Stillbirth Support Group
This community is dedicated to those who have been impacted by a stillbirth. A stillbirth occurs when a fetus which has died in the uterus, during labor, or during delivery exits a woman's body. For help and support, share your experiences and learn how others coped. Don't forget that you are not alone.
Hello everyone,
I'm feeling a bit okay today and hope that you all are as well. I've been trying to work on other things and get back to myself as much as humanly possible before I return to work this coming Sunday. In Feburary my lease with my apartment complex will be ending and so I will be moving out. I am trying to get all the things done that I wanted to have done for my angel baby, Zuri, before her arrival (purchasing a home, getting a new and roomier vehicle and mending my relationship with my ex-boyfriend/her dad) so that I can try for another baby with my ex within a year or two. It's still a tad shaky of whether or not he truly wants to have another baby but a lot of his "vulgar" (hint, hint) talk leads me to believe that's the case and that his variance is just him dealing with our loss (and his second loss). Additionally, he finally opened up about his feelings about losing our baby girl a little. So there's hope. He must be open to the idea to try again in some way. Who knows maybe I'll have enough room in the home that I buy and he'll move in with me after his own apartment lease is up.
I know, I know that's a LOT of wishful thinking. I'm grabbing for straws here but I'm only catching air. Also, for some unknown reason my mother found an issue with me posting on here and turning to this as a means of helping me cope. She was upset that I didn't want her to read the Daily Bread (daily Bible stories/scriptures) to me. I didn't because I told her that my heart wasn't open anymore (it was in the beginning immediately after losing her) but now, that openness has temporarily evaporated. That doesn't mean that I've stopped believing in God. I'm just... numb, only available for certain things. Anyhow she went on to have this long rant about God and maintaining hope in spiritualism when it doesn't seem to be fruitful. How everything is already preordained/destined to be. Yet, she appeared to be discussing her own troubles and outlook on the matter more than mine. It was weird. So today she sees me typing this post up, grimaces and then gives the instructions for me to continue typing. I stopped typing and said nothing the entire time she read.
It's going to be good for me to return home tomorrow and deal with my sadness/emptiness in my own way without comments or judgement like that. I love my mother dearly but that, I could do without. She's still caught on the older generations way of coping with grief and sorrow by not turning to people and simply trying to connect more with God. Sure, I should turn to God but my heart is closed because He is also the same God who took back a child that He KNEW I truly wanted and loved, in spite of all that I felt, said and went through during and prior to my pregnancy. Therefore, at this time I wish not to speak with God. That won't bring my baby back; neither will posting this. But typing out my thoughts to people who can actually ENGAGE with me is a lot more helpful than talking to the Lord (who won't speak directly back to me in the same day, week or month as you guy probably will). As I said... my heart is CLOSED... shattered into fine, little pieces...
I am, however, thankful that my child is with the Lord. Perhaps not thankful enough... because I wanted her. I loved her too.
I’m glad to hear you are starting to pick your pieces of life back together and hope that going back to work is a welcome distraction. I find myself trying to keep preoccupied too because it’s hard when you have silent moments alone, you end up thinking about your bubba and then the heart breaks all over again. We are stronger than we think so we are always able to pick ourselves up again and keep marching on and hopefully one day it gets easier.
Our loved ones are dealing with a loss too and I often forget that and you are right that they deal with it in a different way to us. As for religion, yes it’s hard to have faith right now because I can’t see any reason for why any of us should have to lose a child so late in pregnancy and our babies should be with us and not yet in heaven. It’s unfair and and it’s a brutal sucker punch. I was never all that religious beforehand and this experience has made me less inclined to be. I don’t doubt that there is a god, but like you, right now it’s hard to see the divinity in the taking of young lives that never got to fulfil their destiny.
I hope you get to keep busy when you are back on your own in your apartment & don’t have too many breakdowns. Please remember that we are all here to listen when others might not be and we all completely understand the depth and torrent of emotion you are going through so you are not alone in this ordeal.
Ironically, I had a ‘silent moment’ alone where I did exactly what you’ve described in the worst of ways. I’m now back home and my family has returned to Oklahoma. I couldn’t handle being back by myself with nothing but my thoughts and memories of the months past. I wound up stumbling around my apartment in a hysterical drunken sob, gazing at spaces that her diapers and baby wipes, clothes, and other items I’d already gotten used to fill; all now returned back to it’s original vacancies. It’s hard to go back to living my life like I was never pregnant, like her conception never was. I wanted to die last night, but did nothing to hurt myself. Just drank and cried until my ex-boyfriend arrived to comfort me. Quite counterproductive I’m sure.
I understand your perspective on religious outlooks. It’s hard and that’s about the only word that comes to me to sum up my own take on the matter. It’s hard to make sense of the actions of a God that takes the lives of children and babies who’ve done nothing wrong, who’re so pure and vibrant and who damages the hearts of men and women who would make wonderful, loving parents in the process. Meanwhile, there’s plenty of people who don’t deserve to be parents and they’re able to spit out healthy babies quicker than a conveyor belt can roll out goods at a major production factory.
Unfortunately, I don’t have much at the moment that can preoccupy my mind outside of spending time with her daddy and and watching tv… taking care of bills. You know, normal things but my feelings still vary and I’m certain that’s to be said for all of us. Some moments feel manageable and then, boom, the next moment it’s as if you took a harpoon to the chest and hit with a freight train at once. I hope the upkeep in your volunteer work/fundraising in honor of your little boy has been well.
Again thank you for your regard. Sending love.
Nevertheless, I’ve had varying beliefs be thrown at me as to why my baby isn’t here. One group of people say it’s God who took my baby as an act of mercy of me and my situation, another insists it was the Devil because he rules this world… but it makes no difference to who did what because for one, I no longer believe in a higher power. My heart has dried up and sealed itself off to any idea that a divinity of some kind could allow this to happen. I’d just begun to reroot my faith and stick with it because I thought my baby was a blessing from God that I would get to keep. I wanted to do right unto “Him” and continue a path that had begun being paved but it was prematurely destroyed by a series of terrible events. A smart God in my eyes wouldn’t have done that to someone who was actively working to be one of His soldiers but would have instead kept the reason I had to become the person I was intended to be, HERE. Whether it was the Devil who took my child or not, if there were an “all-powerful, all-seeing God” there was room for intervention to keep what happened from happening with me and with all the rest of you. What happened, was cruel and unusual punishment and I haven’t been handling it well ever since. There’s people in this world who’re parents and don’t deserve to be or don’t need to be but somehow people who have more reason to be, aren't. I’ve been on a downward spiral ever since October 12th. My health has appeared to be taking a hit as a result. I’m indecisive, irritable and angry. My relationships with family and friends are falling apart slowly and I’m not really concerned much about stopping it. Whether everything is all peachy or buried six feet in hardened soil, none of it will be my child back to me.
If I’m wrong and there is a God, I won’t make it to see her in the afterlife, I’m certain of it. From all the things I’ve said in anger and don’t feel sorry for saying. So I’ve memorialized her name and the fact that she was here and mattered with ink on my skin… that way when I do go, she’ll still be with me… and I’ll also have her and my ashes mixed together so that we can be together there too… as for God? It will take a miracle for me to return to Him but I doubt that miracle will ever come to be.