Amanda’s Story

I have been staring at this blank page off and on for almost 2 weeks now. I write a blog post every year for Amanda’s birthday. I don’t know if I am having more trouble this year or I just don’t remember past years.  Nothing seems right. Usually I end up with a spark of inspiration in the weeks leading up to her birthday but this year nothing. Well that’s not true it came during church about 2 weeks ago, but because it is rude to whip out your phone and start typing during the sermon the inspiration left before I could write it down. So I have been left staring at this blank computer screen.

It is now July 12^th the day before Amanda’s birthday. Usually the 12th is worse than the actual day. I am making cupcakes today and we will release balloons tomorrow to mark her birth and death. It is usually not a sad day. The kids know why we do it they know we are remembering their sister. But it’s not a sad day. They enjoy the cake, balloons and we make the day about memories not tears. The first few years were very sad and hard now it’s is about moving forward and remembering the journey.

We started this journey 10 years ago. I don’t know how I am suppose to feel on the 10^th anniversary of my child’s death. I am not depressed. Sad yes! I miss her! I miss what could have been. But I get up everyday and I take care of my family. From the outside we are the normal middle class family with 2 parents, 2 kids, and 2 dogs. On the inside we are a family with an empty chair at the dinner table.

This is the one time of the year I allow myself to wonder what it would be like to have 3 kids. How crazy my life would be with a 12, 10 and 8 year old running around. Some days I wonder if I could handle that chaos but most of the time I know I would love it, embrace it, and complain about it like all other normal moms.

Sadly I am not a normal mom. I am a mom with a child in heaven. I am a mom who still wonders what color Amanda’s eyes are, what her personality would be like, and how she would have fit into our family. I am a mom that wonders what it would be like to raise children that didn’t include a birthday party for a sister they never got to know. 10 years doesn’t make those questions go away. The intense pain is less after 10 years but the questions are still there.

I don’t have the answers to how I am suppose to feel on the 10^th anniversary of my child’s death. My guess there is no real answers. The only answer I have is that I will see her again and everyday I walk a step closer to that. I dream of the day that Jesus meets me at the gates of heaven and hands me the baby girl I entrusted to him so many years ago.

Happy 10^th Birthday baby girl!

10 years. It has been 10 years since Tony and I sat in the doctor’s office waiting with excitement to find out the gender of our second child. It has been 10 years since our world came crashing down around us on that chilly March morning.

It’s amazing to me how 10 years later some things are a complete blur and some things I recall with clear and precise details. I remember being nervous the morning of the first ultrasound with no real reason why. I remember every detail of that first ultrasound: the excitement, and the concern and fear when we realized something was not quite right. But the ride home the next two days of waiting to see the specialist is all a blur. I do remember in clear details the moment the specialist told us our child would not survive. We had 2 choices: carry to term (and lose the baby), or end the pregnancy now (and lose the baby). After that I don’t even remember walking to the car, going home, or any of the conversations that happened later that evening. I do remember the phone conversation with my OB days later about what our choice was going to be. He was supportive and a source of hope through out the next months.

This is where I was 10 years ago. Beginning the journey of pregnancy, complications, and infant loss.

Now 10 years later, Alex is almost 12 years old and in the 6th grade enjoying Boy Scouts, confirmation class at church, school band, and just being a great kid. He was just 19 months old when our lives changed course. He wasn’t old enough to have any real memories of what life was or would have been like if we hadn’t been directed on this path. Sometimes I wonder how things would have been different for him. I know I am a different person; my outlook on life has been altered. I am not the same parent I would have been otherwise. But what did that mean for him? That is a question with no real answer. I could say that it was meant to be this way, therefore he is who he was suppose to be. But then that leads to the slippery slope that I was meant to lose a child and… well yeah, that just sucks.

Then there is Allie, our fun loving and crazy girl. She came to us in the beginning our our journey through the world of grief. The decision to have another child came quickly after Amanda was born/died not because I was trying to replace the lost child, but because I felt if I got sucked any farther into the world of grief, I wouldn’t come out. She is now 8 1/2 years old and truly lives up the Rainbow child label. “Rainbow child” is the name given to the child born after a loss. She brought happiness into our lives in a way that only she could.

In the last 10 years our family has grown changed and continued to walk in our Journey. I saw something on Facebook a few weeks ago from Rick Warren’s wife. Their son committed suicide 10 months ago. She was very eloquent in describing what the first year of grieving a lost child is like. You feel stuck while the world goes on around you. Everyone wants to know when you will “move on” and become “your old self” again. 10 years into this journey “moving on” and “your old self” doesn’t really happen. Yeah I still get up everyday and do the things I am suppose to do. I am an involved parent in my kids’ activities. Looking from the outside I am just like any other parent with an elementary and middle school student. I have carpool, kids activities, homework and I get frustrated/exhausted just like any other mom.

But I see everything through grief colored glasses. It is not always obvious and sometimes it still catches me off guard, but everything I do is filtered through the experience of losing a child. I see the world differently, I react to the world differently. Amanda is never far from my thoughts. I see babies and I don’t think about Alex or Allie as infants; I think about Amanda. What would she have been like? I see pregnant women and I say a prayer that their baby is healthy, because no parent should ever experience the loss of a child. I can say that 10 years later the pain is not as raw and all-consuming. I can have a conversation about Amanda without falling apart. I can walk into the baby department of a store without having a panic attack. I can remember the day she was born without overwhelming sadness. Not because I have “moved on” and not because I am my “old self”, but because I have traveled the last 10 years knowing this is a life long journey; and missing and grieving for my lost child never stops.

Nine years ago today I experienced one of the most amazing experiences of my life.  I held an angel in my arms and placed her in the waiting hands of God.  If you asked everyone in the hospital room what they experienced? The answers would all be a little different.  They would likely included amazing, surreal, sad heartbreaking.  If you ask me to describe the time we spent with Amanda my answer is a jumbled mess, highlighted by the fact this is the 5th version of this post.

I talk a lot about how we miss her and the challenges of the grieving process of loosing a child.  Today I want to talk about the morning we meet Amanda.  After medically assessing her condition the doctors brought her to us to hold and care for her as long as we could.  Several friends were present as well as our Pastor at the time.  We did all the things we wanted dressed her, took pictures, we got hand prints and foot prints a lock of her hair.  All the stuff you do with a healthy infant we just had to do it all then we didn’t have the luxury of time.  Honestly as hard as the last few months of the pregnancy were we were blessed with the ability to prepare so the morning of her birth everything was in place.  This allowed me to be focused on her with all of my attention even though I know lots of stuff was going on around me.

Gods presence filled my hospital room that morning.  I had never felt anything like that before or since.  When I looked upon the face of my newborn daughter I saw the face of god.

Happy Birthday to my Baby Girl that would have been 9 years old today!

Kim

Today in Sunday School we talked about God’s Plan and how people blame bad things that happen in our lives on God.  This is an interesting concept for me and probably anyone who has lost a child or a loved one to tragic circumstances.  I can not in anyway shape or form believe that God would have chosen for me to lose a child.  If I were to believe that then I would have to believe that I had done something to deserve that kind of pain.  And no one deserves that kind of pain!

So no God did not choose for me to lose a child.  No, it does not help if someone tells me it was a part of God’s plan.  No,  it does not help if someone says it was for the Best.  The Best for who?

God did however make sure the right people were in place at the right time in our lives to make the tragic experience of losing a child as tolerable as possible.   From the doctors to church members to family and friends everyone had a part to play in the most tragic experience and most amazing experience of my life so far.

I also never blamed God for what happened. I did go through all of the steps of grief.  Denial, Bargaining, Anger and eventually Acceptance.  However, I was never angry at or blamed God.  I do understand how that happens though.  The need to blame someone is very strong and God is an easy target because he doesn’t fight back.

I believe the strength of my faith before the doctors told us the devastating news that March afternoon is one of the main reasons I can claim that the morning of July 13, 2004 is and will remain one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had.

Kim

Candles lit in memory of Amanda and all babies taken too soon.

October 15th is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day! Tonight at 7pm parents and families will light a candle in remembrance of all the babies lost too soon.

I will be one of them. I am the Face of pregnancy and infant loss!

**Copied from www.Iamtheface.org**

Every single day in the US, 2,000 women lose a baby to pregnancy/infant loss. That’s 700,000 a year, a third of every female in this country. So why does no one talk about it?

In honor of October 15th, National Pregnancy/Infant Loss Remembrance Day, we are opening up the conversation. We are “putting a face” on miscarriage, stillbirth, and infant loss. We are sharing our faces, and declaring to the world, “I am not ashamed to talk about my baby.”

The goal of the I AM THE FACE campaign is simple: to spread awareness of pregnancy/infant loss, and raise support for those who are affected by it. With your help, we will raise $2,000 for the 2,000 women who experience the loss of a child every day. $2,000 for 2,000 faces.

Donations will go to Faces of Loss, Faces of Hope, a nonprofit organization with a mission of providing support and resources for parents who have lost a child through miscarriage, stillbirth, or infant loss and to spread awareness of pregnancy and infant loss throughout the greater community.

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Amanda would have been six years old today. Entering the first grade in a few weeks, learning how to ride a bike this summer and enjoying the pool with her brother and sister. Instead she is running with Angels today. I don’t have the capacity to imagine what Heaven is like but I know it’s a sweeter place because she is there.

After 6 years we have certainly found our new normal but not without thoughts of our sweet daughter we spent so little time with. Every year on her Birthday we have a balloon release and I make a cake or cupcakes. Alex and Allison really enjoy this and it makes her birthday a day of fun and celebration instead of sadness. They are both old enough to understand that they have a sister that is in Heaven. I am really glad we have never hidden that from them and they will grow up knowing her and our journey.

6th Birthday Balloon Release Video

Tonight I was talking to a friend who has a son entering Kindergarten this year.   We were talking about School Supplies and clothes.  Then something I was apparently not preparped for smacked me in the face.  Amanda would be entering Kindergarten this year.  She would be five entering school.  I felt physically ill.  Tightness in my chest,  a knot in my stomach.  As the tears threaten to come, I didn’t know how to make it stop.  I havent’ felt this physically upset in a long time.  Why and how did this blindside me?   I knew it was comming.  Back in the spring I thought about it.   How did I not prepare myself for it?  Busy getting the kids ready for their big day’s missing the fact that this was going to be  a difficult milestone.  I thought the first year had all the really hard firsts.  I guess not!