It amazes me how this sadness comes out from nowhere! I woke up this morning with a very sore back and by 3pm I was soooo very down.
All morning my girls were, as usual, keeping themselves amused - watching TV, dressing up like fairies, playing Tinkerbell and Queen Amethyst which was naturally followed by a fairy tea party. The tea party consisted of chocolate and custard "fondude" (fondue!) on a picnic blanket in the TV room.
I spent the morning packing up some Christmas decorations and unpacking my every day decor which had been packed in the Christmas boxes. Almost everything I unpacked made me think of my angels in heaven - Joshua and Cara. I had statues of angels given to me on special occassions in their name, angels given to me on their special occassions, Josh's remembrance candles, Cara's butterflies.
When we lived in Canberra I had a butterfly wall - I collected a butterfly for every occassion that Cara missed in our lives... soooo many butterflies already! Since losing Joshua I haven't been able to find the right spot for my butterfly wall, feeling somehow that it would be unfair to have a wall in remembrance of Cara and nothing for Joshua.
Last year was probably the hardest year of my life. I've always managed to truly celebrate Cara's birthday and so I felt it was only right that I do the same for Joshua and so after celebrating Cara's 6th birthday in July we celebrated Joshua's 1st birthday in September.
Oh my God! How hard it is to find the strength to turn yet another day of sadness into something positive for me and my darling husband and most importantly my girls. For Cara's 1st birthday I held my first fundraiser workshop and it was so well attended - it was such a fitting tribute to my angel.
A simple lunch was planned for Joshua's 1st birthday, more for Amy than for anyone else. I convinced Amy that it would be best to keep it small, inviting only those who were closest to us, not knowing how I would be emotionally. Sadly not many people turned up, and that in itself made me soooo very sad. What I hoped would be a huge "celebration" of the many lives that my son had touched during his short life, turned out to be a reminder that most people don't really want to remember - too much sadness I think. I was ever so grateful to those who did join us, as it would have been an even sadder day if they hadn't come.
All you mothers out there who have lost infants as a result of miscarriage, stillbirth or neonatal death are probably the only ones who understand how much importance we place on other people remembering our lost babes. With every phone call or conversation I have with someone who lets me know that they have been thinking of Joshua or that their child has spoken of him out of the blue, a bit of the sadness in my heart is replaced with comfort. "Comfort" because that's one more person, outside of my immediate family, who has remembered my darling son.
And yet I still receive comments like "at least you have 2 beautiful, healthy daughters when some people can't have any children". It takes all the strength within me to smile at them and say "Yes, you're right" when all I want to do is scream at them and say "They are so much better off never knowing how much it hurts to lose a life that has grown inside you for months".
I wish that having my beautiful, healthy daughters was enough to take away the pain of losing 2 children, but it doesn't. If anything it magnifies it, because every time I see the dawn of a new aspect of their relationship with each other, it makes me wonder how different it would have been had their been another child in the mix or even another two.
Every time my darling girls fall over or have a rash or develop a cough I feel myself withdrawing from them emotionally because I can't help wondering if this is the start of the end - is God going to take yet another of my children away from me? I used to think, after losing Cara, "Okay, I have a lesson to learn and something to give to others from this experience... this is my cross to bear and I must learn to use it in the best way possible."
After losing Joshua I was dumbfounded and shattered. I felt that I had done so much soul searching and healing and growing after losing Cara. I couldn't believe that there was still more pain and suffering that I had to go through and that it had to be done through the loss of another child. I was angry with God for so many months after Joshua's death. It was only just before last Christmas (2009) that my anger finally subsided. Why, I don't know. Maybe I just got tired of being angry.
I have to say that my relationship with my God is at it's weakest at this point in my life. I always thank him for what he has given me, but it's been a very long time since I have asked him for anything. I know he is there and I know he is waiting for me to ask for his help, but I'm not ready for that yet.
I have been blessed with a very special friend, Maryanne - a gorgeous Samoan woman whose spirituality oozes from every pore, she is truly beautiful in every sense of the word. I feel that I used to be like her, I wore my spirituality on my sleeve for all to see. Right now, I don't even know what I believe in any more and so I hide my spirituality away, only allowing a select few people in my life to see that side of me.
Right now I'm not a very nice person to be around - I'm negative and angry and grumpy and soooo very, very sad all the time. I feel like the real me is buried deep within and what the world sees is just the hard shell of the person that I used to be.
Lightbulb moment!!! Maybe (fingers crossed!) I'm in my cocoon, waiting for the right time to emerge as a proud and regal butterfly ready to share my inherent beauty with the world. I think this caterpillar has started shedding some layers of skin though - I've spent weeks and weeks and weeks cleaning out my home. It has been such a reflection of the way I've felt inside - the downstairs has been relatively well presented but my no means welcoming (a bit like my exterior self) and the upstairs has been in a constant state of chaos (a bit like my interior self).
Over the last few weeks I've felt a renewed interest in making my home a reflection of the real me and it's actually starting to come together, bit by bit.
Well, as always, writing has been cathartic and I am feeling so much more at peace. My eyes are no longer overflowing with tears and the words are no longer pouring out, so it's time to say goodnight. Goodnight.
