Of panic attacks and wishful thinking...

There is a sleeping bundle of girlishness on my bed.  She's sleeping in the pseudo-starlight of  her turtle nightlight.

And I...I am here.

I had a panic attack last week.  Two of them actually.  It's amazing to me that the nervous system can really get fried badly enough that it misfires even when you're feeling just fine.  Because, I really was feeling fine.  Or...was I?

Apparently...I wasn't feeling fine enough.  I get that there is this underlying anxiety that lives in my chest at all times.  I get that I'm hyper vigilant.  I get that I'm basically damaged goods.  But...I also get the psychology of grief.  I get the human psyche.  I understand what I've been through and I've been working hard to heal.  And...she IS here.  Sleeping on my bed.  Right next to the co-sleeper that she never sleeps in, because...that is too far away.  I can hear her sleepy noises from where I stand right now.  She is 10 steps away from me at this very moment.  She is here.  Alive.  A big gorgeous girl with bright blue eyes and a presence that say's "Mama...I am here to stay!"

She's vibrant.  Unscathed by life.

And...my grand-babies are within her body right now.   All the babies she could ever have....inside her ovaries.  And that was what did it.  I was holding her.  Loving her smell.  Cherishing her presence.  Knowing all too well how very very very lucky I am.  It was that moment when my heart clenched.  My breathing shallowed.  My eyes swelled with tears...and it began.

I couldn't really protect her.  Not forever.  Not in every way.  Not from loss.

As I held my tiny 2 and a half month old daughter...all 16 pounds of her...I was deeply aware that I was also holding all her babies...her future darlings...and the fear poured over me.  I quaked.

I lost it.

She slept through my jerky sobbing and my sudden fear that I might just die from the despair that was racing through my veins.   She slept through my wails.  Cuddled on my chest...peaceful.

As if to remind me that she wasn't worried.

As a parent...you have to remember not to push your fears on your children.  I bite my lip hard when I see a spider...and calmly try to act like I'm not terrified that it will run up my leg.  I feign composure when we drive on narrow roads near mountain cliffs.  (Of course...I typically lose that battle...My boys are all too aware of my fear of heights, but, I haven't passed it on.  They just think it's silly....)
I don't want my daughter to fear bearing a child.  I don't want her to fear loss.

But mostly...I don't want her to experience loss.

Ever.

And that isn't something I can force.  It isn't something I can protect her from.

I can only watch.

I can only hope it isn't on her path.

And I fear that it isn't enough.  Hope isn't enough to protect her from pain and tears and loss.

It isn't enough, but it's all a mama has.

When she wants me, she calls for me.  She actually says "Ma mam! Meh Mem!"  She only says this when she wants me.  She can talk.  She's been doing this since birth, and there is no disputing the communication.  She trusts me to protect her.  She trusts me to know what she needs.
I know that she trusts me to have the answers.  She needs to know that I can help her when she's gassy or hungry or lonely or just plain...needy.  She turns to me for help.

My panic attack was over knowing that there will be times that I can't help.  Won't have the answers. Won't be able to take away the pain.

The thing that eased the second panic attack was remembering that I don't need to know the answers.  I found a peace in my being by remembering my readers...my friends...my sisters on this journey that is being a woman who has lost babies.  I remembered all you have done and all you have been to me.  You've been HERE.  You couldn't take away my pain.  But you witnessed me in it.  You couldn't change the fact that loss was part of my being.  You understood and validated my pain.  You couldn't promise me that it wouldn't happen again.  But you held my hands and gave me hope.

And in that, I suddenly realized that hope is more than enough.

Hope is everything. It's all we have.  It's not desperate and it won't change hard events.  It gives you a reason to go on. To find your path. To know that doors will and DO open, even if they aren't the doors you thought you'd venture through.  Experiencing life isn't a bad thing, though it can be a hard journey.  When I look back, I understand that there is hope.  I can give that to my little girl when she needs it...even though I hope she won't need it in the way I did.

Hope.  It saved my life.  It brought me to this moment, where I can hear her breathing.  Where she is only 10 steps away.  Where she is being watched carefully by a loving furry sheepdog who wants nothing more than to lick her tiny feet, but is resisting the temptation....for now.

Stupity....it has to be that.

I know I am not the only one in the world who thinks her mother in law is lacking.  In wit.  In brains. In common sense. In tact.  In everything.

Last night I lay awake wondering, once again, how it was possible that my beautiful, loving, intelligent, spiritually competent, sensitive, amazing husband came from her loins.  How did such a miracle occur?

She does it every time---she whacks me from some unexpected place that only she possess the key to.  I've gotten agile over the years.  Seventeen years of practice...and yet, she knocked me over again.

I was on my guard for this visit.  I'd been practicing my mental fencing techniques, just to be sure I wouldn't get poked again.  I was on my guard.  Practiced.  Seasoned.  Ready.  I've gotten pretty adept at fending off abuse over the past few years...since our loss....

When you realize that life is too short to tolerate anything but the best, you have to be prepared to defend your heart.  Fragile as it can be, people still can be careless about it...stepping on it as they go their merry way.  I've been so lucky to have met amazing people on my journey.  People who go above and beyond to love and support me.  Wonderful friends.  My true family.  My sisters and brothers in life.  People who understand.  I'm married to my best friend.  I'm truly blessed.

And broken.

It is the broken parts...the weak parts...the fragile parts---which I defend the most vehemently. 

My mother in law...she was here for Thanksgiving.  It's been two years since she was last here.  It didn't go very well.

I was pretty good about standing up for myself.  For my children.  For my husband.  In general, if I felt she was out of line, I told her.  Again.  And Again.  And Again.  I was kind.  I was firm.  I was honest.  She didn't like it, but the thin line of her lips would close stiffly and she would stop in her tracks.  She was obviously trying too.

Hour after hour, I would spend in polite conversation...trying to make things run smoothly while my husband was at work.  Trying.  Trying.

The effort was exhausting...

The last day of her visit, I must have let my guard down or something...because she nailed me hard.

She was talking about some celebrity.  She looooves media life.  I know very little about anything in that realm.  It's not my thing.  Never has been.  Even as a young teen, I didn't have posters of the hotties of the day on my walls.  Never fell in love with a celebrity.  Didn't dream of hooking up with someone rich and famous.  Didn't want to BE famous either.  So....I don't really care about who did what or who went where or who married who or which loaded billionaire had another baby.

My mother in law, on the other hand, cares A LOT about this.  So...she was talking.  Very animated. About some famous person...maybe you know who it was...I can't even remember the name.  Honestly.  I'm totally serious.  I was simply nodding and acting like I gave a damn just to keep her happy.  But suddenly...in the midst of my nodding and smiling, I suddenly found that her words were clear as a summers day...and they were ripping me apart.

She was going on and on and on about someone who has new twins and all about how cute they were. "Oh Sara!  They are the sweetest little twins!  I just love twins and always hoped I would have them, but I didn't.  Don't you think having twins would be fun?!"

Bulls-eye.

I stood frozen.  My rainbow baby in a sling sleeping soundly at my breast.  Frozen in time.  Frozen in memory.  Numb.

Do I think having twins would be fun????  Did she REALLY ask me that?

It took me a moment as I looked at her smiling, completely idiotic, sunburned face to really register that she really had said what I thought she said. 

My voice sounded dull to my ears.  "Yeah.  I would have loved to have had my twins.  I would have loved that."

She brightened..not really taking in my reply.  "I KNOW!  It would be SO fun to have twins!"

She babbled on for the rest of the afternoon.  She had no idea what she'd done.  No idea.  When my husband came home from work, he saw my face and knew right away that something had happened.  He told his mom that he wanted to go on a walk with me and asked if she'd watch the boys (who, for the record, don't need a baby sitter anymore.)  We put Ferdinand on his leash and headed out for the gully.  We walked in silence holding hands.

When we came to our rock...the rock that houses our twins ashes...I sat down and held our little rainbow girl tightly against my chest.  I sobbed.  And sobbed.

Would I have thought it would be fun to have twins?

Yeah.

Would I have liked twins?

Yeah.  Yeah I would have liked that.

My tears fell on the rock.  My baby girl nestled into my body...warm and alive.

I have much to be thankful for.


Perhaps, the next time my mother in law comes, I should actually don full body armor...just so she doesn't forget who she is talking to next time.

Grace...

Funny things happen in this seemingly material world.  Things that aren't "supposed" to happen, but happen nonetheless.

My doctor can't explain it.  But, then again...there are a lot of things that have happened in my life that doctors can't explain. 

That hole in my belly is apparently....smaller.  Much smaller in fact.  So small that they wouldn't even think of operating.  So small that they are wondering why they even suggested surgery in the first place.

This is something they said "never" heals on its own. 

And yet....  a two inch hole has turned into a two centimeter hole...in a matter of a few weeks. 

They tell me the hole will never go away, and I believe them.  Of course, I am still talking about the one that is innate in my gut.  The one that yearns for twins that should have been.  The one that aches.

They can't explain why that hernia is suddenly....pretty much gone. 

They are chalking it up to "grace".  What else can they do when medical science fails them once again as they glance at my chart and decide I'm...weird.

My Venus girl slept for 5 hours without waking last night.  Snoozing in the crook of my arm as I looked at her face in the shadows of the night light that casts purple stars on the ceiling.  I thanked Simon and Alexander for healing my heart...for keeping her safe...for reducing the hole within me. 
I thanked them for keeping my family together...for bringing us a furry sheepdog who "knows"...for being.  Yeah....for just....being. 

The fact that they were....that they ARE....
that's grace.

Brick Walls

Somehow, being told one has a hernia from a pregnancy seems like a microscopic occurrence when one has also been told that one's baby is dead.

Perspective...

I happen to have a hernia at the moment.  A tiny little rip in my umbilical region which occurred during my pregnancy with our little Venus girl who is, at the moment, bouncing happily in a little chair as she makes dear little vulture sounds that seem to be the precursor to laughter.  This tiny little rip in my abdomen seems like the most insignificant occurrence I have endured in the past three years. 

Looking behind me, I see a young man with a smashed in skull...a dead baby...my own blood running out of a hospital room...another dead baby....a sudden head on collision in my marriage which, luckily, took no one hostage...and a tearful pregnancy full of terror and fear that resulted in the longest labor of my life....

But all of that....all of that...brought me here.  To the coos of my rainbow girl who squawks and squeaks with joy. 

They told me I should get the hernia fixed.

I agreed.

They told me it was a simple operation.

I agreed.

They told me it wouldn't be a big deal to give my baby a few bottles of breast milk.

I sort of agreed.

They told me I'd be under general anesthesia instead of the spinal I requested and that I'd be out for an entire day and wouldn't be able to breast feed for at least 2 days or pick up my 13 plus pound 2 month old for six weeks.

I did not agree.

I insisted upon the spinal.

They protested.
I insisted.
They refused.
I cried.

Yeah.  I cried.

After all I've seen.  All I've been through.  Everything I've worried about....no...I'm not leaving her for the whole day.  I'm not doing it.

I'll keep the hole in my gut.  In a way, it's symbolic.  Of course I would have a hole in my middle...of course there is a gaping spot in my center....of course there is.

It's not just a metaphor.  There's a hole inside of me.  In time...it may lessen, but, it will never go away.  I'll have to treat it with care...paying attention to it, least it should get bigger.  That's just the truth of my being.  I have a hole inside of me.

Medical science...they might have been able to sew me up---good as new.  However, in reality...the hole would still be there.  No matter how many sutures they apply, that hole can't be repaired.  I'm not about to make that hole bigger with a separation from the little girl who makes my every moment worth living.

I just can't do it.  I've hit a brick wall.

I'm keeping the hole.  It's part of who I am as a whole.
I know that this hole in my body is a symptom of the hole in my spirit.
I can hear my little one bouncing in her chair, and I know that there are worse things than having a hernia.  There could be silence.  The sound of nothing.  The sound of dead babies.  Gone. 

This is nothing. 

There are much worse situations.  I've lived them. 
I have the hole to prove it.

A bad mother...

I felt like a bad mother today.

I sat here...with a beautiful, perfect, softly snoring baby girl in my lap.  Tears rolling down my cheeks as my older boys made salmon chowder upstairs. 

My heart was aching.

There was nowhere to go.  Nothing to do about how I felt.  No place to feel differently.

So I cried in silence while living perfection slept.

guilt.
longing.
lonely.

desire.  Desire for the ability to turn it off--the thoughts--the memories--the regrets.

I sat here just wishing to feel like the me I once was.  Oblivious to the pain. 

My first grand-baby was born on Sunday.  He was early.  His poor mamma has only held him twice due to complications.  I've been crying for her pain as well.  Her worry is my own.

I feel like a bad mother for not just keeping my focus on my girl....for letting my heart wander from her to what is lost....to the  tears of the past...and the tears of others.

A bad mother....for even momentarily...feeling sad after her living presence.   Or maybe...I just feel like a bad sister.  Bad for having reasons to smile when my sisters in life are still crying.  Bad for being lucky.  This time. 

On manipulation...

Did you know there are people out there who really believe that loving a baby "too much" can lead to a personality defect called "manipulation"?

Oh yes....according to this lore, if you respond to a baby, particularly a female baby, who exhibits a lower lip pout in her sadness over...uh...anything at all...with affection, love and attention...you are creating a manipulator.

"You'll have to watch THAT if you don't want her to become manipulative."

What???

I'll have to watch "THAT"???

Hummmmmm.....

As I care for this little sweet one month old baby girl, I can only shake my head in massive disappointment in my "elders".   Suddenly, all the neglect and abusive techniques I experienced as a girl make sense.  It was all in the name of not spoiling me.  All in the name of making sure I didn't really think I was worth much...not worth listening to...not worth attending to...not worth caring for.  My tears were laughed at.  Photos even taken of my sobbing...as proof that I was a little "diva".  A drama queen.

Or maybe I was hungry.

Perhaps even exhausted?

Or...maybe I was just....manipulative.

or would have become manipulative had anyone shown a glimmer of tenderness.

Thank GOD they saved me from myself.

Now...excuse me while I barf a little in my hand.

Manipulation.

This isn't what you get when you respond to a baby's distress---even if she happens to have a vagina and is prone to become "a manipulator".

Manipulation.

This isn't an innate quality in a baby who is nurtured, attended to, even adored.

Manipulation.

This isn't something that develops from being treasured.  Loved.  Honored.

No...I see something very clearly.  People who withhold love from a baby in the fear based non reality which sees NEED as a personality flaw are severely mistaken.  In fact, this false belief is really based on a desire to perpetrate the insult that was bestowed upon them so that they can continue the tradition of selfish neglect that allows the adult to manipulate the baby's very tender psyche.  This, in my opinion, borders on insanity.  "Don't let your baby turn into a manipulative little girl or you'll be sorry!"  Hmmmmmmmm...... what I hear is "Don't let your baby think you actually care about her or she might grow into a human being who actually knows her worth, and then, she will be harder to control with manipulation."  oops. 

In the meantime...I am going to keep responding to my daughters very appropriate need, her tender cries for assistance, her emotional honesty, and her baby-ness with prompt sincerity and total abandon!  I couldn't love her too much.  I couldn't care for her too much.  This abundance of love won't spoil her or taint her.  She can have free access to my heart.


Anyone who worries that she will become manipulative as a result can go take their outdated dogma to a much much warmer climate and roast them over a pit fire.

So, please excuse me while I go, without any worries, to snuggle with the brightest light in the nighttime sky--My Venus girl--Ali V.

Reminders...

It is October.  My husband and Ali V. and I went for a long walk in the woods yesterday, with shaggy Ferdi in the lead.  The boys opted for some uninhibited "gaming" instead of enjoying the fall colors I was so eager for.  It was o.k....I wanted time to just..."be".

October is beautiful in Montana.  Truly stunning.  We have all the color of Vermont maples in abundance...but...it's Montana, so it's all on a much bigger scale, and there are more open places to romp and admire.  We chose the woods near the river that "runs through it".  Beautiful.  Red, orange, yellow, burnt umber...and...purple?

Yes.  Purple.  Purple and yellow flowers.  Everywhere.

I guess we haven't had a frost yet.

Ever since we lost Simon and Alexander, purple and yellow have reached out to us from season to season.  This year, as I felt the crunching of leaves underfoot, I was absolutely taken with the presence of flowers.  Taken...with memories.

I've walked these woods before.  Trying to find myself.

Trying to get a grip.  On sanity...on life.

With a sleeping bundle of girlyness in my arms, and a two year old sheepdog leaping up ahead, I felt my husbands hand in mine.  He saw the flowers as well...and they mean as much to him as they do to me.

Our little rainbow baby is a loud sleeper...she coos happily in an audible mantra of life.  It's a good thing, because I'd be apt to try to wake her if she was too quiet...just to make sure...to make sure.

As she cooed noisily, I felt the tears rimming my eyes.  They felt cold in the autumn air that I was breathing.

They would have been toddlers.  They would have been chattering to each other in twin-speak.  They would have...been.

When Ali V. stirred in her sleep, groping for the ever present nipple which she assumes access to on demand, I didn't hesitate to pull out my breast as we continued to walk in the woods.  My husband laughed at my native look.  Boob being suckled in the woods near the river as I trekked on without pausing even a step.  I smiled...wiping the tears away.

I can do this.  Yes.  THIS I can do.  Being "Ma MAM!"  is easy for me.

It's the loss that was hard.

It's the loss that still stings.

Not only my own losses....but the losses that lay in the breasts of other mamas....the losses that continue.  It's the loss that stings my heart as I listen to my darling daughters coos of contentment with full belly in the magical woods of Montana.  The loss that has been...and will be.  I felt a stirring of guilt in my wondrous fortune having become the grateful mother of this precious being who needs me...who actually gropes for me in a sleepy request for sustenance and comfort. 

I felt the breeze flutter past...and I could almost hear their laughter.  The way it should have been.  It echoes in the woods...

Where purple and yellow flowers continue to bloom in the depths of October...

And...I remember.

Regarding Sleep...

"You look tired." 

"Are you getting enough sleep?"

"Is she a fussy baby?"

Questions...these are the questions people ask. 

My Ali V. is three weeks old.  I do look tired.  I am not getting "enough sleep".  And no...I wouldn't say she is fussy.  Not fussy.  Particular.  She requires consideration.  Attention to how she feels.  But fussy?  No. 

In reference to sleep...  I honestly don't care that I'm tired.  I don't care that dark circles shadow under my eyes.  I was up last night until 2:30...falling asleep while standing up swaying with a small girl in the darkness.  "It's o.k. my Ali V....it's o.k...."  And....I meant it.  It really IS o.k..  It's o.k..  Better than o.k..

For the many of us who know the wakeful hours of tear filled loneliness due to empty arms where a small being should have nestled.  .  .yeah....it's better than o.k. to be walking the halls in a sing song sway of hip in an effort to soothe someone in need of comfort as they get used to having a human body.  It's better than o.k.. to feel tired due to the need a newborn insists upon than the feel tired at a soul level as you try to convince  yourself that hearing a baby that isn't there cry loud enough to wake you up, and vividly enough to remind you of all you have lost.

My husband held me close the other day as I walked those midnight hours.  His confession of finally understanding the depth of our loss as he watched me care for our tiny daughter was comforting.  Yes...it is true...every single moment of every single day for the past two and a half years was spent, for me, in the stark reality that presented empty arms and a broken heart.  No babies.  No twins.  No....anything. 

As I look down at this little girls "finally" sleeping face and admire the sweetness of an existence which allows for her to sleep during daylight hours in the comfort of my arms just as easily as it allows for her to protest the night in those same comfortable arms, I am overcome with the love that is profoundly healing.

I find myself feeling a profound thankfulness to my twins for bringing this little girl to us safely.  I yearn for them.  I tear up as I look at her...and the thankfulness fills my being.  I know that our twins know better than any other how deep the scar was that they left behind as I groped for healing the bleeding wound in my heart.  I know they were there witnessing the pain of losing them.  I know they were protecting this little girl as she made her way into this world, and into our arms. 

In the nighttime solitude that I share with my tiny daughter...yes, I am tired. 

And...I've been waiting to be this brand of tired for several years.  I am tired.  I am not getting "enough sleep".  And no...my little girl is not fussy.  She's alive.  And she needs me.  And that is exactly how it should be.

There will be time to sleep later.  When that time comes, my dreams will be filled with the bliss of remembering those well worn pathways walked with my little girl.

And with the understanding that I will never forget what it feels like to walk them empty handed.  She is not "fussy."  She is Ali V. She is of stardust and rainbow light. And she is HERE.

 

she is here!

Oh my....

That is all I can say as I look at her.
Oh my...

The wonder that is found in her little face.  Oh my....

The beauty...
The precious innocence...
The...life.

Oh my....

She is here.

She took forever....forever to get here.

Oh my....

And...it has taken me some time to acclimate.  To realize it's over.  And, that it has also just begun.

A  new page.  A new chapter.  A new life.

All because rainbows DO occur.

In spite of my fears.  doubts.  tremors of terror.

She is here.

She is REALLY here.

Eyes of sky blue that open and look at me.  Soft downy light brown hair on a warm head.  Softer than peach fuzz.  Or baby rabbit fur....  A rosebud mouth that smiled this morning.  Long slender fingers that really grasp mine.  And hold on.  Tiny toes that clench as warm water from her bath drips off...

She is here.  She made it.  She really did.

I didn't believe she would...until she did.

Even at the last push, when I heard our midwife say "There's a little cord here..." and I thought to myself in terror "Oh god...she's not going to make it..." And I pushed harder to get her here faster....and then...

I heard her voice.  My baby girl.  "MA MAM!" It was all she said.

It was enough.

She was HERE.  She made it.  She cried out for me. "MA MAM!"

And the tears in the room were visible on every face.

"MA MAM!"

I saw my sons...smiling widely as they discovered that babies don't always die.
I saw my husband.  Tears dripping as he said "baby...she's calling for YOU!"
I saw my best friend in the world...who held me two years ago, offering the sweetness of kumquats in the painful reality of loss.  Of total and complete loss.  Her eyes bright with the tears of healing.  Of witnessing that life IS.
I saw our midwife...who never quaked...and yet...the tears were there.  For all of us.  For our joy.

And She IS here.

Our star baby.  Our rainbow girl.

Born after weeks of contractions.  Even with a cervix that would NOT budge without help...the terror holding true release back.  Born after 9 months of fear.  Worry.  nightmares.  and...unrelenting hope.

She is here.  Sweet Alicia Venus.  Our Ali V.

Rainbows do happen.  They really do. 

I take it back.

My last post talked about how I'm not patient. 

I want to retract that.

I am 42 weeks patient.  I am 4 days in labor patient.  I am 2 and a half years waiting to hold my living baby patient. 

I am the most patient woman on the planet.

I am also tired.

I am also afraid.

I am also....lost.  Lost as to WHY this is taking so long.  Tired from being in labor for a million years, or so it seems.  Afraid...because....what if after all this health, life and vibrance....after all the waiting and worrying....after all the support and love from around the world...what if....it ends badly.  What if she doesn't make it. 

My midwife says there is no reason to worry.

My readers know differently.

I know differently.

There are reasons.

Reasons that happen.

That have happened before.

To me.
To you.

I have to look the other way, because if I glance in that direction for too long, it scalds my heart and the inflammation is more than I can bear.

Waiting for a rainbow.  Waiting for the storm to fade.

Waiting.

In patience.

On Patience...

I am impatient.

Well, maybe that is an overstatement.  In general, I'm a pretty chilled out gal.  Or at least....I used to be.  I used to be. 

I remember, 8 years ago, holding a little baby boy in my arms, and nursing for endless hours as bewildered friends openly commented that they could never sit so still for so long.  I was...in a word...patient. 

I loved the baby pace.  The pace of tandem nursing tranquility.  The pace....before. 

Before trauma. 

Before loss.

We were always "poor".  That wasn't a big deal.  Give me an empty bank account any day over personal loss.  I have an empty bank account today for that matter!  It rocks.  Having nothing, you can only go upward from there.  That's how I see it anyway.  When you have nothing...you can't lose anything.  Well...I have zero dollars. 

Actually...I have exactly 6 dollars and 89 cents.  hah!  Not completely broke.  Almost...but not quite. 

My due date is today.  August 30th.  The day I impatiently awaited with fearful breath.  The day I worried would only be marked by more tears.  And yet...it's here....and my buttercup girl...my rainbow baby...my star child....she's moving about in her limited cocoon of love....she's moving. 

She's moving even as I type.

That's wealth to me.

Abundance.

But....as far as feeling patient???  No sir.  I want her.  NOW. 

Not later.

Not after.

Not....maybe.

NOW.

I want my cake and I want to eat it too!  I have never felt so impatient in all of my life. 

Impatient to know....that she is alright.  To know she can see me.  To know she can hear me.  To know she has her fingers and toes in tact.  To know she is healthy.  To know she will live....

Patience.  I saw it on my eight year old sons face at the water park on Sunday.  It was the last day of the swimming season, even though it has only just become summer in Montana.  The last day of the soothing waters and waterfalls of this playful park with slides and bubbles and joy.  My husband was laughingly taking each boy in a double tube in turn down one of the bigger slides.  I floated in all my bikinied glory (for I enjoy a bikini only while pregnant....and the sun felt soooo nice on my golden belly...) around the lazy river...over and over and over in pregnant bliss.  I'd come around the corner to spy one of my sons waiting his turn....and when I saw my eight year old waiting, I was amazed.  He sat there, a little golden skinned buddah.  Full lotus position, with arms carefully poised in a chosen chakra stance.  I could see his rosebud lips...still with all baby teeth in tact...carefully parted as he whispered "ooooooooommmmmmmmmmmmm" to himself. 

This was how he waited his turn.  In patience.  In mindfulness.  In peace.

It is his way.  I taught all of my sons the art of yoga and suggested meditation to them all at one point or another.  But my eight year old....he actually practices it.  Every day, at some point, he can be found in a quiet location...meditating.  It's what he does for inner peace.  It's what he's been doing since his eldest brothers head injury at age five.  Completely un-coached.  He found his peace. 

And he uses it.

We can learn a lot from our children.  They take what they see around them, and then, they implement it in ways we can only imagine. 

Today, as I attempt to find patience in my very unpatient state, I will be taking a page from the book of a small boy we call "Bear"....I will find a quiet place....and I will remember who I used to be.  The lotus mother...who could sit...with a smile....

and breathe. 

and breathe....

It has made all the difference...

The first poem I learned by heart, as far as I can remember, was Robert Frost's "Walking by Woods on a Snowy Evening...".  I learned it, and loved it with all my heart. 

As I walk through this life full of FULLNESS, the words are etched in my brain.  "And I...I took the road less traveled by, and that has made all the difference..."

These words speak to me like no others.  "I took the road less traveled by..." 

It's been an interesting road, with plenty of unknowns up ahead. 

On this road, I've discovered that I am walking toward wholeness.  Healing.  And, if I may be so bold...perhaps even wisdom.

My mother-in-law told my husband the other day "If you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all".  This was in response to him expressing hurt at some things she has done and said.  Of course...it was a phrase only meant for him...and not for her. He and I have been working hard at the work of relationship...of healthy relationship.  It's been very successful within our own home, and with friends and family who are interested in healthy relationships...but not so much with those who wish to remain stuck...stagnant...sticky...and, unfortunately, hurtful.  My aunt told me a few weeks back "When given the opportunity to choose between being right and harmony, choose harmony."  Of course, this was only directed at me for expressing that I felt it was dysfunctional to remain in co-dependent abusive relationships. My other aunt wrote me that she felt "between the judgements of right and wrong, there is a field, I will meet you there."  And yet....I felt distinctly that somehow, the only way to that field was the path less chosen...the path of saying..."Enough." 

Is there a right?  A wrong?  I suppose one could say there isn't.  From where I stand there are many occurrences that feel that they shouldn't have been, but they are anyway.  Things you can not change.  Things you would not choose.  Like losing someone you love deeply.  For no reason.  Perhaps these are the things that are not right...or wrong.  They just are.  No matter how devastating.  Or beautiful.  We can't change them either way.

But, there are other things we have to be discerning about if happiness is to be found.  We can choose to end relationships that refuse to grow.  We can avoid those who would abuse us as they saw fit.  We can opt for communication and the people who understand how to partake in it.  We can select friends and family who desire healthy, loving, peaceful relationships that nurture and sustain hope.  We can move forward...and away if needed.  We can choose the road less traveled by. 

We can make choices about some things, and have to just live with others.  As that reality remains, I stand firm in my understanding that changing the things I CAN change, while perhaps not a popular idea in dysfunctional circles, is what I am given to do.  In that, I may be able to cope better with the things I can not change.  The things I can never change. 

As I strive for this...change...I find myself walking the road less traveled by.  It's funny, but I feel strangely and surely led by the purple and yellow light...and a sparkle of star energy.  I feel my twins and my unborn daughter clearing the path in approval.  "yes, mommy....this IS the way....go this way mommy....you can do it.  We know you can." 

And so, I follow their guidance, knowing they are far wiser than I.  I follow the road less traveled by.  It is making all the difference. 

Werewolf Child...

He's been here for three weeks.  My eldest son.  My werewolf child.

Yeah, I know...it's not nice to label people.  Especially your kids.   But, after 21 years of interactions, I think it's pretty safe to say that he is, without doubt...somewhat of a werewolf.  It's the bipolar.  I never know who he will be.  Sensitive and needy.  Aggressive and confrontational.  Grandiose and manic.  Depressed and Sleepy.  It's all the same kid.  The same...adult.

He has been staying here.  Each week gets a little more...uh...tense.

It's the full moon tonight.

I remember, back when he was small...wondering if the moon was somehow connected to the fits of rage.  The defiance.  The...look.

His looks change.

He doesn't sprout whiskers and claws...his teeth don't show fangs...He doesn't morph into a creature of horrific proportions.  But...he looks different.  His sea blue eyes start to grey.  His sparkle fades.  His back stiffens.  His walk gets heavier.  And...his mood....is scary.

I remember my father looking like that.  I remember being afraid.

It's hard to look at the 21 year old that came from my body...and see someone I'm afraid of.

He won't take medication.

And, at 21...I can't make him.

No one can make him.

I'm 37 weeks pregnant.  Struggling to maintain some sense of peace within.  Fighting the worry that comes from pregnancy after horrific loss.  Trying to nest.  Trying to smile.

Trying to give my family the sense that everything will be just fine.

Even though I can't know such a thing.

No one can.

Ferdinand has started growling when my eldest comes into the room.  He senses that I don't feel safe right now.  He doesn't trust the tall, slender young man with the steely grey eyes.  He licks my tears away and tries to comfort me.

This isn't how I imagined preparation for my little girl would be.

If anyone wonders why it is that I no longer put up with ANY crap anymore...they need only look at my eldest son.  Maybe then they will understand.  After 21 years of being obligated to understand beyond reason, after 21 years of bending so far backward I feel as if my spine should have snapped long ago, after 21 years of crying in helpless horror as a mental illness raced through my happy home causing pain, sorrow, and the stuttering of young children....I have NOTHING left to give anyone who exhibits aggressiveness, hostility, poor communication skills, and a lack of empathy.  I have NOTHING left in my being for abusive behaviors, carelessness of spirit, or just plain...sloppiness of soul.  I've given it all to my son.  The son who, though loved deeply, has literally sucked me dry.

He reminds me of my father.  Of my mother.  Of the mental illness that drips through my family.

He is all I can handle...and even that is too much.

My other children...they've been blessed.  Spared.  They don't deal with the same thread that runs through my ancestors.  My eldest got it all.  My younger children...they know what mental illness looks like because of him.  And, they want nothing more to do with it.

But, he is my son.

22 years ago, a foolish, sad girl of 15 stopped saying "No"...because she felt there was no longer any point.  22 years ago...she was given a task that others would have crumbled under.
22 years ago...it's been 22 years.

And still.  .  .I am crying over it.

Crying when I should be breathing. Crying when I should be smiling.

We were so...relieved...that our daughter would be born into a house where he was no longer living.

And then..he came back.

It all seemed fine at first.  At first.

I am 37 weeks.  My daughter is healthy.  We both are.  Alive. We both are.

And though I am ever so anxious to know she will be born safely...to know she is HERE to stay...

I am asking her to wait.  Just wait 10 more days at least my love...wait until your brother has moved out again.  Give us all some time to heal from his presence.  Let yourself be born to parents who have had a good nights sleep. A chance to find some laughter. Some light.  A chance to make love. A chance to heal from the assault of steel grey eyes with hate behind them.

Please.  Be safe.  Be patient. Be safe.  Be mentally sound...please.

Be safe.

Peripheral Vision...

I keep seeing it. 

Little lights out of the corner of my eye. 

I wouldn't think twice about it...but..they are purple and gold. 

I saw three crows flying two days ago.  They soared and swooped over the trees and billowy grasses of the Montana field I was in, while my sheepy sheepdog romped with butterflies.  Three crows...and then, they parted ways and one of the crows flew away into the pink clouds of sunset.  The remaining two crows danced together in the remaining light. 

A yellow butterfly landed in my garden last night.  Sucking the nectar from a purple cluster of flowers.

And the lights....I see them all the time.  flickering.  I look around, and they disappear. 

"Simon?  Alexander?  Is that you?"

I remember the birds, all three of them flying together.  I wonder if our little girl...our buttercup...is with our twins.  I wonder if they are staying close by her side, until she makes it into my arms.  I like to think so. 

I like to imagine that they are with her.  That she knows them.  That they are telling her it will be alright, that she is coming to a mother who adores her children with all her heart.  I wonder if she will remember them...as I remember them. 

I see them in the corners of my eyes. 

And I welcome the yellow butterfly.  The satin backed crow.  And...the lights.  I will always welcome the lights. 

On waiting...

Thirty six weeks. 

That's what the calender says today. 

Thirty six weeks.

This is a road I've not traveled before.  The thirty six week mark of pregnancy...without confidence.

Oh sure, it flutters here and there...the sense that all will be well. 

But doubt follows closely.  Fear.  Grief.

It's the grief that gets me down.  It's the understanding that while "she" seems to be coming..."they" never will. 

It's the stark truth that while "she" may make it...."they"...did not.

It is that eye opening fact that makes me wonder if pain will ever leave this heart.

Even when rosebud lips smile in my direction.

Oh yes...I love her already.  Treasure her more deeply than one would think possible.  She is my rainbow light.  My one and only daughter.  My star child. 

She will, I'm sure, radiate her brilliance throughout my world.  And, it pains me to know that as she grows...she will see that unspoken tear in my eyes...and she will know of loss even without touching it herself, which I pray she never will. 

I am waiting.  Thirty six weeks today.  The midwife will do her non stress test, which, while she finds it comforting...I simply find it stressful to be in what seems like a completely healthy and normal pregnancy which is being treated like a time bomb.  All the tests.  All the....silence...as we wait....for the glimmer of normality.  Which...is always there. 

Always. 

So I wait...

For the end.