May 12th 2013 - My first Mother's Day

Today has been sad so far, like I anticipated. Many tears already and I feel at a moments notice they could start again.
I have done well to stay off facebook for the most part today, but can't help but think about all those mothers doing I should be doing today. It breaks my heart to not have Liam here right now. 

When I woke up in Liam's room today (after a migraine and needing quit) I pictured the day starting out like this:
Brad would have gotten Liam up and fed while letting me sleep in for a bit. He would have brought my little into the bedroom and set him on my belly to wake me up. I imagine Liam would have been smiling, laughing, and drooling all over me. Brad would make breakfast and we would eat together. Then Brad would have gotten Liam dressed and the diaper bag ready to give me some extra time before church.
We would have gone to church together, then picked a place outside for family pictures. We would have all color coordinated I am sure, and after Brad got some good pics of Liam and I, I would have gotten some good family ones. I imagine by then I would have gotten pretty good at using a tripod and remote to take pictures we could all be in at the same time.
Then we may have sat outside to eat somewhere or had lunch at home. Liam would have laid down for a nap and we may have dozed too. Then I am sure when Liam woke up we would have skyped with family to hello and send mother's day wishes around the country.
Then perhaps a walk on the beach and play time together before dinner. Brad would have given Liam a bath and gotten him ready for bed and we would have all read stories before tucking him in.
The hand and footprint card that Brad would have made from Liam for me would be hanging on the fridge, soon to be framed. The cards and flowers wishing me a happy mothers day would be sitting on the kitchen table and I would laying in bed reflecting on the perfect first mother's day with my 8 month old baby boy Liam.
AAAHHHH, sigh. What a glorious day that would have been. 

May 11th 2013 - Mother's Day

I have been thinking about Sunday, and in a lot of ways, dreading the day for quit sometime now. Although no one is forcing me to write about the day, I know it's good for me to sit and allow myself to think about it. I have still been, however, avoiding it thus far. 

It took a long time for me to acknowledge that I am truly a mother. This Sunday I will grieve the motherhood that I never got a chance to experience with Liam beyond the pregnancy. 
I know I am a mother, a mother who lost her baby. Everyone tells me what a great mother I was to Liam and how lucky he was to have me. But I don't feel like it. I go back and forth about feeling guilty for what happened to Liam. That there was something I have done to prevent it or change the outcome. Untimely however, I know that what happened to Liam was out of my control. But it's still hard to think that I was the best mother I could have been too and for Liam when it wasn't enough to save him. I wish I could have done more. In some ways I feel like I failed him. No one is putting that on me, but me. It's just that when I feel like I am the one carrying him and untimely responsible for him then it all falls on me.
Bottom line, when I stare at his picture and think about him so helpless, it breaks my heart that I couldn't have helped him. That he didn't do anything to deserve or warrant this. It breaks my heart for him. 

A year ago at this time Brad was on his first civilian deployment, but third overall deployment overseas. I was home in Iowa staying with my parents and Brad sent me a flowers and a mother's day card. I also received one from my parents. It was surreal to read them and think that I was actually going to be a mother. At that time I envisioned my first mother's day as something totally different than how it will really be tomorrow. 
I had thought perhaps Brad would have used Liam's little hands and feet to make me a mother's day card that I would stick on the fridge for awhile and then display in a scarp book. That we would dress up and go to church together as a family, get some pictures, and cook out at home or go out to brunch. then spend the day playing and enjoying one another. 
That I would be wearing the badge of motherhood proudly. The snot on my shoulder, food in my hair, bags under my eyes. Unfortunately, the only badge of motherhood I wear now are a few unwelcome reminders of delivery, empty arms, and a broken heart.

This Sunday I will be celebrating the amazing mothers in my life, but am so saddened that I do not have my son here to celebrate his mother. It's one of those weird "how did come to this" moments. One of those moments when I really stop to think about how deeply I miss Liam and it washes over me so intensely that suddenly I feel like I am drowning in despair.

This Sunday I plan on staying home with Brad, perhaps never getting out of my pj's and just "being". I don't want to go to church and torture myself with the mother's day sermon. It was hard enough seeing all the families in their cute outfits at Easter. I know it's just a day to focus on mothers and in all other ways it's just another day. So part of me wonders if my dreading the day and how I will feel is all brought on myself. But none the less, it's a day I would be participating in, had Liam been here. But, he is not, and it f****** sucks. So I am going to allow myself a day to just sit and be in the suck. To feel it and try to happy myself up. 

Momma loves and misses you dearly Liam!

May 9th - 8 months old

It's been 8 months since Liam died. The reality of him being gone has been my reality now for almost as long as the reality of him being alive and preparing for life with him.

It's weird to think that he has been gone now for almost as long as he was with us (me being pregnant with him). Soon he will have been gone longer than the time that he was here and that breaks my heart.

When I think about Liam now, I picture Brad sitting on the hospital bed next to me and holding Liam. My mom and brother were standing at my bedside and we were all looking at Liam for the first time. Examining every part of his body and commenting on what he looked like. That is what I think of right now when I think of Liam. I don't think about my pregnancy, or what he looked like on the ultrasound, or feeling him move inside me. That to me isn't reality, because he was alive then and he isn't anymore. Reality to me is seeing him in his perfection, yet lifeless.

Talking about Liam in past tense has been my reality for almost as long as talking about him in present and future tense was. In some ways I have gotten use to this new reality and accept it to be the new norm for me. The new norm in the sense that this is what, and how, it is and always will be for me. I have gotten to the point where I don't close my eyes and imagine that I am still pregnant and ready for him to be born any day. Or think I will wake up and it will have all been a bad dream. I am not in denial about it even though there are days I still can't believe it all went the way it did.

I don't have as many "I can't believe he is really gone" moments, mostly because I have lived through 8 months of him being gone. Time has a way of showing us reality, and squashing all our hopes of how things could have, should have, and maybe will turn out different. I know this, because for the past 8 months I have woken up to the same reality, my son is dead.

This has been my reality for the past 8 months, and always will be my reality for days, years, and a lifetime to come. It will change slightly as time goes on, but yet, will stay the same. Even when I become pregnant and have another baby, Liam will still be gone. Nothing is ever going to change the fact that Liam is dead, and I am never going to hold him or see him again here on this earth. I will go through more pregnancies excited yet petrified, happy yet sad. I will (God willing) one day celebrate the birth of another baby and live out all the joys that that precious life will bring. But that doesn't change the fact that every time I think about Liam, and picture him in my mind, the reality will stay the same. I will see Liam's beautiful characteristics of both Brad and I, my precious baby boy. I will see him in all his perfection, yet lifeless.

April 8th 2013 - Anchor

As I am reading this morning from the book "Empty cradle broken heart" and "Holding onto Hope" I am reflecting on my own emotions, grief, Liam, and God.

I read a quote in "holding onto hope" that says, "Hope is symbolized in Christian iconography by an anchor. And what does an anchor do? It keeps the ship on course when the winds and waves rage against it. But the anchor of hope is sunk in heaven, not on earth."

Gregory Floyd-A grief unveiled

This is an affirmation of sorts for me. I am reminded about a verse that someone emailed me or put in a card after Liam died. "For I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, but plans to give you hope and future."

It's a verse I know all to well and have clung to many times in my life.

However, at a time when I am confused, frustrated, and even angry at God, this verse just doesn't sit well with me.

I think to myself, "Liam never had hope of a future. He never had the opportunity to live out those plans that God had for him. Does that mean God never had plans for Liam? Liam never had a future on this earth, he never had a chance. I really struggle with that, especially knowing God's promises are true, and that his word will never return void. So I asked my high school youth pastor about it.

He brought up a very good point and shed some light onto this verse for me. This verse isn't specifically talking about life on earth. It's referring to heaven. The hope and a future God is talking about is eternal life. In that sense Liam does have hope and a future, he is living that out right now with the father in heaven.

It's easy for me (and for a lot of people) to only see the here and now and be fixated on this earthly life. Sometimes it's hard for me to see what eternity looks like with Liam when I am so sad and disheartened about him not sharing this lifetime with me. I could only see that verse for what I thought it had to say about living here on earth, not in heaven.

It makes me realize that so much of my vision, thoughts, and attention are truly on the here and now. But God wants us to be fixated on heaven and eternity. He has put eternity in the hearts of men. We are never fully satisfied here because we are not at home here. This is but a brief moment in the grand scheme of things. My hope isn't just in having another baby (a living baby) and having that dream fulfilled in my life. It's not just about having a family, my hope is about heaven, the long term.

My focus should be on advancing the kingdom of God. Should be in wanting a deeper relationship with God and not just because I want the blessings that God has for me on this earth, but because of what is to come. I need to expand my view and see the big picture, look beyond a few years down the road and see eternity in everything I do. In the people I meet. See eternity in Liam.

I will always grieve a life never lived on this earth, but I can celebrate a life that will be spent together for longer than this one.

I need to place my anchor in heaven and not on things of this world. there is where my heart and life are!

April 3rd 2013 - I AM

I AM....

I am a mother, I am the mother of a still born baby. I am Liam Michael Felty's mother. I am the mother of a perfectly healthy baby boy. I am the mother of a full term baby bot. I am the mother of a baby that died. I am a mother with empty arms. I am a grieving mother. I am a hurting mother.

My faith has gotten me through this tragedy thus far. My husband, friends, and family that have supported, encouraged, prayed for, cried with, and been there for me have helped me to walk through the grief of losing Liam. My faith and strong support system have helped to get me through, but that doesn't mean it doesn't still hurt, that it isn't still hard, or that there aren't days that nearly knock me out. Having a strong faith in God keeps me going, but it doesn't make it easier. It doesn't automatically take the pain away.

Does the fact that I can still have a good day, still laugh with friends and family, still enjoy moments, or continue to make memories, does that make me strong. I don't know. Does that make it seem like I have all it together, maybe. But it doesn't mean I do. Does it mean I am over loosing Liam, hell no! Does it mean that I don't still think about him, or that I am not still saddened by his loss, NO. Does it mean that time really does heal all things and the further we get away from September 9th, 2012 the easier it gets, definitely not!

I will grieve looking Liam until the day that I die. I will think about my son everyday for the rest of my life. Even after I have more children, I will still look at kids, boys, men that are Liam's age and wonder and be saddened by all that could have and should have been. Although the sun does still shine through the clouds in my life, the storms still roll in. Perhaps I am truly learning to dance in the rain, as they say. But you can't always avoid the lightening strike.

The fog of Liam's death always surrounds me and always will. It's like Pastor Rick said "It will always be there, for the rest of your life. But sometimes it will be thicker than others." Sometimes that fog is so thick I can't see my own feet in front of me. Other times I can carry on down the road.

As I lay here now in our pseudo nursery, crib taken down and put in the closet, air mattress back out. Liam's clothes, blankets, and stuffed animals packed away in boxes. Diapers tucked away in the drawer, books closed on the shelf. Stroller and car seat wrapped up and put in the attic. Swing folded away. Bouncy seat, high chair, and baby both never been opened or used. The wooden letters "L I A M" and empty picture frames set aside. All I can do is lay here and cry. There isn't a damn thing I can do to change my circumstances. Liam is gone and he is never coming back, and it breaks my heart and hits me to my very core. It angers me, saddens me, and frustrates me.

I miss Liam so deeply, I ache to hold and kiss him.

I would give anything to have his here with me. Part of my heart will always be missing.

I have been robbed of the joys that being a mother entails.

Yet, I am still a mother. I am the mother of still born, I am Liam Michael Felty's mother.

March 31st 2013 - Easter

Each holiday has taken on a new meaning and perspective since we lost Liam, and Easter is no exception.

Today as my mother and sister go to put flowers on Liam's grave, I am reminded of the hope and assurance we have through Christ of one day seeing Liam again.

Death here on earth is very painful (to say the least) for those left behind. But where oh death is your victory, your sting? It is lost in eternity. Today even more than my own salvation, I am thankful for the cross that affords me hope and assurance of spending eternity with my son.

I mourn and weep over Liam's grave, at a life never lived on this year, hopes and dreams vanished, and a piece of my heart ripped away from me. But my friend there is a grave, that today lay empty. And just as sure as He will turn our mourning into dancing, today we rejoice and celebrate a risen savior. One who has concurred over death for you, for me, for Liam, and all our loved ones gone.

He has set eternity in the hears of his people. Today and always, a piece of my heart awaits me in heaven. I know the deep pain and despair of loosing a child. How much more the father in heaven knows the pain of giving up his one and only son to die so that we might live again.

I didn't have a choice in loosing Liam. It's a heartache I wouldn't wish on my worse enemy, but it's something Christ chose and endured for us. It's beyond my comprehension and something I am eternally grateful for.

Today, celebrate life. Life lost to be found again, celebrate life resurrected, eternal life. All because Jesus came, died, and rose again.

March 12th 2013 - A year of firsts

This is and is going to continue to be a year of firsts. All the firsts that should have been this year with Liam, and all the first that are, without him.

This year isn't unlike any other in the sense that I have spent Christmas, New Years, Valentines Day, and coming up on St. Patrick's Day without children. It's not like we had a child for those holidays last year and now we don't. In that sense they are no different. But, it's what was suppose to be that changes everything. Not only because we got pregnant and knew a baby was on the way, but because we actually held a full term baby in our arms. I gave birth to a baby at 37 weeks and 1 day. Lot's of babies survive at shorter gestational ages than that.

I saw Liam in his perfection, all his features, his complete and whole body. So those "firsts" that should have been seems all the more real because I was so close to it. I was so close to that dream becoming a reality, so close to getting to see Liam's personality come alive and watch him grow and change. Yet, instead of a year of first hugs, smiles, kisses, waves, rolling over, trying food, going to the beach, crawling, cooing, bathing, going to Iowa, walking, new years, v-day, laughing, talking...instead of experiencing all that with Liam for the first time, it's, the first car ride with an empty car seat, the first baby dedication at church that our family should have been a part of, the first thanksgiving he was suppose to be at, the first Christmas of his life, the first trip to Iowa we took that he was suppose to be with us, him wearing his hawkeye gear and watching the football games. The milestones, like what should have been him turning 6 months old, him being in his first ever Glynn family St. Patties Day parade. The list goes on and on. I will experience the year of firsts both living in the present and everyday thinking about the firsts that should be happening and everyday thinking about the first s that should be happening.

This time of year the milestones are getting harder to pass. The time in Jan when I had gotten pregnant and were telling immediate family came and went and I thought about it but it wasn't an overwhelmingly sad day. This time last year however, I was home in Iowa. I was 12 weeks along so Brad and I felt comfortable sharing our exciting news with extended family. I told lots' of family at the hooley and several cousins and I were talking at the parade about how next year (meaning now) I would have a kiddo in the parade. It was something that was so hard to fathom, yet at the same time I could picture every detail about it and it was beyond exciting.

So this coming weekend when we are out here on the east coast and Liam isn't here to celebrate us, it's seems really hard.

Liam would have turned 6 months old last Thursday. That is a big milestone I feel like. Hard to believe in some ways he would have been that old already. Yet on the other hand it feels like so long ago sine I held him and rubbed his feel, and traced his face with my finger that it almost seems like a dream.

Aaron was in CR on Friday and stopped by Liam's grave. He text us to let us know he was there. It was so sweet of him to stop and meant a lot to us.

Brad and I were talking about it at dinner that night and we both started crying. I told Brad that seeing Aaron type that he was at Liam's grave just hit me like a ton a bricks. I mean I know Liam is gone, I was at his burial, I helped design his marker. I have been there to see it, yet, for some reason seeing the words "Liam's grave" just seemed so final, sad, and gut retching. And yet at this same time of year when Easter is around the corner. I am reminded again of God's overcoming death. After loosing Liam I am even more thankful for God overcoming death.  Liam's death makes what Jesus did seem more real to me. I have always known I would die someday (it's not something I think about often) and that I would go to heaven. I always knew that Jesus made that possible for me, but since I think of Liam so often and know he is in heaven, I think about heaven more often and I am more excited tat I get to go there and see him. I am aware more often and Jesus death, his resurrection, heaven, and being there one day. Easter this year like Christmas has taken on a whole new meaning for me.

Part of my heart, part of me is up there. I understand how Jesus all the more yearns to be with us for eternity cause part of his heart is down here on earth. And as painful as it was for me to hold and see my son dead in my arms and have to send him away and bury him. How much more painful was it for the father in heaven to send his one and only son to die on the cross. It's like Cory said "few people in the world will ever know love and loss like this." We have caught but a glimpse as to what the father in heaven when through. All the more that God knows exactly what I am going through and how I feel because he himself lost his son. But his son was raised from the dead, just as I will one day be reunited with Liam And oh, what a glorious day that will be. I am reminded of an old song....

"When we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be. When we all, we all see Jesus, we'll sing and should the victory."

February 2013

                     "We can't let the devil validate our fear, give them any credit, or let us think they are warranted."

Thinking that maybe I just wasn't ready to be a mother.  I didn't have that motherly instinct to know that something was wrong or that motherly intuition about Liam.

I am mad the doctors didn't see the red flag, but then again, neither did I.

Everyone telling me my whole experience at the hospital isn't normal and is awful care. Great, why did it happen to me. I feel like I picked the wrong doctors and got the ghetto care, ugh!

I feel like I am nervous about something going wrong with the next pregnancy and yet I am scared everything will go right. What if....what if I actually take home a baby next time. It's scary to think of the responsibility I will have of carrying a baby for 9 months, but also scary to think of taking care of an infant and knowing how to raise and protect them. What if our pediatrician sucks? 

I look at so many friends that are mothers. That were born mothers and have multiple kids with no problems. They know what to do and everything seems to come naturally to them. Not me.

I also feel like after Liam was born you feel very vulnerable and like everyone is in the know about your deepest feelings cause your living out your deepest fears. I felt transparent and not afraid to share. I craved deeper relationships and meaning to life.

Now I feel like that is wearing off. People say, and don't say the stupidest things and I am back to my shy, don't say anything to make waves self. I just not my head and smile, while I am bubbling up on the inside.

It's hard when people don't talk about or bring Liam up. Just an acknowledgment would be good.

February 2013 - My worst fear

My worse fear in life is something happening to my loved ones. After Liam's death that naive haven was broken and I fear someone else close to me dying.
It's like knowing that someone could break into your home, but never really thinking about it or thinking it could happen to you, until it does. After our home was broken into my freshman year of college, that safe haven for me was gone. That ignorance really is bliss was out the window. Now I hate being home alone at night.

Seeing other people and their "miracle" babies is hard for me. For the first time in my life I feel like I am being punished for something. Why did the blessings of God stop in my life? I have always felt blessed. I have always been provided for, have an amazing husband, friends, and family that you don't see everyday. I have often looked at other couples and families and thought, "we have something special, how did I get so lucky"?
Blessed to get pregnant after only two months and blessed with a good pregnancy. Then all of the sudden....BAM!!!! What was it? What did I do? I feel like it's something I did and if I don't figure it out and change it then something bad will keep happening to us.

How can I trust again? How can I trust God again with another baby when I prayed and trusted him for Liam and he took him away. What if I pray for the next baby and the same thing happens?
I am pissed that the joy is taken out of everything. That everything now is bitter sweet and peppered with sadness. 
I am sad for Liam's grandparents, aunts and uncles who were so excited for him. Seeing their pain hurts as well. It just sucks all around.

I am trying to learn to pray "God what do you want to show me and teach me through this"? Instead of praying the same prayer about God comforting me. The damage is already done, I may as well learn something from it and have some good come from it.

Suddenly I see all the greys and blues in the world and the sadness. Instead of seeing the yellows and pinks and the happiness.

February 2013

In the mist of my pain, anger, and frustration about Liam's death, everyone keeps telling me "you can be honest with God, he is big enough to handle your honesty and emotions." I totally agree, and feel comfortable voicing my opinion to God. That is not what I am struggling with, I am struggling with the all important question of "why" and "who" is ultimately responsible for my son's death. As humans I think it's natural to need to find someone to blame. We can't believe that everything "just happens". Something is making world go round, whether you believe in fate, karma, chance, coincidence, choice etc. 
I am reading the sequel to 'Heaven is for real', a book called 'Heaven changes everything'. In it, Todd Burpo (the author and pastor) explains a time when his son was on his death bed. Todd cried out in anger and desperation to God to save his son's life. 
Here are his thoughts:


So are we to assume that satan is behind everything 'bad' that happens in life? I know God will not give us more than we can handle. I know satan is always at work, just as God is. But ultimately God has the power to stop it, right? God had the power to save Liam. So why didn't he? Just like any business or organization, there is always a person who is the bottom line, the top of the heap, the ultimate say so. In life, and death, I believe that person is God. Is it wrong of me, or against everything I was taught as a child to look to God as the reason my son died and not satan? I don't think satan has that kind of power or authority to give and take life. So once again, how do you not play the blame game with God? I struggle with that, and how I am questioning the very foundational things that I have known to be absolutes in my life since I was a child.
I know God is always battling satan, but God always wins. People say "what the devil planned for evil, God can use for good", so did God allow satan to do this? The devil obviously planned this evil and God can turn it around for good, but come on. 
Everyone says that I will come out of this a stronger women, nothing I face in life will compare. I will learn so much from it. Well let me tell you, nothing that I could learn from this, or how this molds or shapes my life will ever warrant Liam dying for. Nothing in this life will ever justify his death. If God needed to teach or show me something why the hell didn't he just do it? He is God after all.

Mid February 2013

Grief

My grieving Liam is so different than any other person that I have lost in my lifetime. It's so different that I am not sure, nor are a lot of my friends and family sure, how exactly you deal, cope, and process this type of loss.

When I said good-bye to grandparents, classmates, my great great aunt, and friends family members etc. You are celebrating a life lived. You may grieve a life cut short or a person gone to soon, but you have memories that you will carry with you forever.

I remember after my great grandma Elsie's funeral, we sat around with my dad's family and everyone went around the room and shared a story about grandma. We laughed and cried and those are the things that help you grieve. You can look back fondly on memories, you remember things they taught you, showed you, and shared with you throughout your life. Those are the things you carry with you. Those are the parts of them that live on forever in the hearts and memories of the loved ones they leave behind.

I don't have any memories of Liam alive. I never got to know his personality or what kind of kiddo he would be. If he would have been more involved with sports or more musically inclined. If he would have been really outgoing and active, or more reserved and intellectual. Would he have pushed the boundaries, or been more of a ruler follower? I will never know. I don't have any of the "remember when Liam...." or "He always use to say...." In that sense I feel like I have nothing to hold onto. Even the 9 months I was blessed to have him in my life, watching him move on the monitor, or feel him kick and poke inside my stomach. Hearing his heartbeat, it seems like a flash in the pan in the grand scheme of life. Just a short time of moments and memories is not much to hold onto until eternity.

I sat in his nursery for months envisioning and thinking about "what will it be like when we actually bring him, a human being home and put him in this bed, when I rock him to sleep at night, I feel him and change him..." Now I will never know.

Instead of the "what WILL it be like" I am faced with the "what WOULD it HAVE been like" Those aren't memories for me, they were merely dreams, and now they allude me. It's that feeling of trying desperately to run in a dream while you're being chased but feel like your moving through thick glue and can't get anywhere although your running as fast as you can. Or wen your right in the middle of the season changing game and it's all tied up, and then your TV goes out and you have no idea what's happening. Or when you're falling in dream and in a panic try to yell for help until you're jolted awake to realize it was only a dream. It's that question that never gets answered, that dream that never becomes a reality, the pain that never goes away, the game you never see the end of, your still running in slow motion.

So how do you grieve the death of a dream?

How do you mourn someone you never got to really meat?

How do you keep someone's memory alive who you never got to know?

How do you bring up and talk about your dead child when it makes everyone so uncomfortable?

How do you articulate how you feel when you know now one really understands?

I am not sad because of the memories and times spent with Liam that I will never have again. I am sad because of moments, memories, and times I never got to experience at all.

February 11th 2013

Surgery~

Tomorrow I am finally having surgery to fix some issues I have had since Liam was born.

The physical aftermath I have endured is like a constant reminder that I really gave birth to a child that is no longer here. It's like a cruel joke that I am still dealing with my body trying to heal 5 months later without any of the benefits of having my child with me today. As if my broken heart and my whole world being turned upside down isn't enough, my body still has to be broken as well.

It's like being kicked while your down.

I want to remember my pregnancy fondly, after all, it's the only real memories I have of Liam alive. Those happy times of feeling him move, hearing his heartbeat, and getting to see him on the monitors.

I want to remember Liam fondly, his soft skin, big feet, cute nose, long hair....

I don't want to remember that hospital stay and all the painful and dark moments it held for me. Each time I see a doctor in regards to the complications I am dealing with, it brings those dark memories flooding back.

It's a constant reminder that our experience wasn't the norm. Liam died from placental insufficiency that caused IUGR. We were told that happens in 1% of babies. The horrible patient care we received at the hospital the day Liam was born isn't, or at least shouldn't be the norm. Then the two doctors I saw a week after Liam was born said in their combined nearly 50 years of practice they had never seen the problem that I had after giving birth.

It's like winning the worlds worst lottery several times in one week. I guess I am just that lucky.

I am nervous for being put under tomorrow and the procedure itself, healing etc. I am also nervous for the flashbacks I feel like it will be me coming home from the hospital that Tuesday without Liam. The stitches, the butt pillow, all of it. I am ready to be 100% done and get this physical part behind me, so in that sense I can start to move forward.

Mid January 2013 - A mom?

It was only a year ago by a couple weeks (January 17th 2012) I was realizing I was pregnant and falling in love with our first baby.

Hard to believe that 2011 and 2012 both brought such drastic changes for us. 2011 brought Brad safely home from a year long deployment to Afghanistan, and us home house jumping until finally moving out east. 2012 brought joy beyond belief and excitement about the birth of our first baby, and the overwhelming news of his death.

It's amazing how life can change in a moment.

I have worn many hats in my life, but the one entitled "mother" is one that I still feel like eludes me.

Its hard to feel like a mother since pregnancy and delivery were the only part of that title I got the privilege of experiencing. Especially since I feel I wasn't even good at that part and seemingly failed at it since the whole point is taking a baby home from the hospital.

Seeing and hearing to many of my friends talk about the overwhelming love, joy, bottles, breastfeeding, etc just pisses me off. I was looking forward to connecting with women on that 'mom' level and now I feel like I don't belong in those conversations. It makes me happy when women are talking about pregnancy and ask me "did you experience that" It acknowledges that I did have a baby. I can only engage in those conversations through the delivery, then our life experiences take a drastic separation from each other.

I still understand the overwhelming love you have for a child. I remembering journaling about how I was scared about other relationships in my life and how they were going to change. I realized after seeing Liam for the first and only time that your love really does multiply like people say. I feel in love with Liam and feel more deeply in love with Brad at the same time. My love for Liam will never stop, although I desperately wish it could have kept growing as I got to know, love, and take care of him.

It's weird how you can experience two such deep and overwhelming emotions simultaneously, love and heartbreak.

I feel so much love for Liam, but I don't feel like I have earned, deserve, or carry the title of being a mother. Maybe it's my own subconscious because I feel so jaded and ripped off.

"If love could have saved you, you would have lived forever."

January 14th 2013

My brain, heart, and soul feel like a scrambled egg.

In the first weeks, even months after Liam's death, my emotional time was spent trying to absorb the fact that my son had died. I had to try to wrap my brain around the fact that the unthinkable had actually happened.

I got to as place where I could accept the reality of his death, not that I accept his death, just the fact that it happened. I came to terms with it for what it was.

Then it's the overwhelming sadness that all those day dreams will never become reality. I may not have accepted the new reality (my life without Liam) but it has barged it's way into my life regardless.

I went through many days of feeling guilty. Even though I know hine sight is 20-20 and looking back there are a million things I would do over again if I could. I know it wasn't my fault, although my heart and brain don't agree.

I then moved into the short phase of anger, at myself, God, the doctors and nurses, life, and anything else that may have had anything to do with his death.

I still have my wrestles with God and feel like Job. I may not visibly walk with a limp, but I am forever changed.

Over the holidays I had many moments of levity and laughter. Sometimes to the point of feeling guilty for having a moment of seemingly pure happiness.

I feel like those were clear and defined phases of this emotional journey, and now, now it's all scrambled.

I struggle now with feeling every emotion under the sun all in one day. Hell, all within a matter of minutes.

I can go from feeling "ok" about things and feeling like there are brighter days ahead, to feeling like I can't go on, to laughing and being happy, to overwhelming hear ache, to irate, to guilt, to feeling ready to have another baby right now, to feeling like I don't know if I could ever do it again, to feeling like I want to scream, to crying, to feeling a sense of release, to being totally confused and frustrated, to "ok", and back again.

All these emotions while life, time, and the world keep ruthlessly marching onward, it's tiring.

My brain wants to start thinking through everything at night when my body wants to rest. I can feel the tension start to mount and my head begins to hurt. Even now at 1:30am when I have a plane to catch 6:00am. Even typing all this out I found myself feeling jaded that this stress and pain is even a part of my life. Why did all this even have to happen. It's hard enough burying your own child, let alone dealing with all this long after.

I so badly just want to know what it is I am suppose to learn and take away from this. It can't possibly just be, your don died and that is it. I feel like this big, monumentous event happened in my life and it should drive some big, visible change. I know this even has changed me, but I have yet to find out how it will come to define me.

I feel like this is when I am suppose to join March of Dimes and fight the good fight. Team up with a cause, that this should drive me to great things. So far I feel nothing like that. I want, and desperately need Liam's' death to mean something, not just all be for not. Even though nothing in this life could ever being to justify his death.

It's like one of those things you read about "You ask God for peace and he gives you trials to teach you to be calm".

Well, this is one hell of a lesson.

      

December 24th 2012 - Christmas Eve

I toasted to Liam tonight at dinner at we all started crying. Cory looked at me and said that while he was holding Liam at the hospital for some reason he was singing the nursery rhyme "Humpty Dumpty" to himself. "All the kings horses and all the kings men couldn't put Humpty together again."

While he was praying on the airplane to Iowa he really felt God spoke to him as he was thinking again of that nursery rhyme. He said that we serve a Mighty God who is able and will put the broken pieces of our hearts back together and make us whole again.

He said he really truly believes that for us and just wanted to share that with us.

I was very thankful that he did.

December 20th 2013

It's been a tough week as I am putting together Liam's scrapbook. Already more memories, pictures, journal entries, and memorabilia than I thought we had for someone who was only with us for a brief moment. It breaks my heart looking back at a time when the world was as it should be. Liam was alive and we were joyfully looking forward to what the future held. I still find myself dreaming about what could have, what should have been. Not a day goes by that my heart doesn't physically ache over missing Liam.  Sometimes I can carry on and try to live in the moment for all it has to offer, as the world keeps quickly moving along. Other times, the sadness is more than I can bare. When I am done, all the will tangibly remain of Liam will fit into a 12X12 photo album, and a wooden keepsake box. But there are emotions, memories, and a special part of my son that I will carry with me wherever I go, and will always be a part of me. I am not sure yet how this tragic event in my life will define me, but I know it has forever altered and changed me.