March should just go away

I woke up at 3 a.m. about two weeks ago. Something was nagging at my brain, and I couldn't pin it down. So much had happened in the last few months: I'd quit my 9 to 5 in order to be a stay at home mom with too many side hustles; one of my side hustles was pretty big for about a month and ate my life alive; I had ambitiously ripped out the contents of several closets and every kitchen cabinet to "get organized."

But all of those issues are in the positive column. My problem with February was that March was coming, and it was bringing feelings with it.

March 2018 is a lot different than March 2017. I'm in therapy once a week now and it's WORKING. I take a mood stabilizer that is WORKING. I'm happier and more rested because I'm NOT WORKING.

"It's going to be OK this year," I told myself. "This is a good place to be in."

Last night I couldn't fall asleep. My brain pulled and flipped at memories and anxiety. My restless rest was interrupted by Clark, who somehow lost a Pokemon stuffed animal at 2 a.m. and needed immediate assistance. I found Charmander, and then Clark needed milk and snuggles. I had another panic attack, and the morning found me before peace did.

At about 5 a.m., I fell into the thoughts I had been trying to push off. March 8 - John's death day - was upon me. Right before that is March 6 - the day my grandmother died on the same year.

My brain went KA-THUNK. Of course. OF COURSE this is my issue. This is why I'm on the verge of tears every minute. THIS is why I'm crying myself to sleep. THIS is why my brain is on hiatus. THIS is why I want to hold my children and never let them go.

John would have been 6 in July. Six years old. First grade! Learning to read, playing Bitty Basketball and rec soccer and getting ready to leave t-ball behind for more grown up things. He would be going with his dad and little brothers for their haircuts, growing out of his pants just before he really can wear shorts, chasing Pokemon on Sundays with his sister, and he would need a new western saddle this year.

There are craters in my heart where these parts of John's life should have been. I grieve them all year, but rarely do I let myself really feel them. Except in March, when I can't stop it from coming, and I feel drained of the strength I need to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

I miss my boys. I miss the woman, the person, I used to be. I miss not knowing what a STUG is. I miss looking forward to spring. I miss simply loving my child without an intricate web of comparison to his dead siblings. But overall, in front of everything, I miss John and I miss Drew. And no amount of headspace, life changes, therapy, and mood stabilizers is ever going to change that.

Hello, January. Now go away.

I seem to approach each January with a wary eye.
I know February is coming. I know March is coming. But first, there is January.

January is the thinking month before the grieving months. I spend all of January thinking about how I will accomplish the next two. I strategize my grief. How will I get through the grief and the hard days without missing Clark and Emily's many lessons and birthday parties and commitments? Where can I go to cry at work where no one can find me? How can I secretly take the anti-anxiety meds my husband hates but I need sometimes to get through this? Should I take the death days off? Power through them at work and stay busy? Work from home those days?

I have chosen not to tell my co-workers at this new job about the boys, the grief, the genetics or the PTSD. That's a double edged sword - I don't have to talk about it, but then I can't explain it when I need to, either.

I have run through February and March in my head about 100 times so far, and I can't wrap my head around what I ought to do, how I should handle any part of it, other than the wreath at the grave and the self-preservation that comes with staying the hell away from my in-laws.

How, I wonder, have I been through this four other times and not learn anything from it? I shake my head at myself. January, you are full of anticipation and anxiety. Now go away, but not so far as to take me to February and March.

You know what voters? You're on your own

It has been a few long, emotionally draining days since Donald Trump became our President-Elect. As I have sifted my way through the stages of grief, my journey to acceptance both bolstered and hindered by Facebook.

I have cried, real tears, every day since Nov. 8 and I have been introspective about my depression. First, in shock, I realized that I was not upset or disappointed with Hillary Clinton. My despair and anxiety comes from a shattered view of humanity. It isn’t that I thought Hillary was the perfect candidate, or that everyone should get on board with her politics and policies. In my heart, I knew that a lot of people were compromising their personal beliefs to vote for my candidate, but I never let myself believe that so many people – so many people I know! – so many people with daughters and wives and children with special needs – would elect a man so full of hate, so counterintuitive to their interests. I knew Donald Trump’s message resonated with “some people,” but to turn to the right and to the left in my own community and see “Make America White Again” signs and a swastika, I still could not reconcile my heart to the math: my neighbors are racist. My friends, family members, school board members, councilmen, and policemen are racist. It was unimaginable to me. Surely they don’t feel this way.

My white privilege showing, I believed they were better. I believed that the “racists” were a few loud bad apples. I wanted to believe in the best of people, to know that they were good in their heart of hearts, no matter how many times they used the highly offensive word “Killary.” (Which is not nearly as clever a nickname as they think it is). My heart has paid dearly for my naiveté.

The realization own democratic base did not show to the polls to cost us the most important election of our time was the punch to the gut that almost did me in.

But then it dawned on me: what do I have to worry about really?

My family immigrated to this country seven generations ago. My children are blonde haired and blue eyed. They are healthy and have no special needs. They wake up in a two-income household of highly educated, white, upper middle class, heterosexual parents. Our credit score is impeccable. We own our house and pay on a small, affordable mortgage.

My children attend public school, but we could afford private tuition if necessary. As state funds dwindle for our school districts, we have been proactive about the arts and sciences, padding our children’s educations with tutors, art and drama workshops and piano and horseback riding lessons and stepping up to take a more active role in their at-home work.

I am not a minority, a single parent, a protected citizen, a veteran, self-employed, or a business owner. My baby making years are over – so I have “termed out” of my relevance to birth control and abortion laws. Do I support Planned Parenthood? Sure. But I don’t need their services. I am not, nor do I wish to be a gun owner, so my constitutional right to bear arms is a bit lost on me. Lobby on, NRA.

I am no longer a student, and my student loans are paid in full. I make far more than the federal minimum wage and do not need to care if hotel maids and waitresses can’t make a reasonable living.

I appreciate Obamacare and have benefited from the raised standards and polices in healthcare in general, but I have always opted for my employer’s private insurance offerings.

Will my personal wealth suffer under a Trump presidency? Undoubtedly. But I don’t anticipate any wild swings in fortune. We have not overly invested in the stock market and we are behind in our retirement savings – almost like we were smart enough to hedge our bets instead of stupid enough to plan late for our silver years.

In the end, it’s the less educated Trump voters who showed up to trample on humanity, and the much-discussed but absent African American voters, the missing Latino voters, the always disappointing millennial turnout, the stubborn Bernie Bro hold outs and the silent women voters who can feel as good about their choice in president – either by actual vote or vote by absence – in their individual situations.

I’m sure it will all be just fine for you. Really, what could go wrong?

triggers, triggers everywhere

Donald Trump can go fuck himself.

Watching the last debate, I was astounded to hear Donald Trump sound off on "partial birth abortion." This term, which I know from my own experience, is a lie. A calculated falsehood perpetuated by Catholics and pro-life evangelists who don't know their heads from their assholes.

Beyond the idea that a woman would carry a baby 8 and a half months and then wake up on the final day of her pregnancy and skip on down to the local abortion clinic to "get rid of it," Donald Trump thinks it's an abortion-a-polooza out there!

When I was pregnant with John, we found out at about 21 weeks that he would not likely live past the first moments of his life. We found out at our "gender reveal" appointment. We spent the next few weeks getting every single test we could get - heart, brain, lungs, digestive system, renal system, hands, feet - everything. We went from specialist to specialist, all with bad results. That time that we spent trying to find any way to save our son soaked up all the time we had left to terminate. Because of this, we had to cross state lines into Pennsylvania because we were not eligible for a termination under any circumstances in Ohio because I had crossed some imaginary line in my pregnancy that told the government that the baby had to be born - no matter what.

So off to PA we went, where I didn't know the doctors or the hospital, where I recovered in a hotel room instead of my own bed. And when we got there they put the screws to us - I had to prove John's gestation with his first ultrasound picture. There was some snafu in the dating that put me just  a few days ahead of the termination deadline in PA. So there it was questioned - should I get the termination or not? Was it legal?

There I was, having made the hardest decision of my life, having been through every hard decision a parent can make when trying to save a child's life, and they told me they didn't think the decision I made was legal.

In the end, it was decided that I was one half day in the clear. Now we must do the paperwork. Paper after paper. Form after form. Asking me invasive questions about my decision. Do I know what abortion means? Am I being coerced? Do I feel threatened by my spouse? Do I suffer from depression that could influence my decision?

And the kicker - a waiver saying that I understand that there are people who are willing to take my child in any physical condition if I sign over my rights immediately and have the baby and give it up for adoption. As if that were the issue. As if I would not love and care for and keep my baby if I thought he would live with any sort of quality of life. As if I simply didn't love him enough, and some stranger would take him with all his flaws if I would not.

I signed the paper in the negative. I wanted to sign it "Go Fuck Yourself."

So with a couple of ignorant phrases, Donald Trump inserted himself into my trigger base. Every Facebook post is a picture of a fetus with the message "don't kill me right before my birthday" or the stories of mothers just like me, who feel more comfortable sharing their stories for social media consumption. One text-only post from a mother who terminated for spina bifida got 21K likes. Good for her. Good for her for standing up to Donald Trump and all the church billboards that say "Life is not a choice" and tells me that I am going to hell for my decision. Our pastor told me that he didn't think I would go to hell because of John and Drew. That he's pretty sure God has a loophole for situations like mine. I haven't been to church since.

I am both parts mad and sad. On one hand I feel ashamed and I am not ashamed. I feel like I will be judged for my choices even though I feel like they weren't choices at all. I want to stand up and say "OH HELL NO" and "GO FUCK YOURSELF" to Donald Trump, and tell everyone about my boys and how close I came to not being able to make the decision only their mother and father can make. On the other hand, I don't feel like I'm strong enough to put my head down and take the wrath of the people who would condemn me. I feel like I shouldn't have to explain myself. Or the broken system that wounded me so badly that I still, years after my terminations, suffer from PTSD. Because nowhere in the "got to save all the babies" rhetoric does anyone suggest mental health follow up care for the women who have to go through this. Because no one cares about the baby or the mother after all is said and done.

I had my first STUG in a long time yesterday, brought on by a Facebook post shared on a friend's wall. I will never stop hurting from the decisions I had to make. I will never stop believing that I made the right decisions. I will never forget the children I lost, and I will never, ever forgive the people - Donald Trump on down - who would judge me for it.

Thriving In Holland

Today I met little Stewart. Born at 33 weeks gestation, he has ambiguous genitalia, lung disease that mimics - but is not - cystic fibrosis, and a host of other medical issues. He is constantly tethered to his oxygen tank - and that isn't easy for a two year old boy. He eats through a G-tube. He spends weeks at a time in Intensive Care.

I'm going to write a story about Stewart for the local paper, and I interviewed his dad today at the diner down the street from my house. Stewart's father, John, and I talked about care and health insurance and out of pocket expenses and, of course, genetics.

It's hard for me to look at tiny little Stewart, who is so much smaller than my Clark and didn't talk at all, and not see my Drew looking back at me. As I spoke to John, my eyes kept going back to Stewart, who just wanted to walk around without his oxygen tank attached to him. With all his medical issues and delays, with all that he will face in his very uncertain future, Stewart is far healthier than my two sons would ever hope to be.

"You are so lucky," I told John. "You are just so lucky to have him."

And, of course, I told him about John and Drew. And I explained about Holland.

"You dream of Paris. You save and you plan and you wait for Paris. All you have ever wanted is to live in Paris. But there is a mistake and for some reason your plane lands in Holland, and you are stuck. And you hate it because it isn't Paris. It isn't your dream, and you planned for your dream. And after a little while, you look around and you find a few things you like about Holland. There are some blessings in Holland. There are some things you come to love about Holland. And before you know it, you are thriving in Holland. And it isn't Paris. It will never be Paris. You will always wish for Paris. But this is Holland, and you live here, and you are more than just stuck. You are thriving, doing the best you can. And you make a life, here, in Holland."

His mouth hanging open, John looked at me for a second.

"Thank you," he said. "Because that is amazing."

I can't say what it's like in Paris, but I really, really like the people I let into my own personal Holland.

In the middle of it all, progress

I came from a big family - three siblings, lots of cousins. But I have virtually no one outside of the family I have created here in Ohio.

Deep rifts tore apart my paternal family years ago. Determined that "the cycle ends with me," I cut them off to raise my daughter in an emotionally healthy life. That left me with my elderly grandfather. My dear grandmother died two days before John, breaking my heart and leaving me in a deep pool of grief.

My maternal family is there, but for various reasons I see them only a few times a year.

That means that so many of my childhood realities are lost to my children. No family dinners on actual holidays. No birthday parties with a special bakery cake at the supper table at the farmhouse. No catching fireflies with their cousins at twilight. No sleeping under a quilt at grandma's house. No family vacations at the beach.

The decision to leave behind your family - everything you loved about them and your life and your past - even when they've hurt you, even when you know the will hurt you again, even when you're sure they will hurt your children - is honestly the hardest thing I have ever had to do. I have never had to harden my heart and turn my back on anything so completely before. The act of emotionally "walking away" was so devastating to me.

How excited I was to get married and join up with a new brood! Invested grandparents for my children, a mother-in-law turned best friend for me. Barbecue's at our house. Family vacations. Sunday dinners. But that wasn't the reality. It couldn't be. It won't be. I've gone to therapy to try to figure out how to make some of these things work, how to swim through the emotional waters and save us all from each other.

It didn't work.

But somewhere in the middle of trying to fix broken bridges with my husband's family, something unexpected happened - my heart came back to my family, in the smallest of ways.

Every single time I go back to Pennsylvania, my grandfather asks if we can have a family dinner. I always say no. But my heart is conflicted now because the very last time I saw my grandmother, she asked for a family dinner and (being the travel agent for guilt trips) convinced me to sit through the most awkward meal of my life with them.

But I know how much that meal - all of us sitting together in the same room in silence, ignoring each other - meant to her at the very end of her life, and I don't regret it.

So the last time my Pap asked about a dinner, I said yes. We went to the farm in January and opened presents with my brother and his family, my pap and my dad, and we all had dinner together. Not the easiest meal, admittedly, but we made it work. I had a short but easy conversation with my sister-in-law. It was good.

A week later, I received a Facebook message from her. Could we come for her baby's first birthday party? I was stunned. This was very generous of her to do for us. For me.

So with some hope I look forward to having a family again. Maybe not the family I always dreamed I would have, but people. People you call when you have happy news, sad news, or when you need help. People to love my children as much as I do.

I know that I am entering my hard time of year - February through March - a time when my tears are automatic. When I have to watch what I read and what I say and how much I sleep and eat. This time - these six weeks - are fraught with all the unhealthy things my heart and my mind can do to my body and soul. The easy thing to do is to fall into it, stop eating, start sleeping all the time and disconnect from everything around me. But every time I disconnect, it's hard to re-establish.

I'm hopeful this year will be a turning point for me in so many ways.

Little pieces of comfort and grief

I think it's impossible to think about my life without thinking about my boys. What would it have been like to have those two little brothers running the show around here? Where would we have put them? This year would have been John's first year in T-ball. Drew would go to story hour at the library.

And things would be a lot different.

I only have those glimpses into the might-have-been every so often. And every so often, I also think about my future spiritual self in the context of my lost boys. When I die, will they be waiting for me? Will I see them? What will they look like - babies? Men? Little boys? Will they have been with my grandmother, waiting for me to join them? Will they know me? Will they love me?

I made it almost all the way through this article in the New York Times about the dreams of dying people. What do they mean? What do they predict?

And then there was this bit: An older woman cradled an invisible infant as she lay in bed. (Her husband told researchers it was the couple’s first child, who had been stillborn.)

I love my life. I love my husband and my job and all my children - living and dead. I want to live to see every moment we create together.

And sometimes, in the dark, in the sun, at the cemetery, in the grocery line, at a red light...I can't wait to hold my little boys again, to see their faces and run my fingers through their soft hair, to kiss their little cheeks.

The article is amazing. Read it here: http://nyti.ms/1P3IF2g