Monday, April 8, 2013

Rainbow baby


I haven’t written much about my pregnancy. I haven’t talked about it much either. It’s April, the month after hell month, the month before our “Rainbow baby” is born.

Like everything in life now this pregnancy is fraught with contradictory emotion. I swing from elation every single time I hear his heart beat to absolute conviction that something has or will go terribly wrong. I swear my Obgyn’s office has my number on speed dial I call so often and my friend who is a labor and delivery nurse probably wishes she’d never given me her number!

What if he looks like Damon? What if he doesn’t? What if I call him the wrong name? What will it be like for a child to enter a family after the loss of his beloved brother? Will I be able to give him room to be Raz or will I always see his brother?

There are a million things that could go wrong. A million things between now and his birth. A million things during those few crucial hours and as we know agonizingly well, a million things every day for the rest of his life. I no longer get to live in that comfortable place assuming my children will be ok. Terror fills every minute. What if?

A friend asked me today what we need to be ready for Raz…

Well, everything. We haven’t let ourselves believe it. We haven’t let it be real. We keep saying to each other ‘ok, we need this and this and this and we need to get ready for this baby.’ Then we just end up staring at each other, paralyzed. We are so afraid, so afraid.

I stood in a local store the other day, staring at the diapers. I had a coupon for diapers. I stood and stared. I couldn’t buy them. I walked out with my heart in my throat thinking ‘at some point, Jodie, you will have to venture into the baby section. At some point you will have to buy diapers and wipes and onsies….’ That point hasn’t come yet because I want so desperately to by buying pull-ups and 3T clothes.

Our amazing family (no blood relation but they are) is throwing us a baby shower this month. Wow… this is getting real ya’ll. So afraid.  So afraid.

Until next time…

4 comments:

  1. Don't let fear take away your joy. I spoke with a woman 5 days ago who had lost a 9-month old baby in a freak accident. This was decades ago, but she has not forgotten Kyle. What she told me was this, "It was devastating, but I knew that I would see him again one day in heaven." Hope is a friend to us all.

    Never can we fully understand why tragedy happens and I do not pretend to philosophize it away, but I do know that Damon is with God, dancing, laughing, happy and secure in the arms of his heavenly Father.

    You are loved by many people, but no one loves you more than God does.

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  2. Your nurse NEVER one time thought that! ;p I can handle whatever you throw.

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