Weekend Review: Flashbacks

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January 7th, 2014.  22 weeks and 1 day. It is one of the coldest winters on record.  Snow covers everything. Another snowstorm is about to hit. It is the day after my birthday.  I am at home, watching tv. I'm watching Despicable Me 2, a birthday present from my husband.  The minions remind me of the two little boys who will soon be joining us. Tim is at the fire department on a 48.  I won't see him until the 9th.  I am pregnant with twin boys.  I start having contractions.
Halloween, 2014. 22 weeks and 1 day. I am pregnant with my baby girl.  I am driving to pick up gourmet cupcakes for when my niece and nephew come by.  And it is snowing. I'm sure parents and children alike sighed in contempt, but I drove along, smiling the whole way. The snow gets heavier the closer I get to home. Is that you, boys?


January 8th 2014. 22 weeks and 2 days. I am admitted to the hospital.  I expect to go home soon, and Tim promises to buy me a strawberry shake on the drive. Then they wheel me into a room with a fucking baby warmer, and I know it is going to all be over soon.
November 1st, 2014. 22 weeks and 2 days. I wake up and the snow has stuck to my car overnight.  The day wears on.  I go to bed early.  I wake up around 4 am, but not for the first time tonight.  I haven't felt baby girl in awhile.  I run my hand over my stomach, trying to wake her up.  Kick, punch, wiggle.  There she is.  I try to get her to move more. Leave me alone, mom, I'm sleeping. Tonight I am still pregnant.  I am not in labor.  My baby is alive.

January 9th, 2014. 22 weeks and 3 days. My last full day with my boys.  I am still pregnant.  I finally agree to having an epidural, after being in labor for days.  The only reason I agree is because I do not want to be in physical pain during the short time I will be able to hold my babies.  That night, one of the boys' water starts leaking.  We don't know whose. We call our pastor at 4 a.m.  He comes right away, and stays with us until after the boys are born.
November 2, 2014. 22 weeks and 3 days.  We go to church this morning, as usual.  Pastor comes up to us and sincerely says, "God be with you today."  He has a look on his face.  He looks sad.  What is today?  I open up the bulletin for today's service. It is All Saint's Day.  Conner and Benjamin's names, along with 14 others, are listed as the faithfully departed. Special prayers are said for them today.  My eyes fill with tears as Pastor announces their names.  "The little babies, Conner Sullivan...Benjamin Sullivan."  A chime is rung after each name.  Later, he gives the sermon. He addresses each of the 16 faithfully departed.  "And the most heartbreaking of all, Conner and Benjamin, taken after just 23 weeks of life."  I see the man in front of me shake his head.  Tim and his sister are crying.  So am I.

January 10th, 2014. 22 weeks and 4 days. Conner is born at 11:27 a.m.  I hold him.  He breathes.  He hiccups. Benjamin is born at 11:43 a.m.  He breathes.  His hands always find his face. They are baptized in my arms the minute they are born as our pastor, our doctor, and our nurse cry with us.
November 3rd, 2014.  22 weeks and 4 days. I wake up this morning, and Baby C is squirming away.  Stay with me, baby girl.  I'm going to raise you to know all about your brothers.

THE 22 weeks

Is it me, or is my bump shrinking?

How far along? 22 weeks, the same week that I lost my baby Conner and my baby Ben.  I did not, like I usually do on Thursdays, wish this baby a happy 22 weeks.

What's happening with  baby?  I didn't anticipate how difficult this question would be. I realize now that I am going to be writing the last things that Conner and Ben were able to do in the womb. Lips, eyebrows, and eyelids are more distinct (and Conner had my eyelashes and Ben luckily had his father's). She is 11 inches, almost one pound.  She is covered in fine hair and taste buds are forming. She can feel touch.  I wonder if Conner and Ben realized it was me who was kissing their tiny foreheads. 

Total weight gain: I usually try to go off my scale, because I wear the same thing everytime I step on it, making my weight more reliable than the OB's scale.  My scale says I've only gained 5 pounds. For the first time ever, my OB's scale said the same thing - up five pounds.  Not much, but I'm sure that will change. I think I've lost weight since last week. 

Maternity clothes?  No, but my amazing husband did buy me maternity compression tights since edema has already started :(

Stretch marks? Nope.

Sleep: Insomnia.  I can't explain why - anxiety, missing the boys, dreading the next day and everything that has to be done... not sure.  It could also be because I am peeing ALL THE TIME. 

Miss Anything?  My baby boys, always. More so this week, if that is possible. 

Differences between Baby C and Conner and Ben at this point: This will be the last week I can answer this question.  Had I know how difficult and heartbreaking this would be for me, I would have never included this question in the first place.  But here it goes: baby girl is not up on my lungs yet, so I can breathe.  I have edema, which I didn't have with the boys (until I was in labor).  My skin is clearing up. I can definitely tell now that I was indeed bigger with the boys.  At first, my baby bump was right on par with the boys at the same gestational age and I was freaking out about being huge. The bump growth has slowed, where at this point with the boys I was growing rapidly. 

Best moment this week: This is going to sound weird, but the fact that yet again we couldn't get a 3d picture made me a little proud. She has her hands up in the air like a boxer. Then, when the nurse went to find her heartbeat via ultrasond, she couldn't find it for a few minutes because this little baby kept on moving. We found her heartbeat for a split second high up by my belly button, then it disappeared.  We found it a minute later by my hip bone, then we lost it again.  She's an acrobat. 

Difficulties this week:  Last night, I couldn't sleep.  I've been battling insomnia lately.  I thought about how Benjamin and Conner would miss their first Christmas this year, and cried.  I looked at their pictures on my phone, and I cried.  I memorized their faces for the millionth time, and cried. 

Movement:  Still kicking and rolling and punching like a pro. 

Food cravings/aversions:  I KNEW I shouldn't have bought Halloween candy before Halloween!  I've been slowly eating it all...

Symptoms: Swelling.  Oh, the swelling.  It's so early!  Right now, I can only fit into my yoga pants because my calves are so swollen (and my thighs a bit, too).  I really hope it doesn't get much worse! 

Looking forward to: Hopefully, a big shopping spree for baby girl when we reach 24 weeks. Tim is also buying crown molding for the nursery this weekend. I have mixed emotions about that.  I am excited for her nursery, but so sad to change what we have up for the boys.  We will be incorporating their things in her nursery though, and I'll post that in her nursery reveal.

"I throw my hands up in the air sometimes, saying ayo..."

The Capture Your Grief challenge is coming to an end. As I said in an earlier post, I stopped doing the challenge and got back to writing letters to my baby boys instead - writing to them is more therapuetic to me than anything else, and I think that is the point of the challenge anyway.  Hopefully this letter will help me get back to writing to them on a regular basis.

Dear baby boys, 

I am 22 weeks pregnant with your sister. Twenty-two weeks. It's so hard to believe that she is as big as you boys were when you were born.  I keep thinking of her as this little tiny baby, but really, she is big enough to cradle and hold in my arms. 

Everyday, I think of what it was like to hold you.  I was in awe of how perfectly you fit in my arms and how heavy you were.  I didn't expect to have so much weight in my arms, and I am so grateful that I had the chance to feel that. I hope I never forget those moments. 

At 22 weeks and 1 day, I went into labor with you.  At 22 weeks and 4 days, I gave birth to you.  This week is traumatic for me, but a very supportive blog reader once commented and told me that your little sister will do great with both of her brothers holding onto each of her hands.  I imagine that all the time now.  I don't want you to ever think you will be replaced.  Everytime I look at her, I will think of you both. 

Tomorrow is Halloween.  When I was pregnant with you, I thought it would be funny for all of us to dress up as breakfast foods.  Your daddy and I LOVE getting breakfast on Sundays, and it has become a kind of tradition.  I was going to make your daddy go as sausage because he would really kind of look like poop.  I'm not sure what you two would have been, but I'm guessing one of you would have been orange juice. 

I know this week is going to be incredibly hard to get through as we reach milestones with your sister that were our last with you, and then when we reach milestones with her that we never got with you. But I realize that my whole life will be like that from now on.  I am not okay with that.  I am not okay with the fact that I can only imagine what you boys would be like today... tomorrow... your first day of school.... your wedding day.  The only comfort I have, if any, is that you are happy in heaven and that someday, I will feel the weight of my little boys in my arms again. 

Love you to the moon and back,

Mom

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Where exactly do I begin?

On January 10th, 2014, I gave birth to two beautiful boys.  Conner Timothy was born at 11:27, weighing 1 pound, 2 ounces and measuring at 11.5 inches.  Benjamin Michael was born at 11:43, weighing 1 pound, 2 ounces and measuring at a stocky 11 inches.  They were born after just 22.5 weeks of pregnancy, victims of an infection that only had a 1 in 10,000 chance of ending their short lives.

This blog is a testament to them and their journey.  Even though my babies are no longer with me, I feel the need to have their story be heard and go on.  I am still their mother.  This blog also chronicles my experiences and struggles on trying to move forward while still remembering my sons and including them in my life everyday.  I hope that this blog will help someone who has dealt with/is dealing with neonatal loss, infertility, or the like.  Its not the club we wanted to be in, but here we are ladies.  Maybe words can heal what time cannot.

Warning: I don't believe in censorship on blogs or memoirs of any kind.  I can't possibly be truthful and open without including my streams of thought that contain sarcasm and profanity.  Babies die.  Parents grieve. It gets sad. But I do promise that we find laughter and make future plans and all kinds of lighthearted things.