Mother's Day

Today it is Mother's Day.  Our baby boy, Wolfgang, went to be in heaven at just 5 days old last Thursday.  We held his memorial service yesterday. 

I still feel compelled to write.

Since the birth of Wolfie things were a blur of hope, doctors, crying, wheelchairs, hugging and holding on to one another, beeping and chiming monitors going off all over the NICU, despair, nurses, taking in the sights/feel/smell/warmth of our son, finding it uncomfortable to neither sit nor stand as I heal, anger, spending time with family members, guilt, reading all the amazing prayers and support from our friends, and thankfulness.

The body.

Sometimes in the quiet when we were at home, when my heart had settled from the chaos of the day and the enjoyment of spending time with our precious one at the hospital, I would lament and cry because... and I'm not sure I can ever do this feeling any real justice... well, I would literally feel like every cell in my body knew that a baby was supposed to be there... in my arms, within arms reach.   Even my pinky toe would sort-of ache...an emotional ache.  The kind of strange physical thing you might hear about when someone has an organ transplant from another person and then suddenly has new urges or new cravings (as if their tissue carried with it life experiences)... that kind of ache.  It's in all my tissues.  My body says, "Something is missing here" and it cries out uncontrollably.

Still though, I feel my body healing.  The last week has felt like three.  I have to remind myself that only a week has passed.  I think I'm healing very well for it only being a week.  The birth was hard, he was a big boy.  I pulled all my neck muscles and experienced a full-body soreness I haven't felt since the day after I started an intense fitness bootcamp.  But every day gets a little better, and every day I can count more physical blessings. 

The mind.

God is good.  I am so crazy blessed with good friends, good family, a loving and caring man of God for a husband.  Without these, my mind would suffer.  There is a big difference between suffering and pain.  I am not suffering.

I won't pretend, however, that everything is completely kosher in my mind.  We all have dark voices inside that like to try to sway our nerve.  In these days mine sometimes try to ease their greasy fingers into the door, to open it wider, to make me hear or think that some part of this was my fault.  To make me think there was something I could have done differently to save my son.  Some other choice I could have made.  Some other way I could have been.  Who of you wouldn't trade in anything... anything in the world... to keep your child?  No birth plan, c-section scar, terrible birth experience, amount of pain,  embarrassment... nothing... nothing would have kept me from choosing to have him.  I don't care about any of that stuff because I would have gladly given it all up to save him.   And then my mind is put to ease, I am reminded that no matter what I do, or have done, it isn't up to me.  God's will is most powerful.  I did the very best I could do.  I guess I did more than some expectant mothers would do.  Last night, in a conversation, I was reminded of all the women who are so careless with their pregnancies.  Who don't value the gift they've been given.  Who drink heavily or don't eat well.  Who smoke crack or otherwise consciously choose put their precious baby in danger.  Some of them still have beautiful, healthy babies.  It isn't fair.  But it isn't up to me.

Dear friends, don't worry.  Ben and I are sure to seek some grief counseling.  I am told that guilt is a perfectly normal emotion to experience during the loss of a child.  It's just my mind trying to find a way out, a place of blame, a resting place so it can stop churning, stop seeking.  I don't honestly blame myself, but at times I do feel weak... I guess it's to be expected... and that's Ok as far as I'm concerned.

The spirit.

During the memorial service we took communion.  Ben and I received first and then sat down.  I was in a slight daze.  I gazed at Wolfie's pictures on his little shrine and thought hard about his little soul.  For a while at the hospital I imagined it hovering above his body, listening to us sing to him and read to him.  Feeling every kiss and touch.  There in the middle of the service, I felt him somehow high above me, but reaching down, like a little thread draping down... or reaching through... neatly weaving little stitches in the middle of my soul.  Sewing us together forever.  I leaned in closer to my husband's shoulder, and I also felt the stitches connecting me to him tug a bit tighter, pulled by an Almighty hand...all the seams becoming stronger.       

Our friends in the communion line kept coming... and coming... and coming.  Just when I thought, "Surely the line must be getting to the end," it kept coming still.   I hadn't really looked behind myself to assess just how many people were there for Wolfie... for us.  We had entered the sanctuary earlier but the measure of everyone's support for us in that moment had yet to hit me until the fog of my mind had lifted just enough to absorb it.  The love... the support... the outpouring of everyone's heart... my God... we felt it all.  We feel it all.  It wraps us in blessed comfort such that I have never experienced before.  Everyone remarked at how "strong" we were being.  No... we were being strengthened... by all of you.  Every prayer, every thought, every kind word, every hug,  we breathe it all in.  They have nourished our souls.

The road.

One day at a time right now.  I cannot tell what life holds for us now.  We sit and listen to records, we talk, we eat, we sleep, we spend time with loved ones.  For now, that's about all we can do.  Eventually we will celebrate, we will indulge, we will venture out, we will dance, we will not feel the sting of loss as incredibly sharp as it grabs us now.

I'll leave you with a quote I'm stealing from another friend's blog... because I feel that it completely describes... well...  everything.

"We do not have to die to arrive at the gates of Heaven.  In fact, we have to be truly alive.  The practice is to touch life deeply so that the Kingdom of God becomes a reality."

-THICH NHAT HANH (from Living Buddha, Living Christ)