Tag: Pregnancy and Grief

Grief, Pregnancy and Pies

 

Ronan. I think I told you that I tried to “prep,” with Dr. JoRo about this whole getting pregnant thing. We spent hours upon hours talking about it. Nothing could have prepared me for what it is like to be pregnant, after losing you. I am a natural born mother. I am a good mother. The fact that I still don’t really feel all giddy and excited about this baby, scares me a little bit. I still think this baby is going to die, so therefore I am trying not to get too attached to it yet. I guess I wrote a lot about having another baby when you were still here. I know we talked about it, but I don’t remember all the things you told me. A lot of my blog readers have been posting that you said you wanted a baby sister. I don’t remember that, but apparently I wrote it so it must be true. My foggy grief brain still makes a lot of my memories of you, hard to remember. Whatever this baby is, it will be loved. I know I love it, but I also know it will never take the place of you. It will never fill the empty space in my heart that feels like a gaping hole. I can’t even begin to think about a nursery. All I know is we have 3 bedrooms in our house and yours will not be turned into a nursery. I’m not sure what we will do. There is no way I can even fathom the thought of taking down your things and packing them away. I told your daddy he needs to build a new room for this baby because it’s not having yours. I cannot part with your toys, clothes, stuffed animals, books, blankets, pictures on the walls. I cannot take the things down from your room, only to fill them with something new. I cannot get rid of your bed and the Master Yoda that hangs above it. I won’t do it.

I am still pretty sick. The thought of any type of food, makes me nauseous, except pies. What in the hell is that all about? That’s all I want to eat. Peach Pie, Apple Pie, Cherry Pie… yes please. Any type of meat makes me throw up. Any type of cooking smell, makes my stomach turn. I’ve been living off of pie. So weird, but I’ll take it. You know in my obsessive exercising eating nothing world before I was pregnant, I would have never touched a pie. Bring on the pies now. I’ll enjoy them while I can:) I was productive yesterday. Of course this left me wiped out so I had to come home and take a bloody nap. I was going through some emails. I had been going back and forth with your Sparkly on some things. He had read my last blog post about how barbaric the cancer world is. He told me he thought I was being a little harsh. This led to me sending him an email back saying in no way, shape or form, was I too harsh. This led to him calling my phone. We had a little debate that  I took a stance on and refused to back down. You know how he loves to play devils advocate with me. Not because he thinks I am wrong, but I think he likes to provoke me into thinking long and hard about things from every angle, before I take such a strong stance. This is one of the things that I love most about him. The way he makes me exam everything that comes my way, with a magnifying glass. This led to me bawling on the phone. “You didn’t see everything he went through, but you saw more than most people. I won’t tell you everything they did to him, because I feel like I have to protect you. I know how much your heart is broken. Why would I want to break it anymore? Yes, it was barbaric. Yes, it is wrong. These are kids. They deserve more compassionate treatments. I lived in this world. I saw things that you don’t even know about. Someday, I will tell you.” I sobbed into the phone. “Darling. It’s o.k. You are right. You are so right. You don’t have anything to prove to me, o.k. He deserved better. You know you have my utmost respect, always. Come on, settle down. When do you leave for New York? Tell me about your trip.” I wiped away my tears and appreciated the way he tried to change the subject. We talked about New York for a bit. He always knows how to cheer me up, but I was still left a little shaken. I still feel like I have post traumatic stress syndrome over the things we went through. I will not ever forget the way you were treated like a lab rat by supposedly one of the best doctors in the world. What a fucking joke.

I have tried to be as productive as possible. I had a long board meeting last night. As always, it was good. I love our little unconventional board. I love the way we gather around our kitchen table, somebody always brings food, and we get down to business. There is a lot of business to attend to, but that never gets in the way of the love and laughter that fills our house while those girls are here. That means everything to me. We have so much going on which we are all so thankful for. We also know some changes are going to have to come, in order to start raising the serious about of money, that we want to raise. Let the strategizing, begin…

Sooooooo… New York!!! I leave soon. I have some serious business to attend to! I’m so excited. Stacy is coming with me. She needs a break and this trip is just what the doctor ordered. She will be great to have along with me to help with the business things that we are dealing with. We are also going to meet up with my friend, Scott Kennedy, from Solving Kids’ Cancer, another really great organization that is based out of New York. We will spend some time with our Fairy RoMo which is the thing I am most excited about. NYC with our Fairy RoMo is my paradise. It will be a trip packed with a lot of business, but a lot of fun as well. All fueled by everything Ronan. My favorite kind of trip. The only one’s I feel comfortable taking. As long as you are the reason I am going, to keep things moving forward with your foundation, your memory, and your spirit… I know great things will come from this trip.

A lot of you little blog readers have asked why I am calling this baby Poppy for now. It’s because when I first found out I was pregnant, it was the size of a poppy seed. I thought that name sounded cute, so that is why. It won’t be the real name for the baby. We have had those picked out for a long time. Our girl name was picked out even before Liam and Quinn were born. We think we have our boy name too. Ronan will be a part of both of their names, regardless of the sex of the baby. That is important to our family. We have all agreed on that. Anything else I need to address tonight?? Your questions are sweet. I love reading all of your comments. Thanks for writing them.

I think this is all for tonight, Ronan. I miss you so much. I watched your daddy come home from work today. I was laying in bed.(still sick and maybe a little depressed) He put his keys on our dresser, just like he always does, right in front of your urn. Watching him do this, I felt like I was sucker punched. His keys, our son, on our dresser. It is just all so wrong. You should not be sitting there. You should have been causing trouble somewhere like I know you would be doing, if you were here. I’m sorry for everything. I miss you, I love you, I hope you are safe.

xoxo

All good things are wild and free, right Ro???

Quinn Does Not Have Brain Cancer and I Am Not Dying

Ronan. Quinn does not have brain cancer. Thank you for that. He just suffers from migraines, like your daddy. Brain cancer worries to rest. For now. It was a busy weekend. I spent most of it, hanging out with your brothers. They had a basketball game on Saturday. I felt so proud, watching them. Basketball has become therapeutic to them. Your daddy spends so much time, practicing with them. It’s showing on the court for sure. They are strong, fast, and aggressive. You heard me right. Aggressive. This coming from the two most gentle giants, to walk this earth. As their mama, watching this fire that burns within them on the basketball court, makes me so proud. I know it comes from you. I love watching them play. I hate how my eyes wander over to the other side of the court to where the 5 and 6 year olds are playing. I always picture you out there. You would have been the best player, rocking your Nike headband for sure. I told them after their game, how proud I was. I told them how much you would have loved watching them play and how you would have been yelling and screaming for them. The not having your little squeaky screams around, will always destroy me. Always.

I was tired Saturday, after being out for most of the day. I had a date night with Liam and your daddy took Quinn to the ASU football game. Liam and I cuddled on the couch and watched a movie. It’s still hard for me to sit still and just watch a movie. I did it for Liam. I made him a pizza and popcorn. I may have burnt the pizza, but he didn’t mind. He was just happy to have me cook it for him. On Sunday, we had a nice little treat. Our friends, Robyn and Kyle, flew in for the night. Kyle asked Robyn, if she could go anywhere for one night, where would she want to go? She said to see me. I was over the moon about the two of them, coming to visit. They got in Sunday afternoon and we spent the day just hanging out and lying low. Your daddy and Kyle did a lot of guitar playing and singing. Robyn and I did a lot of trying to find me something to wear for The Gold Party (I still having nothing to wear because I refuse to spend an insane amount of money on a dress!) and talking about you and Ezra. I hate that she gets this in what seems to be the exact same way that I get this; but I love this too. I don’t feel so alone when I am around her. I swear to you, she knows my pain almost exactly. She loved Ezra, that much. She knows her perfect life will never exist again, because her perfect life was when Ezra was here. I know that, too. We feel a lot of the same dark things that I don’t really want to share on here. I can go to the darkest of the dark places with Robyn and not be scared that I am being judged or criticized. She is one of the few people I can do this with and it’s all because cancer killed her fucking kid, too. Fuckwad asshole that cancer is.

I took her on a night hike with Kassie and your brothers. I huffed and puffed all the way up the fucking mountain. Robyn laughed at me and the way I had to have my hands on the side of my hips, so I could keep my balance. It is a lot of work carrying a Poppy in my belly. My inner insane workout goddess is not happy, but what’s a girl to do? I can’t do much, so I continued to huff and puff up to the top of the mountain until we arrived at our church. It was dark, quiet and peaceful. We did our little list of the things we were grateful for. Robyn said lists like that were hard for her. They are always hard for me. I made your brothers do one, too. I told them we couldn’t leave the mountain until it was done. They said some cute things. Things 9 year olds should say. Quinn’s last one was he was grateful for his health. That got to me, in a good way and a sad way. I was proud of him for saying his health but it also made me fucking pissed at the world that I know he only knows this, due to you dying. We got down the mountain, in the dark. I didn’t fall. Yay, me. Poppy wouldn’t have been to pleased about that one. We came home and your daddy and Kyle had cooked us all dinner. We gathered around like the unconventional family we are, but nothing has ever felt so much like family since you’ve been gone. Kyle had your brothers in stitches. Kassie just looked like an angel. Robyn just feels like home. Your daddy makes everything safe. Liam and Quinn, remind me of you. Our kitchen table was filled with laugher, pain, sadness, and beauty… all in a very safe, yet dark world that we exist in. I have decided I don’t really feel like I live anymore, Ronan. I exist if anything. I can get by, existing and working the rest of my life to exist in a really, really, really good way. By helping others and opening my heart to these beautiful people, that I am so lucky to know. So lucky for being so unlucky. Talk about ironic.

Robyn and Kyle left today. I was sad to see them go but so glad that they came. My phone rang from my OBGY’s office. I didn’t pick up, on purpose. I had blood work done there last week. I knew they were calling to tell me I had some deadly disease or that Poppy is dying. I listened to the voicemail and called back. My heart was racing. I waited to talk to someone. I was preparing myself, for the worst like I always do with every situation now. I had the talk in my head with Liam and Quinn about how I was dying or how Poppy could not be born. This is automatically where my mind goes and I’m not proud of it but it is not anything I can control. I think I was about ready to hyperventilate on the phone when the lady came on to tell me everything came back fine, except my thyroid looked off. “What do you mean, I’m not dying and Poppy’s not dying!” I wanted to scream. Surely something bigger had to be wrong? Surely the other shoe was going to drop, right?? Not today, Ronan. Not today. Not even today when my very special friend had her very hard surgery. One she thought she might die from. I told her I had talked to you, and she would not be dying. I was right. Everything went great. Thank you for that. You know I could not survive, without her.

I’m going to go now. I’m tired, but what’s new. Seems to be a theme around here. This Poppy pregnancy is for the birds. But I will try to be grateful for this gift that is growing inside of me. I am grateful, Ronan. Don’t get me wrong. I am grateful, but it is a lot harder than I had anticipated. I wasn’t mentally prepared for all the grief that was going to consume me, too. I miss you. I love you. I hope you are safe. Sweet dreams, baby doll.

xxoo