Emotional Roller Coaster

Well, it has been quite a week. Last Saturday we went to visit our friends who had a baby while I was out of town. Their due date was 1 week exactly after ours. Not sure what to expect, we dropped Violet off at her grandparents and headed over. It was not emotional at all. I held the baby and it was fine. No problem. That was Saturday...

That night after we got home and put Violet to bed we talked a little about our day. One thing that my husband said stuck with me. He said that when we were talking with them about babies and normal behaviour (they have all the first time parent type questions) he was thinking that instead of remembering what Violet was like we should have been comparing (in a good way) our two babies. He's right. We went to bed early being exhausted but our neighbours were having a housewarming party. We live in a town home so some walls are shared. It is a 4 bedroom and they don't have kids so they turned the bedroom that shares a wall with our bedroom into a video game/guitar room. Finally at 1:30 am when the guitar was added to the music and games Ward banged on the wall (just like in college!) The noise quickly stopped.

After that I did not sleep well. I had so many crazy dreams about babies and losing babies my mind never settled down. I woke up in the morning feeling like I needed to go back to bed. Since Ward runs Sunday mornings I get up when Violet does. No extra rest for anyone!

Sundays are notoriously bad for me. Maybe I am making it worse by believing that but it has been true. Even at my parents church was hard. A girl I know from high school (who is friends with me on facebook and should know better if she paid any attention at all) asked if we were going to have more kids. I looked at her and said, "You know we had one in the summer, right?" She said, "Oh, I thought I saw something on facebook about that." And then something about waiting between kids which made it sound like the whole break between Violet and number 3 was my idea... People just don't know how to react.

Anyway, back to this week. I went to church feeling tired and beat up. I followed Violet around trying to compose myself. Then My friend with the baby walked in. Violet loves her so she ran over to see her and the baby. I lost it. I cried more than I have since the first couple weeks after we lost Oliver. My friend cried to. So here we are hugging and crying on what should have been her happy day bringing her daughter to church for the first time. I am so glad that she is understanding and that she feels some of our pain too.

Needless to say, we left church early that day. We stopped at the cemetery (Violet's first visit) and then went for a family lunch.

Since then Violet and I have been to visit the baby. Violet loves her so much. She stood and stared at her most of the time. She held her hand and kissed her. When the baby opened her eyes Violet yelled, "Hello!" It was so sweet. I know it would have been a little different having a baby around the house all the time. Violet did try to poke her in the eye and was climbing all over but it was SO cute. I am including a pic of myself, Violet, and Kacia.


It felt so nice to hold the baby. I think we are ready to start trying for number 3. Part of me wants to fast forward to the end of all of the trying and waiting but I know that is not how it works. Plus I am really (mostly) enjoying the stage Violet is at right now.

Oliver's Marker

Here is a picture of Oliver's marker. I mentioned in my last post that I was not sure what I thought of it. I am not a person that does well with surprises. I need time to process things. So I think that when I saw something I wasn't expecting I kinda freaked out a bit. Now that I have had time to think it over it makes sense that the lettering is white. I am still disappointed that the hand and foot prints are enlarged from what we gave them but I am OK with it. There is nothing I can do anyway. I should have talked to the lady on the phone instead of emailing. I don't think she completely understood what I wanted. I am glad it is finished and in place.

Vacation?

Well, it has been a while since I posted. That is because I went to Saskatchewan to visit my parents. Since they don't know about my blog I decided to leave updating until I got back.

So, in the one week that I was gone 3 babies were born to people that I may or may not see. One was to one of my best friends. They had a girl, named Kacia (Kay-sha). I have talked to her since I got back and we are going to see them on Saturday. We thought it would be best to get the first awkward meeting out of the way before church. The second was a boy to one of my good friend's sisters. The third, also a boy, was to another family in my church. So, if my friend's sister all of a sudden decides to come to church with her there will be 3 newborns at church. That should be fun... Oh, did I mention that the day we found out about Kacia was the day we found out that Oliver's grave marker was put in place? Great timing.

So, I went to see Oliver's marker today. I wanted to see what it looks like. We had his hand and foot prints put on it. The thing is I'm not sure I like the way it looks. The stone is black and then the writing has white paint or something in it. I was not told about that. Plus the hand and foot prints are larger than the ones I gave them. I signed off on the design so there is nothing I can do about that but what about the colour? I will have to talk to my husband and see what he thinks of it (he went to see it while I was gone).

Weekend Update

Well, this weekend was/is the weekend of dates. Friday was our original due date (the 7th) and Saturday (the 8th) was Oliver's 3 month "birthday." At first I was not looking forward to having those two things so close together but in the end I think it was better to have one not great weekend rather than two of them.

So, how was my weekend? Surprisingly not that bad. I think I had built it up into this huge event that was going to reduce me to tears which would not have been entirely shocking. I was not in a good mood on Friday. I cried a little in the evening once Ward was home. But not the meltdown I had expected. Saturday was actually a good day all things considered. I had arranged for Violet to go to her grandparents for a sleep over so I dropped her off around lunch. I had a spa treatment booked for the afternoon (which had originally been a pregnancy massage bought for me for mother's day by my hubby). It was really great. It was a hot stone massage and I would totally recommend it to anyone thinking of going in for some pampering. After that I did a little shopping and by the time I got home Ward was also just getting home from work. We had the evening to ourselves and it was a nice treat. Of course I thought about Oliver a lot but I was glad not to be controlled by my grief.

So, now it is Sunday - my most dreaded of days. Church is usually the hardest place to go. It always makes me emotional. But, on the plus side I am home alone right now and enjoying a cup of coffee. Did I mention I was home alone? The last time I was able to wake up alone in the house was before Violet was born. Obviously I would rather be home with a sleeping or crying or hungry newborn but since that can't be the case I will take the silence.

Sorry this is kinda rambles a bit but I warned you that might happen in my blog title...

Add On

I remembered something from my visit to school yesterday that I wanted to add. While a couple students were asking me about where my baby was one other girl did something different and very sweet. She looked at me with a look of sympathy and said, "I know what happened" as she gave my arm a quick rub. From a 10/11 year old? Sometimes kids are quite mature.

Days Like This

Well, today was one of those days that I have been hoping wouldn't happen. There is a book fair going on at the school where I worked/work so I decided to go in for a visit. This is not the first time I have gone in so I was not really anticipating anything. I thought maybe I would run into a parent but that it would be fine. Not the case.

Violet and I were wandering around the school and went by the gym. Since she loves kids we went in to visit. I did not realize it was grade 5 intramurals going on. I taught grade 4 last year so these were my kids. They saw us and headed over in a swarm. That was fine (except for the fact I totally interrupted the game) until a couple students asked, "Where's your new baby?" One girl asked and I just stared at her. I didn't know what to say. Why should it be up to me to tell an 11 year old child that my baby is dead? Thankfully the teacher in charge came over to get them back on track and she told them that my baby is in heaven. She whispered to me to say that but I just couldn't answer. Not the visit I was expecting.

I am thinking of emailing my principal to let him know about what happened. I think it was harder on me than the students but when I sub there I don't want to have to do this a bunch more times. I don't know... Well, he has gone through this so I think I will just tell him so at least he knows. Whether or not there is something he can do will be up to him I guess.

On to another topic now. Sunday night I was up around 5:45 registering for my half marathon. When I went back to bed I was laying there half asleep daydreaming about Oliver. I was thinking about how he would be here with us now and I got this picture of what he would look like. It seemed to me like it was actually looking at him. I could see his pudgy face and he had a little bit of blondish hair. My husband had reddish blond hair as a baby so I think that Oliver would have had it too. Anyway, it was a good daydream even though it was sad.