Grieving an Idea

May 16th was one of the worst days of my life. The ensuing weekend wasn't much better. While the grief has let up somewhat as the weeks have passed, we find ourselves in a constant state of mourning. It ebbs and flows, waxes and wanes. Some days are worse than others. Sometimes the reality really slaps me in the face when I least expect it, just when I think I'm having a "good day". Sometimes it's easy to talk about. Sometimes it makes me cry just thinking about it, much less holding a conversation about it. Overall, though, I'd say we're moving toward a "recovery" of sorts - from a more grief-stricken state to a more peaceful one.

The problem is that it isn't over. We haven't reached a point of closure. The physical loss of our daughter is still impending, looming somewhere in the uncertain future. I'm beginning to wonder, though, which will ultimately feel worse - May 16th, or the day our Gracie girl grows her angel wings.

In the past few weeks I have learned that different people grieve in vastly different ways, and that this kind of a loss and its impact on a person's life depend on a seemingly endless variety of factors. What I believe about our situation, having read about so many different variations on infant loss and stillbirth, is that we are at a distinct advantage (if there is any "advantage" to be had in a situation like this) by virtue of the knowledge that we have. We've been given a warning. We know what is to come. Not only will we not be blindsided by this sudden and most tragic of losses - we will have had time to prepare ourselves emotionally and spiritually, to physically make preparations for her arrival and her passing, to contemplate ways to make it special and ways to remember her, to handle the logistics of a funeral and burial ahead of time. We have been able to ensure that we're making the memories we want to make while we still have her with us, like getting a 3D/4D sonogram, recording her heart beat, and having maternity photos taken. As difficult as this knowledge is to bear at times, these are all tremendous gifts. I am forever grateful for each day I have with her, and for the fact that I have been warned not to take any of them for granted.

What hurt so badly about May 16th was losing the idea of her. We didn't physically lose our daughter that day, but we lost her in every other sense imaginable. We lost the idea of Eli's little sibling. We lost our "family of four". We lost Saturday morning snuggles buried under not one, but two babies. I lost the breastfeeding relationship that I was looking forward to. We lost the nursery that we had planned to decorate in yellows and grays. I lost the image of my husband, toddler and newborn cheering in the crowd on my graduation day. All of the things that we had imagined, the plans we had made, the logistics we had thought through so carefully, all disappeared that day. All that is left now is our baby girl herself, completely robbed of the potential that her life once held. No less loved, no less real, no less alive... just robbed blind of all that she deserved, and all that we were so excited to give her in this earthy life that we had planned.

Having all of that stripped away has really changed the way I relate to her, but not in a negative way. All that is left is her - her physical body and her perfect little soul. I'm no longer enthralled with any ideas of what life will be like, what she will bring to our world, how cute Eli will be with her... I just love her for her. It's not that I don't think I loved Eli for Eli while I was carrying him, but having been pregnant twice now, I know full well where a lot of the excitement and anticipation comes from. So much of the joy of pregnancy is found in looking forward to the future. After all, the end-goal of pregnancy isn't just being pregnant, it's bringing a new life into the world, adding to your family, creating a new little person to love.With Gracie, I don't really have any of that anymore - at least not in the traditional sense. There are no other distractions, no future to get excited about... there is only her, in this moment, and maybe not in the next.

Of course I still think about that stolen future, and I grieve for it because I have already lost it. I often wonder if having had the opportunity to grieve and begin to recover from that loss will help to ease the physical loss when it happens. By the time she passes, we will no longer be so heavily mourning the loss of that future. We will be that much closer to acceptance of what cannot be, and acceptance of the fact that her life, however unfairly shortened, was meant for a different purpose than we had planned. That can only help, right? I follow the blog of a friend-of-a-friend who recently (about a month ago) lost her son in utero to Trisomy 18, another severe chromosomal abnormality, and she seemed to confirm that this was true for her. She still feels that the day they learned of his diagnosis proved to be much harder than the day that he was born into heaven.

I take some comfort in the idea that this may also prove to be true for us, and that maybe as a result, we will be able to find a special brand of joy and peace in welcoming Gracie when the time comes. I hope that we will be well-prepared to welcome her with tremendous love and appreciation for who she is, just as she is, whether or not her heart is beating, whether or not she is born with any potential for an earthly life of any duration. I hope that experiencing some of this grief in advance will allow us to be more present, clear-headed, and able to make memories with her.

Before I go, I'd also like to share this beautiful custom creation that arrived today - Gracie's "birthday" present. I have mentioned previously that we were designing a necklace for her, and it turned out exactly as I had envisioned it. It was created by an Etsy shop owner in Canada, actually, who was incredibly generous to us and expedited the process so that we could have it on-hand as soon as possible, given the uncertainty of our circumstances. We want to bury Gracie with a piece of us - something special that will reinforce the idea of the four of us as a family. I know that she will never understand or appreciate the sentiment behind it, but it means something to us to leave her with this "reminder" of our love, of how badly we wanted her, of how sorely she will be missed.

I haven't seen her yet, but I'm reasonably certain that she is, in fact, "too beautiful for earth" ;-)