Originally written on my facebook page for Fruit Of The Womb TTTS Angels. On Friday, May 31st 2013. When I wrote this facebook post/note I still hadn't given our story a final finishing draft, even though it had been published on the All That Love Can Do blog. I was still so emotionally wrapped up in what I had written that I didn't see what I should have fixed before submitting it. I still take ownership because I wrote it. Words from the heart that were therapeutic and helped me heal a little more.
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
I imagine that those that don't know me as well or even some of the few that do, believe that I'm not doing ok,.. That my page on fb, talking about our girls and wanting to start a website/blog in their memory and do things for others who have experienced baby loss, means that I'm not moving forward and that I'm not ok..
This is actually untrue as well as being true. I am forced to move forward even if I don't want to. With each passing day the past becomes even more the past, and the moment I am in is how I try to live as nothing I can do will make a difference or change the past.
So, no I may not be "ok" and my days may not always be wonderful. I don't ever pretend that they are because I do not live a false life, I do not use false speech, and I do not do things that are untrue to what I believe in. I may not be ok all the time, I may have bad days, I may have better days, but all of those days does not mean I "need help" or "am not ok". I'm just being me. We all have our different days, if we were happy all the time or pretended to be happy all the time, could we really face ourselves in the mirror? I think not. It is natural for our emotions to take us in different directions, that is what makes us human.
If I ever make people uncomfortable I sincerely apologize, that has never been my intent. I have my own way of mourning the loss of our twin girls who were a very BIG part of our lives. I have my own way of grieving and healing after the loss of our twin girls, who as far as we are concerned were not something so simply listed as "miscarriage" but were little human beings. Just because they weren't at the age where they are specified differently doesn't mean I don't feel like our twins were any less of the people that they were.
I despise the word "miscarriage". When I felt like I lost a pregnancy years ago that is something I would use the word miscarriage for because it was early on enough that it was too early to tell but late enough in my cycle I knew I was pregnant, even if for a short time. Something within the first four to eight weeks feels like you can call it a miscarriage, because that is a loss that happens more often than you realize. Late cycle that month? Faint positive line on that home pregnancy test? Then suddenly the new cycle begins and is unlike the "normal" cycles. There is a chance that you may have had what doctors like to describe as a chemical pregnancy, which just is a nice way of stating "early miscarriage".
So when is an appropriate time to state the passing of your child as "miscarriage"? When is an appropriate time to state a death as a death, or should it be that they passed on, or aren't viable anymore? They all mean the same thing more or less, it just depends on where you are emotionally to what you feel is best to describe what happened when you experience loss.
I despise the word "miscarriage". When I felt like I lost a pregnancy years ago that is something I would use the word miscarriage for because it was early on enough that it was too early to tell but late enough in my cycle I knew I was pregnant, even if for a short time. Something within the first four to eight weeks feels like you can call it a miscarriage, because that is a loss that happens more often than you realize. Late cycle that month? Faint positive line on that home pregnancy test? Then suddenly the new cycle begins and is unlike the "normal" cycles. There is a chance that you may have had what doctors like to describe as a chemical pregnancy, which just is a nice way of stating "early miscarriage".
So when is an appropriate time to state the passing of your child as "miscarriage"? When is an appropriate time to state a death as a death, or should it be that they passed on, or aren't viable anymore? They all mean the same thing more or less, it just depends on where you are emotionally to what you feel is best to describe what happened when you experience loss.
I feel that doctors are often the worst as stating the technical facts that describe what's happening, what you don't want to hear like, "threatened miscarriage", two words we learned while still early along when bleeding suddenly occurred. Or to hear, "your baby is dead" plainly stated and then the doctor just walks out of the room. Just a dagger to the heart.
When I'm upset I may say that our girls died, that's the upset momma in me screaming from the inside when I say that. However when I'm less upset and able to think more clearly I say that our girls passed away. I like to think of their passing as more a peaceful thing than something sudden and horrible. Our girls were safe inside their momma's womb and then they passed away..
I have two dates in my mind when I think about our twin girls. There is their passing date and their angelversary date, which I also used to call "the day our girls were born into the world". The word "angelversary" is much shorter an word of the second date, don't you think?
At 18 weeks 3&4 days, about a week and a half short of twenty weeks and having that not so little word "miscarriage" would have been something else. Our daughters would have received a birth certificate / death certificate and would have been recognized as being people. It's all so very wrong as far as I'm concerned.
I end this moment of thoughts and venting with a few more things that are on my mind. I recently read about someone else's story, about their loss and their own personal thoughts about what have become common language in the baby loss community. Their frustration about the terminology around how we describe our babies who have passed and our hopes for new babies. While reading through their own personal views, which should have been listed as such instead of sounding more like fact than opinion, I realized that everything is still all too new, all too fresh, all too painful still for them. I don't judge this person, however I don't agree with them either. I remember feeling some of the same emotions back when everything was all too real and had just happened. There is a world of emotions that flood over you when you lose a child or in our case, your children.
All I can say is especially when you have a page, a website, a blog or any type of forum where you have a leader roll; that you never make it sound like you are stating a fact unless it is truly that, a fact, if it is your own personal thoughts or views then you should be sure to state it as such. Never come off sounding like you are better than others or know more than others just because you believe or don't believe in something. Never come off sounding like you grieve better than others because of whatever you do, did or didn't do. We all take our own time to heal when we have a loss, especially the loss of a child, that loss like no other.
To bring the focus back to where I began, yes I still actively grieve however doing all I do for my community at this page in memory and honor of our twins helps me heal. Being that I do still actively grieve for the loss of our twins does not mean that I need distraction, help, advice, or "something to do" because actually now, I do have something to do and for the first time in months I feel like my life has some meaning again. These are all good things.
I may notice the lack of comments, replies to what I write more often now than before because I'm in a better place than I was months ago. Which also may make me feel as though people don't care to read what I write and therefore don't read it because they automatically assume that it is negative, that I have "not moved on". Honestly that hurts that would be the automatic assumption if that's what they believe.
When I'm upset I may say that our girls died, that's the upset momma in me screaming from the inside when I say that. However when I'm less upset and able to think more clearly I say that our girls passed away. I like to think of their passing as more a peaceful thing than something sudden and horrible. Our girls were safe inside their momma's womb and then they passed away..
I have two dates in my mind when I think about our twin girls. There is their passing date and their angelversary date, which I also used to call "the day our girls were born into the world". The word "angelversary" is much shorter an word of the second date, don't you think?
At 18 weeks 3&4 days, about a week and a half short of twenty weeks and having that not so little word "miscarriage" would have been something else. Our daughters would have received a birth certificate / death certificate and would have been recognized as being people. It's all so very wrong as far as I'm concerned.
I end this moment of thoughts and venting with a few more things that are on my mind. I recently read about someone else's story, about their loss and their own personal thoughts about what have become common language in the baby loss community. Their frustration about the terminology around how we describe our babies who have passed and our hopes for new babies. While reading through their own personal views, which should have been listed as such instead of sounding more like fact than opinion, I realized that everything is still all too new, all too fresh, all too painful still for them. I don't judge this person, however I don't agree with them either. I remember feeling some of the same emotions back when everything was all too real and had just happened. There is a world of emotions that flood over you when you lose a child or in our case, your children.
All I can say is especially when you have a page, a website, a blog or any type of forum where you have a leader roll; that you never make it sound like you are stating a fact unless it is truly that, a fact, if it is your own personal thoughts or views then you should be sure to state it as such. Never come off sounding like you are better than others or know more than others just because you believe or don't believe in something. Never come off sounding like you grieve better than others because of whatever you do, did or didn't do. We all take our own time to heal when we have a loss, especially the loss of a child, that loss like no other.
To bring the focus back to where I began, yes I still actively grieve however doing all I do for my community at this page in memory and honor of our twins helps me heal. Being that I do still actively grieve for the loss of our twins does not mean that I need distraction, help, advice, or "something to do" because actually now, I do have something to do and for the first time in months I feel like my life has some meaning again. These are all good things.
I may notice the lack of comments, replies to what I write more often now than before because I'm in a better place than I was months ago. Which also may make me feel as though people don't care to read what I write and therefore don't read it because they automatically assume that it is negative, that I have "not moved on". Honestly that hurts that would be the automatic assumption if that's what they believe.
It also hurts when I don't see as many comments as before because I do put a lot of work into what I do now, I put a lot of work into what I write. Like with the blog our girls story were featured in. http://allthatlovecando.blogspot.com/2013/05/apple-and-bananas-story-by-their-mama.html It took me several hours to write that, and then the next morning I had two windows open on the computer. One window was everything that I originally wrote, and the other window was me writing everything out all over again, trying to edit it down, trying to shorten everything, trying to make it sound less broken up and flow well together. I then went over it two more times fixing all the grammar, spelling, punctuation, you name it, so it would be perfect. Reading it again I honestly am amazed that I wrote it. But very few have actually read it or said that they read it. Should I be personally upset, no I probably shouldn't, but I poured my heart and I let a big part of myself open to anyone who would read it. It makes me reconsider writing a book someday with our story and our happy ending, because if barely anyone reads our story about our journey to parenthood with our twins,.. You see where I'm going with this?
This is why I have to end this post. I have too many thoughts sometimes. Days like this are where I have my inspiration to write. Perhaps I'm just not that good of a writer. Perhaps I am kidding myself. The only thing working against me is that it's been years since my college writing class, that I aced, so I'm out of practice but I still have the heart and the desire.
I know I shouldn't give up on what I'm doing, despite what others may believe or think of me. I'm ok enough and these days may not be my best but they are better. It's all about healing and moving forward as best I can. I shouldn't have to let go of our girls if I don't want to, I keep them alive in memory, I think of them often and how old they would be.. Because while your baby you had that learned out to roll, lift their head up, crawl, speak, walk, run, eat solid foods, speak entire sentences,.. Those are moments we will never get with our twins. I don't obsess about our twins, I don't sleep with their urn, I'm ok my friends, I'm gonna be ok. I'm just a grieving, healing momma.
Much love to all who have had to say goodbye to their child(ren). It's not natural to have to say goodbye, especially before you can say hello. Ever hear the saying, "when hello means goodbye"? It's an emotionally, heartbreaking moment. Much love to you all and all our angel babies.
No comments:
Post a Comment