Abit Of Therapy

So over the weekend J and I had a “Therapy Day”, to be honest we both needed it for different reasons.

We spent the whole day doing stuff together, we did some food therapy, used Theraputty, drew pictures, blew bubbles, did puzzles and even did some painting. It was a very busy and pretty tiring day but it was just what we both needed. J was very relaxed after his day of “therapy” and spent some time relaxing with Mario and then playing with his Dad before going off to bed. Whilst he was playing Mario I started writing some things down, just to clear my head. And then once he’d gone to bed I wrote some more. I wrote from the heart, as I’ve said before I’m not great with feelings but I like to write things out. I have a few more appointments coming up over the next month that I hope will give me some answers and maybe a little more hope……….. who knows maybe they’ll even start to heal the mind games and grief that’s troubling me at the moment.

But anyhow, this is what I wrote …………….

I don’t know if I can, I don’t know if I dare

Open my heart to begin to share 

How I’m screaming inside, how I really feel

Because then I have to admit what’s happened, it’s real

*

I try so hard to lock my feelings inside

But sometimes they’re too overwhelming for me to hide

The emptiness inside fills my heart with pain

As the thoughts in my head drive me insane

*

So many thoughts going through my mind

Trying to understand why life’s so unkind

But as the words go around they hurt my head

And inside I feel nothing, I’m empty, I’m dead

*

To lose one baby too soon broke my heart

But to lose five more has torn me apart

My heart’s trying so very hard to understand

Why we’ll never get to hold their hands

*

It doesn’t make sense, I keep thinking “why not?”

And then “Should we be happy with what we’ve got?”

But maybe, just maybe I want a repeat of the joy

That I get each and everyday from my special boy

*

But there’s a pain inside, the scars run deep

It overflows and wounds begin to weep

I don’t know what to do, again do we try?

How?   When all of our hope has run dry

*

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Dear Jellybean……

Dear Jellybean,

I can’t believe a year has passed already!

12 months ago we had hope in our souls, belief in our minds and love in our hearts. Hope that in some way things would turn out ok in the end, belief that one day we’d hold you in our arms and so much love for you in our hearts. Then came the news that would take away all of the hope and belief that we’d had, leaving a hole that would be impossible to fill.

I’ve thought about you often over the past 12 months. Wondering if we’d of had another prince to rule our house. Ofcourse you would have had a tough time trying to rule the house of J but I’m sure he would have loved you as much as we already did. I can imagine that he would have been such a fab big Brother and would have taught you so much. Or maybe you would have been a little princess, a little sister for J to watch over….Yes you would have been a princess, imagine the fun we could have had on our Mother/Daughter days. How we would have laughed together as we shared precious memories and cried together as I wiped your tears when a boy dared to break your heart.

I often wonder who you would have been like. Everybody tells me J looks like Daddy but has my personality, so I wonder if you would have looked like me but had Daddy’s personality. I wonder what your eyes would have been like, would they sparkle like your Brothers? I wonder what sort of person you would have grown into. I bet you would have had a smile that could light up a room, just like your Brother.

I’ll never forget the pain we felt rip through us when the doctors told us that we’d never get to hold you in our arms, we’d never get to see that beautiful smile or the sparkle in your eyes. That day like too many before it are memories that will remain with us forever, as will the love for you in our hearts. For now my sweet princess, I’m going to keep hold of those memories that could have been.

Lots of love

Mummy xxxxx

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Just Thinking

So this month was my due date and whilst I’ve been trying not to dwell on anniversaries that I wish didn’t have to occur, there’s no escaping it.

By some coincidence my sister’s baby is due this week, which has shoved all of those “what could have been” thoughts and feelings right back to the front of my mind and heart. It’s not jealousy, in fact I’m very excited for her and can’t wait to see pictures of my new nephew and to meet him (via Skype), it’s just the whole “wow, that’s gone so quickly, it could have been us too” feeling, it would have been a nice thing to share with her.  The overwhelming sense of loss creeps up again, you start to wonder what might have been if things had turned out differently the first time around and ofcourse this last time. I suppose at the time I tried to deal with my feelings in the best way that I could, by keeping busy and trying not to think about it. J kept me busy ofcourse but I also helped to set up a parent support group (for parents/carers of children on the spectrum), my friend at the time kept me very busy with this, which at the time was what I needed. But then it became too much, I was trying to do too much. Trying to do too much just wasn’t working and when we received the test results (the tests completed by the hospital because we’d had recurrent miscarriages), it forced us to revisit that place inside again. I gave up running the support group and my friendship dwindled very quickly. At the time that added to the hurt and the stress but looking back now I’m glad that happened. I got to see that the friendship wasn’t what I thought it as and it enabled me to spend the time needed on me and my family and those feelings.

I’m rambling abit I know, but I like to write things down, it’s kind of therapeutic for me. Anyhow, I wrote a few words after the miscarriage earlier this year, just to get some feelings out, it’s not good to bottle things up. These are the words that I wrote……

For a small short time a little light shone

But now I know it’s too late, you’re already gone

Once again all of our hopes and dreams simply crashed

And ofcourse deep inside our hearts were bashed

Any of the feelings of hope that we had

I now know were there just to drive us mad

I think of all that we have and I feel my eyes gloss

Should we just be grateful and not mourn our loss

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Sometimes Things Happen For A Reason……… Right?

I’ve always thought that things always happen for a reason. Sometimes things happen that we don’t want to happen but that’s part of life, some of us are luckier than others but still everything happens for a reason……….. right?

Almost 13 years ago I sat holding my Granddad’s hand and watched him peacefully pass away. That morning I had been told not to go to the hospital because he had had a rough night and needed to rest. Well I’ve never been one to do as I’m told and if my Granddad had had a rough night then I wanted to be there with him, so I went to the hospital anyway. My Granddad was my father figure growing up and whilst I felt my heart getting ripped from my chest when he died I managed to hold it together long enough to make the call to my Mum, who was with my beloved Nan. That was it, the reason I’d been there that morning, so that I could be there with him, so that I could be the person to tell those that mattered the devastating news rather than a stranger calling them but most importantly so that my Nan could take a little comfort in the knowledge that he wasn’t alone.

A week after my Granddad died, (around the time of his funeral), I discovered I was pregnant, it was my 3rd pregnancy so I was very cautious with my feelings. Around the same time my cousin also discovered that she was pregnant. Unfortunately I again went on to miscarry however my cousin went on to have a healthy baby boy, who looks, (in my opinion), very much like my Granddad. So whilst we were forced to say goodbye to my Granddad, maybe it was to make way for my Nephew…………. afterall everything happens for a reason, right?

When I said goodbye to my Nan I thought it would be something that I could never recover from. My Nan was my world and I would have gladly given my life for hers. When she died my world stopped for a while…………….. then I discovered that I was pregnant again, (5th pregnancy). Despite the usual cautiousness with my feelings something felt different this time around, I felt that this baby was my Nan’s final gift to me and that she was watching over us to ensure a safe arrival. I had various difficulties during the pregnancy and J was born a month early by emergency cesarean but he was and is perfect. I still miss my Nan everyday and I’m sure I will for the rest of my life but I take a little comfort in my belief that everything happens for a reason. Maybe she had to say goodbye to us so that she could watch over J as he entered the world, I often wonder if she knew what the future held. And maybe we had to go through the pain of the previous miscarriages so that when J entered our lives we would really appreciate just how special he was and would love him all the more, (if that’s possible).

So I’ve been thinking alot recently about my belief in “things happen for a reason” and I just can’t see it right now. I can’t see what possible “reason” there would be for us to go through another loss, surely we’ve had our fair share! We’ve had a variety of tests done now, my arm is beginning to feel like a pin cushion, the results of which we’re still waiting on. But what’s really not helping is the way the hospital seem to be dragging things out. It’s too hard to go into details but right now we’re in limbo…………. I’m not miscarrying in the usual way (whatever that means!!!), no-one wants to do the necessary surgery until certain tests results come back but there’s only so long they can wait………….. it just seems to be going on and on. Do they not realise we can’t move on until certain decisions have been made …………….. and I have a very confused little man at home wondering what’s going on, wondering if his mummy has to stay in hospital or not and asking questions like “will you come home from hospital?”

I just wish someone could give us some answers because right now I really can’t understand why all of this is happening to us.

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Where Do I Start?

It’s a good question, one that I’m not sure of the answer to. I’ve not posted for a few days now and I may be quiet for a while longer, right now my head and my heart are feeling a little scattered, I’m hoping by writing it all down I can release some of the feelings I’m trying to keep on top of.

This month I discovered that I was pregnant and to say that it was a shock would be an understatement. As well as shock the news came with a huge bag of mixed emotions. On one hand very happy and excited that we could be welcoming a new addition to our family but on the other hand fear and dread. Those of you that have read my blog for a while will know that my hubby and I had 4 miscarriages before we welcomed J into our life. So once the shock had sunk in the next emotion felt was fear……………… fear of what might happen, fear of how we’ll cope if we lost another baby, fear of how we’d deal with J wondering what’s going on, (he can usually sense when Mummy is sad or if something is wrong), just plain old fear! Only for a brief moment did I start to think about how exciting and how wonderful it would be to welcome a brother or sister for J into our life, then the fear started to creep back into my head and my heart.

We were instructed to go for an early ultrasound due to my history and as we entered the door to the ultrasound room we wondered what the next 10 minutes would bring. The sonographer was chatty and very pleasant so we wondered if things were starting to look good but then we got “the look” and she told us that she was concerned and that we had to return in a couple of weeks for another scan. At that point we knew something was wrong but she had not explained her concerns so all we could do was cling to the small piece of hope that we had left.

All of that hope was taken away the following morning……………… my doctor rang me to explain that he had the results of the ultrasound and it didn’t look good, (I’m sorry but this is pretty hard to write and I simply can’t and don’t want to go into details). He told me I had to have more blood tests and return to see him after 2 working days. After returning to see him he told us that the first results had not come back as he had expected and I would have to repeat the tests.  Today those results came back and the doctor told us the bad news. Tomorrow I would have to go see the specialists at the hospital because I was indeed going to miscarry. I can’t put into words how I felt, how I feel. It was an incredibly devastating blow. All of the feelings felt too many times before came flooding back tenfold and then on top of those feelings came the fear and worry of how we were going to cope and explain things to J. Each miscarriage has resulted in a hospital stay and a period of rest afterwards, I’ve never even spent one night away from him. How do you explain to any child, let alone a child with ASD that Mummy can’t put him to bed or come to him in the night when he yells out because I have a poorly tummy and have to go to hospital, how do we explain that without creating huge anxieties. Then more devastation swept over me when the realisation hit me, not only is all of this happening but it’s happening around J’s birthday, I can’t ruin his birthday he’s so incredibly excited, how could I do that to him?!?!

I’m very lucky and have made some wonderful friends here in Oz. Friends who for the past week or so have offered help, support and understanding, but most importantly have cared. Thankyou to you lovely ladies, you know who you are xx

I’m sorry if I’ve “gone on abit” but I don’t know how else to get some of these feelings out, writing is a powerful tool in trying to help me understand and come to terms with everything that’s happening at the moment. x

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