Loss Can Bring Us Together

There’s this almost honeymoon-like period after a loss, wherein you’re so focused on your grief and comforting your partner, everyday difficulties and discussions are tabled until it’s over.  My family recently suffered a loss (two, actually, within the past month-and-change), and today was our day to ease back into “real life” after the devastation.

As we muddled through our morning, I felt a reluctance to move forward. This reluctance, plus the lingering fatigue and other heightened emotions meant there were a couple of snappish or impatient moments.  I noticed them at the time, acknowledged them, and moved on.  Now, though, I realize that they were significant. They, too, marked a shift back to “normal life” because when we are grieving, we are often so caught up in our – or our significant others’ – feelings and immediate emotions, there is simply no room for criticism, impatience, or arguments.

This leads me to wonder, how can we hold on to a piece of that?  How can we keep from losing sight of the feeling that our need to be close is more important than the mundane things which crop up and create distance?

Perhaps that is the purpose of grief and loss – to remind us of the important things.  Love, closeness, family.  And to allow us to put aside petty squabbles, differences, and frustrations while the important things are highlighted.  Yet I’m sure there is a way in daily life to hold those priorities dear, as well.  I’m going to work to try to find it because these things are more important.  Always.

“That’s All Anybody Really Needs”

Monday is my wedding anniversary – 6 years since I married my best friend.  Today is the wedding anniversary of a dear friend of mine – 3 years since she married the man I never had the chance to meet.  A year ago on July 4th, her husband unexpectedly passed away.  Her Facebook status today reads:

Happy anniversary, honey. I hope it’s nicer where you are than where I am, and that cool music is always playing on the radio there.

During our conversation earlier today, I mentioned the similarities in our anniversary dates, and that I didn’t expect we would be doing anything special because money is fairly tight around here.  Her response (paraphrased):  “A night of cuddles and closeness are all anybody really needs.”

Yes.  She was absolutely right.  Times may be tough, but there is still so much for which I am grateful.  Taking a look at the situation from her perspective, I admonished myself for what I had said.  Though I know she did not intend to make me feel guilty, and that she welcomes “normal” conversation that does not tiptoe around her widowhood, I still chided myself not only for my insensitivity, but for taking for granted what I do have.

The Author and Jer Husband in July 2009

In all honesty, I already have those things that most valuable to me.  I have a roof over my head, even if it is not my own roof.  I have food on my table, and enough money to continue to buy that food, even if it means eventually dipping into savings to make ends meet.

But most importantly, I have someone to curl up with on the couch while we watch Veronica Mars or The West Wing, or play Wii games.  I have a Scrabble or Trivial Pursuit opponent, there for the asking.  I have a life partner, a father to my little boy and any future children we may have, and a companion.  I have him, and he has me.  And in the end, that’s all anybody really needs.

Pregnancy & Infant Loss Awareness Day

Pregnancy & Infant Loss Awareness Ribbon. Graphic belongs to October15th.com

It seems appropriate to me that Pregnancy & Infant Loss Awareness Day happens at this time of year. At this point 6 years ago (my God, was it really that long?), I was in a deep depression. September 11th through October 26th, 2003 were the worst weeks I had ever suffered. Those weeks span the time period from when we first found out our baby was dead inside me, to our wedding day – the single bright spot in an autumn of darkness.

Because of this early loss – she died at 5 weeks gestation, though it was not confirmed for several more weeks – I underwent various tests and was watched very closely during my next pregnancy, even though that did not occur for another 3 1/2 years. It took us that long for our broken hearts to heal enough to try again.

We never did learn what caused the miscarriage, nor do I know what caused the even earlier loss I’d suffered some five years previous. The tests showed nothing conclusive, and I had an uncomplicated pregnancy in 2007, resulting in the birth of a perfect baby boy.

Though my heart is healed, the scars upon it remain. Never again would I be able to go through pregnancy without fear. Though my son was carried to term (and a few days beyond) and arrived safe and sound, that does not erase the memory of my previous pregnancies. I can not forget those babies I never held or saw, those whose gender and features I can only imagine.

The baby my husband and I lost together lives on in our hearts. She has a name, given to her long before her conception: Micaela (Caelie) Marie. That name makes her real, and allows us to honor her memory. Though I never gave the first baby any such memorial – he or she was gone so quickly, almost before I knew I was pregnant – I mourned in different ways. Neither child has been forgotten, nor ever will.

Coping Quiet

Buggie with his favorite "uncle"

This morning I woke up to startling news about a dear friend’s health.  It’s one of those situations which could be nothing, or could be very serious.  Only time (and likely a barrage of tests) will tell which it will be.  This man is the husband of one of my best friends, and has slowly become a friend of mine in his own right over the years.  He is also incredibly close to Buggie.

I told O about it as I was driving him to work today.  The rest of the drive passed in relative silence – a rarity around these parts, let me assure you.  When questioned, O said he was thinking about M.  It made me realize that I … mostly wasn’t.  Not because I don’t care, but because I do. That’s how I cope with things – I put them to the back of my mind until I can fully process how to cope with it.  I skip immediately into denial/distraction, moving along with life as if I hadn’t heard what I heard, until I can’t any longer.

My Gramma

This actually seems to be something of a family trait.  It’s not only a matter of self-preservation and pride, but also of strength.  There are a couple of us in the family – most notably myself and my Gramma – who have taken it upon ourselves to be The Strong Ones.  It isn’t a matter of stoicism, nor of hiding our emotions.  I’m absolutely no good at that; my face and eyes betray me, every time.  It’s just a matter of putting our own feelings on the back burner while others may need us to be strong.  For example, when my mother calls me with any kind of difficult news, I tend not to react right away.  I get through the phone call, hang up, and only then do the tears come.  She doesn’t need my pain to make hers all the worse.

Mind you, it’s not by any means a conscious decision.  Sometimes, I wish it didn’t work the way it does for me.  I would be able to heal faster, if I didn’t delay my pain.  I know this, but my brain seems to not be wired that way.  Instead, I grieve after the fact.  I panic when the danger has gone.  I cry when everyone else’s tears have dried.

The Definition of Family

Any pet lover will tell you the same thing – the furry (or scaly, or whatever) ones are just as much members of their family as the furless bipeds. I am a cat person, and I have always referred to my cats as my babies. When I was pregnant I even had a dream that interpreted that literally, as I was strapping my eldest cat into a baby seat in the car.

Once my son was born, though, I realized that there is a line to be drawn. Twice in the fourteen months since his birth, my husband and I have had to make the impossible choice between two members of our family. Once was over the summer, when we had to rehome one of our cats due to his unsanitary tracking habits. The other was yesterday. The following is excerpted from my personal journal:

He hid under the dining room table and hissed. And growled. At everyone. Including us. So we decided it best to shut him upstairs, where he would be able to relax, and wouldn’t scare (or God forbid) hurt anyone. (Note: before tonight, he’s never actually attacked anyone unless he was absolutely cornered, and even then it’s been rare.) So O took him upstairs, growling, hissing, etc. And he just … freaked out. O got him past the baby gate, and he broke free and barreled into the gate, knocking it down. I’m a little fuzzy on everything that happened from there, but it took at least 45 minutes… and O got attacked. As in, his hand has a ton of puncture wounds and scratches, despite having Sage wrapped in a blanket (because that was the ONLY way he could get hold of him – he tried for a LONG time before that).

Eventually Sage got closed upstairs (on the third floor), and M helped clean O up and bandage his hand. And we made the most difficult decision we’ve ever had to make as cat-owners. We had to call animal control.

The fact of the matter is, as much as we love Sage, he was a danger to us, to our friends and their children, and to Buggie. This was not the first time he had reacted that way, but it was certainly a stronger reaction than we had seen in the past. We simply could not risk it happening again.

However, Sage was my baby. O and I have had him since a month after we started dating, and he’s been a constant companion for all these years. I am nothing short of heartbroken at having lost him, and have spent the past 27 hours questioning what I could possibly have done differently over the past eight years, to have achieved a different outcome. Obviously, though, there is no way for me to know the answer to that question. Was it because of his unstable kittenhood and the multiple moves we had to make when he was small? Did someone hurt him when I was not there to see or to stop it? Or was this going to happen no matter what, and only the specific place and time uncertain?

There are countless unanswerable questions in my head, mingling with the guilt and sadness I feel. I know O and I made the best decision we could for our family. Our responsibility as parents dictated that the line be drawn to ensure our son’s safety. Does this change my definition of the word “family” to exclude the feline persuasion? No, I think that if it did, the decision would not have been so difficult, and my heart would not be so heavy.

Buggie petting Sage