I exercised my phone a friend option on Tuesday night.
I had to do a series of 3 things related to Gabriel's loss and a new baby, and they were going to hurt. Frankly, I didn't want to do any of them. Crawling into a hole and pulling the turf back over my head was looking like a reasonable and viable option.
So I called this old teacher/mentor/friend of mine and I said "L. tell me I have to be a grown-up. Tell me I have to suck it up and do these things. Tell me I need to dig deep and be an adult."
And I suppose what I was looking forward to was someone telling me that I simply had to do these things. That it was a part of being a grown-up. That doing this was like picking a funeral home and planning the funeral. It simply had to be done. And while I would have liked to stick my fingers in my ears and shout "la, la, la", that wasn't an option. Dig a bit deeper and get it done.
Perhaps the most frustrating thing was that Mr. Spit and I were going to do these terribly difficult things, and no one around us was going to know that they were hard. Certainly, the most painful, galling thing about baby loss is that it is so hidden. Today I will go downstairs and I will order flowers for a new baby. On Sunday, I will sit in church, and I will hold Mr. Spit's hand, and I will know how painful it is for him to watch a father announce a baby. And in that moment, just the two of us, we will be left behind, forsaken in this dead baby world. And if you are going to do a terribly difficult thing, it is a good thing to hear a well done afterwards. And Mr. Spit and I, we don't hear well done.
read the rest from Mrs Spit
I had to do a series of 3 things related to Gabriel's loss and a new baby, and they were going to hurt. Frankly, I didn't want to do any of them. Crawling into a hole and pulling the turf back over my head was looking like a reasonable and viable option.
So I called this old teacher/mentor/friend of mine and I said "L. tell me I have to be a grown-up. Tell me I have to suck it up and do these things. Tell me I need to dig deep and be an adult."
And I suppose what I was looking forward to was someone telling me that I simply had to do these things. That it was a part of being a grown-up. That doing this was like picking a funeral home and planning the funeral. It simply had to be done. And while I would have liked to stick my fingers in my ears and shout "la, la, la", that wasn't an option. Dig a bit deeper and get it done.
Perhaps the most frustrating thing was that Mr. Spit and I were going to do these terribly difficult things, and no one around us was going to know that they were hard. Certainly, the most painful, galling thing about baby loss is that it is so hidden. Today I will go downstairs and I will order flowers for a new baby. On Sunday, I will sit in church, and I will hold Mr. Spit's hand, and I will know how painful it is for him to watch a father announce a baby. And in that moment, just the two of us, we will be left behind, forsaken in this dead baby world. And if you are going to do a terribly difficult thing, it is a good thing to hear a well done afterwards. And Mr. Spit and I, we don't hear well done.
read the rest from Mrs Spit
Thanks Joe.
Posted by: Mrs.spit | November 25, 2008 at 09:29 PM
There is a "lesser cousin" of what you are feeling common among those who have kids with disabilities. It is not nearly the same as what you & Mr Spit go through, but I think it is a shadow of it.
Every milestone being celebrated by the parents of "regular" kids is, at the same time, a reminder of things our kids might never experience...
Posted by: joseph | November 27, 2008 at 11:05 AM