10-30-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 30, Reflection

Looking back over the month, I do feel like I have a better handle on myself and my emotions than I did at the beginning. Some of that may be that more time has passed, but I think in bulk it was working through my grief with these post. It hasn't fixed things, and I still have some really bad days, nights, moments. I think of her most of the time, but it doesn't feel like it consumes me either. I enjoyed doing the post for the most part, though I found it much easier to write about her than me. I suppose the biggest change is in my attitude toward it all. I know I'm on this lonely, grief road for the long haul, and I'm ok with that. Abigail is our daughter, and she will always be.

Today's picture I took from Britt's window, looking out toward our neighbors about 8am.

10-29-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 27, Self-Portrait

After co-op this morning, I took the kids to Chickfila for lunch. While they played in the play place, I took 2.5 hours to finally do my griefwork project from a few days ago, the one I skipped. I knew when I read through the list of topics at the beginning of the month that I wanted to sketch one. I had Britt take the digital camera, and snap a couple of photos of me across the table, and then I used one to draw, since I didn't have a mirror handy. I'm not sure that I've sketched anything since the week before Gary and I got married. Nothing dates past that in my sketch book anyway. I feel like I'm incredibly rusty at best, and that the proportions are still off.

10-28-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 29, What Heals You

Since I still didn't make time to do Day 27's post, I'm just continuing with the off a day theme. I'm having trouble with the next assignment though. Carley Marie wrote, "So for today, spend some time asking yourself what is it that heals you? What brings joy to your heart? If you cannot think of anything, maybe you could revisit something that you used to love doing and go from there." I'm not sure what really brings joy to my heart. I suppose spending time with our little family, spending time with the Church, spending time with our very best friends. I suppose being creative helps. Seems like if I go too many days without writing, or coloring something, or working on my grief journal, or cross-stitching (like right now) everything feels more overwhelming and I get grouchy. Seems like just moving through our days takes alot right now, and it's difficult to set aside the time to do those things.

Today's picture was part of SweetPea's Luminary Vigil,  they did this month. This one was for our Abigail.

10-27-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 28, Reach Out

I'm going to skip today's post since I didn't have a chance to do the work for it. Maybe I'll do it tomorrow since, I'm doing tomorrow's today. For Day 28, we're encouraged to reach out "give love, show compassion and kindness." I figured out REALLY, REALLY early in this journey that I felt better when I was praying for others. For example, because I don't think her Momma would mind me calling her out, we pray for Brooke every night. She had major surgery shortly after Abigail died, and I spent alot of that day while we were driving down to FL for the funeral praying for her. Of course, since I've read Bro. David's post for years encouraging us to not focus merely on ourselves but serve, care for, and pray for others, I already intellectually knew what I should be doing. And you know what, he was right, it is healing.

So today, I was able to do something of service that felt very, very special. For years we've gotten handme downs from the rest of the cousins (all girls who live in Florida). And if you know me, I hate to get rid of something that might be useful later, so even though we had WAY too many clothes, I never got rid of anything until it was too wore out to use. Oh a few times, I'd sit down with Heather and we'd sort through clothes, and I'd consign some, and take the money to get Britt clothes, but for the most part, since my girls are the youngest, they just kept piling up. So with special attention to the things that Heather told me to save, and NEVER get rid of, I started sorting through summer clothes a month ago. I mean they have 11 months of summer down there, and I only get 3 good weeks up here, I didn't need so much summer stuff. With alot of help from Kathy yesterday, I sorted, labeled and loaded up the extras. Today the kids and I went with them and some maternity things, and lots of shoes, and donated them to Morning Star Pregnancy Choices in Harrisburg. They help women who find themselves pregnant and don't know what to do, to let them know that they have help and they do have options other than abortion. It was incredibly healing to me, to know that these clothes that Abigail wouldn't be able to wear, would bless another little girl, infact LOTS of other little girls.

I hope to have a chance to finish sorting the winter stuff before we move, and carry them another load. After all I won't be needing winter stuff as far South as we will be moving.

Today's picture was picked out by Britt, from the ones I took today. This is one from the top of Peter's Mountain.

10-26-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 26, Gratitude

This topic so fits today. The only thing there is to say today, is that I am grateful that Gary again has a job. I just got off of skype with him, and he had a busy but great first day. He seemed to enjoy both the guys he's working with and the work itself. After a stretch of hard things to deal with, him having work that he enjoys (and steady finances for me) is something we are very grateful for.

June 29, 2013, One of my favorite all time pictures of Gary.

10-25-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 25, Earth Remembrance

Today is suppose to be a day to plant something in remembrance of your child. It's not really the season to do that here. But I have thought about later on, a while later, when we get our stone in place and the gravel put out there, I'd like to half the bulbs I have for a blue flower I have here, and keep half, and place half on Abigail's grave. Maybe I'll dig it up and carry it with us to Florida.

10-24-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 24, Choose Your Breath

Today is suppose to be a day for self-reflection, for the heavy intentional grief work that we have to do to heal. On one hand, I don't really get that, how can you do more than function. Grief work is suppose to be heart and head work, but I grapple with the deep thoughts daily, and to a certain extent I always have. So, it also comes somewhat naturally to me. I'm pretty introspective, overly analytical, and somewhat depressive; and I'm going to blame every bit of that on my Daddy's genes. wink emoticon On the other I hand I think I understand that to grow from this experience and to move through it, I have to be willing to change. Staying the same means to atrophy and stagnant or die. I've come to grips with never being the same, after all this isn't something you get over and go back to normal, but it's not yet clear to me who I will be. I'm still trying to find some footing, mostly overcome with despair and loneliness and anxiety, but with a sprinkling of other emotions thrown in when I least expect them. I am trying to work on acceptance. Of making the most of the situations in my life - every one of them was out of my control, but I can just to be optimistic to find the good in them. I don't have to be fatalistic, I can choose to have hope. Somedays that choice is harder than others, some days I choose to wallow and fit pitch. Some days I even choose to set aside my grieving for later and get through the current day. I may do that alot with this imminent move, but I am also determined to feel, not to lock away all my emotion. Because if I do, I will not only not feel grief I will not feel anything, and that's a terrible way to live. If grief is the price of love, then it is worth it.

The Bed and Breakfast we've stayed at this week.  It was so peaceful and beautiful.

Abigail,

Today's assignment for CaptureYourGrief was to write a love letter.  While I thought about attempting to write a letter to the doctor's office, to plead with them to change some things in their practice, that directly contributed to the loss of you.  While I considered that, it's not a letter I'm ready to write.  When I considered who I might wish I could write today.  There was just one person that I felt like talking to, and it was you.

I would tell you that you have touched so many lives.  That your very brief time, though unseen and silent, glorified our Heavenly Father in a way unimaginable to me before your birth.  I would tell you that throughout this experience I have felt God in a way that is very tangible, that my prayer life has grown and changed, that I more fully anticipate, more anxiously await Heaven.

I would tell you just how beautiful the cemetery at Little Union was yesterday at sunset.  How peaceful of a place it is.  I would love to ask you if you have met the seven other children buried there that left this world too soon.  Names that I have only seen on a stone, but not known.  I would tell you how lovely your stone is that we picked out for you.  Our one gift, the only thing we ever bought for you, that really everyone bought for you.  It is funny how the carver remarked about how beautifully simple it was.

I would tell you about our new home, and the hope for a fresh start.  How while I hate to move, I also long for stability and certainty in life, and I hope to some small degree we might have this here.  I would say how we hope to have more siblings, that you might be the baby for a record amount of time in this family.  I would ask you how it is to share your memory with those babies who will be born after you.  I would you want to be remembered.

Of course though, if you were here and I was able to talk to you.  I would tell you none of these things, because they would be too much for the tiny baby you would be.  They would be incomprehensible to you.  Instead I would hold you close, within for now, and in my arms in another 2 months.  And my beautiful girl, if I could talk to you, I'd tell you, "I love you."  That was something I failed to tell you while you were with us.  I would beg your forgiveness for that oversight.  For not taking the quiet moments at the end of the day, to talk to you.  I am sure you know, but I would have like to have told you, anyway.

Love always,
Momma,

10-22-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 22, Dreams and Rituals

I have only dreamed once of Abigail. I don't have any birthday rituals, or do anything to set aside and remember her on certain days. It's only been just shy of two months, and yet, I can't even imagine what it might be like to do so for the rest of my life. It feels like such a long time to be without her, to wait to meet her. I'm sure there will be some sort of ritual, but I just can't imagine it now.

However, while we are on this topic. For the first time today, for the first time in those two months I have allowed myself to dream again. Oh I've told Gary that perhaps beginning of next year we will want to try again for a baby, but we've not dreamed about it. It's too frightening in a sense. Trying to picture life, let alone dream in the wake of a lost job, and a lost baby is difficult at best, futile at worst. But this week Gary accepted a job offer, we flew to back down to South Florida, and today we found a house. It's a nice house, an incredibly nice house. It's a house that I think our family could grow in. It's a house that we could have laughter and fun times again in. It's house that the owner might want to sell next year, and a house that I think I would love to have. I today caught myself dreaming about that possibility. Of dreaming about how I would like to set up the rooms (I wanted a double set of bunkbeds in the one room). I caught myself wondering who else will be born into our family and how our life might look here in this place. I caught myself window shopping for furniture and storage solutions online. And for the first time, I realized though it might be really small steps. Really slow steps. It might be nigh unnoticeable to everyone else, but I am healing. This season will not last forever, joy cometh in the morning.

10-21-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 21, Sacred Space

I haven't really had a place to go and "be" with Abigail. I have a shelf in our bedroom at home with a few things on it. And we have her grave, but since we have been living in PA and she's buried back home at Little Union in Florida, I've not "seen" her since we left after the funeral. When her stone is placed it will face this beautiful giant, live oak in the back of the Church yard. I like to think about hanging a swing out there on that perfect branch. It would be something old fashioned looking, made of board and rope. I like to think about sitting out there on that swing, and praying. I haven't talked to her, but it's a good place to pray. I like to think about all the other kids who run around that yard playing, swinging on it. I like to imagine her still connected and part of us even though she's gone. It's a happy thought.

10-20-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 17, Secondary Losses and Day 20, Forgiveness and Humanity

Today has been my first really good day since loosing Abigail, and I feel like shouting "finally!" Like I actually felt like myself and enjoyed most of my day. Tonight I'm going to tackle a two for one.

For me my secondary loss is not directly because of our first loss, but has compounded my grief. I have always approached each of our upcoming moves with great excitement, the adventure of something new, the next chapter in our lives. But I have really agonized over this one, and have deeply grieved over the leaving our Church and I may have cried more this week than I have for Abigail. I'm scared to death about this move, and that's not like me at all. I have made a few really good friends, which really isn't easy for me, and I don't want to leave them either. Perhaps my secondary loss isn't so much losing my support group, because while it's not the same, we can keep in touch, it's losing my sense of self. I just don't feel like me at all.

For me I'm trying each day to forgive those who miss managed my pregnancy. Hypothyroid issues have been known to increase miscarriage 225% for 25 years now. It's very simple to manage, and with medicine makes the chances no higher than they previously were. Having all the testing that told us there was no problems with her, leads us to believe that it was my thyroid. And that if it had been properly managed she'd still be here. That realization is very difficult to swallow. I think the lack of coordinated care, is why all the warning signs were not noted and managed. I think it will continue to be a struggle for me to forgive them. And in some ways it's a struggle to forgive myself, for all the things I didn't do. I should have been more active in my own care, and not just leaving everything to someone else. I just tell myself that I'm human, and I did the best I knew to do at the time, next time will be different.

10-15-2015, Me and the kids doing school, on a field trip at the old Jamestown Fort in VA.

10-19-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 19, Music

I've already written pretty detailed about "Be Still My Soul" which the kids have begun to call Abigail's song, when I wrote about triggers, so I won't write about it again. I have always adored music, it speaks to me. I can't really make music, though I piddled with clarinet in high school. I can't really sing despite singing schools, though I love to. When we moved to the valley and ridge area of PA, where the radio changes stations every few miles down the road, every time you cross a ridge, and the only good service is on top of them, I just about quit listening to country on the radio. I still love my cds that I have loaded on the ipod I bought in college, but we primarily listen to singing tapes and cds. We have some from annual meetings of congregation singing (those are our favorites). We have others from singing schools (Gary went to ALOT of those before me). We have some that were done by various Churches, families, or groups in a studio.

These songs have become even more precious to me during this ordeal. I have always loved to sing, but often now I just cannot. I can remember having bronchitis one time, and having no voice, and I just couldn't stop myself from singing, from trying to anyway. Now I sometimes, just cannot find my voice. But that's ok, because mostly I just need to listen to them. Sometimes I just need a minor, it's not even about the words, but the tune that my soul cries out for when my own cries can't even be translated to words. Sometimes I need to hear the words of the hymn writers that have been through great trials. Sometimes I need to remember what He has done, to help me remember that there is more than this. Sometimes I need to hear a song about Heaven, and let my imagination roam with wonder.

Three tapes have been favorites for me throughout the last several months. The first is "All the Day Long" which has "Be Still My Soul" on it. The second is "Nearer, My God, to Thee" which was recorded by Bethel Church in Mississippi after a singing school. Both of these are fairly mellow in their song selection, and peaceful feeling. The third one is the outside singing tape from the Camp Meeting in 1999 at Bethel Church in Texas. It is funny to listen to it because I can remember, and nearly be transported back to that 14 year old girl who was amazed at the number of young people, and was on cloud nine when shape notes were first explained to me sitting under the tabernacle after lunch, learning fuging tunes. There are many different songs, and they all serve different purposes, but the first song on that tape is "Eden of Love." While I loved it then, I really love it now. In the Good Old Songs book it is set to a minor that doesn't fit the words at all, but out in Texas they singing it to the most joyful tune you've ever heard. One day listening to it, it made me wonder. The second verse hit me like a ton of bricks. If perhaps at that very moment while we were singing praises, if Abigail was too. And while perhaps it is too simplistic a view, after all Heaven is outside of time, it brings a sense of closeness with both her and my Saviour, with all of God's people really, that almost makes me feel whole. Then the third verse points to the fact that one day I'll be there and sing praises in His very tangible presences. You can't help but be happy to hear and dwell on that thought.

1. How sweet to reflect on the joys that await me
In yon blissful region, the haven of rest,
Where glorified spirits with welcome shall greet me,
And lead me to mansions prepared for the blest;
Encircled in light, and with glory enshrouded,
My happiness perfect, my mind's sky unclouded,
I'll bathe in the ocean of pleasure unbounded,
And range with delight through the Eden of love.

2. While angelic legions, with harps tuned celestial,
Harmoniously join in the concert of praise,
The saints, as they flock from the regions terrestrial,
In loud hallelujah their voices will raise;
Then songs to the Lamb shall re-echo through heaven,
My soul will respond, to Immanuel be given
All glory, all honor, all might and dominion,
Who brought us, through grace to the Eden of love.

3. Then hail, blessed state! hail, ye songsters of glory!
Ye harpers of bliss, soon I'll meet you above,
And join your full choir in rehearsing the story,
Salvation from sorrow through Jesus's love.
Though imprisoned in earth, yet by anticipation
Already my soul feels the sweetness above
Of joys that await me when freed from temptation
My heart's now in heaven the Eden of love.

10-18-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 18, Seasons and Symbols

I've not posted much this week, it's been a tumultuous week. I've been feeling the need to write, but I don't know how to share what I feel. Sometimes even I can't put the thoughts to words and arrange them on paper. Maybe I can capture some of it with today's topic. Though in some ways as I haven't experienced a year without our daughter, maybe it's too early to say what affects me most.

I have always loved fall, the colors changing, the multitude of trees that all blended together in their green array, suddenly bursting into every shade of red, orange, yellow, and brown imaginable. There is even a tree down the road, that almost looks purple. And this past week the color in our area has been at it's prime, prettier than last year's pictures; and yet, I feel nothing but a profound sense of grief and loss. I don't see brilliant colors, I see death. The grass turning brown, the flowers' blooms fade away, the leaves drift down and then crumble to dust. I have always loved getting to bring out the sweaters and coats, wearing the boots (that are never out of season in my opinion), and bundling up. But this year those things don't feel cozy or warm. They maternity sweaters remain in a bag in the closet floor, and I am never warm enough. The temperature today felt about the same as the April day I found out I was pregnant again. But instead of spring bringing the promise of new life, fall just brings a remembrance of death. She silently slipped away, without anyone knowing somewhere as the Pennsylvania summer was fading toward fall...

Many of the women I've read or met on this journey see symbols of their child everywhere They are certain that their baby is there, manifesting themselves in someway. They feel they are signs or gifts from Heaven. I don't believe that. I think that Heaven as a wonderful place, and that when we get there, this world no longer holds any concern or allure for us. Afterall it would sadden and grieve us to see how the world continues to spin, and we no there is no sorrow or weeping there. I don't think that feathers are a sign that my angel has visited, or that butterflies are sent by my child. I believe the feathers in my yard have blown across the pasture from the duck and chicken barns our Amish neighbors keep, and that the butterflies come from caterpillars as they always have. It's hard to be reminded of someone that is always on your mind, but in the last two weeks, I have finally begun to have some relief from her constant presences in my mind. Short stretches, 10-15 minutes, where she isn't even on the backburner of my mind. A few things always bring her memory back - red leaves and dark starry nights.

Three weeks after her birth, we went to Niagara Falls, and there was one tree changing colors a month ahead of its counterparts. It was a vibrant red. I picked up one from the ground and immediately thought of her. Perhaps it was because it was red, as I often imagine her hair is. Perhaps it was because it was beautiful, yet out of place like her untimely death and birth. I carried it around in my purse till it was nothing but crumbles. Last weekend I found another very tiny one as I walked between Sis. Bonnie and Bro. Jonathan's house, it was so smooth and it is now riding around in my purse.

We often have amazingly clear and starry nights here. We live in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by the Amish, so there is basically no light pollution. To watch as the Milky Way changes position in the sky over the course of the year is really something. I had never seen stars like I do here, not even out West where there is nothing to obstruct your view for miles and miles and miles. If we end up moving away for work, it will be something I greatly miss. The night after our follow up doctors appointment was such a night. We visited with the Brubakers for a long while afterward, till it was dark. When out of nowhere, we saw a blazingly bright shooting star stream across the sky. It must have been huge, because of how long it burned. But of course it was a shooting star, and as such didn't last more than several seconds. It too made me think of her little life, very bright but far too short.

The very beginning of our fall color, 10-04-2015.

10-16-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 16, Creative Grief

I have done alot of creative things since losing Abigail. I suppose it is something of a gut reaction to create something when you fail at creating life. To make something lasting, when there is nothing left of your baby to hold on to. I've also found, it's also a great way to attempt to distract yourself from your own thoughts. On the way to Florida and back for her funeral, I spent much of the long miles, coloring kaleidoscope snowflake patterns. The kids Christmas Elves intended to color them and hang them all one night last year, so I thought I'd help them out for this year. We set some of the money given for Abigail aside to help others. I designed a bracelet for Abigail, I needed to make her something, just for her, for me. Mostly I have created through my writing. It all helps you know but it's not enough.

Right now, I'm working on a bigger project. I started it Tuesday 10/13. One that I think I may have been out of my mind to start. I'm cross-stitching a Christmas stocking. I up and decided I wanted one for her this year. (Exhibit #1 for craziness: As Ruth (5) asked me, why does Abigail need a stocking if she's not alive anymore?) I looked around online, and couldn't find a needlepoint one like we had that I liked. So I did a wider search, and fell in love with a pattern only to discover it was a kit, not a finished stocking. Gary asked me what I was thinking, last project I did, which was a pillow for my mom, took me over a year and it wasn't this big. (Exhibit #2 for craziness: Cross-stitch takes forever.) I'm a little concerned, because while it has directions, I have to put it together with the felt to then turn the cross-stitch piece into a stocking. (Exhibit #3 for craziness: Mother cross-stitched all of us stockings as kids, and she wasn't able to get the last one made into a stocking, because the shop that did them for her went out of business, I have no idea if this will even work.) Furthermore as if all of that wasn't enough work, the pattern that I just had to have the toe of the stocking points the wrong way (oppose of the 5 we already have) so I'm reversing the pattern as I go. (That was Exhibit #4 for craziness if you are keeping up.) I'll let you know how it goes.

Today's topic was too big to post straight to facebook.  Today is the day of the year set aside for remembering our babies who are gone too soon.  Around the world those who have lost and those who remember the losses light a candle from 7pm to 8 pm local time, so that for 24 hours around the world they are remembered.  Today I wanted to share a video I made.

10-14-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 14, Express Your Heart

9-15-2015, A photo from our trip to Niagara Falls of the American Rapids,  totally fits the way that I feel.

10-13-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 13, Regrets and Triggers

Oh regrets are a dime a dozen when you've lost a child. I wish I had seen an endocrinologist years ago and this wouldn't have happened, I wish my thyroid had been properly managed.

As for regrets with our stillbirth. I wish I had better known about things I could have done to make memories. The midwife on the phone told me that they would tell me everything when I arrived. I should have been give more information before hand. I regret rushing to deliever her. When she had already been gone for 2-3 weeks, there wasn't going to be much change in her physically if we had waited a little longer to learn our options. I most regret the lack of good pictures. Our nurse offered to take some, but I didn't look at the settings on the camera, which was still set up for night photograph. All our pictures she took are over exposed and blurry. By the time I realized and took a few pictures her appearance had changed alot. We didn't call Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep, even though they had agreed to come, because we didn't feel like they could get very good pictures due to her condition and young gestational age. I wish we had of though. I wish I had a few good pictures. I wish I had insisted on them trying to get me some footprints and handprints. They didn't come out and say they couldn't, but they didn't, and I just assumed it was because of her fragile state and tiny size. I also regret that no one else held her and saw her. Our families lived way off, states and states away, and we thought the kids were too young to understand what they were seeing. But I we had waited longer, we could have had family there. I think now it would have been better to share her with a few people. We weren't able to do that at her funeral.

I really don't have any triggers, after all she's on my mind all the time still. I do think of her alot when we sing Church songs. I like to think when we are singing praises to God here, she is also singing there at the same time. I especially think of her when I hear or sing or think about the song "Be Still My Soul." We had it playing in the car on the way to the ultrasound that changed our lives. The third verse is especially meaningful now.

10-12-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 12, Normalizing Grief

"Because grief is so distressing to endure, many people believe that grieving is something bad, and it's to be avoided or gotten over as quickly as possible. But it isn't a problem to be solved - it's a process that unfolds over time. As you move through your emotions, you gradually let go of what might have been and adjust to what is." - Deborah L. Davis from "Stillbirth, Yet Still Born"

I am trying to regain a sense of normal. It takes a great deal of energy to project normal when i don't feel it. I'm not good at showing emotions, some people seem to fall apart in public so gracefully, but not me. I try to keep that very real, and very scary sight just around the house, particularly under the covers when the lights are out. But the truth is that grief is normal. I mean "hello, Danielle you just lost a child here."

For me grief has primarily been manifested two ways. 1) Incredible depression and sadness. It is so hard to function when you feel this insanely heavy burden all day. It's like trying to clean the entire house in only an hour with a 50 lb weight strapped to each foot. And the mental is worse than the physical. All the time, whether it's the forefront or just the back burner, my mind is thinking of her, what is she doing right now, what would she have been like, what does she look like, what does her laugh sound like, would she have liked the song "Happy Land" as much as the other kids, why did this happen, how can I prevent this from happening again, how can I find a doctor that really cares and takes me seriously, what if this happens again, why am I having to lose baby weight all over again but get no baby. It's a constant stream of thoughts. We've always joked that Gary's brain doesn't have an on switch, but mine doesn't have an off switch. He can stop a thought process and his sleep is never disturbed. I haven't mastered that, and am often lying awake in bed for more than an hour after he begins snoring. I find that I'm mostly exhausted within a few hours of getting up, just from my mental acrobatics.

The second way that I have been affected goes hand and hand with the first, and it is dealing with anxiety. I'm trying terribly hard to not change the way I parent, to let the kids have all the freedom they are accustomed to, without me hovering, or really, with out me insisting they be in my vision at all times. The worst of it though is when Gary and/or the kids are out of the house. On afternoon he left with Ruth I think it was that day. I expected them to be back within 2 or 3 hours, about 4 hours later, I was convinced they had been in a car wreak and because he had the phone not me, no one could call to tell me they had been killed. I have designed Britt's tombstone in my mind. I'm convinced that we will go through this again, it feels so hopeless, and there is absolutely no logical feeling for this. I don't want them away from me, and I don't like not being able to be in touch with them when they are away.

I read, and re-read the grief books, to remind myself this is normal, this is a stage, this will not last, and I should remain calm and find our new normal.

The flowers my sweet hubby got me when he had to fly out be gone this past week for 3 days for a job interview. He knew how worked up I was by him having to be gone and how nervous I was about it being just me and the kids for the first time since we lost Abigail.

10-11-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 11, Glow in the Woods

Today is about where we have found support. One great resource for me has been www.stillstandingmag.com. There have been a lot of articles on so many topics relating to grief and loss, by so many different writers in different places on their journey. I have come to recognize that is what this, is a journey. I will always bear this sense of loss and longing, but I will be able to carry it with me. I will not forever remain bogged down in this one place, in grief, in this intensity.

The biggest help has come from a few women I know who have travelled this road before me. I won't call them all out, because I don't know how much each of them would want to share. Why I think we should never feel ashamed of our losses, or embarrassed, or afraid of the response of others to the point of not talking about our children; I also recognize that we each determine what is ours alone, and what we want to share. However there is one person, I want to call by name, who I am sure won't mind.

Sis. Kate Richardson, who I am still waiting to meet in real life at a Church meeting, has been the single biggest help. She lost her second born, a son, nearly 30 years ago when he was born too early. She has shared Steven with me. She has shared her sense of loss. She has shared her sense of hopelessness as she held him, and watched him slip away, powerless to help him. She has shared how she tried to cope. She has encouraged me in my writing and helped me to process my feelings even when I don't fully know what it is I feel. She has reassured me, that all of these are normal to work through. She has talked to me for as long as I have wanted no matter what time of the day or night, when I have jumped on Facebook chat. She has encouraged me in the faith we share, sharing her studies following her loss. She has shown me that even after unbearable loss, we can find beauty and hope. That we can let this be a testimony in our lives to ourselves and others of the truth that He walks with us, and He gives us great strength. Most of all she has shown me that I am not alone. Not alone in my loss, not alone in my grief, not alone. Even when I feel like Elijah and cry out "I, and even I only am left." (I Kings 19:10. There is the Lord with me and there are others, both who have felt loss and those who feel our loss with us. And for all of these things, I cannot say thank you enough.

10-10-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 10, Words

Today we were encouraged to take some time to write something by hand. Maybe even a poem or something. I wish I was a poet, but I am not. I finished reading a collection of poems about a woman's still birth last night, "She was born, she died." While I have shared some pictures and a lot of my writings, because somethings should be shared. There are other things that I want to keep for my own, at least for now. So I also keep a journal. It reminds me a little of Luke 2:19, "Mary kept all these things, and pondered them in her heart."

10-09-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 9, Family

Today we were asked who is our family, what do they mean to us, what does our family look like. Unlike many, maybe most of the women I've talked to, no one has come to me and told me I should be over it, and to stop talking about Abigail. There have been some poorly thought out comments, but then again I don't even know what to say about what has happened. I've not needed to cut people out of my life, I've not seen some friends just drift away. Y'all have all been wonderful.

So family means to me what it has always meant. There is my actual family, my Church family (which sometimes is both, and often the most important family), and occasionally there are those rare friends that reach the status of family. They are the people who love you no matter what. The people you think about when you aren't with them. The people who you can't wait to see. I have a big family when I think about all these people - Mallards, Hurns, Varnums, and Cunninghams, Little Union Church, Old Carroll Church, Primitive Baptist this nation over some of whom are so close and wise they feel like extra parents and grandparents, Kristi and Melissa and Ashley and Kathy. So much love, and to think I've probably missed some.

As for our little family, it is Gary, Me, Britt, Ruth, Rebecca, and now Abigail. She will always be the unseen part of our family, the one we carry in our heart, the one unseen in family photos, but she will always be there, and she is loved by our family, our very large, loving family.

9-16-2015, Our little family at Niagara Falls, 3 weeks after Abigail was stillborn.

10-08-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 8, Wish List

I feel like this one is really difficult. Wishing to never have experienced this, wishing that I was currently 28 months pregnant and still arguing over baby names is pretty futile. It's hard to get past that one though to figuring out what I wish could come from this tragedy.

1) I wish, for me, that I could find a way to honor Abigail and balance her place in our lives without becoming a morbid freak show. (Honest to goodness some days I feel like I am.)

2) I wish, for others, that she would never be forgotten, that her name wouldn't be come the unspoken.

3) I wish, at large, that I could do something to ensure such a simple thing as this is monitored so that no woman loses her child again to something as easily preventable this. I am struggling with a real feeling of medical negligence in Abigail's death. I have no idea how to go about this though.

4) I wish that I can grow in this. In the past I have mentioned that nothing has stretched me personally, made me grow, and deepened my faith like our experiences with unemployment. That after all that time while I wouldn't want to endure it again, while I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy, while it was still a horrible experience. Despite all that, Gary and I are the people we are today because of that experience, it has shaped us so profoundly. And I believe that we are better people because of it, deeper my faithful people. That the experience brought me closer to Gary and made me lean more fully on God. It is a classic example of the Lord not causing a situation, but walking with us in His Providence and us growing through it. I feel like this experience has the ability to either utterly break us, or be an even greater testimony to His faithfulness, and grow us in new even if painful ways. I would pray that this experience would be one that would deepen my relationship with Him and bring Him honor in how we handle it.

10-07-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 7, Memory

Today's assignment was to share a memory. It's nice to think about the good ones, not just life since she's been gone. One of the absolute best memories from our pregnancy with Abigail was telling our family that we were expecting again. Gary and I are both the oldest of four, so we knew our parents would be appropriately excited with the news. I knew I wanted to tell them in person this time. We haven't lived near either side of our family for sometime, and sharing baby news is so much more fun in person.

I spent a week or two scouting the internet - pinterest, baby boards, the works. I wanted to come up with something new. Announcing a new baby is about the most fun thing in the world. And it's a chance to be creative. With the first I sent a basket to my mom from her grandbaby, since we didn't live near by. With the second we had a shirt made up for our first, you wouldn't believe how long it was before anyone read it, I about blurted out the news. For our third, I lined up shoes and added baby shoes, with the note that we were expanding our house by 2 feet.

I finally came up with the perfect idea. I made up the signs, and didn't even read them to the kids. Our oldest two are learning to read, and I wasn't sure they could keep the secret so after the picture I hid those away. We live near Hershey, PA now so I put the picture in a little bag with some candy. It was a "sweet surprise" for them.

Our oldest had asked to join the Church, and both sets of grandparents were coming up for the baptism. We all went to lunch together on Saturday before hand at Red Lobster. Afterward, I let the kids hand out the goodie bags. When our parents opened them and began to read, the smiles were wonderful. We had video of it somewhere. They weren't expecting it. It was the perfect surprise, maybe the best announcement yet. So, then I got to talk about what I'd been bursting to share ever since they all arrived.

Here's the photo we gave them. It was taken May 22, 2015.
The signs read:

Britt: Been There
Ruth: Done That
Rebecca: Now it's MY turn! I'm being promoted to BIG Sister!
Gary: We have a sweet surprise.
Me: Baby #4 to adore, December 2015.

10-06-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 6, Books

This topic is just comical to me. Carly mentioned in her post that many of us turn to reading, and asked us to share anything that was helpful or encouraging. You all know that I'm a bookaholic. So it might come as no surprise that since Abigail passed away 6 weeks ago today, I have spent a lot of time either on my bed, or curled up in my chair in the living room with a blanket and a book. I have read 10 books all but one of them on the loss a child. I might have a list of about that many more that I've saved on Amazon since the library doesn't have them. I am rereading one of the first ten, and I have another one sitting on the nightstand by the bed to read. And of course I'm reading my Bible a lot.

So I'm going to give three suggestions, well maybe I'll give four.

On the topic of miscarriage, stillbirth, and infant loss. My hands down favorite book so far has been Miscarriage: Women Sharing from the Heart. This was a work from a scholarly point of view by two women who had experienced miscarriage. They interviewed more than 50 women and some of their husbands in the course of their study, and liberally share their own words. It is a relief when you feel like you are going crazy to know that everyone else experiences this too. That you aren't crazy, or if you are that at least you aren't the only one.

For just a great read, some of you know that last year I got to read Elizabeth Byler Younts new book "Promise to Cherish" before it came out, to review it. This year I was again privileged to be able to read her newest book, "Promise to Keep." I read it all yesterday. This book centers around Esther an Amish woman, who has been through enormous loss in her life. She's slightly older than myself, and has lost both of her parents at 5 and 7, lost her best friend and cousin just 4 years earlier, loses her grandmother in the first pages of the book, and faces losing Daisy, the child of her cousin that she has raised as her own four the last four years as Daisy's father returns from WWII. Alone in the world, in many ways and facing incredible loss she remains a strong woman, she doesn't become bitter, she doesn't become hard, she still retains faith, and love, and an ability and desire to serve others. At times it was an incredibly hard read, but it was also a really encouraging read. It was exactly what I needed to read yesterday.

Obviously though, the best source of comfort other than prayer has been time reading my Bible. Three separate people who had experienced losing a child, suggested I read Job. I'm reading it now. I have read alot in the Psalms. David has always been the most honestly real character from the Bible to me. Maybe it just because we know so much more about him because of all of his writings. But most of all I have read over and over the verses that were used at Abigail's funeral (Ecc 3, Isa. 57:1, II Sam. 12, Isa 65:17-20, I Thes 4:15-18), and the verses I have engraved on the bracelet I made for her, the one I wear every day (Psa. 106:1, II Cor 12:9, I Thess 4:13-18, Rev 21:3-5).

Finally as my bonus book, "What Was Lost: A Christian Journey through Miscarriage." The author of this book is a woman who has experienced two miscarriages and who also happens to be a Methodist minister. I don't agree with all of her theology or ideas, but there was a lot of good stuff in her book. Most especially there was a chapter on who God is. It showed that he doesn't cause the deaths of our children for his plan, but that neither is he powerless in our daily lives. It was a really well written chapter for what I've always believed in balancing His power, His providence, and His love for His people in a sin cursed world.

10-05-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 5, Empathy

Today's topic maybe the most important one that I share this month. It is the entire reason that there is a Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month. While this month is a time to encourage more research into preventable causes of death, unlike say Breast Cancer Awareness we aren't trying to raise money or find a cure. When your baby is dead there isn't a cure. The entire point of this month, is to change the fact that pregnancy loss is seen as the end of a dream an unfortunate disappointment that is taboo to speak about. The truth is that it isn't just the loss of a dream of a pregnancy, it is the death of a child. What I most want from others is empathy.

Now empathy isn't the same as sympathy. People often offer sympathy. They tell me how sorry they are for me. And while that's at least a response out of love, unlike so many like you can always have another, this is part of God's plan or some thing else totally irrelevant for the situation. Yet, it doesn't help. When people say they are sorry, it doesn't fix anything, and why should they even say it, they didn't do anything wrong. Empathy is when you put yourself out there and allow yourself to really feel what someone else is going through. Now, I know not everyone is truly capable of empathy, but I do believe we should all try.

When a baby who is just learning to walk trips and skins their knee badly, we can be empathic. We remember the way it burns when you get a bad skin, we can just practically feel that throbbing pain of your pulse there. We know how even the most gentle pats and rubbing to get that gritty sand and dirty out of our skin feels. Often we kinda involuntarily gasp and feel our heart skip a beat when they fall down those concrete stairs and get hurt. We've all been there, it's easy to be empathic.

If you could only allow yourself to imagine the pain of life without one of your children. If you can realize that those dreams you have for them would still continue, but with no possibility of ever seeing them fulfilled. If you could truly picture that for yourself, then you could be empathic for the situation that many of us find ourselves in. I won't lie to you. I only knew of 3 people before Abigail that had lost a child, and I wasn't truly empathic. I mean how many of us truly want to be, how deeply do we really want to think about the possibility of losing a child and what that would really mean. As humans we push the unwanted ideas out of our mind, we refuse to dwell on them, as if that can prevent them from happening.

The truth is that the most comforting thing in this whole experience have been those who start out by saying one of two things. "I can't imagine, but we love you and hurt with you." or "I don't know what to do or say, but we are praying for all of you." Then because they honestly feel with us they follow it up with action. I believe the Bible has something to say about the need to follow up faith with works (James 1:22-24, 2:14-18). I have to go and do some how cleaning or I could spend all day telling you the many things that people have done for us to show their love. To hear her name spoken aloud, to have someone reach out with a hug or to squeeze my hand, to have all the money that was given for her burial and medical bills, to just show up and help clean house, to take care of things so I don't have to try to figure it out, to not ask me how I am, but a specific question and let me talk. And on and on and on.

The truth of the matter is that everyone in this world probably is in need of some empathy, and it's something everyone should cultivate in our lives. It's just something that we find ourselves in great need of in this journey since so many people don't understand that regardless of the child's age or the circumstances of their death, it is still the death of a unique individual and the loss hurts too much for words.

Sometimes all you need is a friend holding your hand while you talk. Mine and a friend's kids, 10-05.

10-04-2015, Capture Your Grief - Day 4, Dark and Light

Our Abigail was a child we very much wanted. Her middle name is Miriam which means "longed for child" in Aramaic. She will always be longed for now. While we were pregnant, Gary was laid off. They combined his position with another and kept the gentleman who had been there more than a decade. During that month, after he was laid off but before we found out she was gone, she was a real light in our days. Someone we were looking forward to with such excitement. No matter what else was going on, we were having a baby!

Now each day feels a little bipolar, swinging back and forth between light and dark. There are times when I can think about her and smile. Trying to imagine her, all the things she knows and sees that I can merely guess at. The picture in my mind, well it is more of a feeling of arriving there one day and her running with her long red hair swinging and bouncing, a huge smile on her face with her arms out to give me a hug.

Then in the next moment there is nothing but despair and tears. The stark realization that Heaven is a long ways away, that I am serving a sentence of life without parole. That I know nothing about this person that holds a special place in my heart, that I never will, that even the wish for a red head daughter is just that a wish.

Then the next moment I feel like she just is, that she has to be. Just like I knew we were having another daughter, before she was born. Then at the height of despair I think perhaps when we die that is it, and she is forever gone. Then I remember the promises of the Bible and again feel them to be true in a way that is unexplainable. There is the light of trying my best to function to have ok almost normal moments in public. I read to the kids at the library. I handle my co-op class. Then I come home exhausted, wrap up in a blanket, and somehow look up having lost 3 hours.

Every day is like the view we saw while driving today, light and shadow, in and out of clouds. Sometimes in the valley and sometimes on the mountain. But we will get there, one step at a time, by holding on to those things we know to be true. I know this is not the end, and I will not feel crazy like this forever.