Remembrance

Today is Pregnancy & Infant Loss Remembrance Day.

I'm one of the thousands, maybe millions, of women that grieve the loss of a baby they didn't get to meet or hold, name or bring home from the hospital, see alive, celebrate the first birthday.

It's something that will stay with me forever.

I don't talk about it to anyone. Not my husband, not my mom, not my friends.

I keep all of the feelings for this loss locked inside or here.

They are mixed up, ugly, jumbled feelings.

I can't say I wish I'd never suffered this loss because if I hadn't, I would not have Jacob and Boden in my life.

I think about it at odd times. I remember what my sister-in-law brought me for supper after I lost that baby, when she came to keep me company because Eric left me alone to attend a meeting. I remember calling my sister first to tell her, because I didn't know how to tell my mom. I remember calling my mother-in-law and asking her to come and get Ella because I had a fever and was too sick to take care of her.

I still have a little t-shirt that i had bought Ella, that said "Big Sister to Bee" with a super cute picture of a bee on it. I took photos of her in the shirt and emailed them to our family. I don't know what to do with that shirt. I can't bring myself to throw it away.

It's hard to grieve a miscarriage. No one met this baby. No one saw this baby. No one loved this baby aside from me. There is little evidence that I was even pregnant. It seems silly to think about it, 4 years later. But I do.

On my medical records it says I had a spontaneous abortion. I wish there was a way to change that. It feels very wrong. As if I had a choice in what happened.