Winter/Holiday/New Year's 7x7 From Glow in the Woods

I suspect most of you read the babyloss blog "Glow in the Woods." This month's questions for mamas to answer were recently posted on their site; my answers are here:

1 | Welcome to 2009. What have you left behind in the year just past? What do you hope to find in the year to come?

I've left behind my hope of having another child. I turn 40 this year, and as much as I want another baby, I'm too frightened to try again. And getting too old, and a dozen other things. I've had a terrible time accepting that the baby making years are over for me, but they are. I'll miss them more than I ever thought possible.

What do I hope to find? Peace. A connection. Me.

2 | We've just come through the season in which our culture touts cheer and peace and family togetherness rather relentlessly. How did your child's death impact your experience of the "holiday" season, personally or culturally?

Ben died the day before New Year's Eve, and was born NYEve morning. The holidays suck. And yet they don't, because I have two little ones, alive and well, who bring their joy into my life, their excitement about Santa, presents, candles, secrets and surprises. But this time of year I'm 100 times more aware of what I'm missing than all the other months of the year. The silence this time of year...the silence of the snowy winter landscape, the silence from family members, who won't say his name - and, oh, I could complain bitterly about this, and have, about wondering what they think, do they remember, why the hell they can't say his name.... If they only knew how much it hurt.

3 | If you celebrate in any way through December, are there ways you include or acknowledge your lost baby/babies?

We have an ornament with his name on it that we put on our tree. We light a candle on the day of his death, a candle given to us for his funeral, lit only once a year. We give money in his name to charity. It's not enough, not for me, not for my husband. But what else can we do?

4 | Through the year are there any holidays, seasons, or parts of what were once cherished rituals that have changed for you because of your child's death?

Christmas and New Year, obviously. New Year might as well not even happen - it's just the marking of one more year further away from Ben. All the holidays are different without him, wondering what might have been, what he would be like now, wondering what life would be with him, instead of his little brother.

5 | Do you do anything to remember your baby/babies' birth and/or death day? Or will you?

Not much. We light his candle, give money to charity, but we grieve silently and alone.

6 | Is there anything about the winter season (for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere right now) that lifts your spirits? Is there anything that especially brings them down?

Christmas brings me down and lifts me up. Because of the babies I have with me, who saved me from complete despair, the lights, the presents....

7 | During your hardest times, how have you found your way forward

One foot in front of the other. Cleaning like a maniac. Cursing at the top of my lungs. Moment by moment.

What I Really Want

I just want people to say his name.

(And yes, there are people in my house not saying his name today, and it hurts.)

Five Years

Today, five years ago. I sat in my living room, trying to eat some lunch my friend kindly made me, waiting for 6 p.m., waiting to return to the hospital I'd only just left, to deliver my first son. Preparing--as if you could ever prepare--to come home without him.

The poem below doesn't relate to stillborn babies, but the last line slides through my mind from time to time, as it has done for the last 15 years or so, since I first heard of (and briefly met), the poet, Seamus Heaney. He's Irish and has a way with words I envy. This poem gripped me the first time I read it, wrapped a hand around my heart and squeezed. I couldn't imagine, then, the loss of which it spoke.

Last night, before sleep, I thought of a friend of mine, E., dead for nearly 18 years now, whose youngest son was killed at the age of 16 in a car accident, in the week between Christmas and New Year. His name was Thomas, which was--is--Ben's middle name. I had a crush on Tommy, harbored secret dreams of marrying him when we grew up. People have pointed out to me that maybe that first angel, Tommy, led me to give my own angel, Ben, his second name. I don't know. But the timing...of their deaths, and those memories. I don't know. But last night, I thought of his mother, who I loved dearly, and pictured me, now, going back through the years to her, hugging her, both of us crying, and telling her, "Now. Now I understand."

I'm rambling, I know, full of thoughts I can't complete. Today, I remember, like every day. And long for what I'll never have.

Watch out for the poem's last line - I think it will grab your heart, too, and clench it with a mighty fist.

Mid-Term Break

I sat all morning in the college sick bay
Counting bells knelling classes to a close,
At two o'clock our neighbours drove me home.

In the porch I met my father crying--
He had always taken funerals in his stride--
And Big Jim Evans saying it was a hard blow.

The baby cooed and laughed and rocked the pram
When I came in, and I was embarrassed
By old men standing up to shake my hand

And tell me they were "sorry for my trouble,"
Whispers informed strangers I was the eldest,
Away at school, as my mother held my hand

In hers and coughed out angry tearless sighs.
At ten o'clock the ambulance arrived
With the corpse, stanched and bandaged by the nurses.

Next morning I went up into the room. Snowdrops
And candles soothed the bedside; I saw him
For the first time in six weeks. Paler now,

Wearing a poppy bruise on the left temple,
He lay in the four foot box as in a cot.
No gaudy scars, the bumper knocked him clear.

A four foot box, a foot for every year.

--Seamus Heaney

Just Because

Because there are 528 things currently not getting done in my house and life - the basement renovation that was supposed to end last week, the 10 hours I spent painting the basement this weekend, the carpet that is not getting installed tomorrow but instead on Thursday when I can't actually be home - and the Christmas cards, the wrapping, the baking, the tidying up of this infernal mess that is my home.... I give you a poem by May Sarton:

Now I Become Myself

Now I become myself. It's taken
Time, many years and places;
I have been dissolved and shaken,
Worn other people's faces,
Run madly, as if time were there,
Terribly old and crying a warning,
"Hurry, you will be dead before..."
(What? Before you reach the morning?
Or the end of the poem is clear?
Or love safe in the walled city?)
Now to stand still, to be here,
Feel my own weight and density!
The black shadow on the paper
Is my hand; the shadow of a word
As thought shapes the shaper
Falls heavy on the page, is heard.
All fuses now, falls into place
From wish to action, word to silence,
My work, my love, my time, my face
Gathered into one intense
Gesture of growing like a plant.
As slowly as the ripening fruit
Fertile, detached and always spent,
Falls but does not exhaust the root,
So all the poem is, can give,
Grows in me, to become the song;
Made so and rooted so by love.
Now there is time and Time is young.
O, in this single hour I live
All of myself and do not move.
I, the pursued, who madly ran,
Stand still, stand still, and stop the sun.

Giving Thanks, Giving Back

In the spirit of my last post, and in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I thought I'd direct you to another website you may already have heard of. It's been around for a number of years now, and I've been clicking on it almost daily. It's actually a group of sites: The Hunger Site, The Breast Cancer Site, The Child Health Site, The Literacy Site, The Rainforest Site and The Animal Rescue Site. By going there every day and clicking, site sponsors donate money to save the rainforest, feed hungry people and rescue animals, provide vaccinations and medicine for needy children, provide mammograms for low-income women, and give books to underprivileged children.

All you have to do is click. How radical is that?

All the site also have awesome shops, with many fair trade and hand crafted items, including some absolutely gorgeous jewelry (dangerous for me to look at!), Burt's Bees products, clothing, and much, much more. I love to do holiday shopping on these sites; every purchase funds more help for those in need. If I'm going to spend my money anyway, I'd like to know I'm not simply buying into my nation's rampant consumerism, I'm also doing some good.

One thing in this life I truly believe is that small actions can make big changes. Join me in taking some of those small actions; it only takes a minute to make a difference.

Save the Children

I've mentioned Save the Children on my blog before as one of the charities my husband and I chose to send donations to--and have friends and family send donations to--in memory of Ben. This charitable organization helps mothers and children all over the world. Currently, Save the Children has a campaign called "Survive to 5," and, well, the name says it all.

From their website:
"Every year, more than 9 million children in the developing world die before they reach the age of 5. That means about 25,000 children under 5 are dying every day!

Many of these deaths are from preventable or treatable illnesses like pneumonia, diarrhea, malaria, measles and complications related to childbirth. Nearly four million of these deaths occur to newborns – babies less than one month old.

Most of the deaths could be prevented through low-cost health solutions. But making these effective, affordable solutions available to families living in poor, remote communities is the key challenge."

One large part of Save the Children's mission is to train community health workers to go out to impoverished towns and villages and make sure parents know that their children need vaccinations, give support to breastfeeding mothers, provide antibiotics for infection and bed nets to prevent malaria-carrying mosquito bites. This holiday season, I'm not going to ask you to make a monetary donation, though if you find it in your heart to do so, that's wonderful. You can go to Save the Children's website and, with a few simple clicks, send a letter to President-elect Obama, your senators and congresspeople to show your support for the Global Child Survival Act, which would expand funding for things like immunizations and medicine for those who need them.

If you're a knitter or crocheter, there is also a download available with patterns to knit baby hats, which Save the Children will give to newborns in need around the world.

Even though Ben is not here with me, I have much to be grateful for. I know just how lucky I am to live in the United States in the 21st century. There's a quote, I can't remember from whom, that goes something like, "For those to whom much has been given, much is required." And I agree. This is one of my ways of giving back, small as it may be. I truly believe small actions can change the world; little things add up to great big ones, and I want every child to have a decent shot at living a wonderful life.

Things They Don't Tell You

They don't tell you about the friends you will lose, nor do they tell you that the world will go on when your world has stopped. They don't tell you of the songs that will make you burst into tears five years later, entire CDs you can't listen to ever again. They don't tell you about the permanent ache you can't specify in this land without a map. There is no geographical place called the land of broken hearts, no mile marker to track your progress through grief...mile 2,892, mile 2,893....nearly there, almost done, destination reached. They don't tell you that you will become the grim reaper for expectant parents everywhere, you will be the last one they inform, the one they walk away from, hoping that it doesn't happen to them. They don't tell you that you will measure other's pain by your own, rightly or wrongly. They don't tell you what to do with the overwhelming, boundless love you are aching to give to one little person, spilling out of you with nowhere to go. If they are wise, they might tell you that the hole will never fill, and they will say that you will survive, somehow.

And you do. You survive, whether you want to or not. Whether you know how to survive, or not. You go on.