Six and a half years later

I don't have a real purpose for this post. It's mostly disjointed rambling. But I guess that's how my thoughts are. Still. Six and a half years later. It still doesn't make sense. It's not nice and neat. It still sucks. The words and feelings still get stirred up and start to bubble out of me and I don't know what to do with them. So here they are --

I hate being in this club. This club that no one should ever have to be in. And even more, I hate when women I know are thrust into this club. I hate telling them that I am thinking of them. I hate knowing that their life is forever changed and that there will now be "the new normal" for them.

A woman that I went to high school with recently lost her son to SIDS. I wish I knew what to say to her. I wish I could give her peace. I wish I could let her know that it's okay to feel whatever she feels; that it's okay to cry and that it's okay to smile, and that just because she has good moments doesn't mean that she loves her son less. But I don't know how. We're all in this awful club together and yet I feel distant. I wish that I didn't. And I'm sorry that I do.

I wish I was better about being more open. I don't feel like I'm closed off. I don't feel like I shirk away from talking about Maggie. But six and a half years later, it's not really any easier. It might even be harder. I'm living in NYC and far too often I hear "one day you'll see" and "just wait until it happens to you" -- I cringe and keep quiet. They don't know. They don't know her. They don't mean to cause this pain.

I know that Maggie is not forgotten. I know that she touched so many lives in so many ways. Ways that I will probably never know. But it hurts to realize that when I meet new people, they don't know her. They don't know that my daughter had the cutest button nose and the most perfect cupid's bow. They don't know that this year she'd be in first grade. (First grade?! Is that right? Time is a strange thing.)

I wondered how long it would be, and for a time it felt like there was no way it was ever going to happen again, but it's finally creeping in, slowly but surely -- the yearning to have another baby. People ask me if I am scared; scared that my next baby will be like Maggie. I am scared, but not for that reason. I'm scared because I worry that Maggie will be overshadowed. That people will forget that I was already a mother before this next new baby. That my heart has already been full of love for a child growing inside me. I don't want them to forget. I don't want ME to forget.

I never know how to end these posts....it doesn't seem possible. The thoughts and feelings are all still there so it's weird to find a tidy stopping point.

So I'll leave it with these ellipses since that's really the best way to describe it all.

...

Four Years Later

My sweet girl has been on my mind a lot recently as her birthday draws near. I feel so guilty and conflicted. My life is so drastically different than it was four years ago that it doesn't even seem like it could have ever been my life at all...

Brian and I are no longer married. Losing Maggie created a very deep pit that we were never really able to climb out of.  It changed him so much more than I realized. We healed separately and not together. Or at least I thought we did. I didn't know. We never talked about it. He assumed. I assumed. In fact, it has only been in the last month that I have had any insight as to how it got to him.

My best friend (and sister) Fran died 18 months after Maggie. Fran was so involved in my pregnancy, the birth and death and healing. The silence after my sister's death was deafening. Suddenly I felt so alone. I  felt had no one to connect with. No one really understood.

Fast forward to now and where do I stand? I'm divorced and have not had any more children.

So where is the guilt and confliction that I mentioned? It lies in my happiness. I feel guilty for moving on. I feel guilty for being "glad" that I don't have kids. For being glad that I'm not that woman at the playground. For being glad that I can come and go as I please and don't have to worry about arranging a babysitter.

Please don't misunderstand me. If my daughter was here, I would be over the moon with happiness. I would have gladly given up everything that was "me" for the endless appointments with doctors and long hospital stays for her countless surgeries. But you know what? She's not here. And living the rest of my life in a pit of dispair and forever drowning in grief wouldn't have benefited anyone.

It has taken four years but I am finally feeling like I am pulling it all back together and becoming ME again -- I'm living in the city that I have wanted to live in for basically my entire life. I have an amazing boyfriend who is so insanely good to me that my face flushes and I'm a puddle of giddy goop every time I think about him.

It has taken four years but it has finally happened. I am happy.

Maggie caused me to change in ways that I could never explain to anyone. I am a kinder and more compassionate person because of her. I appreciate more. I take for granted less. I am a better person because of my daughter.

-Kelli

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Several of you have mentioned trying to track me down and I'm sorry for not being more accepting. For a very long time I wasn't in a place where I could be who I needed to be. I pushed so hard to heal that I alienated myself from a fantastic group of people who wanted to be there to support me.

Four years later and here I am! I welcome you all to contact me through whatever social mediums you would like!

Facebook (I ignored my FB for a long time and have been trying to get better about being more active recently.)
Twitter (I'm not super active, but it's a random view into my world. You've been warned.)
Pinterest (because everyone has one.)

My personal essay on Babble.com

I had the incredible opportunity to have a personal essay posted on babble.com -- click on the link below to check it out.

http://blogs.babble.com/being-pregnant/2012/05/14/coping-after-the-loss-of-a-child/

Hope all of you are well.

Love to you all.
-Kelli

An update of sorts

It's been almost three and a half years. So much has changed.

I've recently relocated to New York and work for a parenting website. I haven't yet shared my full story with anyone, and in fact I've only shared a very partial story with two people.

There is a possibility that I'll be posting a personal essay on our site this weekend. I say it is a possibility because I haven't yet written it. I don't know if I can. I want to. I need to. I feel that there is so much inside that I haven't let out.

I'll of course send out the link if I can get myself together enough to write this essay.

I just wanted to post to say hello. That I'm still here.

Baby Clothes

I guess I always thought they were cute...looked forward to buying them someday. However, now I find myself DRAWN to them, even though I have there is no one to wear them and dirty them up and out grow them too quickly.

This evening I was at church and my friend's 2 year old ran by looking so handsome in a pair of jeans. I love jeans on kids. They look SOOOOO cute. This however led to me being so upset and crying so much that I ended up leaving about 15 seconds into the very first song.

Today has been a rough day. I just thought you should know.

Life Goes On

I would like to write a beautiful eloquent post...but it's not in me right now.

I would however like to let you all know that I am doing well. There is plenty that I could complain about, but I won't. Losing Maggie has taught me to look towards the positive. I try to live each day soaking in the blessings that God has surrounded me with.

This year has certainly been a bumpy one...but I take each day as it comes and I know that the Lord has a plan for me...it is not for me to whine about. He knows what is best for me. As long as Brian and I keep our eyes on Him, we'll be just fine.

Kelli, the Humpty Dumpty Fruit Cake

8 months and 1 day.

I was doing really well for several months, but I've quickly come unraveled in the last couple of days. I'm a mess. Despite the fact that I have a full time job, I feel like I have too much free time. And in this free time I think. And when I think I fall apart. The pain is so strong that I can hardly breathe. My eyes water up....but I don't cry. It is as if I am afraid to let myself let the walls down....afraid that I'll never be put back together again. So instead I sit on top of the wall...teetering...balancing.

My heart feels heavy and empty at the same time. I am so blessed to have Brian. He is such a wonderful husband. But I feel so incomplete. My “baby fever” is back in full swing...and Brian has more than given the thumbs up. But I can't let us try again right now. The economy totally bites. He still has one semester left of school. Having a baby is EXPENSIVE. I'm being too practical. I want our family to grow....one cat and one dog are not cutting it.

I'm an emotional fruit cake right now. Just wanted to let you all know.

Hitting a brick wall at 70 mph.

I want so badly to write, but I don't know what to say.

I'm currently reading Waiting with Gabriel. It's a story written by the mother of a baby boy who was diagnosed with Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome, and his parents being forced to chose between endless surgeries or "comfort care" that would result in his passing a few days after being born. I've only read 29 pages so far yet they seem like a memory of mine, pulled out and written on paper.

Magdalyn's diagnosis was even more severe than Gabriel's. Hypoplastic right heart with pulmonary stenosis and dextrocardia. They never did an autopsy, so we can't say for sure if anything else might have been wrong or how severe the heart block was.

I can't imagine the pain the might have endured if she had lived longer. If given the choice, which would I have chosen? As it is, her very very brief time on this earth was spent in surgery. We were told she would die almost immediately if she did not have the pacemaker put in. She would not survive. This was her only chance. She died an hour after surgery.

It's strange the things I remember; these tiny memories so strong that they bring me to tears and leave me teetering on the edge of losing it.

We were in our room waiting to be told that we could go see her. The doctor came in and told us that we needed to go now, or we might be too late. We were waiting to get clearance to move me, since I had just been more or less severed in two, and I was not supposed to be in a sitting position for another six hours. My nurse walked in and said she wasn't waiting anymore. I don't remember getting from the bed to the chair. I just remember that my nurse was pushing the wheelchair so fast that I felt like she was almost running. I was not upset. I was excited. I was about to see my baby girl for the first time. When she was born they rushed her off so quickly that I never got to see her.

I never saw my baby alive.

When we entered the NICU I saw the team of doctors, there were nine or ten of them around her. Just standing. Then I heard it. The sound of a flat line on a heart monitor. You hear this sound all the time on TV and in movies. It is now in my head as the worst sound in the entire world. The worst sound of my life. The sound of the end of her life. I wasn't told by a doctor while I was in a waiting room. I wasn't standing around, pacing back and forth. I was trapped in a wheelchair and the sound of that flat line was like being in a car and hitting a brick wall at 70 mph.

Surely there were other babies in the NICU, but I don't remember seeing any baby in that room but my daughter. There must have been nurses and parents, but I don't remember them.

My baby is in heaven. She is with God. She is not in pain. I try to take comfort in this. But some times, some days, I just want my baby to be here with me. And today, today is one of those days.

Yesterday

Yesterday was Maggie's due date. How surreal. I'm doing quite well in my day to day, however these "landmark" dates still feel like a ton of bricks have landed on me.

A church sermon a couple weeks ago stuck me pretty hard, the pastor was talking about Mary and Joseph on their way to Bethlehem, and how hard the journey was with her being 9 months pregnant. It made me realize that I should have been 9 months at that point, and that I wasn't. I should have been waddling around and complaining about how much my back hurt, how my feet were so swollen that my shoes wouldn't fit. I should have been wondering if God would shake his finger at me for wanting to wear house slippers to church.

It hit me hard. I cried. A lot.

Here is a link for a song that I love. It makes me cry every time I hear it. And yes, sometimes I listen to it when I feel like I NEED a good cry. Go Listen!

Wasn't that great? Are you crying now? Have I ruined your makeup? If so, I'm terribly sorry. However, it was completely worth it. I LOVE that song, and I hope you do too.

I got my pictures back from Michelle!!! There are far too many to post here, but I'll get a slideshow posted on here soon. I also set up a Shutterfly account where you can view them all.

I will never be able to show Michelle just how grateful I am; I pray that the Lord will bless her, just as she has blessed me.

Love to you all,
Kelli

I want YOU in Maggie's book

So I'm starting on my Maggie book soon. I'll be working on it on Picnik and Shutterfly.

I saw the cutest thing....and was thinking maybe I could get something similar going for Maggie's book.

The link goes to a page that shows some ADORABLE pics. I can't really explain it, just go check it out!

Anywho, so like I said, I would LOVE LOVE LOVE to do something similar for the book.

Make one and send it to me! You can be in Maggie's book! I would love this because it would be a permanent reminder of the people who have been with me supporting me on this journey.

You can e-mail me Kelli_Mears@hotmail.com

It's Spring

It feels like time has flown by.....it's been nearly 2 months. So much has happened....

Michelle finished my pictures....they're beyond amazing. Here's one, I'll post the big slide show later.


I forgot just how tiny she really was....she seemed so big and heavy to me!

I've been keeping very busy lately. Just moved halfway across the country. Currently looking for a new job. And reading whenever possible.

To those who have sent me books -- thank you. thank you. I didn't realize how much I needed them. They all have a slightly different perspective, which has helped more than I even knew.

It is springtime. Flowers are growing. The icky brown grass of winter has been replaced by soft fresh green grass. There are budding leaves on the trees. I wish I could show her. Sometimes it makes my heart ache; to know I'll never play in the park with her, I'll never buy her a new spring dress, take her to the zoo.

BabyCenter says I should be 36 weeks now....this idea is so strange to me that it seems foreign.

Just wanted to give y'all and update. I'm still here. Trying to settle into this new life. This new normal.

Love to you all. I wish I could hug you and tell you how much you mean to me. Each and everyone one of you.

-Kelli

I can't help it...

I'm a mom. I can't help but show off pictures of my beautiful daughter. Here's the birth announcement that Michelle made for us.

get your kleenex ready...

Michelle (my Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep photographer) is seriously amazing. Here's a slide show she made with a few of my maternity photos.

Also, here's another pic of my darling Magdalyn. Michelle is still working on the images from the hospital, but she always seems to know when I'm needing to see my baby girl and another picture will be right there waiting in my inbox.

I am so so SO very grateful to her and for the work of Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep.

Tacky but truthful and One Month Later

Many people have asked me -- "What can I do to help?" or have said "If there's anything I can do for you, don't hesitate to ask."

Here's the tacky but truthful answer...

You can buy me a book.

I currently have a wish list of almost 20 books on Amazon. This list comes after looking for about an hour. I'm sure I could find more, and I'm sure that you have more to suggest (And please do!!) I would love to be able to buy all these books myself...but I can't.

Many of you have said -- "I don't know what to say. I don't know the words to make it easier."

Here's a solution that makes everyone happy. You can help me. I can get help.

*************

"One Month Later"

Today is February 27th...She would be a month old today...

It feels like it was a lifetime ago that I was in the hospital. And yet when I think about her, I can still feel the weight of her body, and what it felt like to have my lips pressed against her forehead.

It wasn't that long ago...

I've been keeping busy in the last few weeks. I've traveled to Indiana to spend a week with my sister. I stayed in Missouri for a week with Brian's family. It has been wonderful.

However, I wonder, am I keeping myself too busy? Am I keeping myself occupied so I don't deal with this? So I don't grieve fully? I need to. I know this. But I don't know the answer.

Back to the first part of this blog. I am hoping that if I start reading some books it will push me off the edge and force me to deal with this. I want to deal with this. But it is so easy to distract myself. To think of all the upcoming events and details.

I think of her often. Every day. Every hour I am awake. I smile. I have fond memories. This is not the part I have problems with...

I need to grieve my daughter. I do from time to time - Hearing a certain song that makes me think of her; overhearing people talking about the joy of bringing their new baby home. There was no joy in bringing my baby home. She came home in a green velvet bag.

*************

I never know quite how to end these blogs. For me this blog is a glimpse of my thoughts and emotions on a computer screen. This blog is a window into my grief. To "properly" end a blog entry makes me feel as if I am telling you that my "grief session" is over for the day. This is not true. My grief is unending.

So if you've ever wondered why each entry as of late has seeming just stopped out of nowhere; now you know.

Why now?

***Disclaimer: This post is nothing but a rant. It'll probably only be up for a few hours til I regret posting it...oh well here it is. ***

People have been coming out of the woodwork lately to tell me how exciting it is that I am about to have a baby.

...uh....

This puts me in a very awkward place. I have NO IDEA how to respond when people say this. I either LIE or I make them feel TERRIBLE. Not to mention that it doesn't exactly put me in a great state of mind. I miss her enough without being reminded of the fact that I should still be pregnant. That I would still have two months to go til I'm due. That I shouldn't have seen her yet. That she should be ALIVE.

Instead she is ashes. In a green velvet bag. My baby should be moving and kicking inside of me. But she's not. Thanks for accidentally reminding me.

I don't want to be angry. I don't want to make people feel bad. I don't want to be in this position.

I miss my daughter.

This is my new life...I am now that woman.

This is my new life...I am now that woman...

Took my first trip to the grocery store last night. I was not ready. There seemed to be far more babies there than usual. Sometimes I forget she's gone; when I remember the pain comes on so strong I can hardly breathe. I am that woman who is crying in the middle of the frozen vegetable aisle. The one that you pity because she can't "handle her emotions in public".

This afternoon we went to Best Buy. Still not ready. First there was a woman holding a baby that couldn't have been more than six months old. A wave of panic started to hit me. I took in deep breaths, I released them slowly. I was determined to make it through this trip. Just as I felt myself start to calm down, I heard a voice behind me, "you better shut your mouth." The little girl had been wimpering (not crying loudly or screaming, or trying to get out of the cart). She couldn't have been more than two. Seriously? Why did he get to keep his daughter and I didn't? How can someone be so mean to their child for no reason? This made me livid. LIVID. I wanted to yell at him. I wanted to tell him to appreciate her. To be thankful she was healthy and alive. If I had been there alone and not in the company of others, I might have actually said something. Instead, I got so upset that I turned into that woman again...I was crying in the middle of the bargain CD aisle.

Awhile later I joked with a friend about how if that guy didn't want her, I'd take her. But the truth is, I don't want her. I don't want a baby. I want Maggie. I want MY DAUGHTER.

We went to the funeral home yesterday. We had to legally identify her body. I had been both dreading it and almost looking forward to it. I wanted so badly to see her again. We were told "you can look but you can't touch." What? What do you mean I "can't touch"? She's MINE. This hurt far more than seeing her. I wanted to kiss her tiny hands. I wanted to feel her silky hair on my fingertips. I was terrified right before they opened the door, and then, there she was. She was in a tiny pink velvet casket -- it was the size of most of the shoe boxes in my closet. She was so much tinier than I remembered. She was beautiful.

I wonder what she would have looked like growing up. I wonder if she would have picked soccer or ballet? Would she have liked cats or dogs? Would she have been afraid of bugs or begged me to let her have a pet snake? I will never know. And I wish I did.

This is my new life...I am now that woman...

To all of you who have reached out to me, thank you. I am not ignoring you. I am so very grateful you are there. Please don't turn your back and walk away. I'll be there soon, but not yet. Keep bugging me. I'll come around eventually.

Love and heartfelt thanks to you all,
Kelli

My favorite poem.

This is a poem that I read many years ago when I was grieving the loss of a friend. It has stayed with me always and has brought me much comfort in the last week as I know it will in the coming days, weeks, months and years.

Adapted from Unknown Author from the original Do Not Stand At My Grave and Weep by Mary Frye.

Do not stand at my grave and weep.
I am not there. I do not sleep.
I am a thousand winds that blow.
I am the diamond glint on snow.
I am sunlight on the ripened grain.
I am the autumn rain.
When you awake to the morning's hush,
I am the swift uplifting rush,
Of birds circling in flight.
I am the stars that shine at night.
Do not think of me as gone.
I am with you still - in each new dawn.

Come and gone, but forever in our hearts.

It has been the longest week of my life. Every day feels like it stretches on forever. I have been very blessed to have an amazingly wonderful and abundant support system. Thank you for all of your comments, thoughts, prayers, voicemails and visits.

In this past week time has ceased to make sense; days and nights....minutes and hours.

Tomorrow will mark one week since my daughter entered this world. It will also mark the day she left. We prayed that she be big and strong. Her daddy talked to her in the nights before her birth and asked her to be big and strong...and she did as she was told. She entered this world at 3 pounds 3 ounces and was 18 inches long. That's big. According to Baby Center she should have weighed less than two and a half pounds (some of this weight was fluid on her abdomen, but not THAT much) and should have only been about 15 inches long. My mother suggested that maybe I was further along than we thought. I know this is not the case because she was weighed and measured several times between 20 and 24 weeks and she always measured very SMALL. In fact, based on measurements from back then, the doctors thought I was actually about a week LESS further along than we thought. She fought hard and she grew big and tried to be very strong in the last month.

I'm not sure what happened exactly in the end. We didn't speak to the doctors afterwards, and even if we had I don't know that I would have remembered it. Shortly before her passing, a doctor came in and said that she was not getting enough oxygen to her organs and that were about to give out and shut down. But when the nurse called my mother she told her that Maggie's heart has simply stopped beating. As of right now, it doesn't really matter to me what happened. All I know is she is gone. She is not here with me. I cannot go to the NICU to see her. My daughter is gone.

Grief is like the ocean -- it ebbs and flows and there is the occasional tidal wave that seemingly comes from no where.

I miss my daughter.

I miss the weight of her body in my hands. I miss the smell of her skin. I miss the feeling of my lips pressed against her forehead. Her perfect bow lips and her tiny monkey toes. I miss my daughter and I would do anything to have her back for only a minute. I would do anything to be able to look into her eyes and tell her that I love her.

I will never know what her eyes looked like. I will never see her smile...hear her laugh. I will never feel her tiny hand wrapped tightly around my finger. Never put a band-aid on a boo boo. Teach her to ride a bike. There will be no dress up. No tea parties. No ballet recitals. No hugs when her heart has been broken. No tears at her wedding.

I miss my daughter.

This is not the way it should be. Twenty-three year old women should not have to decide burial or cremation for their child. Babies are not supposed to die. Women with abusive boyfriends and prostitutes with drug problems have healthy babies. Why not me?

God has a plan. He knows what is best. He would never give me a burden I cannot bear. He would never give me too much. He would never leave me alone to deal with this. I know this. I know He is in control. But it doesn't make it hurt less.

I miss my daughter.

Many of you have asked about a service for her. The answer is -- I do not know. The funeral home called this morning to let us know that her cremation will be taking place on Wednesday. I wanted so badly to have her body donated to medicine...for some worldly greater good to come from this. All of the organizations said she was too young and too small. This hurt me deeply. They did not want my daughter. It was like she was picked last for kickball. Like she didn't get an invitation to her friend's birthday party. Like no one put any cards in her homemade shoebox card holder in her class on Valentine's Day. It made me want to hold her even tighter and never let go. I wanted her.

Meet Maggie

Hello again,
It's Fran updating for Kelli one more time. Kelli is on her way home from the hospital right now. She wanted you all to meet Maggie. She said she'd try to write a entry soon. Here is her little girl, Miss Magdalyn Grace.

She's Gone

I don't have all of the details yet, but Maggie went home to be with the Lord a few moments ago. Please pray for Kelli and our family as we grieve the loss of this beautiful baby girl.

***Update***
I just spoke to our mom and she said that Maggie's organs failed. Kelli is with Maggie now. Her photographer is on her way back to the hospital to document their time together. Please continue to pray for Kelli.

Kelli, we love you so very much. Maggie was one lucky little girl to have you for a mommy.