Amanda’s Story

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.