What To Expect When You Are NOT Expecting

I remember the way my heart sank that first morning after Mateo passed away. The first time you open your eyes and you realize, my baby is gone. I didn't scream, I didn't panic, I sank. I must have let out what must have sounded like a whimper. I do not remember every detail around Mateo's death.   I definitely remember the sinking feeling that first morning I woke up and my baby was no longer safe inside me, kicking, giving me heart burn. He wasn't in the NICU being cared for by nurses and doctors. He was gone forever and I sank into that reality.

When we left the Ronald McDonald House I left behind things I thought other people might need in the future, parenting things, things I no longer had use for. I distinctly remember leaving my copy of What To Expect When You Are Expecting. What a piece of shit book. I carried that book around with me like a bible. I could tell you developmentally every single thing Mateo was doing, supposed to be doing and would be doing at any given moment. Here is what the book did not tell me- your baby might die. Here are some things to watch for even if your pregnancy is completely normal.... I remember joking around with a friend after reading one chapter that I found especially cheesy and over the top, I told her I was going to write my own version without all the fluffy cheesy puns. Now I just want to write a book that's real, though who wants to buy

What To Really Expect When You Are Expecting: Chapter One Your Baby Might Not Make It. Your baby might be that statistic, that one in whatever.
Chapter Two Sometimes Life Kicks You In the Teeth, Hard.
Chapter Three Avoid Going Places Where Women Who Have Lost Babies Will See Your Very Pregnant Self, You Will Cause Them Distress.
Chapter Four Did I Mention Your Baby Might Die?
And so on....


When I have another child no one is permitted to buy me What To Expect. Tackle the delivery person, gently escort the unsuspecting person out of the baby shower, do whatever necessary to stop anyone from giving me that book. Because I know what to expect. I know what to hope for. I know what to pray for. I know what will happen. I will bring a baby home either in my arms or in my memories. I know what to expect.

Today I took some time to bake some cupcakes and take them to the Ronald McDonald House here in Orlando. I dropped them off and while the house looked familiar I was grateful that it wasn't my RMCDH. I made those cupcakes with love and gratitude in my heart. I hope that the families there enjoy them. More than that I hope all those families go home with their children alive and well.

I wasn't quite sure how today was going to go. I imagined myself laying in bed rocking back and forth sobbing. I used to think that is something people just say to dramatize being upset until I found myself doing it all the time the first couple of weeks after Mateo was buried. I thought I would go back there. I was afraid of the sinking feeling. I was afraid of waking up and feeling like I did that first morning after. Neither of those things happened. I woke up and I was sad. And I cried. And then I got up and I did things. And the day went on like all the days have since he has been gone, like all the days will from now on. I made cupcakes, and bought Easter things for his grave and thought about him a lot. But the thing is I think about him all the time. He is the first thing I think of every morning and the last thought on my mind when I fall asleep. Things remind me of home all day, how much I miss him, how much I love him. Him being gone and my being painfully aware of it is my reality today and every day. I wonder what other people think about all day? I can't remember what I used to think about all day before him. It is hard to recall what consumed by being before loving him and missing him did. What was I like before my son died? Ill never be her again. I wouldn't trade my time for Mateo to have her back. I also can't be this person I am right now forever. He is allowed to always be a part of me. His grief is not.

Tomorrow the world moves forward in that way that it seems to know how to do so well. Cupcakes will be eaten and babies will be born and someone will buy a copy of What To Expect and be elated about it. I will go about my day knowing to expect anything, be grateful for anything, and missing my baby.

March For Babies

Hello Friends and Family

First I would like to say thank you for all the love and support you all have shown throughout this time in my life, including this week being his due date week. I am so overwhelmed and honored with all the love and support and do not take for granted the blessing you all are in my life. Thank you.

So the time is coming up for the march of dimes walk! Below is the link to join the team. I am hoping that everyone who wants to walk that day will make a 10 dollar pledge, and that those who cannot walk with us that day will donate anyways! The March of Dimes was so gracious to me and I am grateful for this opportunity to give back to them. I hope we can walk together and help support this wonderful organization who at one point not too long ago supported me.

If you have any questions about the event please feel free to message me

And here is the link to join the team http://www.marchforbabies.org/team/t2049163

Love You All

My Last Week As The Pregnant Lady That Should

You have your own way. For you, this way of living is the absolute right way. Honor it. One of the most influential sources of peace is simply being comfortable with who you really are.  Not trading your reality for a role, or your truth for an act.  Not giving up your freedom of thought. Not putting on a mask. There cannot be peace in your external life until you are at peace within yourself, being yourself.  It won’t always be easy, but no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning your inner spirit.  

I got back from a work trip to D.C. today. A friend called to catch up just a couple of hours after I got home and told me "I saw all of your pictures, you look like you had a great time" yes, parts of it were great. Most of it was great. But how do I say I was also counting down the seconds until I could crawl into my bed and cry. That I put my grief on pause, moved it to the back for a couple of days so that I could be present at work, productive on my trip, but that I could also feel it building up. Backing up. Growing and Mounting. Like a child throwing a tantrum the longer I ignored it- the louder it kicked and screamed. Unlike a child throwing a tantrum however it never wore itself out and fell asleep.

These couple of days are the days around my due date. It feels like there is this flashing giant sign hanging over me YOU SHOULD BE PREGNANT. This is around the time I should have brought my baby home from the hospital. Instead I brought him home in casket. What a harsh reality. This is the time when I should have brought my baby home. Days feel surreal. I am so tired. It is as though I cannot get enough sleep, I never feel well rested. I think my soul is tired. My cells are tired. Every ounce of my being is tired. This pain is so heavy and exhausting. Rest cannot fix it. Only unloading it can. 

My life right now is a life of grief. There is pain and sadness and pure and utterly unadulterated  exhaustion. I will honor it. I do not pretend to be anything else because I smile in a picture. In that moment when I smiled, I felt like smiling. In the moment I feel like crying, I felt like crying- the difference is I don't take pictures of that moment and put it on Facebook. If people saw me cry more would they believe me when I say " I miss my baby"? Would they stop believing me the next time they saw me laugh? Good thing I am not in the business of convincing people. Too bad I am in the business of grieving and I need people.

A really sweet friend wrote me today and asked to take me out to lunch this week. Another friend asked if we can do dinner- sit and talk. My mom went and left flowers at Mateo's grave today. I am grateful for these moments of love. Thank You. 

These next couple of days I might find myself wanting to be alone more. To spend time with my pain as I figure out how to unload it. Please feel free to reach out to me, I am not so strong that I do not need support and friends and love. This is the week I should have brought my baby home. I never will and it breaks my heart.

*Recommended Read The Untethered Soul.

Birthdays and Goodbyes and Everything In Between

Though nothing compares to the grief of losing Mateo- losing him is not my first experience with grief. In 2009 I lost a very dear college friend- Andre to a tragic car accident. He was my inspiration for applying to the Peace Corps and honoring his memory was often the driving force behind my seeing it through until the end, as hard as it was to do my first trimester in rural Northern Peru it was even harder to feel like I was letting him down by not fulfilling both of our dreams to serve as Peace Corps Volunteers. There is this sweet moment Andre and I shared that I will always hold dear to my heart, we were sitting next to each other, probably studying for a test and he put his head on my shoulder and lovingly asked "When we met did you ever think we would be best friends?" I am not sure what I replied but I remember knowing that the love was mutual. I love Andre. I feel so cheated of not having shared my Peace Corps experience with him, we were supposed to be pen pals. I feel cheated every time I do not get to call him on the phone to share something I know he would have found hilarious. I feel cheated every time Adele releases a new song, he adored Adele. I feel cheated knowing that we can't create new memories, we only live in the ones I have now. A friendship frozen in time, stored in a time vacuum and shelved under those couple of years in college. Our friendship is marked by could haves and would haves and definitely should haves with no potential of will be, can be, or possibly. When someone you love dies your whole experience around that person is preserved in your mind. A clear timeline can be drawn out- this is when we met, this is when we loved each other, this is when you died. I will spend the rest of my life keeping his memory alive, honoring the man I knew and the friend I loved, but our story is told and I absolutely hate the ending.

In about an hour it will be his birthday. His family and friends gathered for a mass and a moment of remembrance today and if you knew Andre you would understand why a shot of patron was in order in order to truly honor him. I did not share in this particular moment of remembering him but I did take time out today to do it in my own way. I am not a person of faith so I will not make any claims to where he resides now and what has been become of his soul. I do know that that soul was so full of life and energy and love and hope that if anyone is going to continue onto a next life and carry out a purpose in another realm it would be him. It should be him. I don't know if there is a heaven. I do not know if he is there or if Mateo is there. Honestly it isn't as comforting for me to believe there is as it is for others in my life because I want them here, in this world, with the bodies I got to touch and the hearts I got to witness. If they are not here, where they are now doesn't matter so much as where I am now and my grief over them. I am still here. And I miss my friend. And I miss my baby.

From now on life will be marked with those I have loved, the time I got to love them and the time that I lost them. and you will lose everyone in your life. And when you no longer notice that you are losing people, it is because someone has just lost you. You are now a part of someone's grief journey. Year after year candles will be lit and tears will be shed, shots of patron will be taken and funds will be raised in the name of our loved ones. This is my life now. Life and death intertwined, inseparable, cut from the same cloth, weaving in and out of my memories leaving fingerprints on birthdays, goodbyes and everything in between.

“The tears I feel today
I'll wait to shed tomorrow.
Though I'll not sleep this night
Nor find surcease from sorrow.
My eyes must keep their sight:
I dare not be tear-blinded.
I must be free to talk
Not choked with grief, clear-minded.
My mouth cannot betray
The anguish that I know.
Yes, I'll keep my tears til later:
But my grief will never go.”
― Anne McCaffrey, Dragonsinger

Blog Life

Starting a new blog not about grief. People are always suggesting things that I should blog about- about life, politics, and the random things that happen- but I want to reserve this blog for my Mateo story. For all the other stuff check me out here!

http://anamdelarosa.wordpress.com/

Sometimes there are no words. Sometimes there are six.

Legend has it that one day Ernest Hemingway was lunching at the Algonquin, sitting at the famous "round table" with several writers, claiming he could write a six-word-long short story. He believed any real write could tell a compelling story with the right six words. The other writers balked. Hemingway told them to ante up ten dollars each. If he was wrong, he would match it; if he was right, he would keep the pot. He quickly wrote six words on a napkin and passed it around. The words were: For Sale, Baby Shoes, Never Worn.

What a story that tells. Hemingway told My story. The story of so many in just six words. If you had to capture one of the narratives that has shaped your life in 6 words what would that story be? When it comes to Mateo mine would be something like "The smallest footprints left biggest impact". Sometimes there are no words, sometimes there are six.

The Five Things Continued: Thing Number Four "I Forgive You"

Dear Mateo,

I forgive you. I forgive you for coming into my life so unexpectedly. I was caught off guard by your determination to become. I forgive you for leaving just as unexpectedly. I forgive you for making me love you. You are just so easy to love. I forgive you for changing my life. I knew from the moment I found out I was pregnant that my life would never be the same. Life is now divided into everything before I carried you inside and every minute after. I forgive you for connecting me to your co-creator, your father. Just because you died and he isn't a part of my life doesn't mean he is no longer a part of me. He through you will alway be a part of me. Some day Ill have to forgive him also. I forgive you for pushing me to my limits of my convictions. I made some very hard decisions because of you, from choosing to bring you into this world to choosing to comfort you on your way out of it. Loving you has changed me in this way I could never describe. Not in six words, not in a million. I forgive you for leaving me behind and going on without me. On some days I wish it had been me instead, on other days I wish I had gone with you. I always wish that you were still here. I love you.

Check out this link to this mother's story. She was recently on the Today show sharing her story and promoting her new book that she wrote as her son was dying from a rare disease over the last three years. It is a touching story and she has great advice, watch this interview if you get a chance!

http://t.today.com/moms/grieving-moms-advice-rest-us-love-purely-take-it-easy-1C8709317

These Five Things

The last two nights have been interesting, for the first time since Mateo passed away he has been in my dreams. I dream of a baby boy in different scenarios. This baby boy is mine, and I am his and we interact. That is how I know it is a dream. For the last two mornings after shaking off the sleep I have recalled the dreams, I wish I couldn't. Sometimes I tell myself that parallel universes exist and that in another reality that mirrors this one Mateo never died. There is a version of me that gets to raise her son and they are happy together. I just happen to be in the other reality. This is my reality and in this one, I only see him in my dreams.

After losing Mateo I went to Barnes&Nobles and bought a couple of grief books. Then I went on amazon and bought baby loss books. Then I went through baby loss blogs trolling for any recommended books, podcasts, websites, whatever anyone ever in the history of loss and grief had ever done and found useful. As I read through the different resources I collected, I give myself the freedom to sort through and feel what is right for me. Not everything I read is meant for me at this time. Some books I will go back to at a later point in my process, some I will re-read, some I will give away. I am grateful for the access to these books, to the combination of tools that I have. Between the books, therapy, meditation, friends, journaling,blogging, and some awareness work that I have done years leading up to this, I do more than make it through the day- I continue to live my life.

One of the books I am reading is about grief and consciousness. I am at a chapter that suggests working through 5 different topics in order to facilitate healing. With each topic it is suggested you create artwork, write a letter, come up with some sort of visualization about the topic addressed to the person you are grieving. I am going to blog mine out one at a time. I will continue the 4 other topics in future blogs.

Number One: I'm Sorry

Dear Mateo,

I am sorry. I am sorry our time together was so short. Around 24 weeks inside of me and 3 days in the hospital just wasn't enough. No amount of time would have ever been since mothers shouldn't bury their children. I am sorry that we got off to a rough start. I am sorry I didn't know from day one to not take you for granted. I was scared. I was alone and I was scared. I am sorry if for even a moment of your existence you didn't feel loved by me. I knew that I would love you with such devotion that It scared me to jump right in. I am sorry that I didn't sing to you more, that I didn't read to you more, that I didn't know to do more, to be more. I am sorry that I didn't know that our whole relationship would be tied to this short span of time, I would have spent every second holding my belly and praying, and talking to you. I am sorry that I didn't know I was sick. I am sorry that my body failed you. My only job in life was to protect you and I couldn't even protect you from myself. I am sorry that I couldn't save you. In the hospital when they were giving you blood transfusions I asked if I could donate my blood and was told that's actually worse for the babies. I couldn't do anything for you medically. I am sorry if I made any wrong choices around your birth. I am sorry if you felt any pain in the NICU. On your last day, when they told me you were at the point of no return and were starting to feel discomfort, they gave you pain medicine. That is when I asked to hold you and say goodbye. I think some people would say holding your baby as he passes away and saying goodbye seems like too much for a mother to handle, knowing you were in pain was too much for me to handle. I couldn't let you hurt, and I am sorry that you did for even a second. I am sorry you never got to meet your family. I told you goodbye from your grandma, and auntie, and all the people sending love, I even told you goodbye from your father in case he would have wanted it said or will some day. I am sorry none of them got to hold you. I am sorry my little guy for all the places and spaces where I fell short and was less than. You were perfect. I was not and could have never been. You are the love of my life and I am sorry I do not get to share this life with you.

Rainbow Babies

When parents who have lost a child have children after that child, they call those children rainbow babies. I see it in baby loss blogs and hear it mentioned at support group meetings. " ...is having a little girl, this is their rainbow baby". I can see why the rainbow would be the symbol chosen. Evidence of the calm after the storm. In the bible a rainbow appeared to Moses and the survivors of the end of the world as proof that life would continue on, that the earth would replenish itself. It was a symbol of hope from God to man. If religion isn't your thing then rainbows are refractions of light. Rainbows are simply a different way of seeing light- light that you couldn't see before is now visible. God, science or both- rainbows symbolize change and in the case of rainbow babies hope.

Whenever I hear of someone having a rainbow baby I say a personal prayer of hope. I know what it is like to lose a child. Sadly I do not know what it is like to keep one. To take one home alive and have that amazing experience of raising one. It seems like I am at a place where even all the people who understand my pain now also will get to understand the joy I have not been privy to.

From what I can gather trying to have another child within a year of losing one is pretty common. It seems as though most couples I encounter start trying as soon as they get the medical green light. Why wouldn't they? These are people who wanted children and life kicked them in the teeth. If they are brave enough to try again, I am brave enough to support them. But the thing is- I don't get to try again. At least not anytime soon. I don't get to announce my rainbow baby at support group meetings and I don't know if I ever will. Often it is only mothers who come to group meetings but every now and then couples come. A man at the last meeting made a comment along the lines of " I have to be there for my wife, we have to be there for each other, we are the only two people who will ever really understand what it means to lose our baby" I have no one to understand that with- not in that sense. I made the decision to be a single parent and so I have turned into the single parent of a deceased child. A single griever. Without the option of a rainbow baby even. I feel as though life is very cruel with me at times like this. I am not taking away from all the kindness and love that those in my life have shown me or all the strength that I have found within me. Appreciating this does not take away from the fact that I do not have a partner to share in my grief, and not just a partner, but the person who helped create him. Whose DNA he shared, features, blood in his veins- biologically he wasn't only mine. In every other sense he was. I have reached out to Mateo's father and have been made to understand that this is my son and my grief and mine alone.

There is no way to know if life will align in such a way that I find someone I love and trust and decide to have rainbow babies with. If that doesn't happen do I decide to have rainbow babies on my own? People were so supportive when I had an unplanned pregnancy and decided to be a single parent- it is hard to picture that level of support if I actually planned a pregnancy knowing I'd be a single parent. A mistake seems admirable, when its planned it gets called selfish. I just want the experience of being a mom. How long do I have to wait before people are like- oh yea- she's not married, she is not getting any younger, she lost a child and still really wants one- so now it is ok that she does it on her own? 5 years?10? The couples I know having rainbow babies wait around 3 months. I understand their urgency- it isn't about replacing the child they lost, it is about making their dreams to bring a healthy beautiful baby home come true. They don't know how long it will take them to get pregnant, or how many more miscarriages it might take before that happens. They want to know that they can do this- that they can have this. You don't stop wanting to be a mother because you stop being pregnant. Your body changed its mind- not you. Of course you want to try again- you never stopped being ready. I wish that all of these rules applied to me. I can deal with being a single parent. I can deal with single grief. I can't deal with never having a rainbow baby. I can't deal with the timeline restrictions- what is normal for a couple to want is not normal for me as a young single woman to want. Tell that to my heart. I want share the same dreams but without restrictions on my timeline. I have to wait for either the person to do this with or the courage to do it on my own knowing that the support might just not be there.

I might have to stop going to support group meetings when the faces stop being familiar, when everyone I know has stopped coming because they are pregnant with a rainbow baby and no longer pregnant with grief. I've already noticed some of the moms who were actively trying to get pregnant stopped coming. No one has to announce it- Rainbow Babies. Maybe by the time it is all new faces, I will be in a place in my healing process where leaving the group feels natural to me also even if it isn't due to pregnancy. I am not ready to have a baby tomorrow, next month or even by the end of this year. I just want to feel that when I am ready single or not- I can and everyone will still love me for it.

Grief Talk

I sat and talked grief today with a friend. We talked about life, forgiveness, personal growth and grief. We talked about feelings while commenting that no one talks about feelings, at least not really.

I know of this man who was a college professor. Smart guy they say. He made some choices in life and in consequence life made choices for him and at the end of it all he lost everything. Hi career, his family, his reputation, his lover, all of it. He is now known to wander around the streets of downtown pushing a grocery cart while reciting some of the most beautiful literature those within ear shot will probably hear that day. Homeless.

After Mateo died I pictured myself with a similar fate. I envisioned what it would be like to fully give into my grief and then fall apart and then never come back to sanity. I misdiagnosed grief in that situation. Grief is the process- and if you make it so, a teacher. Grief is not the reason one ends up losing their life while still alive. A handful or two of feelings are. Depression, anxiety, despair and so on. That's how you end up giving up by giving in.

I sit with my grief now. A witness. It introduces me to different parts of me. Shows me where I am strong, where I am quiet, where I am restless, where I am lonely. I do not plan on carrying it around forever but our time together is no where near done. Grief is doesn't take time- grief is time. Grief minutes pass by every hour and in that hour I will feel any number of emotions. Grief is the time it takes for you to feel through something, be present with it and create ways to cope and to heal. Then your time is no longer counted by a grief clock. You are in a different place. I do not know what this next place looks like because I am still grieving. I know what grieving is to me. And so I am learning to sit with it. Be with it. Learn from it so that then I can let it go.

I don't know if everyone else knows all this about grief. I didn't. I didn't know what it meant to grieve- it was an abstract commandment. Thou shall now grieve. I did not understand what that meant. I am figuring it now. So far I can say I have sat with some of the deepest darkest corners of my pain and have not ended up coming so far apart that I could not come together again. I come back different- better or worse is relative- but I always come back.

Here is a great TedTalk on grief from a woman who lost her baby around the time in her pregnancy I did. Her words really resonated with me- maybe they will touch you also

http://youtu.be/gqX3Ygy8NOo