I miss my son. Those words are at once insufficient to describe how I feel every day, and the best I can come up with. To say that it feels wrong to go on breathing when Gabriel doesn't is true, but then I feel guilty. To say that a piece of me is missing is also true, but it's not something that can be seen on me and so that description too seems to fall short. I miss Gabriel. I miss my son. I long to hold him again and the pain of longing for him is visceral, and it's real, and it grows more intense every day, and it is a reality that I will have to live with for the rest of my life.
Sometimes I fear my missing Gabriel is being interpreted as my not moving on. It is a fear based on what I am sure are well-meaning suggestions that I must learn to move on, or that Gabriel would want me to go on. I guess all I can offer in response is that moving on from a child's death is not something I would wish on anyone, but it is also something that can't be understood unless one is standing in similar shoes. Figuring out how to move on is something I grapple with every day. Gabriel's memory should be honored and as his mother it is something I am compelled to do, but it is hard to do under such scrutiny. I read of mothers who have shrines to their lost children in their home, which I don't have, of families who have birthday parties for their lost babies, which I have been criticized for wanting to do, or families who organize March of Dimes teams in their departed children's honor, which I have been discouraged from doing for fear that people will feel I'm hanging on to the past. Just yesterday I saw a tribute bumper sticker in memory of a baby girl, Annabelle LaRae Lynn Hernandez, who lived seven days and passed away two years ago this week. My parents have a similar bumper sticker in Gabriel's honor, but I have always felt I couldn't have one of my own -- Ben would hate it, and I would feel I lost something all over again when it began to fade and had to be removed. But when I saw Annabelle's sticker I didn't think her family was strange, or clinging too tightly to a memory. I thought, "She may have only lived seven days, but she still lived."
I take too many pictures of the dogs, I stare at other people's children (especially, right now, nine-month old baby boys) a little too long, I sneak peaks at pictures of Gabriel throughout the day, I find reasons to talk about him or to talk about the pregnancy and all of those are my way of coping and maybe it's weird or maybe it means I'm not moving on or that I am moving on in a way that is unhealthy, but I challenge a stranger to this experience to tell me how I can "better" grieve.
Through the separation process with Ben I have been reminded constantly, again by people who are probably well-intentioned, that men and women just grieve differently. I don't think our differences are really that simple, just a matter of men being from Mars (and completely alien to me), and women being from Venus. In our case, I think the opposing qualities that we found in each other were just SO extreme, and clashed tremendously with Gabriel's death. Ben is private and reserved and even he will admit that he tends to stuff his feelings. I am driven by my heart, and open book, and sometimes a little too impetuous. There have been times I wished I could demand of Ben that he teach me how to turn down my love for my child, and my resulting longing for him. But we are parting because that is not a feeling I want to turn down. I know that eventually this hurt will be easier to live with, but until then I want to feel everything.
I realize more every day that I love my little boy so deeply, that all of that love can't just disappear. I had hoped to direct it towards my husband, and towards another child. My hope hasn't played out, but I know that my love has found other places to go, that it is poured out on my family, my friends, my pets. The passion with which I love my sweet Gabriel was reflected in the way I attacked the creative writing class that I just finished, and in my dedication to my criminal client who is facing trial soon. I know that I'll continue to see my love for Gabriel in unexpected places. Love can always find a home.
I've finally got the courage to post a message.
ReplyDeleteWe've never met and I only recently found your blog, but I wanted to say HUGS, because you need them. HUGS & prayers.
Gabriel is your son, he grew under your heart and the space in your heart that his passing left will never be filled. There is no need to "move on" or to grieve less, you do what is right for you.
Hugs and God Bless
You are still so early in the grieving process. Gabriel is your son and he will always be your song whether he was able to stay here on earth with your or waiting for you in heaven. You love him. Nothing changes that.
ReplyDeleteImagine a giant wound. It hurts. There is blood and pain and it looks and feels terrible. Over time the wound closes. Before too long, you have a scar. The scar will be there forever. Every so often you will move and it will pull and twinge. You won't have the acute pain as in the beginning anymore but you will get twinges from time to time.
Nobody has the right to tell you how to or how long to grieve. For some weird reason, we are afraid of the grief of a mother who has lost a baby. We don't tell people who lost older children to "get over it." We don't nag people who have lost spouses that they need to "stop dwelling on it and move on." But the death of a baby makes it somehow okay?
And now that I have written a novel, I just want to say that I have been where you are in grief. I'm two years out from my own loss. I still think of my babies every day. I have a symbol for them, dragonflies, that I can wear as jewelry or as a decoration around my house that doesn't draw too much attention or scream out "Hi! I'm a memorial!" Maybe something like that could be a comfort to you?
I chose dragonflies because I saw three of them flying around the yard when I came home from the hospital with empty arms. It felt like a sign from God telling me that they were safe and okay.
I wear a dragonfly with blue topaz for their birthstone. Nobody knows but me what it really means.
Okay, I will quit the novel now.
God bless you and keep you.
Kellie
Kellie is right you are still so so early in the grieving process. For us it will be 5 years in July since we lost our Calypso and just last month a mother who lost her son 16 years ago 'You are still in the baby stages of grief'
ReplyDeleteIf I, after 5 years am in the baby stages of grief, you are still in the newborn stages.
Losing a child is not something that magically gets better with time. We change and the pain becomes more bearable but I still think about my Calypso DAILY after 5 years. I have photos of her all over I have her things. I sleep with her teddy bear.
You grieve for Gabriel how you need to and as long as you need to. Even if it's the rest of your life
^def agree. it's still so early even if people think you should move on so to speak. i don't think a mother ever moves on from losing her precious child
ReplyDeleteTake your time. This is your journey. There is no need to do what others think you should be doing. There is no time limit. ((((HUGS))))
ReplyDelete