be just a phone call away, it won't be the same, and I'm going to miss her.  I told Andy the news and how upset I was, and he tried to console me.  And I told him that I mentally know things are going to be fine, but I'm just having an emotional over-reaction to it, and it's coming from dealing with another loss.  It's such a strange thing when you cannot control your reactions.  There is a split between my mind and my heart that still hasn't healed, and it's times like these that I know I still have healing left to do.

I went to Kansas City for an annual trip I make with one of my part-time jobs, and the people I ran into there either didn't know me or hadn't seen me in a year.  One year ago, I wasn't even pregnant yet.  And in 5 days time, I felt the need to explain my situation to 10 or more people.  (I lost count.) Getting to know people or just in catching up, I talked about my almost 3 year-old daughter, and I heard a lot of, "It's about time for another one" or "Have you thought about having more kids?" and "When's the next one coming?" And I just told them that I have one more month before I can start trying.  The funny look on their faces begged me to explain that I was pregnant, had a stillbirth, and my doctor asked me to wait 6 months before getting pregnant again.  I am so glad that I'm in such a state of acceptance and peace, and glad that I can talk and explain about what happened without the tears.  I'm in a place of being able to remember, but not needing to relive the emotions.  Sometimes I elaborated and gave more details and sometimes not, but they are kind of awkward questions to answer.  This experience is just one more way in which I can see that stillbirths are very much not private matters.  And that's okay.

My Story--Mother's Day

Tomorrow is going to be Mother's Day, and I am feeling a bit melancholy.  I'm not sad enough to cry--I've definitely accepted the way things are--but realizing that I'm celebrating with one daughter instead of two has just set me in a down mood.  I've been thinking about how precious every child is, and how fortunate we are to have them in our lives.  And this Mother's Day, I'll focus on the joy that Whitney brings me and how lucky I am to be her mom.  And I'll think of Miri, and I'll be grateful for the short time that I was able to be a mother to her.  But I'll still wish that things would have been different.  I'll hold Whitney, and she'll hug me back.  We'll exchange "I love you's" and give each other kisses, and I'll lavish every minute of it.  And deep on the inside, I'll be wishing that Miri and I could do the same.  

My Story--I Think Differently Now

I almost just wrote, "Miri should have been 1 month old", and then I caught myself.  Miri would have been 1 month old.  There's a difference, and it's an important one...Would have means "if it were not for the unfortunate circumstances", but "should have" means a little more--that something isn't quite right and it was supposed to be differently.  And part of being at peace with the situation means realizing that this is the way it was meant to be.  It shouldn't be different than it is.  This is it, and as much as I sometimes wish otherwise, I was meant to have lost her.  She was not meant to be 1 month old.  

In any event, Miri would have been 1 month old, and although I feel happy, confident, and peaceful, there are still plenty of moments that catch me off guard.  The obvious ones--people who hadn't seen me in a long time saying "Congratulations"--although, these don't nearly cause the same anxiety-filled reaction as some of the others.  It's more the people who ask, "How's the baby?", wanting to know how my almost 3 year-old daughter is, because in their eyes she still is a baby.  And my heart races, I think to myself, "Don't they know I lost the baby?  How can I explain it without making them feel ill-at-ease?"  It took a few times of someone else saying, "Whitney is fine." before I realized the intent of the question.  And there are the other moments that force me to do a double-take.  Friends, cousins, etc who are pregnant, and as proud and excited as a new mom should be.  I'm not jealous, I'm not sad, it doesn't bring me back to that dark place I was in so many weeks ago, but there are moments that give me pause.  My cousin had posts on Facebook,  "3rd Trimester already!"  "2 months to go!"  "Can't believe the baby will be here in 3 more weeks!"  Those sort of things, while very innocent on her part and something we all do as first time moms, now give me a very different reaction.  While I used to share in the excitement of the moment, now when I hear those comments, one word and one word alone always pops into my head...Maybe.  Maybe she'll be here soon.  Maybe you really have 3 weeks left.  Maybe if you are not one of the unlucky ones.  I feel awful that I can't get as excited as I once would have, but this is now my experience.  It gives me a new perspective on the old adage, "Don't count your chickens before they hatch."  I always knew what it meant, but it's visceral now.  Even today, when I heard another cousin announce "It's a girl!", my gut gave me an overwhelming feeling of "I hope she makes it."  I really can't count on a baby being born alive until it is.  That sigh of relief at viability day, when they tell you if something goes wrong and we have to take the baby, it'll have a 95% or higher chance of survival, still is no real sigh of relief.  Had I been able to predict what happened over the weekend, I could have had a c-section on Saturday and a 95% chance or higher that Miri would be alive and healthy today.  It's dumbfounding sometimes.  

One thing that a good friend of mine taught me is that in the Jewish faith, when a woman is pregnant, you never offer her congratulations.  Instead of Mazel Tov, you say, "B'sha-ah Tova", meaning, "all in good time."  And having gone through a stillbirth, I can now see the wisdom in it.  Congratulations is for things which have already happened, not for things you anticipate will happen.  All in good time...how true.

One of the tasks that I saved until I was better able to deal with my emotions was returning the gifts that were meant for Miri.  My grandmother had purchased matching outfits for her and Whitney for the spring, and I couldn't keep either of them.  I didn't need anything newborn sized, and putting Whitney in it would just be another reminder that Miri isn't here anymore.  So I called my grandmother and asked for the receipt, then went to the mall.  When the sales lady asked me what my reason was for the return, I figured I should be honest...not many stores will allow a return that is more than 3 months old.  I cried a bit while telling her, but she was sympathetic and went ahead with a merchandise credit for me.  It wasn't fun, but one more task checked off the list and one more element of closure.

My Story--Saying Goodbye

On the day before my due date, the hospital called to remind me about the pre-op instructions for the next day.  I was driving down the highway when I received the phone call and I had to kindly tell them that I wasn't coming in because I had had a stillborn 2 months earlier. Apparently my OB had forgotten to cancel that appointment.  That was another one of those caught off-guard moments on what was already a tough day for me.

It was tough due to anticipation of how I was going to handle saying goodbye, but also tough because I was trying to decide how the day was going to play out.  We had already decided that Whitney would not be allowed to go.  There would be too many questions that I didn't think she was ready to have truthful answers to, and both Andy and I wanted to have the freedom to break down emotionally if we needed to.  Neither one of us wanted to have to be strong in that moment.  Andy wanted it to be private, as in just the two of us, but I wanted my parents there as well.  After all, it was their granddaughter too, and my mom had been my emotional support for the past two months.  He had agreed the night before that they could come, but only if they would stand in the background and not be with us when we spread her ashes.

Right before I received that phone call from the hospital, I was at our temple, meeting with my rabbi to try to find something appropriate and meaningful to say.  I knew the mourner's Kaddish wasn't right, because she technically was never alive.  I wanted something that was looking ahead with promise and looking back but not in a mournful, grief-stricken way.  My rabbi found a few passages and prayers from a modern reformed book specifically written to address stillbirths and miscarriages.  He made photocopies for me to take home.  He even offered to come and say a few words during our final goodbye, but I declined.  I knew Andy really wanted privacy, but more than that, I wanted Miri's goodbye to come from me.  This was the last loving act I could do, and I wanted to be the one to do it.  He also asked me if I had decided where we were going to spread her ashes.  It was going to be on the temple grounds, but I hadn't yet found the perfect place.  He offered a suggestion that that we spread her ashes at the center of their new labyrinth, right at the base of a tree that had been planted for him when he became our head rabbi.  He showed me where it was from his office window, and I said that I'd think about it.  At the end of our conversation, he asked me if I had ever seen ashes before (which I hadn't).  And he warned me that sometimes there are still remnants and pieces of bone mixed in with the ashes.  He did say that in her case she was so young and her bones were so much cartilage that he didn't think there would be many pieces, but he wanted to warn me ahead of time so it wasn't one extra bit of unexpected stress.  I thanked him for that and I left his office very emotional from thinking about what was coming up tomorrow.  I walked around the entire temple, and the spot that I had been thinking of ended up not being as great or as private as I had imagined.  I found another place that was nice, and I checked out the labyrinth.  I couldn't decide between the two, so I figured I'd give Andy some ownership in the "where".

Later that evening, after I put Whitney to bed, I went through the passages and came to the conclusion that none of what these progressive male rabbis wrote was what I was feeling.  Their words seemed empty and the solemn tone seemed as if they were imagining what it felt like rather than knowing what it felt like.  And when I thought about it, of course they didn't know...they were men.  They can't experience the loss in the same way.  They can't feel the responsibility or the sense of letting your child down.  So, I decided to just write my own letter to her, expressing what I felt and telling her what she meant to me.  I wrote and thought for a long time and I hit on this idea that made everything okay...I found purpose and meaning to her little life and I summed it all up in this short letter:

Miri,
I believe that people come in and out of your life to teach you lessons, and they stay until all the lessons they were meant to teach you have been learned.   You have taught me about deep sorrow, compassion, strength, and courage.  You taught me that I can do things I never thought I would be able to do.  You showed me how much love and support I have in friends and family that I didn't know was there.   You also taught me not to take a healthy pregnancy for granted, and that a second child's milestones should be just as exciting as they were for the first child.  You brought new friends into my life.  And you did all that for me in just 7 months.  And so your life, even without a taking a breath, had meaning and served a purpose.  And for that I will always be grateful.  As painful as it is, knowing you and losing you has enriched my life in so many ways.

I could have elaborated so much and described each point, but I knew that I wanted to read this letter to her, and I knew that it would be one of the hardest things I'd ever have to do, and I didn't know if I would be able to find enough of a voice among the tears to even get through one sentence.  Short and to the point was what I needed, but the thoughts behind each statement would be forever in my heart.  And upon the realization that her life had a meaning and that I am forever changed for the better somehow made it all okay.  That was the moment that I turned my grief into gratitude.  I felt better about how the next day was going to go, and it was late at night, so I settled in and went to bed.

The next morning, I was met with a wave of anxiety as I knew what the day would entail.  Andy and I showered and got dressed.  We both decided to wear something nice, a rarety in our house.  I printed the letter I had written and placed it next to the box containing her ashes.  My grandmother came over to watch Whitney, and Andy and I gathered our courage, the letter, and Miri's ashes, and we headed out the door.  We still hadn't decided with certainty where we were going to do it.  There were two spots I had in mind, but when we arrived at the temple, there were gardeners tending the plants at one of the spots.  I didn't want to ask them to stop, so by default we had chosen our spot.  It was going to be in the labyrinth, under our rabbi's tree.

A few minutes later my parents arrived, and just as we requested, they stayed back and watched from the entrance of the labyrinth as Andy and I walked toward the center.  We took a deep breath, with tears in our eyes, and we knelt down at a spot right next to a rock big enough to sit on.  I opened the box, with a bit of trepidation, not knowing exactly what the ashes would look like.  They were light gray, and very fine.  No bits or pieces, like I was worried about.  And very matter-of-factly, I asked Andy if he was ready because once we did it, she would be gone, and he nodded, so we both held the bag and sprinkled them in a small clearing we had made in the ground cover.  I tried to mix her in with the dirt and mulch, because I didn't want the gardeners to move her when doing their maintenance.  My hands were dirty, my eyes were filled with tears, some had streaked down my face, but I didn't care.  I got out my letter, and I read it.  The tears were coming out so fast, that the words looked blurry on the page, and at one point, I couldn't even read what I had written.  It didn't matter, though.  I knew it by heart, as the sentiments came directly from my heart.   I managed to speak every word out loud, and I told her I loved her.  Andy cried.  He said that it just wasn't fair.  He told her that he loved her, and we hugged, held hands, and walked back.  I put the letter that I had written in the box where her ashes were, and I held it.  It was lighter and empty, and part of me was sad that we let her go out of our hands forever, but most of me knew that it was the best thing we could have done.  It was the final step in achieving closure.  My parents gave us a hug, and a remarkable thing happened as we walked to greet them.  All of a sudden, my dark haze that I had been living in lifted.  Just like that.  It was over, and I felt happy.  It was the first time in months, and I felt like I was going to have a good day.  My mom asked how I was, and I said, "Good.  I'm really good."  I told them that if they wanted to go and pay their respects, they could.  And they did.  I could tell that it was really hard for them too, but they did it.  I took a deep breath, enjoyed the warm fresh air, looked up at the beautiful blue sky, and I knew that I was going to be okay.

Over the 9 weeks I had just lived through, I did a lot of thinking, feeling, and introspection, and this was the first day for me to move on with my life.  I needed to get back to a normal routine.  I needed to be a mom to Whitney and take care of her.  And I had a few months ahead of no stressing about a baby.  My life could be mine again.  And it was a relief in a weird way.  I no longer had to worry whether or not I would make it through spreading her ashes.  I no longer had to play the scene over and over in my head, where I just fell apart, where my legs buckled underneath me and Andy had to catch me because I just couldn't handle it, where I cried so hard I could barely breathe.  I did it.  I made it through.  I had a voice, and I used it.  I said goodbye, and I was proud of myself for finding that strength.  You wouldn't think that the day you say goodbye would be such a happy day, but I couldn't stop smiling.  I forgot how good it felt to feel happy, and it just felt so good.

Andy and I decided to take the rest of the day and spend it together as a family.  We took Whitney to the zoo and were having a lovely afternoon.  As we were walking to see the hippos, Whitney's favorite animal, I got a phonecall from Joy, wanting to know how everything went.  And I told her all about it with no tears or anything.  I was really relieved and really happy.  It was a good day.  Then her news once again rocked my world...Gabby was taken by ambulance from her pediatrician's office to the hospital.  They didn't know for sure what was wrong, but her blood oxygen was only 68%, and Joy was so distraught.  As it turned out, after a day or two of tests, Gabby was missing her pulmonary artery and a valve in her heart, and she had a hole between her ventricles.  Officially, she has Tetralogy of Fallot with MAPCAS.  And she needed to have open heart surgery as soon as she could.  After I got off the phone with her, I told Andy, and we were both in shock.  She was living through one of our, "It would be worse if" scenarios.  

My story--The Psychological Struggles and Little Victories

At home, I was met with a very happy daughter.  And I told her, "Look Whitney!  Mommy is getting better.  I'm well enough to come home today."  I gave her a gentle hug then headed upstairs, slowly, as climbing stairs was difficult, and gently crawled into bed and rested.  Later that evening, my dad carried in dinner, and we all ate together.  At the dinner table, Whitney was so happy to have her life more normal and have everyone over that my mom said, "Isn't this nice...we're one whole, big, happy family!"  And with those words, I immediately burst into tears.  We weren't one big happy family.  One of us was missing, and she'd never be there, and I didn't think we'd ever feel completely whole again.

I looked up and saw this look on my mom's face that I hadn't ever seen before.  She felt so bad for saying something so innocent.  She apologized profusely.  And I knew there was no malice behind it, and I told her it was okay.  I needed to get used to the things people say, and I knew that I needed to get a bit more thick skinned when it came to things.  But it was still hard to hear.  Everything was still so new, and I still was learning about what I could handle and what I couldn't.  I composed myself again, sat back down, and picked at the rest of my dinner.  I still had no appetite.

I was very fortunate once I was home.  My mom came over every day to help watch Whitney, clean my house, and take care of me.  I was so energyless when I returned home.  In the beginning, I spent just an hour or two out of my room for an entire day.  If you know me, you know that I'm a goer and a doer.  I go stir-crazy very easily.  It was so obvious that I was depressed and needed time to grieve.  And thank goodness all the adults in my life recognized that and didn't push me.  

One thing that my husband did was that he liked to try to "protect" me.  There were condolence cards that had arrived in the mail, and he hid them from me when I got home.  He wanted to spare me the pain of reading through them and reliving how much her death hurt.  But, fortunately for me, my mom had convinced him otherwise.  She explained that I needed to know that people were thinking of us, and that he shouldn't deny me those sympathies.  And she was right.  While I couldn't read them all at once, and I had to gear up each time I read one, it was nice to know that we were being though of.  I had just enough strength to read two a day in the beginning.  I couldn't cry, and so I had to limit myself as to how much pain I could handle.  But, while difficult to read, it really was the support of friends and family that helped me through. I needed to read them in order to help heal.  And, with each card I read, the situation became more real and not just a bad dream that I had been having.  It was important to have the option to see them.

One other thing that was completely out of my control was that I had diarrhea.  I would get a stomachache after every meal and spend time in the bathroom.  I could barely eat a whole meal even when I was hungry.  At first, I assumed it was from the anxiety.  And I didn't think too much about it.  Then after a few days, I thought maybe it was a residual effect of the anesthesia, but typically they drugs are constipating.  However, they did give me ketorolac, which can cause digestive problems, so I figured that was it.  After I was home for about 5 days, I decided to stop taking my prescriptions to see if that would help.  I had become so weak from the loss of fluids that climbing the stairs in my house made me out of breath.  But stopping the ketorolac didn't help.  This was just my body's response to all the stress, emotions, trauma, hormone shifts, and mental anguish I was going through.  And finally about 3 weeks later, I started to get back to (a new) normal.

I had to visit my doctor's office on Monday so that my stitches could be removed.  When I called to make the appointment, my OB was booked for the day, and they told me I'd have to see the nurse practitioner.  I was somewhat frustrated, but I didn't have a choice.  Getting stitches out was scary enough, and I didn't really want to deal with anyone but my doctor.  It was going to be hard enough sitting in the waiting room with a bunch of pregnant women.  There are 4 or 5 OBs in that office and the waiting room is always full and the doctors always run late.  I never had an appointment where I waited for less than 30 minutes past my scheduled time.  Just sitting there watching all the other women for that long was not going to be fun.  Andy offered to take me and he said that he and Whitney could wait with me, but I didn't want to get the stitches out by myself, and I surely didn't want Whitney to watch...if it pulled or hurt, she didn't need to see me cry.  This ordeal had been hard enough on her already.  And she didn't need the extra trauma of seeing that her mommy was crying, but not knowing why.  So, I just asked my mom to take me.  (I couldn't go alone yet, as I was still on driving restrictions).  And, when we arrived, I was pleasantly surprised...for the first time ever, they got me in at my scheduled appointment time, and my OB had rearranged his schedule so that he could take out the stitches for me and answer any questions that I had.  What a relief!  The stitches weren't bad.  He made two long running stitches all the way across my abdomen, so it was two tugs and that was it.  Tender, but not painful.  He didn't even tear off the tape holding my skin together.  He suggested I keep it on until Wednesday, and then slowly take them off until Saturday, when they should all be removed.  It was easier than I thought, and I even did well holding myself together in the waiting room.  It's the little victories that really help when your whole world is spinning out of control.

When I got home that evening, I finally allowed Whitney to see my new scar.  She had been asking for a few days, but I didn't want her to see the stitches, because I didn't want her to get too scared.  With them removed, I figured "why not?"  So, I laid down in bed, and sat her next to me.  I told her that she wasn't allowed to touch, because it was a boo-boo and still hurt.  Then I tried to describe it so that she would know what to expect.  The scar wasn't exactly in a straight line.  It dipped down in the middle and the skin was still red, so I told her that the scar looked like a smiley face.  The pieces of white tape, perpendicular to the scar, I told her were like the teeth.  So, it looked like a smiley face with teeth.  Not a scary image, and she was fascinated.  Every night we went through the routine of looking at it, and every night, I gave her the same image before showing her.  Then as the "teeth" were removed, she had a visual cue that I really was healing each day.  I am so glad that I was able to show her and be truthful with her about the whole medical procedure.  I think that level of honesty was good for both of us.

Now, I just had one more day left before what I feared was my biggest challenge--picking up Miri's ashes.  The cremation center called me on Monday, letting me know that her ashes were going to be delivered to their west county location and that I could pick them up on Tuesday anytime before 3:00.  I spent so many hours from Friday (when they picked her up) to Tuesday (when I got her remains) imagining how it would go and how heartbroken I would feel.  I still couldn't cry because of the surgery, but I went through the pain over and over in my mind, preparing myself.  I pictured myself crying so hard that my knees would buckle under me.  I imagined crying so hard that I ran out of breath.  I pictured needing my mom to hold me upright.  And these were all the things that I really was feeling, but couldn't act out because I was still too sore from the surgery to cry.  I was forced to stuff it all in.  

On Tuesday, I asked my grandmother to come over and watch Whitney so that my mom could drive me to pick up Miri's ashes.  Andy went back to work that day and so he couldn't go, and I was still under doctor's orders to not drive.  Even if I could have done it alone, this was one of those things that I knew I needed support to get through.  My mom had suggested that I take an extra percoset that day to help with my discomfort, and I agreed, because 9 times out of 10, she knows exactly what the right thing for me to do is.  So my grandmother arrived, I had a "sundae", took a deep breath, and got in the car.  It was a 15 minute drive, but it felt like an eternity.  On the way, my mom had offered again that she could do this for me if I didn't think I could handle it or didn't want to.  But for me, that wasn't an option.  I had such an overwhelming need to handle everything myself.  I had to cancel my registries, I had to call the funeral homes, I had to take care of the paperwork.  And this was no different.  I just had to be strong enough to do it.  When we opened the door, the director was talking to a couple about their services.  He asked if he could help me, and I said "I need to pick up my daughter's ashes."  My eyes welled up, but I held it together.  He quickly excused himself from the couple and took me to a table at the back of the store.  He presented me with a small cardboard box, probably 3 inches tall by 8 inches wide by 3 inches deep.  There was a small label that said St. Louis Cremation and Miriam Grace Shrensker underneath.  He expressed his condolences and had me sign a piece of paper.  I didn't read it--I don't think I could have with my eyes as teary as they were--but I signed it, and I assumed that it confirmed that I picked her up.  He said how sorry he was for our loss, and then we left.  I held the box so closely.  And I was so surprised...I didn't feel like I thought I would.  I was sad, but not overwhelmingly so.  I actually felt really happy, in a strange way.  For a week, I had been missing holding my baby.  I felt so empty and I just wanted to hold her.  I thought about getting a teddy bear as a substitute, but really, there is no substitute that could fill that void.  But finally, for the first time, I got to hold her.  Granted, it wasn't the way I wanted it to have been and it she didn't look like a baby anymore, but she was back with me again, and I needed that so badly.  I cradled the box in my arms, and I loved her.

We then went to my mom's house, because Andy couldn't handle having her ashes at our house.  So my mom offered to keep them safe at her house until the day came when we were ready for them.  It was a quick 3 or 4 minute drive, and then I had to hand over the box.  I stayed in the car while she found a spot for her granddaughter.  And in a minute or two, she returned and started driving back to my house.  She asked if I was okay, and I was.  I felt really good, better than I had felt in a while.  Relieved that it was over.  Proud that I found the courage to do it, and happy that I got to be with her.  "I did it," I said.  And then the extra dose of percoset started messing with me.  I started feeling woozy and a bit over-drugged, and I just needed some time for it to wear off.  When we got home, I headed straight to bed and laid down for a couple hours.

I was so proud of myself for doing it.  I needed that little victory.  And it was another piece of the closure puzzle that I was glad I experienced.  If I had let my mom or someone else do this for me, I think my healing would have suffered.  With each challenge that I overcame and each task that was difficult, I gained confidence, closure, and pride.  I learned about my own strength.  And these are such valuable lessons, and ones that I will carry with me through the rest of my life.

Every Monday, my grandmother takes us to lunch at Einstein's.  Finally, I was recovered enough from the c-section to go.  And, as we walked up to place our order, Andy looked at me and said, "Are you excited...you get to eat lox again."  Lox is my favorite sandwich from there, and with each pregnancy, I had been avoiding it along with sushi, carpaccio, and other raw or under-cooked meats.  I know he meant to cheer me up, but really, he just made me feel miserable.  It was a blatant in-your-face reminder that I wasn't pregnant, and I still should have been.  I started to get teary-eyed, and I just couldn't bring myself to eat it.  Eating lox now meant that Miri was dead.  I wasn't 100% ready to accept that I was no longer pregnant nor was I ready for that "perk" of having a stillborn.  Having those "first time since I got pregnant" moments should be met with joy, and I wasn't ready to handle them yet.  I ordered a turkey sandwich even though it wasn't what I really wanted.

About two weeks after I returned home, my mother-in-law came in town and stayed with us, as she always did.  This trip had been planned a couple months earlier when Andy decided he wasn't going home over Christmas.  Both Andy and Judy double-checked that I was okay with that, and I said that it was okay as long as Judy understood that I wasn't going to be very entertaining.  Her visits normally go like this:  arrive on Friday early evening, stay Saturday, leave Sunday after lunch--quick weekend trip.  And Andy typically works Friday night until 10:30-11:00, and then again on Saturday from 10:30 am to 11:00 pm.  He's off Sundays, so Sunday before lunch is his only time to visit with his mom, and I entertain her the rest of the time.  However, this time she decided to stay an extra day to have time to be with Andy, which I was totally okay with.  I would like him to get to spend time with his mother.  That just meant that my mother, my safety blanket, wouldn't be around.

So she arrived Friday afternoon, and when she got there, my mom left.  We went out to dinner, and I heard all about how hard it is when someone you love dies--her husband had passed away 8 years earlier and she still cries every time she thinks about him.  And I know she meant well, but a child is different than a husband.  It's a totally different feeling. I was supposed to be her caregiver, her protector.  I was supposed to keep her safe.  And I let her down in the worst possible way.  Not intentionally, not that it was even in my control...but it was within my body and that somehow made me feel responsible.  

After dinner, I started having some of the worst thoughts I had ever had.  I knew in my head that it had been bad luck.  I knew I couldn't have stopped it.  I knew I couldn't have prevented it.  But I started feeling responsible.  And I kept apologizing to Miri over and over.  "I'm so sorry I couldn't protect you.  I'm so sorry the safest place on earth was what killed you.  I'm so sorry I couldn't help you."  And then the thoughts turned to what it must have been like for her...I kept wondering, "What must it have felt like to strangle yourself?  Was she panicked?  Did she know to move or wiggle the cord?  Did she struggle to free herself?"  And those were so overwhelming.  And those were things I couldn't share with my mother-in-law.  I just thought and thought.  And the analytic part of me knew that an oxygen-deprived brain would go to sleep and die peacefully.  But what about right before?  It was mental torture and I couldn't stop it.  And I kept everything to myself for a couple days.  And that was really hard.  So, I decided that the best way to ease my worries was to learn more about stillbirths.  Perhaps there would be an article about what happens to the baby.  So I took out my iPad before bed and I googled "stillbirth 31 weeks".  And I was grossly underprepared for what came up.  Three websites, and then the link for images with pictures already displayed on the screen.  I had such an adrenaline kick when images of stillborn babies surfaced all over the bottom of the screen--that was not what I wanted to see.  I didn't even hit the image tab and they were there in plain view.  I couldn't look and I immediately shut off the iPad, and tried to get those pictures out of my head.  There really should be some sort of warning for that.  It took me about another month before I was ready to go online again to learn more.  It was just horrific to me at the time.  It was too fresh and my wounds were too raw for that.

I had Andy, Whitney, and Judy all go out together on Sunday, and I stayed behind, because I really needed to talk and get those dark thoughts out.  The longer I kept them in, the more they just festered, and the worse it got.  I started visualizing her inside me strangling herself and being scared, alone, and in the dark, and I needed to talk to get those visions out.  And once I started telling my mom about my dark thoughts, she told me not to go down that road, and that she was sure everything happened easily, peacefully, and painlessly to Miri, and she hugged me.  And I needed that--the reassurance and the love.  And while the thoughts didn't exactly go away, they became less all-encompassing to my mind.

It had been a couple weeks since I returned home from the hospital, and I had heard my grandmother and my mom talk about going to my cousin's baby shower.  I knew it was coming up, and just the week before, I made a comment to my mom that I was so happy I didn't get an invitation, because I didn't think I would be able to emotionally handle watching her prepare for the arrival of her daughter, seeing her as pregnant as I was when I lost Miri, and more than that, I didn't want to take any attention away from her if I suddenly burst out in tears.  What I didn't know was that I really did get an invitation and it was delivered in the mail on the day I returned from the hospital.  Andy had told my mom that he threw it away, because he didn't want me to have to deal with it and he didn't think that I'd be capable of going.  My mom RSVP'd for me that I wouldn't be coming, but she felt somewhat uneasy about hiding it from me.  There was a part of her that wanted to let me know, but because I had commented just a week earlier that I was glad I didn't even get an invitation, she and Andy felt that my not attending was probably what I would have chosen anyway.  But with a few weeks of perspective, I started feeling differently, and my mom decided to tell me about what they had done.  I was a little frustrated that they had hidden it from me, but I completely understood why.  After losing your baby, it's kind of hard to be in the mood to celebrate someone else's.  But when she told me, I decided that I needed to go for my own sake.  I was still nervous about how I would handle it.  Things kept catching me off guard and it was hard to predict if I was going to be having a depressing day or not.  So I decided to plan on going, but I told them that if they saw me get up and leave in the middle of the shower to not take it personally.  It would just be more than I could handle and I would try to discretely make an exit.  The hostess (the to-be grandmother) was very understanding and told me that I could either show up or not at the last minute with or without Whitney, and it would be fine.  She understood that this would be hard, but they would love to have me if I was up for it.  So, with one week to go, I had to find a gift.  I had purchased some cloth diapers that I was going to turn into burp cloths for myself by sewing some pretty ribbons on them, and since I now wouldn't need them, it couldn't hurt to give them to her.  I started sewing and finished the project in two days, and then I also gave her my jumbo box of newborn diapers that I had purchased already.  Clearly we wouldn't need those either.

Right around the 4 week mark, a few days before the shower, I was anxiously awaiting the news from the genetic testing.  There were no definitive answers as to why this happened, and I couldn't wait to find out or rule out something.  When the doctor's office called, I spoke with the nurse, and she unknowingly put me in a tailspin for the day.  She called to tell me that the lab results were inconclusive.  What did that mean?  She explained that the tissue samples are sent to the lab, and they grow and culture them until there are more cells to do the testing on.  She explained that they could not get Miri's cells to grow, and therefore, they were unable to do any testing.  And a few thoughts raced through my head...the first one, looking back is somewhat humorous, but during the time was a really hard thought to deal with.  The movie, The Princess Bride, had a scene where the miracle worker was describing the difference between someone who was dead and someone who was only mostly dead.  And I thought, "I knew on that Tuesday she was dead, but she wasn't even mostly dead...she was really all dead." And it was hard knowing that not even science could bring any of her cells back in a petri dish.  And I don't know why the difference between all dead and all but a few cells in a petri dish made a difference to me, but it really did, and I mourned her all over again.  And since she had been cremated 3 1/2 weeks earlier, there was nothing else that could be done.  There were no do-overs no second chances.  I would be forever left in the dark and I had to make peace with not knowing a thing.

My cousin's shower was February 11th.  I woke up and felt anxious but ready to face my challenge.  If I could make it through, it would be one more feeling of empowerment, one more victory, one more way I could know the amount of strength and courage that I had inside.  I got dressed and got Whitney ready, and I had my mom and my grandmother come with us for support.  I didn't want to walk into the shower before anyone else I knew was there.  I still looked somewhat pregnant, and I didn't want to worry about questions from strangers.  And, I didn't want all the I'm sorry's to start without having a safety net, just in case it was going to be overwhelming.  And, if I needed to leave because I was so distressed, I didn't want to have to drive home that upset.  When we arrived, I settled in, grabbed some courage to go up to my cousin and congratulate her and ask how she was doing.  And I made it through the chit chat, hiding myself around Whitney and my mom and grandma.  I made it through the lunch.  There were a few people who expressed their condolences, but I had prepared myself for more than I had to face, and so it was okay.  And then I made it through the massive pile of gifts, and the shower was over.  I did it.  And I felt so proud of myself for being able to stay, being composed, and being able watch her enjoy her moment without dwelling on me not having mine.  It was a great feeling of accomplishment, and I was so glad I was able to tuck that experience away and get a sense that I was starting to heal.  I celebrated by indulging in a chocolate chip cookie that night.

With that shower victory behind me, I was ready to open the memory box. The next day, I went over to my mom's house, and she pulled it out.  It was a nice sized box, covered in a soft purple fabric with two ribbons that tied it shut.  When I opened it, there was a blanket, the one that she had been wrapped in.  And the primal instinct in me immediately tried to smell it, to see if there was any of her left behind, but when I brought it to my nose, it just smelled like a blanket.  I found a card signed by the hospital staff and my OB with small notes of sympathy.  They had cut a lock of her hair and placed it in the box as well.  Miri had long (for a baby), dark (almost black) hair.  They had taken hand- and footprints of her, and placed those in the box as well.  It's nice to have those artifacts.  It means that she really was here.  She was "alive".  She did exist, and this wasn't just a bad dream.  Opening the box was emotional, but I was so glad to be strong enough to do it.  Now I know that whenever I feel like I need to see something or hold something of hers, I can.  It's there, ready for me, if I need it.  And that is comforting.

At the end of February, my best friend, Joy, came in town to be with me for a while.  She brought her 4 month old daughter, Gabby, with her who I was very excited to finally meet.  Her visit, while difficult in some ways, was really good for me.  It forced me to get out of the house and back to doing fun things with Whitney.  We toured St. Louis, and did something different everyday.  We took pictures, we gave Gabby a lot of "firsts" and it was fun to be there for that.  After all, I wasn't going to have any of those "firsts" with Miri.  Joy is the kind of friend that no matter how many months or years pass, we pick up right where we left off.  We've been best friends since the age of two, and there's something special about our relationship.  For as close as we are, it took me until the third day of her visit to finally open up and talk about what really had been happening and how hard this was emotionally.  We sat in my bed for a couple hours after Whitney was asleep, and we talked, and I cried, and so did she, and we hugged.

About two weeks before my due date, while Joy was still in town, another bout of reality hit, and I started struggling with wondering what Miri looked like.  There was just something inside of me that was so curious.  Was she pretty?  Did she look like me?  Did she look like Andy?  I knew she had long, dark hair from the memory box, but that was all.  What were her other features like?  These thoughts started to be obsessive, and I just couldn't put them away.  I knew there were pictures at the hospital, but I didn't want to see them while I was there, and I still didn't want to see them.  She would have been 9 weeks premature, and she probably didn't look like a normal full-term baby.  What if I took one look, and was horrified.  Some of the pictures on google shocked me so badly a few weeks earlier that I didn't want to risk another shock.  And this time it might be worse because she was my daughter.  I didn't want that kind of image stuck in my head forever, because right now, the Miri that I was picturing was beautiful.  But I just had this huge need to know what she really looked like.  After talking with Joy, she suggested that I get the pictures.  I didn't have to look at them if I didn't want to, but if I felt like I was ready, they would be there.  And that made sense.  So I called the social worker at the hospital, and after a tearful conversation about how I was doing, she happily mailed them to me.  Two days later they came, and I was afraid to open the envelope.  Luckily, Joy was there, and she opened it for me.  The photos were in a second envelope, so even if I were the one to open it, I wouldn't have seen them right away.  Joy asked me if I wanted to see them, and I said no.  I was too nervous about what I would find.  She, being the best friend that she could be, offered to look for me and just describe them.  From what she said, Miri had big eyes like Whitney, she had a rosy complexion, not ashen as I would have expected.  There was possibly a birthmark, but the camera angle wasn't great to know for sure.  They dressed her in a nightgown.  And there was one shot of just her feet.  That one didn't scare me to see...I already saw her footprints, and everyone's feet kind of look the same anyway.  So that one I glanced at, and I cried a little.  I was glad Joy was there to give me that brief description.  And after a couple days, I had almost worked up the courage to look for myself.  I didn't though.  I decided that it would be better for me psychologically not to see them.

A few days later, I took the pictures over to my mom's house to keep them in the memory box.  She actually wanted to see them so that she could put a face with a name.  We had a conversation about how I didn't want to but how she did.  And what I realized was that without seeing her, I already knew her.  I felt her move inside me.  I knew she was a live.  And I loved her.  For my mom, the pictures were like the only evidence that she had been here.  She didn't feel her.  She didn't go through all the bodily changes.  And while she saw my belly expand, she never got to feel her kicking.  Having the photos was her link to Miri.  When she looked at them, the first thing she told me was that she could tell that she would have been a pretty baby.  She thought she had my eyes and Andy's nose.  She gave me a bit more of a description than Joy did. After that, I knew I made the right choice.  My need to know what she looked like was over, and I didn't have to be stuck with any vision that might not be 100% pleasant or beautiful.  My mom put the pictures back in the envelope. I had her put the foot picture on top, just in case anyone ever accidentally opened it and I happened to be there, I could glance away in time.  Then we put the envelope in the memory box, and that is where they have been ever since.

The rest of Joy's visit went quickly.  The day she left, I drove her to the airport, and I started to cry on the way there.  In my head, I thought that this was a bit silly.  We hadn't lived in the same city since we were 4 years old, and pretty much my whole life, we had to say goodbye.  But this time it was different.  It was pretty overwhelming.  As I drove home, I couldn't hold it together.  And if there's one thing that I learned these past couple months, it's much better to get the emotions out than to let them fester inside.  At one point, the tears were coming down so hard, I could barely see the road.  When I got home, Andy needed me to take care of Whitney, but I was in no shape to do that.  I ended up calling my mom to have her come over, because I was losing control.  I could feel it.  It's such an odd feeling to know that you are being completely irrational and over-reacting, but you can't help it or stop it or even lessen it a little.  I even thought that maybe this is what it felt like to have a mental breakdown.  I started to talk to my mom, and then it hit me why I was reacting like this.  The words just came out of my mouth, "Another baby that I love was just taken out of my life again."  It wasn't all about Joy...it was also about Gabby leaving, and it just resurfaced so many raw emotions, and I could barely deal with it.  

After they returned home, I had a bit of news that was really hard to take, involving my job.  Apparently, I have to return to work by the 8 week mark, or I'll end up losing my pay.  Originally, I had worked out a deal with my department chair in which I'd be working for the first 3 weeks of the semester, overseeing other instructors and coordinating courses, writing quizzes, exams, and a final, but not teaching any classes of my own.  It wouldn't have been fair to the students to have a professor for 3 weeks and a sub for the remaining 12 weeks of the semester.  However, once the HR department found out that I had a stillborn, and not a baby, they informed me that I was no longer entitled to maternity leave (12 weeks of paid leave), but that all I could take now was medical leave for the c-section surgery (8 weeks of paid leave).  This meant my original deal with my chair was invalidated, since my work only amounted to three weeks, not the 7 that were needed, and there is a policy at my university that if you miss more than 8 weeks due to medical leave, you cannot receive your salary for the additional time.  So, if I did not figure out how to teach for the last 8 weeks of the semester, I would be losing 1/4 of my annual salary.  My department chair was incredibly sympathetic, and at the last minute, he created a class for me to teach and pushed its approval through the proper channels quickly, and additionally asked the dean to approve of allowing me to serve as his associate chair.  (The associate chair has a course load reduction to accommodate all the extra duties they are expected to be performing).  He told me that he would still take care of most of the associate chair duties himself, although there were a few things that he would be asking me to do.  This was more than fair.  The math department almost never has classes which last 8 weeks, and since he could not get enough students to enroll in two of these courses,  he creatively found a solution so that I could still get paid.  I was so grateful for that, but really upset at the no maternity leave policy when your baby dies. Apparently, when you don't have a baby to care for, you don't have a reason to be at home.  But, I really could have used the extra time to grieve and physically heal.  Whoever wrote the policy obviously does not understand what it is like to have a stillborn.  And, to add insult to injury, I also was informed by HR, that because maternity leave is part of Family-Medical Leave, and I had taken two weeks off when Whitney was born--a mistake that HR made, informing me that I got 8 weeks from the date of delivery, not 12 weeks as needed due to a change in family status--that I had now used up all my paid leaves for the next three years.  Employees are entitled to at most 2 leaves in a 6 year period.  I took one for Whitney, although I should have had 10 more weeks off, and now I was taking my second leave for Miri, although I should have had 4 more weeks for her.  That means that if I do ever decide to try to have another baby, I won't be able to get any paid time off.  So unless the stars align, and I happen to get pregnant at a time when the baby will be born over summer vacation, I'll be losing between $10,000-$20,000 from taking the time off to recover from a third c-section.  So of 24 weeks of potential maternity leave, I will have taken only 10, and not entitled to any more until I am 37 years old...kind of late for having another child.  I brought this point up to my chair, and asked if there was any way that the university might agree to give me one additional family leave, and he agreed that the way things worked out didn't seem fair to him either.  He spoke with the dean on my behalf, who also agreed that it wasn't right.  They both wrote a letter, and upon presenting it to the HR director, she asked that it be approved by the provost before implemented.  So, the Dean, in turn, spoke with the provost, who stuck to her guns, and said that the rules are the rules, and she would not make any exceptions.  So that's it...I'm out of maternity leaves, and I should expect a loss of salary if I get pregnant again.  I know I shouldn't worry now, but it's something I'm sure I'll be thinking about in the future, if/when we decided to get pregnant again.  It's just one more frustration to deal with at an already difficult time.

With about one week left until my due date, I knew that I couldn't wait any longer to have the dreaded conversation with Andy about what we were going to do with Miri's ashes.  Andy can be really stubborn and he likes things done his way, whether it makes sense to me or not, and this was an important decision for both of us.  I really wanted her to be at our temple, and as time passed, that need grew stronger and stronger.  I couldn't imagine having her out of town.  I needed to be close to her and have the option of visiting when I needed to.  I knew that our temple was his last choice, because he would find it difficult to go to temple if we did it there.  He really wanted to spread her ashes in Kentucky, on top of his father's grave so he could be with one of his grandchildren.  He died just a few months after his first grandchild was born, and a small argument within the family meant that he never got the chance to meet a grandchild.  I completely understand his wishes and his reasoning.  If we spread her in Kentucky, that would mean that we'd almost never get to see her--we only visit his family once a year, if that.  And, Andy has never visited his father in all the years that I've known him.  So for me, following his wishes would be like abandoning her.  I couldn't live with that.  So, I sat him down after Whitney went to bed, and explained that I needed her close.  I needed the opportunity to visit at a moment's notice.  I needed her to be somewhere that I felt at ease with, for my own mental and emotional well-being.  He was somewhat frustrated that I automatically eliminated everywhere he had thought of with that statement, but I think he understood that I couldn't feel like I had abandoned her.  I told him that "once we spread her ashes, she'll be gone forever" and I could barely handle that concept, let alone spreading her somewhere so far away that she really would be "all gone".  So reluctantly he agreed to the temple.  I did ask him if he had any other ideas besides temple that would be better for him, but he didn't.  He told me that this option wasn't going to be easy for him, and I said that I knew.  I reminded him that although it might not be easy, temple is a place I visit every two weeks, and so I could see her as often as I wanted.  And, the more you go, the easier it gets.  I told him that when my grandfather died, I couldn't visit his grave without tears, but now I can.  I've gone enough, and eventually with time you get used to it and the pain isn't so new and intense.  And, with all the friends we have in the congregation, I told him that even if we broke down in the middle of services, there would be more shoulders for us to lean on than tears that we have in our eyes.  We'd be putting her with "family", in a place of love and support for us.  I couldn't imagine a better place or one that would be easier for us.  I know he didn't fully agree, but the tears in my eyes spoke volumes to him, and he said "okay".  It was just what I needed, and I love him for being able to give me that.

The first day of classes (halfway through a regular semester) started.  I wasn't really ready to be back.  All day long, people asked me how the baby was.  I hate explaining that she died.  It makes me feel so awful to say it, and then to see the looks in their eyes after hearing my news is just dreadful as well.  No one knows what to say back, besides "I'm sorry." And, it's hard to escape from the emotions of the ordeal when you are being reminded about it constantly.  But at the start of my class, I decided to tell my students what happened, really because I wanted to have March 14th to grieve and to say goodbye, and I didn't want to be bothered with student issues on that day.  So I went through the syllabus, and then explained that I will be available every day via email, with the exception of one.  "I was pregnant, and I was supposed to have the semester off due to maternity leave.  But my daughter was stillborn, and I had to come back to work.  March 14th would have been my due date.  So I hope you all understand that I would really appreciate no emails or phone calls on Wednesday, as I really don't want to think about math on that day.  I will answer your questions on Tuesday or Thursday, but please give me that one day to myself, to grieve, and to be with my family." I explained.  And you should have seen their faces.  My eyes were filled with tears as I asked for that courtesy, and some of them teared up too.  But I did it.  And then, I took a deep breath, and started in on the first day's lesson.

My story--The Hospital Stay

As it turns out, there are blessings if you look for them.  My evening nurse was fantastic.  I really wanted to eat a cracker or have some 7-up to help settle my stomach, but after a spinal, there is a no food or drink order for 24 hours.  Around midnight, she snuck a graham cracker and a 7-up can in the room, and told me that these were for my husband when he came back (with a wink).  Throughout the night, I ate 1/2 of a cracker and had 4 small sips of soda.  Just enough to settle my stomach, but not enough to cause any trouble from the medication.  She was so empathetic, and she saw that I wasn't going to be sleeping at all that night.  In between caring for her other patients, she came in my room and sat with me and talked.  We talked about what had just happened, but not too much, because she seemed to know when I was done thinking about it and needed to be distracted.  She told me about her life, how she was a traveling nurse, and really lived on the other side of the state.  She told me about her ex husband and her kids, and we talked about anything and everything.  The conversation just flowed, and before I knew it, the sun started to rise and I had made it through what was probably the most difficult night of my life.  Her shift was over, and my daytime nurse came in to introduce herself to me, and she asked if I was okay.  I told her that I was just looking at the clock and counting down until my mom came...2 more hours until the plane lands.  Then 30 minutes more to get her luggage and drive here.  I couldn't wait.  

Around 7:30 in the morning, a lab technician came in, needing to draw more blood.  I was not happy.  I still had an IV, but she had to reprick me, and I already was quite bruised from the massive blood-letting the previous afternoon.  Why in the world did they need more?  Weren't the 14 vials from yesterday enough?  She said no, that they needed a CBC post-surgery, but this would be the last prick.  Then she tried to make small talk to cheer me up, because she could see I was crabby.  "Is this your first pregnancy?" she asked.  "No."  "How many kids do you have?"  And this is where I lost it..."One" I said, with tears welled up in my eyes, and then I had to take a few deep breaths to keep from crying.  At this point, I was no longer numb from the spinal, and my stomach muscles were too sore to cry.  I stuffed the emotions in.  And then the small talk stopped.  She must have missed the sign on the door when she walked into the room, but I'm sure she figured out why I was not a pleasant patient.  She finished drawing my blood and left.

The countdown continues...1 more hour to go!  Then it was any minute now...And, a little later than planned, but still as fast as she could get there, my mom finally arrived, sleep deprived, but she was there with the great big hug that I needed.  And I needed it more than I realized.  Once she was there, I felt safe and I didn't have to be strong or in control for a few minutes.  I could let someone else hold it together for me.  I could gently cry on her shoulder.  And without saying a word, she knew what I was feeling, what I needed, and she knew just how to comfort me.  It's something only a mother can do, and it was such a relief.

We talked about what had happened during the last 24 hours, and I filled her in on all the details.  Then we talked about Whitney.  I hadn't yet told her that her baby sister had died.  Yesterday when we said goodbye, I was pre-op.  My mom had suggested that we tell her the truth, and we don't soften the words by explaining that we lost her (because then losing toys or getting separated in a store would be traumatic) or that she's sleeping (because then bedtime would be scary).  And she also suggested we explain as much as she questioned, but not more.  I let my mom read the book that the nurses gave me, and I was debating on reading it to Whitney.  And then I had to do a lot of thinking.  The book explained that the baby was an angel.  Did I really believe that?  No.  I don't think she's an angel, in the typical sense.  I don't picture her with wings or a halo.  Although I loved the way the book was written, I decided not to read it unless Whitney had a lot of questions that I didn't know how to answer.  She had no construct for an angel, and explaining it wasn't going to be easy, especially since I don't believe in them in the traditional sense.

Later that morning, my rabbi stopped by to express his condolences and offer some advice.  I told him about all the decisions that had to be made and how I was still struggling with some, and he gave me the best advice.  In a crisis, he said, you have to make the decisions that feel right in the present.  Don't worry about how you might feel a month from now or a year from now.  Make the decision you have to make that will help you get through today.  And if you come to regret that decision in a month or in a year, then you can deal with the regret later.  There will be counselors or therapists that can help with that.  But at the very least, you'll know that you made the decision that was best for you at the time.

He did a lot of listening.  I told him how I could accept what happened, and how happy I was to have my mom back in town.  He told me that when he got Andy's text, he was in a meeting with all the other rabbis and the board of directors.  He had everyone step outside except for the other rabbis and he informed them what had happened to us.  He said that they all wanted to express their condolences and come by over the next few days.  He also talked to me about how Judaism views fetal deaths and death in general.  I was trying to figure out what to do with Miri's remains, and no option was a good option.  He told me that the body is merely a shell in which the soul resides, and upon death, the soul departs, so anything that we did with the body would be fine.  There's no standard protocol for how you dispose of a fetal body, as the baby was never considered alive, and all the religious rituals only pertain to those who took a breath.  He offered to say a few words if we wanted that, when we decided what to do.  He also gave me almost the same advice as what my mom had about telling Whitney.  It actually did help having him come.  I wasn't sure he'd be able to say anything I didn't know already, but that one piece of advice he gave me was priceless.  It took away some of the worries I had, because every decision I had to make was so quick and so final, and I didn't want to make the wrong ones.

Not long after my rabbi left, Whitney and Andy arrived at the hospital with McDonald's for them and my mom.  After they ate (I was still on my 24 hours post-op no food order), I had Whitney come in my hospital bed and lay down next to me.  We explained that mommy had a big boo-boo and she needed to be very gentle for a while.  And then I told her... "Whitney, I need to tell you something very important.  Your baby sister died."  "She died?"  "Yes, she died."  And then Whitney surprised us all with her question..."Are you going to try again?"  I clarified, "Try to have a baby?"  And that really was what she meant.  Wow.  She really got it.  I told her that we couldn't try for a while because of mommy's big boo-boo, but that maybe later when it was all better we would.  I explained that her baby sister wasn't in my tummy anymore.  The doctor " cut cut cut, then lifted up my skin" to get her out.  And there was a big boo-boo where he cut cut cut, and she would need to be very careful around mommy.  Mommy couldn't pick things up, or walk very far.  But everyday, I would get a little better until one day, the boo-boo would be all better.  She then reassured me that the baby in her tummy "is doing just fine."  I told her that I was glad to hear it.  Then she reiterated a few times that her baby sister died, and we told her that she did.  And she didn't have any more immediate questions.  I gave her a big hug, and we cuddled in bed and played for a while.  And I thought, how wonderful it was to be 2, and have the ability to immediately switch gears from a serious conversation to Mickey Mouse.

Now you might think that telling a 2 year-old that the doctor cut me open and lifted my skin up is a bit graphic.  But about two months earlier, we were laying in bed, watching tv, settling down, and she would hug my belly, feeling the baby kick.  She would talk to the baby and ask her about her day, then tell the baby about hers.  She would give the baby a kiss, and whisper "I love you, baby."  And during this nightly routine, one day, she stopped in the middle and asked me, " How is the baby going to get out?" I thought, oh boy...what do I tell her?  I'm having a c-section, but maybe that's scary.  Should I tell her that it comes out through my vagina, like it does for most people?  Then the teacher in me took over..."Well, how do you think it comes out?"  (When you don't know how to answer a question, let the students try to answer it themselves.)  And to my surprise, she had been lifting my shirt up to see my belly, and she said, "Do you lift your skin up?" And I said, "Yes.  That's what is going to happen!"  Whew...that is in essence what happens in a c-section.  Then the very next night, she asked if she could lift my skin up to see the baby.  And I explained that it was attached and that we can't lift it up.  Then she asked if we "cut cut cut", could we lift it up?  I said that a doctor needed to cut cut cut, but then yes.  But the doctor won't cut cut cut until the baby is bigger and ready.  So, she figured out what a c-section was all by herself, and I just went along with it, because it was the easiest explanation I could think of.

The hospital staff greeted me just before Whitney arrived with a folder filled of information.  It had a list of various funeral homes, a pamphlet about SHARE, a national organization which would provide support and meetings for parents who had experienced stillbirths, and other information which to this day, I still haven't looked through.  I spent the next 4 days in the hospital.  During that time, I parsed out so many of the difficult tasks that I was then faced with.   The first task that I had to do was to fill out her death certificate.  The nurse tried to do most of it for me, and filled in "Baby Girl Shrensker" as her name.  My husband and I talked it over, and we decided that she should keep the name we had agreed on just days earlier, Miriam Grace.  We obviously weren't going to give that name to any other child we potentially would have, so why not bestow upon her the honor of a name?  So I got a new blank form and for the first time, I wrote her name.  With Whitney, I had doodled her name along with many of the others in consideration over and over to make sure I liked it, but not with Miri.  Literally the first time I saw her name in print was on the death record.  Actually writing her name on the certificate somehow made the situation very real.  That was hard.

Later that day, in the early afternoon, I was greeted by my doctor and I begged him to take out my catheter and IV and let me eat.  Apparently, the general rule is that after a spinal, you need to be foodless and off your feet for 24 hours, and therefore, they have to keep your catheter in.  While it didn't hurt, I was just ready to no longer feel "bionic".  He agreed, and told me that I could eat again no earlier than 2:00 in the afternoon, but he'd be okay with letting me return to normal a little earlier than expected.  My nurse came in, had me take a deep breath, and as I exhaled, she pulled out my catheter.  My IV came out a few minutes later, and I felt relieved.  I ordered lunch, but when the food got there, I didn't have much of an appetite.  I was starting to feel very gassy from the surgery and the depression of losing my baby didn't help me want to eat either.

That afternoon, Andy and I went back and forth finishing the sentence "It would be worse if...".  It would be worse if this had happened in two months.  It would be worse if she was born and then died of SIDS.  It would be worse if I had gotten to the hospital on time, but oxygen depletion caused her to have permanent brain damage.  It would be worse if she was born with some sort of genetic defect.  It would be worse if I had done something (even by accident) that directly contributed to her death.  And somehow, this depressing game made us feel a little better, because although the whole situation was awful, we knew we didn't have it as bad as some people.

At one point, I looked over and saw tears in his eyes.  He said, "This isn't fair.  This is the type of thing that happens to other people.  We didn't deserve this."  And I agreed that it wasn't fair.  But I did tell him that this apparently is the sort of thing that happens to us.  And as for his last point, I'll never forget what I said..."No one deserves this.  This is the sort of tragedy you wouldn't wish on your worst enemy.  There's nothing on Earth anyone could do to make them deserve to go through this."

We started talking about what to do with her body.  Andy wanted to just let the hospital take care of it, but I wasn't so sure.  It seemed like an unloving act, just "throwing her away", not knowing where she was or what had become of her.  After reading through the information in the folder, my other options were burial or cremation.  If we chose cremation, I had thought of two places I'd be okay with.  My first choice was somewhere on the grounds of our temple.  I wanted her to be at a place like home, but not at our house, and not at my mom's, because if we ever moved, leaving her behind would be a huge problem.  And, in the past year, I've really made a second family at temple.  I go twice a month, and there would be more shoulders available for me to cry on than tears in my eyes, if I found it difficult.  And, because I go so frequently, I knew the difficulty of visiting would soon wane. Our temple would be a safe place and very supportive to us.  The second place I had thought of was in Hawaii.  Miri was going to be named after my uncle Jerry who lived in Hawaii and had passed away 3 years earlier.  He was cremated and his ashes were spread out to sea in a traditional Hawaiian funeral.  I thought perhaps we could spread her in the same part of the ocean, symbolically so Jerry could look after her.  And, Hawaii was also where Andy and I honeymooned.  I thought of other places too, but eliminated them, as these two would make me the happiest.  Andy added a third suggestion, on his dad's grave in Kentucky.  I was not at all fond of this idea, although I completely understand why he wanted this.  For me, having never met his father, it would be like spreading her over a stranger in a city far away that I wasn't connected to.  I wouldn't be able to visit if I wanted to, and since he never once has been to his father's grave, I didn't think he'd ever go.  To me this would be like abandoning her, but to him, it would be putting her with her grandfather in a place near to his heart.  We both ranked the options.  Mine went Temple, Hawaii, Kentucky.  His was exactly the opposite order.  We agreed not to make a decision until we decided that cremation was the option we would go with.  In my head, I was pretty sure we would both compromise on Hawaii if we chose cremation.

After everyone left that night, my friend Elizabeth came up to keep me company for a couple hours.  It felt good to not be alone.  When she left, my evening nurse came back to check in on me.  I wanted her to stay and talk, although I also wanted to try to sleep a little.  I got about one or two hours in, and by 3:00, I was done trying to sleep.  I spent a little more time talking to my nurse about her life, waiting for the sun to rise.

The next day, I went online to cancel all of my registries, only to find that you can't actually cancel them yourself.  You can "complete" them, but you cannot completely remove them without contacting the customer service people.  I wrote about 4 emails asking that my registry be removed from the various websites due to the loss of my daughter.  Most of the companies found this email to be sufficient, but some requested a phone call to verify that I was who I said before deleting my information from their system.  Some of the companies even wrote me a condolence email in response.  Writing the emails wasn't fun, and I cried each time I explained that I had a stillborn, but making the phone call was even worse.  I spent a few hours mentally preparing before I was able to pick up the phone and ask that my registry be deleted rather than completed.  When you think about all the time and hours that you spend searching for just the right color for the nursery, just the right furniture, just the right accessories, and it was all for nothing...It had to be deleted.  It was one more episode of letting go of my dreams and hopes for the future.  And later, after I got home from the hospital, I had to make phone calls about returning items that had already been purchased for me.  Every company was very easy to work with, except one...

My grandmother had ordered our baby furniture in November, and it was supposed to come in around mid-February.  She had used this company 6 times previously, purchasing nursery furniture for 5 of her grandchildren and for Whitney, her great-grandchild.   I asked her to talk to the company about canceling the order and refunding her money, since she had the credit card.  They were not very sympathetic.  They said that the furniture had already come in (even though none of us received a phone call alerting us to this fact) and therefore, they could not cancel it.  As a nicety, they offered to refund 75% of the purchase price, charging her a 25% restocking fee, but because my name was on the order, I had to cancel it.  She explained to them that I was in the hospital, recovering from a c-section, and please do not call.  Needless to say, I got a phone call from the store manager that afternoon, explaining that I would be losing 25% of the purchase price by not picking up the furniture, and she wanted to make sure that I didn't want to keep the furniture.  Why would I want baby furniture for a dead baby?  Every time I would see the furniture would be a reminder of what happened.  And who knew if I'd ever have another baby after going through this.  And, even if I did, wouldn't it be odd having that child in someone else's room?  Of course I didn't want the furniture! It was absolutely uncalled for to have to deal with this on top of the mental anguish I was already going through.  The fact that they called me in the hospital infuriated my grandmother even more than their not-returnable policy, and she ended up getting her lawyer involved.  After a month of back and forth, the company acquiesced and refunded her money.

One of the most agonizing decisions was what to do with her remains.  The hospital wanted a decision within 36 hours of delivery, but I kept begging for more time, which they thankfully gave me.  We could either leave her at the hospital and they would dispose of her, or we could make private arrangements.  After some questioning of the nursing staff and a little research on their part, leaving her there meant cremation, but the remains would be unrecoverable.  In other words, she would get swept away with the next person in the incinerator.  I couldn't do that to my daughter.  And yes, in Judaism, the body is merely a shell, housing the soul which had already departed, but I just couldn't do it that way.  So, the nursing staff was very kind and gave me a compiled list of funeral homes and phone numbers so I could call to make other arrangements.  I really had two choices--cremation or burial in a cemetery.  Neither option seemed right.  I wouldn't want to be cremated myself.  How could I have my daughter incinerated?  And technically she wasn't alive, so I didn't need to go through a whole funeral that a cemetery would provide.  And, if I did that, would I feel guilty for not visiting often enough?  Would we want to buy our own plots and have her buried with us one day?  That was more than I wanted to start thinking about.  I made some phone calls to funeral homes to learn more about each option.  Worse than making the decision was the question-asking they did.  The first funeral home really caught me off guard.  What is your name?  What is your address?  And so on.  Giving them all my information was fine.  Then, "What was your daughter's name?"  My heart sank.  Tears flooded my eyes.  I had only said her name out loud a couple of times before she died, and getting it out now was too much.  I tried to hold back the sobbing enough to get the words out, and I muttered with all the strength I had, "Miriam Grace."  The man on the other end, said, "Katherine?"  I replied, "No.  Miriam." with more tears.  And he still couldn't understand and said some other name which I can't recall anymore.  At that point, I was utterly overwhelmed, got out the words, "hold on" and quickly handed the phone off to my mother who had to finish the conversation the for me.  I was less than 48 hours out of surgery, and not on any real pain-killers (I had toughed it out with Whitney, taking only Advil-like medication and figured I'd do it the same again) and the act of crying was excruciating, as my stomach muscles were sore beyond belief.  Every time I welled-up, I had to do everything in my power to not let it out.  By the third try, I just couldn't say her name anymore.  But I learned, and the next day when I called another funeral home and they asked the same question, I replied, "Can I tell you later?" and I got through all the other questions and information.  Then at the end of the conversation, I asked if she wanted the name, and I took a deep breath, clearly said "Miriam Grace, goodbye." and promptly hung up, with tears in my eyes again, but proud that I handled it myself.  The third phone call went just like the second.  The funeral home directors were nice, but I really didn't need any sort of a service for Miri...I just needed help taking care of her body, and it seemed that they were more interested in being able to help with some sort of service.  Most of them graciously offered to help me for free, as this was such a tragic turn of events, but the funeral homes required to meet me in person before anything could be done.  One of them even offered to make phone calls on my behalf to local cemeteries, until they found one that would donate a plot.  Spending 5 days in the hospital and then not being able to drive for 2 weeks really hindered my ability to meet with the directors as promptly as they asked.  So after those tough phone calls, funeral homes weren't for me either.  After talking to some nurses, I found out who the hospital used to cremate the unclaimed bodies, and I called the company directly.  They offered to cremate Miri for free and save her remains for me to pick up when I could, something the hospital couldn't do.  And, they allowed me to fill out all the consent forms online from my hospital bed without meeting anyone.  So, while cremation wasn't a pleasant thought, it was something I could live with, and we'd be able to handle our goodbye privately, discreetly, and on our own terms, at a time when it felt right.  This was one of those decisions that my rabbi had talked about...It was the best choice in the present, but I didn't know how I would feel about it in the future.  I waited until the very last minute to fill out the consent, because I knew this was a decision I couldn't undo.  On Thursday afternoon, I filled out the paperwork, and they picked up her body at 10:00 on Friday morning and then she was gone.  And I felt so empty and torn apart.  It was strange, because I knew she was dead.  I never saw her, but we were still in the same building.  But once I realized she left, I felt so lonely.  At that moment, not only did I no longer have her alive, I didn't have her dead either.  Somebody else had her, and it was a moment of letting go that I hadn't expected to take so hard.

Thursday morning, I decided to alert a few people about what had happened.  I first emailed my department chair and one other faculty member, letting them know that I would be unavailable for a few weeks.  There was a meeting planned for Friday that I would obviously miss, and the start of the semester was that upcoming Tuesday, and I definitely wasn't going to show up.  I then made a phone call to my HR director, because I needed my family-medical leave to start earlier than I thought, and I wanted all the paperwork to go through.  When I called, she was on the phone, and I spoke to her secretary.  She asked what the call was about, and I told her I'd rather not say.  (It was hard getting the words out, and I had learned a few things from the funeral director calls the previous day.)  She said that she'd leave a message for her to call me back, and it would probably be in the next 10 minutes.  45 minutes later, no return call.  I called her again, only to get the secretary, who informed me that she was in a meeting now and that she did tell her to call me.  She asked what the urgency was, and reluctantly I told her that I was in the hospital, lost my baby, and I needed my leave to start now.  She must have heard how hard it was to tell her the story, and she promised me that the HR director would call me immediately upon returning from the meeting.  About 5 minutes later, I got the phone call.  And, her secretary had alerted her about my situation, so I didn't have to explain too much.  She told me that I needed my doctor to fax a note indicating that the c-section happened earlier and that would be fine.  I got the fax number from her, and left it by my bed, waiting for the doctor the next morning. Then I decided that I needed to alert the family that I was supposed to be tutoring on Sunday, so they weren't left in the dark with a no-show.  But before I told them, I got a hold of one of my friends who also happened to be a math teacher, and asked her if she would tutor the family for me for a few weeks.  When I explained why, she was very willing to help in anyway that she could.  So I emailed the mom and briefly explained that I lost the baby, was in the hospital, and couldn't drive for a few weeks, but I found a tutor for them in the interim and gave them her name and phone number.  I also emailed my online job, explaining what had happened, and letting them know that I needed some time to not have any job responsibilities.  Of everyone, they were the most compassionate. They told me to take all the time I needed, and whenever I felt ready to come back would be fine with them.

I was in a lot more pain this time than I had remembered with Whitney.  I couldn't really move my right leg without using my hands, and every time I sneezed or coughed, it was excruciating.  My mom had suggested that I try some percocet, because why deal with more physical pain than necessary, since I was having so much emotional pain.  Reluctantly, I agreed, but not until after dinner.  Sometimes pain killers make me feel queasy, and I wanted to have food in my stomach to counter that.  Once my evening nurse came on duty, I asked her for a percocet, but told her that I couldn't swallow pills.  So, she said she could crush it in applesauce.  My mom had done that for me when I was young.  I hate applesauce for that reason...it reminds me of the bitter taste of crushed pills.  Yuck.  So then she suggested maybe jello.  I'm not a big fan of that either.  But her third suggestion was the winner.  Ice cream.  She made me an ice cream sundae with percocet sprinkles.  You get through the bitter sprinkles on top, and the you have the rest of the ice cream as a "congratulations...you took your medicine" treat.  A delicious feel-good treat.  And for the next few days, around the clock, I asked all my nurses for percocet sundaes.

Thursday night, my parents let Whitney sleep over at their house to give Andy a night to decompress and be alone.  He really wanted to have a drink and not be responsible for Whitney for an evening, and I was glad that my parents were able to give him that.  But for me, that meant that everyone left early.  I called Elizabeth to come keep me company one more time, and she graciously did.  I also had a visit from one of my coworkers.

Thursday evening around 8:00, once I was assured that all my close friends and family members had been reached (except Allison, as she was on vacation), I decided to post our news on Facebook and start getting the "I'm sorry's" over with.  I felt like all at once would be better than a slow trickle as the news spread, and Facebook was the fastest way to reach nearly everybody.  The post read, "Sad few days for us...We lost the baby on Tuesday night.  There were just 9 weeks left in my pregnancy, and she stopped moving.  When we got to the hospital, she was already gone.  It was just one of those rare things...nothing happened specifically to cause it and there was nothing we could have done to prevent it.  We're still trying to process everything since it happened so fast and unexpectedly.  I know you'll be thinking of us.  Flowers are not necessary and I am not talking on the phone to very many people right now.  If you call and I don't answer, it's nothing personal.  Please understand that I just can't talk to everyone and relive it over and over.  I'm still in the hospital for 2 more days trying to recover from the c-section and it just physically hurts too much each time I feel like crying.  But I just wanted to let those of you know who had been sharing in our joy these past 7 months."  I received pings throughout the night and a few phone calls as my family and friends heard the news.  But, it was all the strength I had that day to write the post, and I actually turned my phone on vibrate and set it aside on top of a towel, so I didn't have to hear the pings or vibrations and wonder what everyone was saying to me.  During the middle of the night (around 3:30-4:00 in the morning), I finally gathered the courage to read what everyone had written.  It was sad, because again, it was one more step in making the situation real, but it was also comforting, knowing how many people were truly sorry.  I even had a few personal messages from friends who had experienced miscarriages that I didn't know about because it was early in the pregnancy and no one knew that they were even pregnant.  And they reached out to me, because they too lost a child.  I was very appreciative of this, but their situations were not quite like mine.  A miscarriage is different from a still birth.  One of my good friends that I had grown up with and had just recently reunited with a year earlier shared her stillbirth experience with me in an email.  I was surprised and relieved to know that she understood, and I wrote her back right away.  There were a few phone calls throughout the evening, and I slowly returned them, one at a time, when I had the mental and emotional strength to do so.  The first one was to a friend, Lindsey, who I watched go through this 4 months earlier.  The day I announced my pregnancy was the day I found out about her loss.  I knew she would be the ace up my sleeve.  She would be the one I could talk to and lean on when I needed someone, because she got what it felt like.  The second call I returned was to Allison, who called me in tears upon reading my post.  She was the only one I didn't tell ahead of time that I thought I should have.  But, she was in Disneyland, the happiest place on Earth, with her family, and I couldn't ruin their vacation with my news.  I was hoping she wasn't checking Facebook while away, but she was.  And she was one of my biggest blessings as the days and weeks moved on.  The other phone calls got returned over the next two days, but when people didn't answer, I left a message and didn't try back.  It took a lot of mental energy for those calls, and I wasn't really feeling chatty.

Friday morning was hard for two reasons.  First, I woke up and read through the remainder of the I'm sorry Facebook postings that had accumulated overnight.  And secondly, I was watching the clock approach 10.  I didn't know exactly when she left, but by 11:00, I was pretty sure she was gone.  I'd never have the chance to see her.  I'd never have the chance to hold her or hug her or kiss her forehead.  And thinking about giving her to people who would burn her beyond all recognition was (and still is) just awful.  But it was really the only choice I could live with.  

I decided to venture out of my room on my own and stroll down the hall before everyone arrived.  The doctors had recommended that I get up and walk around, and I made a lap or two on Thursday with Andy.  I saw the sign they put on my door...a leaf above a pond with a drip of water falling off it.  And it saddened me to see it instead of the happier "It's A Girl/Boy" signs that everyone else had.  But, I was happy that they had something.  It was a way to protect me, and I was appreciative of that.  I hadn't really felt like doing much of anything before that first walk, and I didn't really want to, but was prodded by my family to get up, so I did.  By Friday, though, the hard choices were over, and I knew that I had to start helping myself heal.  So I took a little slow stroll and I was proud of myself for mustering up the energy to walk the floor.  But of course, I turned the first corner, and what did I hear?  A very happy new mom telling her visitors, "It's a girl!"--the words I wanted to be shouting.  Again, my eyes welled up, but I stuffed the emotions in and finished my lap around the floor. I made a second pass and then headed back to bed.  That was plenty to deal with and I was ready to go back and hide out in my room again.

When Whitney arrived, I told her that today I was healthy enough to take a walk with her,  but that I would need her help.  She was so happy that she could see my progress and that she could actually do something to help me.  She couldn't wait to take me out of the room.  The two of us ventured out together and made one lap around the floor.  She actually made a great walking buddy.  She proudly held my hand, and her little legs moved at the perfect slow pace for me.  It was so reassuring to her, and I was so happy to see her delight in the fact that I was healing.

Friday evening, Andy took Whitney home to get her dinner and my mom stayed with me for a little longer.  She told me about her evening with Whitney.  They slept together in my mom's bed, and Whitney apparently understood what was going on much more than we had expected.  She was laying in bed in the dark, and in a faint voice, she said, "My mommy is very sick..." My mom reassured her that I wasn't sick, but I just had a big boo-boo.  She said, "My baby sister died."  My mom told her that that was right.  Then she was worried.  "Am I going to die?" she wondered.  My mom told her no.  But she told me that her heart broke hearing all of Whitney's fears that she had been keeping inside all this time.  She was apparently also worried that I would die because I was so sick.  My mom tried to comfort her and assuage her fears, and they spent a lot of that night snuggling together.  I am so glad that Whitney had her to talk to.  She must have been so scared throughout everything.  We made a decision that day to come up with something new that I could do to show Whitney how much better I was getting and how my boo-boo was healing every day.  It worked out well that we took a walk together that day.

On Saturday, being released was also strangely difficult.  At the hospital, I felt safe and protected from the surprises of the world.  Even though I was on the maternity floor, and even though I could still hear the "It's a girl!" celebrations in the hallway, I was in a place where I knew I would be met with compassion at every turn and I didn't have to explain my situation.  I packed my things, and I had to decide what to do with the memory box that the nursing staff had made for me.  I asked my mom to take it and put it in the trunk of her car, because I wasn't ready to see it yet.  The nurses actually didn't even bring it in my room.  They handed it to her outside my closed door, so I didn't have to deal with it.  She made one other trip with my husband and took my other effects and the flowers to her car.  Then about 20 minutes later, my OB came for a last visit.  He told me that he had cancelled all my appointments at his office, so I didn't need to worry about that.  He looked at my right hip, where all the pain had been concentrated, and told me that he thought it was from the knots in the sutures and that it would slowly get better over the next month.  And he again expressed his condolences and sent me home.  When the discharge paperwork was completed, they brought a wheelchair to my room to wheel me out.  I got in, and started the journey towards the doors, when all of a sudden, it hit me.  I was going home very empty-handed.  And there was another reality-check I hadn't prepared for.  It was a long ride down the elevator, but an excruciatingly long wait for my mom to circle her car around to the door.  I don't know if there are words to describe the emptiness of not taking my baby home with me.  The car ride was hard too.  I told her as she was driving that this was hard for me and I cried, and she grabbed my hand, and gently said, "I know.  I know," as she squeezed it.  She offered to drive around the block a few times before I got home to help me collect myself before walking inside and seeing Whitney.  But I told her no.  And I took a few deep breaths and stuffed the tears in again.