Caution: Grieving Mother - Enter at your own risk

Below is the draft of a letter that I am thinking of sending out by email to my coworkers to help make my transition back to work more manageable. I go back in just over a week and I'm scared about how I will react when people ask me how I am or when people pretend nothing happened. I hope that sending a letter will help others figure out what to say. Dug says (and I agree) that my letter is way too long and so I'm in the process of modifying and shortening it. My problem is that I feel like it is my only opportunity to get my thoughts across and I don't want to miss anything important. Anyhow, here it is.

Dear coworkers and friends,

With the start of the school year approaching I wanted to send out some information to help you and help me after the death of my twins, Cole and Breanna. In all the bereavement materials I have read (oh how I have read) it says to ‘let people know what you want and need. Friends and coworkers are uncomfortable and don’t know how to deal with such a situation and end up saying and doing things that are hurtful when they think they are being kind.’

First off you should know that my husband and I are proud parents of twin baby angels Cole and Breanna, and just like any proud parent we love to talk about our babies. In our eyes, they were perfect. Although they may not have joined our family in the way we expected, they are still a part of our lives. So before you can ask me ‘how my summer was’ I will share with you that it has been an emotional and difficult few months. Grieving their passing has been and still is difficult and always on my mind.

Below are some things you can do to help me:

Say Cole and Breanna’s names when you talk about them; they are real and it makes me feel good when others acknowledge that. Granted I may cry, not because you are opening an old wound or reminding me of something sad, but because you are showing me that you care and that means the world to me. The more you use their names and talk about them in natural conversation the less I will cry. Having said that, there is an appropriate time to talk about them and I prefer not to cry in front of my students.

Please be understanding that I may not be in complete control of my emotions all of the time and your understanding if I cry is greatly appreciated. From what I hear it will take several years to adjust to the loss of a child and learn how to incorporate it into my new life. I write this letter in hopes that you will know what I am thinking and feeling but please note that I am STILL grieving and therefore all advice in this letter I subject to change without notice!!

Realize that nothing is comparable to the loss of your child. I appreciate the sentiment if you say “I know what it’s like, I lost my parent/sibling/spouse/relative/best friend”. It shows me that you are TRYING to understand and that you are at least familiar with grief. But it is only helpful if you acknowledge that it is not the same as losing your child. They are your own flesh and blood and losing your children goes against the natural order of things. So unless you have lost a CHILD you really have no idea what it is like.

Saying that you understand what it’s like because you have had a miscarriage is bittersweet. I appreciate the effort you are making to understand what it is like to be in my shoes as long as you realize that I gave birth to two babies that were alive and subsequently died. NOTHING can compare to that. And FYI, I have also had a miscarriage so I know the difference and hopefully I will not have too many more on the road to creating a little brother or sister for Cole and Breanna.

Here is a list of things you can say if words escape you:
“You are in my thoughts”
“I can’t imagine what you are going through”
“I’m here for you if you want to talk”
“I don’t know what to say”
If all else fails a simple “I’m sorry” will do


Now let’s talk about the Don’ts:

Please don’t ignore me (ie leave the room when I come in or turn the other way when you see me coming down the hall) – I am not medusa. We don’t have to talk about them. If you are uncomfortable please just tell me. All you need to say is “I’m sorry but I am uncomfortable dealing with such a loss” and I will never mention them to you.

Please don’t tell me about miracles that have happened to premature babies that are alive and well. It does not help me to hear how modern medicine has made such advancements to save premature babies. They could not save my babies and I will forever be haunted by the thoughts of ‘what if’.

Please don’t tell me that I am young and will have other children. This is so painful on many levels. One, I’m actually not that young in terms of child bearing years. Two, there is no guarantee that I will have more children. It took us a year and a half of fertility treatments to have Cole and Breanna. And three, and most painful, is that even if I have more children nothing will ever replace Cole and Breanna. I will love them forever and they will always have a place in my life. Having another child will just mean that I will have to teach someone else, that never met Cole and Breanna, how important they were to me.

Please don’t say “At least you didn’t get to know them or get too attached”. I carried these babies for 6 months and wanted them for many years before that. I was attached from the second I peed on a stick. I felt them kick and could distinguish between their personalities in my womb. I knew them very well. In fact it’s worse that I didn’t have them for very long because I have no good memories to look back on, only what I had hoped for. The wonderful day they were born was also the horrible day they died.

Other things NOT to say are:
“You should be over it by now” – anyone who has lost someone significant in their life can attest to the fact that you NEVER get over it you just learn to live with it.
“It was for the best” or “it is gods will” or “meant to be” – Really that’s not helpful. For the best would be them being alive and with me right now.
“You need to find the bright side” – there is none.
“You need to get on with your life” – I have, it’s a different life, the life of a grieving mother

Here is a little poem I found that sums up my letter best.

You think that silence is kind but it hurts me even more.
I want to talk about my child who had gone through deaths door.
Don't say these things to me, although you do mean well.
They do not take my pain away; I must go through this hell.
I will get better, slow but sure -- and it helps to have you near.
But a simple, "I'm sorry you lost your child" is all I need to hear.
Author unknown

Thank you for taking the time to read this letter. I know how difficult and uncomfortable the thought of losing a child is. I appreciate your effort and all the support I have received so far.

Sincerely,
Audrey Hogarth
Proud mommy of twin angels Cole and Breanna

Due Date Balloon Release

Many people in the baby loss world have several dates that are significant to them regarding their baby. Most celebrate the day their baby was born which is also the day they died. May 3rd and May 4th will always be their special days. The days when my babies were born and became angels… as many in the baby loss world call ‘angelversary’. I know those will be difficult days in the coming years but I want to try and celebrate them…not think of it as the days they died but as the days they joined our family.

I often heard that the expected due date is also a day that people commemorate. I feel like I too want to commemorate that day but I’m struggling to find a date to pin down as their due date. Their official due date, when they would be 40 weeks, is August 30th although at one point it was August 28th. But we never really thought of that as anything significant because we were told that I would be induced at 38 weeks if I hadn’t already delivered them by then, which they expected. Dug and I knew they were going to be early, I was thinking they’d arrive mid to late July, because they were twins and I am so small, so we were getting everything ready. We had bought some preemie clothes and supplies. They were hard to find so whenever we saw them we picked them up thinking we’d rather be over prepared than running around at the last minute trying to find stuff to fit them and figured that if they were too big for the preemie clothes we would donate them to the NICU or multiples association.

So the problem is what day do we commemorate as their due date? I know I don’t need a day because I think of them and honour them everyday but I feel like I need something tangible to hang on to, focus my energy on so that my entire summer for the rest of my life is not a big empty vast space of grieving. I asked Dug what he thought and he had said “Well if you want the date that I expected them to arrive that would be July 15th”. I started to cry. It was already August. I missed it. I felt so awful. How could I have done nothing to commemorate their day?

A week later Natasha came to visit after her appointment with Dr. Donahoe (the psychologist we are both seeing) and she mentioned that Dr. Donahoe asked her if she was going to do anything for Henry’s expected due date, which happens to be August 30th as well. I shared with her that I was so sad because I felt like I had missed the day that we expected them and then gave her ideas as to what people on the message boards had done such as butterfly releases, balloon releases, going to their grave, or just doing something special.

That weekend I went to the store to get some balloons blown up for my friend Amy’s shower. There I saw balloons with Winnie-the-pooh and Eeyore on them. They were so cute and thought to myself ‘those would be great for a balloon release for Cole and Breanna.’ As I drove to Amy’s mom’s house for the shower I started getting emotional, for seemingly no reason (not that it’s that unusual nowadays) but then I thought about it and realized the date. It was August 16th… Cole and Breanna would have been 38 weeks today. I would have been induced today!!! That’s it, today is the day. I figured when I get home from the shower I’ll pick up those balloons and we’ll do a balloon release. I suddenly felt much better. But then I got worried about what if the store closes, so I called Dug and told him my idea and asked him to pick up the balloons while I was at the shower so that we’d have them ready.

Just before the shower started my friend Becky surprised me with the most amazing gift. She had gotten two stars in the Taurus constellation named after Cole and Breanna. I was so touched by such a thoughtful gesture. And it made the day just that much more special to commemorate Cole and Breanna. I knew this was perfect!

When I got home from the shower Dug had the helium balloons ready and we drove to the cemetery. We pulled out our blanket that we keep in Dug’s trunk for when we have picnics at the cemetery with the kids. We sat down and read the information packages that came with the Stars that Becky had gotten named after Cole and Breanna that she had given to me earlier that day. We told Cole and Breanna all about their stars. Then we wrote messages on their balloons took some pictures and released them. It was so windy, they just took off. Dug had tied the two balloons together so they flew away together. Dug and I stood there, holding each other, watching the balloons until they got so high and so small that we could no longer see them. It was perfect!! The weather was perfect and the sky was clear, which is really amazing because this summer has been so rainy and cloudy. Becky’s gift was perfectly timed and to top it all off we were leaving the next day for 2 weeks in Florida. I was so relieved to have done something special that day to commemorate them and the date had significance. It may not be when we expected them or when they actually came but it was the last possible day for them to have been born and I’m thankful that we did something for that.

Starting a new blog

I've decided to move the location of my blog to here. I started a blog (well more like a collection of essays) back in May after my twins Cole and Breanna passed away. I have found it helpful to sort out my thoughts and theraputic in that it lets me get stuff off my chest. My hope is that I will be able to look back on what I have written and see how far I have come in my grieving. I originally started my blog at WTE (http://www.whattoexpect.com/blogs/dealingwiththelossmytwins/default.aspx) since I was there already on the message boards during my pregnancy and it was one of the first grief and loss message boards I found after they passed away. But I have since realized that there are some problems and limitations with their blog site. First off, it was driving me crazy everytime I went on there to see pictures and advertisements for babies. Second, they added a word limit which was really annoying because the entire point of this is to help me deal with issues and I can't do that if I have to limit what I write. And third, is that I could not post pictures which I love. So here I am starting this new blog and thinking I should probably move all of my old posts here. Oh boy, what a chore!

I Hate Doctors

So I have come to the realization that I officially hate doctors. I don’t know why I had put them on this pedestal as ‘those in the know’ when really they know nothing and care about less. Basically through this experience I have found them to be totally insensitive and it sucks. After losing Cole and Breanna I have been to see my fertility doctor, my high risk clinic OB and my GP and none of them can explain why this happened or have even touched me to try and find out why. No ultrasounds, no pap, no checking my cervix, not even a physical...nothing!!!

I didn’t expect much from the fertility doc and he basically said what I figured he would say…. “We’ll see you when you are ready to start trying again.” I thought my OB would have been more hands on but he said there was nothing they know of that caused my water breaking early and it was probably an infection that made Cole come and Breanna just followed. The only information that I got as a type of possible explanation is that my uterus maybe didn't grow fast enough causing Cole's water to break and that it probably wouldn’t have happened if it was a singleton pregnancy. That's it. No tests to follow up or anything. I was shocked. How could they just shrug my loss off like that?

I started wondering ‘what was the point of being registered at the high risk clinic during my pregnancy?’ I had appointments every few weeks but they didn’t do anything. Even under their supervision I still lost Cole and Breanna and they have no explanation for it. I mean what do they DO there other than waste my time? And after my water broke all they would say EVERYDAY was “We’ll just have to wait and see”. Well I waited and saw my babies being born premature and die. How can they not stop that from happening? The OB just shoved us out the door and said ‘we’ll see you when you are pregnant again’. Arggg, I hate that hospital!It’s a baby making factory so if you’re not pregnant they really don’t have time for you.

So I figured my GP would be my best ally in getting to the bottom of this but when I was telling him about how upset I was that no one was checking me or interested in finding out why this happened he responded with "miscarriages happen". Holy shit, did he just call Cole and Breanna a MISCARRIAGE…ARGGGGG! I was so pissed and said "I really hate that you said that... it was not a miscarriage... I gave birth to 2 live babies." He interjected with "but they were preterm" and then went on to say all the things it says in all the pamphlets NOT to say to a grieving parent... like, "you need to move on", "you will get pregnant again", "think of the all the other people that have it worse." Basically have another baby and forget about it!!!! Dug even remembers him referring to what happened as an abortion… wtf? ABORTION… is he asking for a kick in the head? All I was thinking was what kind of f*cking *ss doctor is he?Does he really have a medical degree? I left his office furious and thinking I'm writing this idiot a really nasty letter with a picture of Cole and Breanna saying does this look like a f*cking miscarriage and include a brochure from BFO about what NOT to say to a grieving parent. But… I need to make sure I can find a new doctor first.

So Dug has a friend at work that also had a baby loss a few years ago and suggested that we see his wife’s doctor. She wasn’t really taking new patients but said she’d meet me and consider it. Well when we went to see her we basically got the same shitty insensitive response. She basically said ‘have another baby and you will get over it.’ I was like ‘oh my god, is it possible that I am just crazy?’ I left her office so upset and really starting to doubt myself and all that I have been doing to work through my grief. Have I been wrong? Should be trying to forget what happened? It feels so wrong to ‘forget about it’ and I don’t think I can possibly ‘get over it’. They were my babies, a part of me, a part of my life. I guess they just don’t ‘get it’. I figured because they are doctors they should know and understand but they don’t. I don’t know why I thought they would because really unless you have experienced a perinatal loss you can never understand.

So now I am stuck. We are approaching 3 months since we lost Cole and Breanna and I’m scared it’s too late to find out why this all happened. I don’t want to get pregnant again just to have it happen again and then realize that if they had just run some tests the first time they would have been able to prevent another loss. I keep ‘meeting’ people that have had a preterm baby loss due to incompetent cervix and they say that all they need is a stitch after the first trimester and everything should be fine. What if I need that? Or what if it’s something else just a simple to ‘fix’ but we won’t know because we didn’t check. I’m so scared to try again without knowing why this happened. Help!

Sharing my babies

I was struggling with an issue and I thought I’d write about it to help me sort out my thoughts again. The problem is that I’ve been so scared to put anything on Facebook regarding losing Cole and Breanna mostly because I never even posted that I was pregnant and thought I would really freak people out if I did. Like “Hi, yes I know you didn’t even know I was pregnant but now they’re dead… have a nice day”. People would thing I was crazy. Plus, everyone else that was pregnant was posting status updates as well as belly and ultrasound pics and for some reason I didn’t. I barely told anyone. I’ve been having a hard time trying to figure out why.

I guess one reason was that I was in denial. In fact for the entire 1st trimester I was in denial. I don’t know how I could have been in denial because I was so nauseous and fatigued the entire time, it’s not like my body wasn’t screaming “I’M PREGNANT!!” but I still was so apprehensive. I thought it was because I had an early pregnancy loss last year and when I made it through the 1st trimester this time I did feel a bit better but I still didn’t really tell anyone.

Another reason I guess was because I was so sick and exhausted (normal pregnancy sick and exhausted) and I wanted to be feeling good and happy when I told people not nauseous and miserable. I was waiting for that pregnancy glow… but it never happened. I remember the first, and one of the only times, I went out with friends when I was pregnant. I was so scared to tell them over lunch that I was pregnant for fear that I was jinxing myself. Dug and I sat across from each other and he was like “are you going to tell them” and I was like “you tell them” and they finally were like “tell us what” so Dug had to announce it. I couldn’t believe it but I actually cried. They were so happy and I was so scared and so not feeling like I wanted to be feeling that I cried. I felt so stupid. I wanted to be healthy and happy when I told people…not miss grouchy pants but the pregnancy hormones were wearing me down I felt awful.

But probably the biggest reason for not telling people was that I was just so scared that if something went wrong I would be so devastated. How would I deal with it and all of these people knowing? I thought it would be easier if I just didn’t tell anyone. Like I was protecting myself from getting too excited and that would stop me from getting attached. But that is just so ridiculous. I was excited and I was attached. From the very second I peed on a stick I was attached. But now that something did go wrong I can't believe how much I wish I had told people so that they would know how much my babies meant to me and I could get their support and understanding. Funny how I was trying to protect myself and now I hurt so much more because I feel guilty and stupid for not telling everyone, like I was trying to hide them. The fact that I didn’t tell people makes it so much harder now to announce that I lost them and that I don’t want to hide them.

(** Note: this is in reference to my old blog site and therefore this was seperated into two posts: Okay so in addition to this blog website being down forever so that I couldn't post anything.... now they have also added a word limit. Probably because people like me ramble on forever. lol. Anyhow, I'll continue....)

I should probably explain for those that don’t know, Facebook is a networking website that EVERYONE around where I live is on. People post pictures, videos, comments, and status updates of what they are doing, join groups, announce events etc. It’s the ultimate way to find out what your “friends”, current and those from a previous life (eg elementary school, camp, etc), are up to. I was on it before I got pregnant and would sometimes spend hours searching for people I know and surfing through friends pages, and friends of friends, friends of friends of friends… eventually looking at pages of people that I had no idea how I got there. I was never really a status updater but I posted pics and wrote on walls, etc. Now that I have lost Cole and Breanna, Facebook has become an amazing tool in helping me meet and connect with others that have had a similar loss and I am on it all of the time, especially since I’m on mat leave and really have nothing else to do. I have joined baby loss groups, become friends with other people that have had a loss, joined their groups in memory of their babies, viewed pictures and videos of their babies and use it daily to keep in touch with my new friends.

So, about a month ago, following the lead of my new friends, I got up the nerve to write something about Cole and Breanna on Facebook for the first time. I had posted a status update about missing them. I posted it after midnight and tossed and turned all night (as usual, I never really get a good sleep anymore) and woke up early the next morning and had to remove my status. I guess I just wasn’t ready … for what I don’t know… but I wasn’t ready. But since then I slowly started adding them to my page. First in round about ways; creating a group for Peek-a-poohs which I have been collecting because they remind me of them, then posting a poem I found which so eloquently described how I felt. I now I have applications that refer to them and written status updates about how I feel.

My new friends have all been extremely supportive and some of my best friends that I have known for years and know about Cole and Breanna have also written me amazing and supportive messages. But, now I’m starting to get messages from people that didn’t know that I was pregnant in reference to what I have posted. I figured this would happen and I’m slowing trying to figure out how to respond. I want to be sensitive to other people’s feelings and especially not freak out anyone that is currently pregnant but I have come to the point where I don’t care. I love my babies and miss them soooo much, I can’t pretend they don’t exist. They have had a major impact on my life and I want to share them with the world. It hurts too much to bottle it up and not show how much they meant to me.

I was so happy when one night over dinner Dug said the same thing. He was telling me that he wished people would ask about Cole and Breanna and that he could talk about them. He wants to show their picture to people and wonders why no one asks to see it but is afraid to just pull it out and say “want to see a picture of my dead babies?” I’ve come to the realization that we are proud parents of beautiful twins and just like any parent, we love to talk about our kids but unfortunately they don’t do anything new so there is nothing to talk about.

Loving and Letting Go

Regret and guilt are the worst stage of the grieving process I think. I have been having a really tough time dealing with my feelings of guilt and regret. I was okay blaming Cole's death on my doctor because he did not give us a choice as to if we wanted to try and take aggressive actions to save him when he was born. The doctor had always given me hope that Cole could be okay and that he might have enough water to develop his lungs but when push came to shove and Cole was born, the doctor just shook his head no when I asked can’t you do anything to save him. The doctor said that he had no chance because his lungs would not have developed after his water broke at 21 weeks. So instead we just held him until he died, which was 2 hours later. But with my daughter Breanna, I have no one to blame but myself. I made the decision not to take aggressive actions if she were born soon after my son Cole. When I arrived at Mount Sinai we were given a bunch of statistics on her odds of living if she was born at 23 weeks and if she did live how horrible her quality of life would be. She would likely be blind, be developmentally and physically challenged, and require life-long custodial care. We did not want that kind of life for her so we decided that if she were born that week we would chose palliative care but if I had managed not to go into labour that week and she stayed inside of me then we would revisit our decision based on her new odds. At the time the decision was made it looked like she wasn’t going to come then. I was down to 4 centimetres and hadn’t felt any contractions. But now, knowing the outcome, I wish that I had made a different decision. I don't know how they could have possibly let me make such a major decision seeing as I had just lost Cole... I was not in my right mind. I'm feeling so guilty now and I feel like I didn't even give her a chance. She only survived for 30 minutes but maybe with the machines she would have been fine. Dug insists that we made the best choice FOR HER because being born at 23 weeks meant she would likely not survive and would have spent her last moments suffering with tubes and if she did survive she would have a terrible quality of life. But I can't help but feel that I threw away the slight possibility of having her here with me now. I never even gave her the chance to fight. She never did anything wrong, her water didn't break; she was perfectly healthy and happy during my pregnancy. Maybe if we put her in NICU she would still be with us. All the people I have met so far on message boards and groups have either had still-borns or chose to take aggressive actions to save their babies. I'm so scared that I'm the only one and that I made the wrong decision.

A fellow grieving mommy, Jane, lent me a book entitled “Loving and Letting Go: for parents who decide to turn away from aggressive medical intervention for their critically ill newborn" by Deborah Davis. I have been reading it but very slowly. At first because I wasn’t ready to let myself off the hook or didn't feel ready or open to allowing myself to not feel regret about the decisions we made. And now it feels like it hits too close to home. Some of the epiphanies I have arrived at through my reading are that doctors don’t like to lose babies either and I think that is what started my regret spiral. We had an appointment at Credit Valley to see my OB that delivered Cole. After Cole was born the doctor had me transferred to Mount Sinai hospital between deliveries because he thought Breanna would have a better chance at a better NICU. But seeing the disappointment in his eyes when he found out transferring me didn't do any good was awful. That's when I thought to myself... shit we didn't even try and all the “What ifs” started.

The book has also helped me realize that I will always be full of “what ifs….” I could what if all the way back to Cole and Breanna’s conception. What if I hadn’t pushed so much for multiple follicles during our last fertility cycle? What if I had taken off work fully and been on bedrest from the beginning? What if I hadn’t eaten that chocolate bar? What if I had gone home like the doctor suggested and I didn’t get an infection? What if I had realized that I was having contractions? What if we had chosen to try and save Breanna or been more forceful and tried to save Cole? What if ….. And I will always be filled with “I wish…..” I wish I had spent more time with each of them, I wish they were born at the same hospital so that I could have spent time with them together, I wish I had not been so scared about what people thought and taken a MILLION pictures, and above all I wish I still had Cole and Breanna.

The book says… “You can CHOOSE which assumptions to make: Ones that let you live in peace, or ones that torture you. Whatever assumptions you make doesn’t change the outcome or affect your baby. It affects only you and your quality of life. Give yourself permission to accept your decisions as best for your baby.” (pg33)

Reading that and knowing that guilt is a normal stage of the grieving process have helped me to get through this regret spiral. Thankfully I have found a lot of support through message boards from people that have had similar experiences. Talking to them and knowing that they have made similar decisions has been comforting. Dug and I also had a huge heart to heart talk one night about the choices we made and why we made them. He reminded me of all the things that happened and what we were told that I seem to have blocked out of my memory. I know deep down we did what was best for Breanna but I still can't help but wonder “what if” and think about the “I wish”.

Dug summed it up best when he said to me as he broke down in tears that Breanna just wanted to be with her brother. We had each other and she did not want Cole to be alone, so she only stayed with us for a short while to comfort US and then left to be with Cole. My baby girl was so selfless. She truly was beautiful on the inside and out.

Card Shopping for Father's Day

I knew buying father’s day cards would be difficult but I never imagined that it would be THIS difficult. Anyhow, I decided to tackle it yesterday and it was NOT fun!

I have only seen my dad cry 4 times that I can remember. The first was a few years ago at some random moment when our entire immediate family was in Phoenix for Passover. My older brother, his wife, their two children, my younger brother, his girlfriend (now wife), my dad and I (unfortunately my boyfriend, now husband, could not come) all sat around the table having dinner outside on the patio of the house my older brother rented for the week. My dad was telling stories and during one story about a friend back in Morocco he started to tear up. I still to this day have no idea why but I remember Aimee and I talking about it shortly after and commenting that my father had gotten a lot more emotional as he got older. I could imagine that the fact that he was having a nice family dinner with his three grown up children that lived in different cities and even different countries and were starting their own families might have been a bit touching to him.

The second was on Friday, January 11th. It was the day after his birthday and I went to his house for our usual Friday night dinner together but this time Dug was able to come because he was off work. We had the best birthday present ever to give him!!! We came into his apartment and did the hello hugs, and kisses and then I handed him his birthday gift and card. He opened the card and looked curiously at what was tucked inside. “What is this?” he asked as he turned it around and tried to figure out what it was. “It’s an ultrasound picture” I said. He still didn’t get it. “I’m pregnant!” I said “We’re having twins!” as I pointed to the two little blurry circles on the piece of paper. “Wow, that is so wonderful!” he said and then he started to cry. I couldn’t believe it. He was even happier than Dug’s mom was when we told her, although that was over the phone so we can’t really tell.

The third time I remember so vividly and I wish I didn’t because every time I think of it, it makes me cry and feel so awful that I had caused his pain. It was on Sunday May 4th, soon after Breanna was born and we let the grand parents in the delivery room. The nurse had Breanna and was putting her in a little dress off to the side. Dug’s parents were crying and went to be near her (although none of them picked her up or even touched her as far as I could see) but my dad stayed by the door and would not or could not get any closer to her. He looked at me with tears streaming down his face and said “can’t they do anything for her?” And I realize now just I am typing this that I responded much like Dr. Smith did when I saw Cole for the first time and asked him the exact same question. I shook my head No with a sympathetic I’m so sorry face.

The fourth time was at Cole and Breanna’s funeral. My father had written a beautiful message but felt that he could not read it so he gave it to my older brother to read. As my brother said the words that my father so eloquently wrote, so much so that I thought it was from a book, my father and I grasped hands so tight and with tears in his eyes he apologized for not being able to read his words himself.
I’m sure there have been many more tears after that and I feel awful being the one that brings them on. I remember reading in the grief pamphlets that grandparents suffer the most when there is a baby loss. Not only have they lost a grandchild and all the things they wanted to do with that child but they also feel like they have failed in protecting their own child from feeling so much pain. So what to do for father’s day this year? I sifted through the cards along the wall and for almost every card I read, I cried. People must have thought I was crazy. Kids were picking out cards for Dad and grandpa, wives for their father’s and husbands and I was standing there crying my eyes out. Every time I read a message it made me think about “what could have been”. I struggled with the choice of whether to get him a grandfather’s card from Cole and Breanna. I know that I don’t want to pretend that they didn’t exist but I’m not sure my father could handle something like that. And I thought about the tears I would bring on and how I had already caused so many. I eventually found a card that talked about how glad I am to be his daughter and on the front of the card was two little sets of baby foot prints. I thought well maybe this would be okay. It was clearly a “From you Daughter only” card but I felt it also symbolized Cole and Breanna without having to say anything about it. I still worry if it is still too in your face and I’ll have to see when I give it to him. I may just leave it for him as I leave rather than stand there and have him open it and read it in front of me over dinner.

As for my husband…. What to do? Finding a card for him was also difficult. Do I get him a card from Cole and Breanna or one from all of us together? No matter what I knew I had to recognize them… we are both on the same page in that regard….thank god! But how emotional should I get? There was the “father to be” with all this hope, the “first time father” filled with joy, the “from your daughter” or “from your son” talking about all the memories they have shared. Where was the card for the “father that lost a child” I wondered? With each card I read, tears streamed down my face in sadness of all the things that I wish we could have had, and what could have been.

I found some from you wife and realized that may work best. I ended up buying two and haven’t decided which one to give him. One is more of a “we are supporting each other” and the other is talking about “how proud that he is my husband and the father of my children.” The latter might be too difficult for him to receive but I love it and part of me thinks deep down he will appreciate it.

After I decided on getting both and making the final decision later, I turned my attention to what should I get from Cole and Breanna. I thought since mine was so emotional I’d get him something more happy and fun from the kids. I really wanted to get him something with Winnie the Pooh since the characters remind us of Cole and Breanna, but there wasn’t any, and I went to 3 different stores to look for cards. I finally stumbled upon a card that I liked. It had a doggy in a plane writing “Daddy” in the clouds. I thought wow, it’s like Cole and Breanna sending a message from the sky. I figured I’d add some Winnie the Pooh stickers to the card too to make it more “them”.

As I am writing this I realize that I did pretty well. Granted the process of looking for the right cards was extremely emotional but I think I got some great cards that I am now more comfortable with now that I have written about them and explained why I chose them. Maybe there really is something therapeutic about writing a blog. Hmmm.