stepping back

Anyone who knows me well knows that an email containing the phrase, “I am pleased to say that I surpassed even my own expectations,” would immediately turn me off. 

I’m not a big fan of blatant self-promotion. A bloated ego makes me cringe in the same way executives who wink at women do. Both apply here, and it’s just… ugh.

This particular chap at the office intends to recreate a fundraiser he initiated last Christmas that culminated with a visit to the local children’s hospital to hand out presents and hand over a big cheque. All well and good (minus of course the percentage of intentions that are shamelessly selfish). Except this year it’s within my remit to oversee stuff like this. And I know the hospital far too intimately, particularly the cardiac ward and PICU.

.::.

My memories of the place certainly haven’t faded - far from it. Instead they’ve morphed from shocking flashbacks and taken the alternate, slinky form of dreams and nightmares both.  There are still frequently nights when I relive the hours before and after Sadie died down to the minute. I can’t help it; I don’t know if that ever stops. In a crazy way I’m sure I’d miss it if it did.

I remember the smallest detail, down to the round metal buzzer we would press to gain entry into the ward. I’d say the same thing each time, “Hello, it’s Sadie McKay’s mother,” before hearing the door click and squirting a generous dose of antibacterial cream onto my palm as the door closed behind me. How I felt protective and dizzy and absolutely incredulous on the day we arrived via a silent, steady ambulance.

I remember walking out for the last time, and in a scene straight out of a hundred movies we’ve all seen, I stared from the backseat window as a woman ran to the car trying to reach us before we left, waving her arms at a driver who failed to notice her.  Our counsellor from the ward.  Her eyes locked with mine and I didn’t flinch. I knew I would hate her for whatever came out of her sad mouth beneath her very sad eyes.

.::.

Back to this jackarse with his ambitious plans to surpass even himself. 

Managing this would mean regular contact with the hospital and attending the event itself.  If I’m honest with myself, I can’t imagine a purer form of torture than having to go back there.  And a little part of me is disappointed in myself for that. I would love to be one of those women who takes on a cause because it’s close to her heart and puts her philanthropic urges to good use in the place where she lost so much, helping herself to heal and helping give hope to others. I’m sure you know someone wonderful and strong like that.  As much as I’d like to be, I don’t think I’m that woman.

.::.

What about you? Have you been back to the place where you lost your child? How did it feel?

it's all in the delivery

I've been working very closely with a woman who is about 32 weeks pregnant. Right around the time she found out she was expecting she also found out she is diabetic.  Naturally, our conversations all tend to end up about babies, pregnancy, the risks and hopes involved.  I didn’t tell her about Sadie until we’d passed about six months this way.

By text.

I kind of cringe just remembering it. I had taken a few days off of work unexpectedly because of a particularly bad time – sleeplessness, low moments, etc. One of the extended dark periods that, thankfully, happen less and less these days. It went something along the lines of, “I’m not sure if you know this, but this Really Bad Thing happened to us about two years ago, etc.” 

I rank it on the awkward scale alongside those instances when some asshole goes on and on asking me why I don’t have children, and how I should really have children, because children, you know they’re the best thing to ever happen to you.  And in my mind every time I scream at him that I know all of that and more, including what it’s like to have your entire concept of what life means ripped away in the instant you watch your precious child die.

In person it usually goes a little differently.

This time I was the asshole.  Her response came back much later, very oh my god I’m so sorry I’ve been talking all this time is my pregnancy affecting you oh my god I’m so sorry, etc. etc and etc. 

Eventually, after a bit of a clumsy transition, our conversations morphed to include my experience with pregnancy, birth, newborns. She asks me questions that never include the how or why, but seek advice about gas and air or the trials of breastfeeding instead.  And I’m content with that.  I am a mother too, after all.

I probably could have gone on without ever telling her.  But that day it just felt so overwhelming, keeping up the act.  The fact that there was this huge big part of me that I wasn’t being honest about – especially something that affects me so profoundly – just got to be too much.  I feel as though I’m doing Sadie an incredible injustice when I don’t acknowledge her, purely to save other people from being uncomfortable. There is a time and place for most things, of course. But I can’t make a habit of avoiding the truth about this little person who changed my life forever with her own painfully short one.

And now this woman and I have moved on. Maybe it helps explain me more. I’m sure it reminds her how precious a gift she’s been given. 

.::.

What about you? Do you immediately share your story when someone asks you if you have children, or how many you have?



chance encounter

“We’re 30 minutes early – we didn’t realise how quickly we’d get here. We’re happy to go sit in a café if that’s easier?”

I’m put on hold for a minute and a half while he makes a call from another line.

“Mrs. M no, its fine, the vendor is more than happy to show you the house herself. She just wanted me to let you know that it’s her son’s feeding time so you may be on your own if he’s fussy.”

.::.

Another Victorian row house, another new and unfamiliar neighbourhood. Another reminder of just how big that ocean is between us and the nearest family member.

Three years ago I would have been in a tailspin at the thought of making this decision on our own. Now, having proven what we can survive together it’s almost… exhilarating, to be experiencing a major life change that does not involve major heartbreak.

.::.

A lovely and very English woman in her mid thirties shows us the front room before we hear a gurgle and the thwack of a sippy cup hit the floor. 

“That’s Alex, I should just check on him quickly. He might be hungry, he might not.”

I’m closest to the door and find myself heading towards the next room uninvited.  In the bright white kitchen a blonde haired cherub looks up at me from his high chair. His instant toothless grin is like a tractor beam. I’m at his side before I realise I had moved. Six months old, chubby folds in all the right places, barefoot and happier than anything. His entire face is a wet smile and eyes full of joy.

“Well hello, Little Man!”

An even bigger smile from both of us and our eyes are locked.

“Why don’t I just take him with us – it’ll be easier. I think he likes you! He’s such a little ladies man already!”

And then it happened. I gave his fat little leg a pat and held out my index finger to welcome his super grip. He bounced in his mother’s arms and waved my hand back and forth, back and forth.

I would have bought the house right there and then had she agreed to throw him in with the deal.

.::.

I haven’t even been near a baby in just over two years and two months. The last time I held Sadie she wasn’t my baby anymore. I wish so many of us here didn’t how firsthand how life changing that is.  I certainly didn’t expect that little Alex would make me laugh so purely with his unadulterated exuberance at the sight of my smile. Wee little hand, huge flood of… what? Relief? Happiness? Hope? Maybe all of the above.

.::.

What was your first experience with another child after your loss? How soon was it? How did it make you feel?



just time

On the anniversary of Sadie’s death I received an email from a woman I befriended through our antenatal class, whose boy would have been turning two around the same time.

I was surprised that she remembered until it occurred to me that she must on some level associate her son’s birthday with Sadie’s death, considering our children were born only a week or so apart, and that we were fairly close at the time.  She expressed her sympathy and went on to vaguely mention that she had suffered three losses over the past year herself.

Three losses over the last year. Under normal circumstances my reaction would have been instantly and deeply empathetic. Instead, all I could think of was, “Wow. They probably started trying for baby number two when he was just twelve months old.”  My mind clicked through the math, calculating the age difference between her and I. 

I’ve turned into a bit of an age-obsessed person who can’t see past her own poorly-constructed maternal guessing game.  “How old do we think she is?” (Oh yes, it is the royal we inside my head.) “How old are her kids?”  Five points if she’s older with just one. Two if she’s younger with more than one. And, “You lady, you get me twenty points for being obviously over 40 with a toddler!”

I’ve been working flat out for the past six months, pulling hours that looking back, I’m not entirely sure how I pulled off. All toward an end goal that I’m now on the cusp of; a career opportunity I didn’t even know I had enough drive to want, let alone get.  Every week that passes seems to include blowing off the gym, missing a deadline here at Glow, or bailing on a night out with the girls.  And of course, procreating. Instead of re-jigging my priorities or adding “Try Again” to my strategic objectives list, I cower, digging my head into the sands of avoidance even deeper.

I’m 33 next month. There’s nothing dire about that.  Women have long been fed the notion that 35 should be considered our Best Before date. Yet everywhere around me I watch as others are laughing in the face of that idea as they start their families in their late thirties and early forties. So why have I been punishing myself all this time, calling myself weak (and much worse) when no one else could hear it?

Does time tick by in the same way for the babylost as it does for the rest of the world? After wreaking so much internal havoc on myself, pressure where perhaps pressure wasn’t due, I can’t help but wonder if I haven’t taken exactly the right path in my healing. Lately I feel myself paying attention to things that I haven’t in the past. Realising strengths exist in me that I wouldn’t ever have believed a year ago. Perhaps this indirect route back to Me will be the best one in the end, I still don’t know.

.::.

What personal checks do you go through when you know you’re putting too much pressure on yourself to grieve in the right way, or in the right timeframe?

What part did time and your age play in making the decision (if you have) to try again?