First Post

I wanted to create a blog for something else. Maybe some of you saw it. But that's just not where I am right now. That's where I want to be. But I didn't continue posting on it because there was just nothing to say - I'm not progressing in any area at all right now, but that's okay.

It has been 5 months today since I gave birth to my beautiful daughter. Five months. To be honest, it's been such a daze. Good days, really bad days, and foggy days I don't remember. Lots of fog. Going through the motions and waiting for bedtime, waiting for unconsciousness, to pass the time.

After we lost Brie, my mom warned me that I may have nightmares. I never did. In the first weeks I thought, maybe I'm too exhausted. They'll come later. But they never came, even as we tried to get back to normal. And I got pregnant again with this precious child who I carry within me, and I thought, here it comes. Pregnancy dreams are crazy enough, add some post traumatic stress and you have a perfect storm. But I was again blessed with peaceful, restful sleep. A break from the thoughts and feelings that haunt me all day, every day.

Until last night. I remember that it was a vivid dream at the time, but I only recall snippets from it now. It seems that I had two separate dreams. Or maybe just one. I'm not really sure. I remember being so worried about some babies who were in the NICU.. maybe four. Quite a few. I'm not sure if they were all mine, or if any of them were mine. They were tiny babies though. Too tiny to be real. Too tiny to live without wires and tubes. I was so worried. So fearful. And that's all I remember from that dream. Or from that part of the dream - I'm not sure which it was. The other part, was another child. My child. My child who I had left in someone else's care - again I'm not sure why. Maybe in the NICU too. I don't know. But that's the way it was. In my dream. I'm not sure if my child was a boy or girl, or what his or her name was. But I got a phone call, and was told my baby had a deadly problem, and needed surgery. Only there wasn't anyone, wherever I had left the child, who could perform the needed surgery. I had to find someone. I had to find someone quickly or my child would die. And so I called everyone I could think of, everyone I knew, and no one could help me. Some were too busy, some didn't know how to do what I needed. But no one could help. And then there were ants - ants all over my house. And people were spraying them, and I couldn't think why people would be worried about a few - or even legions of - ants, when my baby was dying.

I'm not sure what happened in the dream. Either I didn't dream any more about it or I don't remember it. I'm not sure whether I was able to save my baby - or any of the babies. But I would guess not. Because how could I? I can't even control or trust my own body enough to be sure that it will protect this new baby until he or she is strong enough to live.

I'm not sure why I'm having these dreams now, though. I've been really frustrated lately, so maybe that's it. I just don't understand how people can, in all seriousness, and of course with the best of intentions, tell me that the answer to my worries it to be positive. And then expect me to understand their worries about their living children, and somehow sympathize. I understand that these wonderful people have never buried their child before. Thank goodness, they've never had to hold their child while her heart beats for the last time. To watch her life slip away. To dress her for the last time, looking and feeling and smelling nothing like the baby you remember, the baby you gave birth to. And put the lid on her casket and somehow, somehow find the strength to leave her alone at the cemetery to be buried. To leave her in her grave, and return to life. But do they not think, that while my daughter was struggling for her life in the NICU that I was not being positive? Do they not think that I sent her all the positive energy and love in the world? Do they think that if I had had more to give, that it would have made a difference? Because I don't think it would have. I am learning a lot from my daughter's death, still, and one thing is this. The Lord is great. He gives and he takes away. And all the positive or negative energy or feelings or whatever in the world, in the universe, is not going to change that. I don't know why this happened. But I know I loved my baby. I wanted her. And I did everything I knew how to do for her while she was on this earth. But she was too pure, too lovely, to live here with us. Much too lovely. Much too perfect. Much too pure. And anyone who felt her presence can attest to that. But some parents, some parents don't want their babies. Some mothers do everything they can to cause a miscarriage, because they didn't mean to get pregnant. Or don't want to be pregnant. Or for some other reason that none of us can judge her for. But they send all the negative energy in the world to their baby, thinking please die, please die. But the baby doesn't die. Sometimes, the baby miraculously shows no ill effects from the substances their mothers ingested trying to kill them. Why? Why does that baby live and mine didn't? Because. That's the only answer. Because it was God's will.

But I'm not without hope. It sounds like I am, but really I'm not. If I were, how could I be pregnant again? How could I roll the dice this way, gambling my heart and soul for this little one? I couldn't. I have hope that this time, things will be different. That this time I'll bring a baby home, not bury one in the ground. That I'll lose sleep taking care of my baby, not crying for her.