Happy Birthday, Miles

The day Miles was born was a good day. Two years ago today we got to finally meet the little guy who we had been waiting nine months for. Two years ago. Two years ago.

This photo was taken just a few hours after Miles was born. We had just learned that he had a serious heart defect; we knew he would be having heart surgery in just a few hours. We didn't know we would lose him. We didn't know that we'd be celebrating all his birthdays without him.

He should be here turning two with us today. It will never be right that he's not here for his birthdays. So that sorrow is there, and I won't pretend that it's not. But remembering the day he was born, that's a good thing. His birthday is a good day.  The joy of welcoming him to the world and spending four and a half months with him and the joy of having him in our hearts always are all good things to celebrate today.

So today we'll eat angel food cake, read his birth story*, and lovingly admire all of his beautiful photos in his baby book. Happy birthday, Miles.

* * *

*Miles' Birth Story

My bag was packed with Gatorade, a camera, tennis balls, and Norah Jones—the things that were supposed to be the essentials.  I had narrowed down our 9-month-awaited-baby’s coming home outfit to three options so those were all in; the teddy bear outfit was my number one, but I worried that it wouldn’t be manly enough for Mitch’s taste.  So the giraffe outfit and birdie outfit with matching cap were the macho backups.   Everything was in—even the worst-underwear-from-my-drawer that I’d been advised I’d never want to wear again; I had cross-referenced all the things-to-be-sure-to-pack-for-the-hospital lists because that’s what I do.  

When my contractions started at 2:30 AM on January 28, 2010, I pulled out my childbirth class notebook.  The chart clearly outlined how long each stage of labor and delivery would take, and this was exactly what I wanted—a clear-cut and simple chart for giving birth.  Mitch and I had agreed during childbirth class that staying at home as long as possible was the way to go.  Mitch had scared me enough with the stories of the patients who come to the hospital way too early and get sent home or just clog-up-the-medical-works.   

During class, we had to prioritize which things were most important—I had insisted that being able to walk and being able to get an epidural were my two non-negotiables.  Mitch told me that those things didn’t really go together.  Sometimes it’s not helpful to be married to a doctor.  No matter, I was the one having the baby so I would walk and walk at home and then walk and walk at the hospital until the second I got the epidural.  Lovely. 

According to my calculations, our baby would be arriving late that night.  We had a long road ahead of us that day, and it was best not to think things would move along too quickly.  Dr. P agreed when I called her that morning to let her know that this was the day.  She was my dream doctor; I fell in love at our first appointment.  I knew I was pregnant because I had missed periods and the drug store pregnancy test had confirmed it.  Those tests were cheap, though, and could we get some real medical proof please?  One nurse had already turned down my request for a real-doctor-supervised pregnancy test.  When I asked Dr. P though, she agreed to do it.  Unless of course I just wanted to hear the baby’s heart beat for the first time.  Yes, please, that would do it.   And with that, I had the confirmation that I needed and finally believed that this baby was the real deal holyfield.  And icing on the cake: she called Mitch’s phone and left a message with the new little heart beat. 

Now, on the day my labor started, my non-stress test was already scheduled for 10:40 that morning at the hospital, and, now that I was in labor that might last a long time, it would be good to know that the baby was doing ok.  Lots of women get these NSTs, the doctors told me, way back when I started the weekly routine, as a way to keep an eye on any babies the docs might be worried about.  It involved me lifting up my shirt to reveal my ever-growing belly so that sensors could be attached with big-mama seatbelts.  I would wear glitter lotion on my belly—to dress the baby up.  And the technicians would tell me, well, I’ve never seen that before.  Then we listened to the baby’s heartbeat, and I rooted for him to move around, put on a show, and do whatever it was that would keep the docs from worrying.  To me, the NSTs were, well, silly.  Still, I couldn’t bring myself not to do them, just in case.  After weeks of NSTs, this would be my moment of glory.  Finally, in addition to checking the baby’s heart rate, my contractions would show up on the monitor as huge mountains.  Huge contraction mountains. 

Just like for every other appointment during my pregnancy, I walked there; we had to take advantage of the fact that from our living room window all we could see was the space-ship-shaped Dean Dome and, off in the distance, the hospital.  So I walked.  It took twenty minutes to walk and then twenty minutes to believe I wasn’t even in labor.  Oh, yes, I felt those contractions, but somehow they didn’t even show up on the monitor.  The technicians were nice about it.  They said I could be having contractions even though they didn’t show up.  Well, that was good.  But then they asked me to go ahead and make an appointment for the next week.  So of course I was confused.  They thought I would have an appointment in a week, so clearly this wasn’t even labor.  I walked home and tried not to dwell on the fact that these contractions—or “pains” as I started to call them since they weren’t classifiable on the stupid machine—were coming faster.  It was a bit hard to walk through them now; I was such a weenie, I thought.  By then it was noon and Mitch was at home waiting for me.  I called to tell him I didn’t want to be alone—in fake labor—and walking around by myself any more.   He was there in a flash, and I told him the whole sob story leaning on his shoulder.  Once at the apartment, I rested on all fours over a bowl of yogurt and cut up apples.  Between pains, I ate bites and explained the pains to Mitch.  That sounds like contractions, he insisted.  He had the same look on his face as when he woke up in the middle of the night to find me webmd-ing salmonella to make sure I didn’t have it.   Not good. 

With our kitchen timer, he started timing them.  Three minutes apart.  One minute long.  He called Dr. P to leave a message that it was probably about time for us to come in to get checked. 

And then he simultaneously ate his own lunch, timed my contractions, answered my cell phone, and bragged to my brother. 

“Yeah, your sister is punching out contractions here…”

Mom arrived with a bag full of goodies—playing cards so we could play spades or war to pass the time.  She was prepared for a different version of childbirth, but she changed gears quickly.

“Do you think this is real labor?” I asked from all fours on the floor.

“Yes, and I think you’re further along than you think.”

With that, we all believed it was time to go to the clinic to get checked.

We walked. 

In all fairness, it’s not a long walk, and I had made it clear to everyone that walking was my main game plan.  I had even written it on my birth plan: walking.  Right next to: no mirrors.  Plus it was only around 1 pm.  We still had hours and hours to go.  After all, I was just at the hospital not having contractions.

We made our way to the clinic in two-minute chunks.  During contractions, we would stop so I could breathe-it-out. 

“We think I’m in labor,” I said to the curious and slightly-concerned moms on the playground as we slowly passed by.

            “What if this isn’t it?” I asked mom, nervous that I was being a drama queen in front of too many people now.

            “This is it,” mom said.

            At the clinic: 7 cm.  Well, la-di-da.

Mom ran-walked back to get the car.  She drove us back to the apartment to get my bag because, in the frenzy, we didn’t have that stupid bag that had been packed for weeks.

            She floored it in her little convertible.  I’m pretty sure I even said, “You don’t have to drive that fast.”

            And I’m pretty sure she said, “I always drive like this.”

            With bag in hand, we were off.

When the next contraction started, I yelled for mom to pull over.  She did and I rolled out of the car to huff out a contraction on the sidewalk.  

“You have to stay in the car!” Mitch yelled from where he was trapped in the tiny backseat of the convertible.  I laugh now when I think of him trying to deal with me at that moment.  They don’t teach you how to handle this one in med school or childbirth class.

Still, I refused to sit down.

We negotiated that I could be in the front seat on my knees facing backwards hugging the seat.  With such clarity, I could immediately see that this was without-a-doubt the only comfortable position for a laboring woman, so I briefly wondered why I’d never seen another woman going to the hospital like this.  Maybe one of those it’s-better-if-they-don’t-know things?

It got us there.  With about an hour to spare.

I could only handle the contractions if I was standing and leaning forward with my arms on Mitch’s shoulders.  I was loud.  I remember that.  But I don’t remember the sound exactly.  It wasn’t yelling.  It wasn’t grunting.  I can’t put my finger on it, but the only thing that comes even close is lowing.  Painful lowing.

There were lots of directions from Mitch: “You have to sit down.”  “You have to breathe.”  “You have to put on the hospital gown.”  “You have to let them put an IV in.” 

My favorite was: “Remember the breathing techniques you learned in class.”

That meant, of course, “I don’t remember the breathing techniques they taught you in class, but let’s hope that you do.”  

By the time I followed his advice to put on the hospital gown and sit down:

9 cm.  No time for drugs.  Later this would make me a superwoman of sorts and a major-hypocrite as well.  How could I be joining the group of psycho women I had always either made fun of or severely insulted? 

It was so hot in the room that I was sure I would pass out.  That had been one of my fears when I thought about childbirth.  Stressful times weren’t always my shining moments.  I had proven that a good old vasovagal response was in my repertoire twice in the past few years. The more memorable one was when we first moved to Brooklyn for Mitch’s medical rotations.  That was the night Mitch woke up yelling every cuss word I know.  Charlie horse!  I jumped up and ran through our very-tiny-so-how-can-it-possibly-be-this-long apartment to get water.  The yelling doubled because so had the pain; Mitch had a Charlie horse in each leg, a physical feat that I didn’t know even existed until that moment.  I started running back with the water, and that’s the last thing I remember.  Mitch heard the thump of my body hitting the floor.  He called my name, and I didn’t respond.  So with his double-Charlie-horse-legs, he had to Lieutenant-Dan-style drag himself through the apartment to save me.  When I came to, I was sweating and could think of nothing but vomiting and going to the bathroom at the same time.   Mitch put me in the bathtub and turned the shower on.  Though I can and do laugh now about it, passing out was not a joking matter on this day and was certainly not part of the birth plan.

So I was hot and stressed, opposed to the calm, hydrated, and conscious birthing woman I wanted to be.  Mom was wetting paper towels with cool water to put on my forehead.  After only a matter of seconds, the water was no longer cool, and I was just lying there with wet-hospital-brand paper towels plastered on my head.  I was still hot and now pissed. 

“Gatorade,” I said.

Mitch and Dr. P glanced at each other.  Later Mitch told me it wasn’t good to drink too much because you could throw it up.  But mom was already proving reason number one to have your mom on the birth team by marching right to my bag to bring me the Gatorade.  I guzzled most of it before Mitch took it away.  And I didn’t pass out.

10 cm. 

The contractions and pushing were intense.  The time in between critical for recovery and gearing back up.  It was physical—like an athletic event, but of a sort without my sneakers and pants—with the breathing, bearing down.  And it was emotional—they could see his head.  He was coming!  And, no, I didn’t want to touch his head with my hands; I could feel it just fine already, thank you very much. 

Push through the ring of fire, Dr. P instructed.  At the time, it was such good advice.  Now, I can’t make sense of it and wonder if that’s actually what she even said.

Such intense pain and then, in a heartbeat, the pain was gone.

Miles Jonathan Mitchell was here.  Our sweet Miles.  He was perfect.  He was ours.  We were in love.  

Dr. P handed him to me.  We held him and took a video that includes me saying something entirely lame that I wish I could blame on drugs and then mostly features the floor and ceiling of the hospital room.  We were new parents and it was one of the happiest moments of our lives.

And that was it—childbirth—four and a half months later I would realize, the easiest, least painful part of motherhood for me.   

~

That’s how we remember the day.  It was perfect.  Yet, when I retell bits of it now, I cause an uncomfortable squirm in others or at least a heavy sigh.  That’s because they know the rest of the story.  Perhaps they believe that the rest of the story changes this day.  But, for us, it doesn’t.

At first glance

Though this photo was taken two months ago, I just came across it yesterday. The longer I looked at it, the more I laughed. But then I kept thinking about it all day and there's just something that's sticking with me that creates a feeling quite different than being amused.

As I've mentioned I wasn't a big fan of having my picture taken after Miles died--I didn't like that "proof" that he wasn't there--I didn't like freezing myself in that time, that place. So there aren't too many photos of Mitch and me until Elliott hit the scene in July. Now since I want her to have photos, that's that. Still, I realize, there's something really hard about seeing myself in a photo without Miles.

This photo was taken when we were in St. Michaels for my sister's wedding. It was Elliott's first venture out to a restaurant (ok, ok, so she had already been to Chickfila twice but come on). Honestly, Mitch and I were terrified of taking her, well, essentially out in public at all because she was such a fussy baby at the time. I was still feeding on demand, which at the time meant that I was feeding her about every hour because I never knew if she was hungry or not...so she was never completely full nor completely thrilled. In short, we were really happy-ish and pretty much at our wits end. ANYWAY, we were trying to enjoy our week off and decided to be super-adventurous and try to go out for lunch with our families. This photo makes me laugh because--for how our lives had been turned upside down by her--Elliott looks so tiny and harmless. Then it makes me laugh even harder because Mitch and I both look like we are in the newborn-trenches. Mitch is in a little bit of a daze, and I can promise you that his arm is under the table because he was gently rocking Elliott's car seat the entire lunch to keep her happy. And then me...I mean seriously. My arm brace was always on because my arms were practically broken from holding Elliott so much. And I definitely had not washed my hair in days. Then there's the fact that I was wearing the green moby wrap practically as an accessory just in fear that I would have to quickly plop her in there and leave the restaurant to walk for as long as it took for her to stop screaming. Exhausting. Hilarious.

Yet it's not the whole story. I think that's what kept sticking with me. Things aren't always as they seem, don't we all know that? Maybe we look normal, I realize. Yes, I think that's what was sticking with me. We look kind of normal, but our new normal is much more than is there on the surface...much more than what can be seen at first glance. And so I see the moment yet I see our whole story when I look at a photo like this.

Being here and there

A friend took this picture of Elliott and me last week:

I love it. My heart just smiles with this picture as I live in the now, the reality of my life. Yet there is so much more than this photo can show. But this picture does show my happiness of having this little screamer, this little one who does everything to the extreme--eat, play, cry, you name it, she gets after it when it's time. I'm right here with her.

And I also go back to this one of Miles and me:

I love it. My seconds, minutes, hours, days, months were filled with standing by Miles' bedside. There's so much to say. But most of all, I was happy because I was with him.

So I'm here and there.
It's me, I can see. And I can see that it takes both photos for my heart to completely fill up with the happiness it can hold.

Not a lot of processing

I realize that if I wait to write until I feel like I have plenty of time, I may never write again. And so here I go, pecking away with one hand as I hold Elliott with the other...

I'm not sure whether it's due to lack of time, lack of sleep, or lack of being able to fully go there right now, but I'm not doing a lot of processing these days (11 days!) since Elliott was born. I'm living much more in the moment, letting thoughts just come in and out of my head. It's similar really to the shock during the hours, days, and weeks after Miles' death. There is much more constant happiness now in this shock (as opposed to the disbelief, overwhelming haze of wanting the world to stop, and just having the memory of happiness of having Miles). And now there's a constant feeling of awe and gratitude. But it's all still there.

Joy does not replace pain. And pain does not replace joy.

And so I don't process too much beyond that. I just let it all be, holding onto each moment before it's gone.

And at times those moments are big.

In the middle of the night, I lay next to Elliott, staring at her precious, perfect face as she sleeps. And there he is. I see her and I see Miles. I do not have a "replacement" issue--I know full well and celebrate that she is our second child, her own little person, starting out on her own little path. But there is something. Something real about feeling like I've been here before--a deja vu of sorts--yet this is the first time I've had a child here with me at home. I look out the window at the hospital at night, the light on the helicopter pad constantly blinking. I think of those days when Miles was alive. And I look at my framed photo of Miles on the day he was born. I whisper to him with tears in my eyes and a smile on my face in case he can see me, "I miss you, Miles. I wish you were here with us, too."

I hold Elliott in my arms, whispering to her how much I love her, memorizing her every facial expression, sound, and sweet way. My moments are happily filled with learning the ways she likes to be held and swayed. Eating spoonfuls of peanut butter and big glasses of milk, trying to keep up my milk supply for her. Panicking when I'm worried she's not breathing well, relying on Mitch to tell me that she's fine. Singing to her and bringing the total number of people who like my singing voice to the grand total of two--Miles and Elliott. Jumping out of the shower midway through to make sure she's still asleep and not crying for me. Holding her all night on the couch since she cries in the crib ("Isn't a walk-in closet supposed to be every girl's dream?" Mitch asks), briefly wondering if I'm doing long term damage to her ability to sleep in her own bed.

Simply I'm busy doing all of the things that I hoped and prayed I would get to do with her--and that I had hoped and prayed to do with Miles. It doesn't take much processing to figure that one out.

Elliott Rhea Mitchell is here!

And she's HOME!

Elliott Rhea arrived in the world on Sunday, July 10 at 3:22 pm. She kept us waiting for six days after her due date, but once she decided it was time she really got moving to make her debut. My mom and I made it to the hospital at 1:55 pm...where Mitch was waiting. He was already at work delivering babies (thus the scrubs in the photos)...and I was very happy to see him there, helping me for that last intense, INTENSE hour and a half. I was 9 cm dilated when they checked me at the hospital (same as for Miles). Everything went according to the birth plan...do anything to help the baby, no drugs, no mirrors, Mitch and my mom on the birth team, Dr. Page delivering the baby, breastfeeding right away. One major thing was a bit different than planned...no need to go into major details here, but I absolutely refused to sit down so we had to be more creative with laboring and delivering positions. To show how humorous he found my sudden all-natural-granola-ness with how I wanted to deliver Elliott, Mitch asked between contractions, "Do you want me to light some incense too, hippie?" He claims that all kinds of jokes are allowed so long as they are made between contractions. A few more contractions and...

I could HEAR her crying!  I could SEE her as they handed her to me.  I could HOLD her.

I just have so much joy in my heart.  Elliott is immediately a joy of my life just as Miles is.

She's here and she's ours.

Every moment is full of so much joy--both filling my heart with our girl and remembering our boy.  I miss Miles more than ever. As before, I think of him constantly. And now I think of Elliott as well. Elliott is in our arms and, quite simply, Miles is here with us too in everything.

Oh, how much our two children share on the days of their births. (Thank you, thank you to Hudson's mama for sharing the idea of having a baby picture of Miles ready at the hospital for Elliott's birth.) "Well, that is definitely Miles' little sister," a friend commented immediately. Yes. Yes, it is. Their tiny little chins, the shape of their faces, the color of their hair and eyes, the little noses--a connection right there plain as day. And she is totally herself. They have unique facial expressions, that's for sure. Elliott's mad face is quite different, I can see already. But their calm faces, the ones on their precious, perfect sleeping faces are strikingly similar. It takes my breath away.

Much, much more to say, but this was at least a start to say, "Welcome to the world, Elliott!"

Parenting, Inc.

Oh, how I love the public library. Let me count the ways. It's nice and cold. It feels like shopping, which makes it free retail therapy.  And reading is pretty much the perfect activity (besides standing in the refrigerator section of the grocery store) for these last few hot, hot, hot weeks of pregnancy.

I just finished reading Parenting, Inc. by Pamela Paul. I picked it out because I wanted to read a parenting-themed book yet somehow the typical get-ready-for-being-a-parent book doesn't exactly hit the target for me. There aren't tons of books out there for parents expecting their second child (especially ones who lost their first child), I've realized, mostly because parents expecting their second child don't normally have time to read, I'm guessing. Anyway, I had already tackled multiple books about raising a bilingual child (for some reason, I feel like I should give this a try), speech development, and my favorite NurtureShock. Anyway, Parenting, Inc. promised to be an entertaining one, and I loved reading it.  In a nutshell, it was all about how we as a society have come to a place where we spend way too much money on our children and we have become big suckers for overscheduling our babies and doing whatever thing/class (baby sign language, baby classes, so on) promises to make our child smarter, faster, more advanced. It was a good reminder of what's important (and what's not!), I thought.

After flipping the last page and closing the cover, I proceeded to tell Mitch how I was so glad that I read it because it just reinforced some of the ways we want to parent.

And then there was a pause in the conversation. We both looked around the living room and, as always is the case, our eyes landed on our beloved photos of our sweet boy. Our Miles who should be here filling our days. Our Miles who captured our hearts and will forever hold his special place in our lives. Our Miles who we watched every moment of four and a half months...just in awe of every little thing about him and just seeing him on the verge of growing up, making it, being with us always. Our Miles who isn't here in the way we dreamed for him to be.

We were silent, letting each other be alone with our thoughts of him.

And then I felt ridiculous for thinking that the book had taught me anything important about being a parent. Miles had already done it. With Miles, we were in parent boot camp. Sure we weren't doing the typical night-time diaper changing, feeding, and burping or many of the typical parent things. We were purely focused on Miles--the happiness of seeing him every day, the significance of every little step forward, the fact that nothing is a sure thing and nothing is to be taken for granted. In his four and a half months, he showed us everything we needed to know. And they were the big lessons. Truly be in the moment. Learn whatever (medical terms galore, baby massage) and do whatever (fly on a medical plane to Michigan, live in The Ronald McDonald House, wait for hours--barely breathing--during surgeries) is needed.  Celebrate life and life's little moments. Do whatever is comforting to my sweet baby even if that means singing in front of nurses, sleeping in a chair for weeks, rocking his booty side-to-side for hours at a time. Insignificant stuff is really silly and insignificant. Let people help. When you can, open your life to others to share the highs and lows with you. Keep praying and hoping yet know that not everything is in my control though I desperately want it to be. Love is stronger than death. Being a mommy is the most magical thing to be...there's just so much really...

"Our sweet boy taught us everything we really need to know about being a parent," was all I could say.

A bigger tshirt (and a timeline of pregnancy photos)

I finally broke down yesterday and bought an XL tshirt from Target. I was trying to hold out and not spend money on maternity clothes--my strategy is to wear borrowed maternity clothes or the maternity dresses my mom has sewn for me (yes, I'm spoiled in that way) or carefully-chosen normal clothes from my closet (yes, just practically bust out of them...it's attractive).  Even Mitch's tshirts are now too tight on my belly so it was time. Hopefully this baby girl is getting bigger...I definitely am.

I haven't taken many photos during this pregnancy. As I've mentioned, I avoid photos in general now because I don't like to see myself frozen in time; somehow that makes the pain worse because it makes it so that I see the pain as well as feeling it. It's just impossible for me to look at a photo of myself and not think, "Miles should be there with me." Still, I do have a few prego photos to put in baby girl's baby book (mostly I've just had to crop other people out of the few random photos I have). I bought a special baby book just for her. It's big; it's notebook-sized so that it's identical to the one I had to take to the bookbinder for our encyclopedia-of-Miles. I don't want her to feel like mommy skimped on her baby book!

Anyway, I'll have to handle my issue with taking photos, I promise myself, once baby girl is here. Just like Miles was able to do, she'll turn her daddy and me into photographers, I know.

In the meantime, here's my timeline of pregnancy photos right up to today's shot in my new Target tshirt.

34 weeks to go (yes, we're dressed for golfing)...

24 weeks to go (my pregnancy was still top secret)...

17 weeks to go...

10 weeks to go (I used to think scarves hid my baby bump)...

6 weeks to go...

Bigger and bigger. Bigger on the outside and bigger on the inside...making room in my heart for another little love of my life. Yes, I love this little one so much. I'm looking forward to her joining our family--Mitch, me, Miles, and baby girl.

Sharing

Miles will be "sharing" his room with his baby sister.

I hate that I have to put quotation marks on it.
Miles never made it to this room. But it was his. It was ready for him.
And we didn't change anything about it after he died. It was still his. I sit in there and cry sometimes, but it isn't the room that makes me cry; I could cry anywhere.

Miles is still in our hearts, and it is still his space. We still have plenty of space for him.
And now, we've just added some pink. Just like any big brother, he's passing down his hand-me-downs. It's not in the way I would have wanted or would have dreamed of, but I'm doing the best I can now as I love both of these little ones so much.

And I added this to the shelf...

We've got a picture of Miles and a picture of our baby girl.
Because just like in our hearts, Miles and the baby girl on the way share this room.

Mother's Day

I've cried at the mere thought of Mother's Day all week.

I'm still a mother, I know. And being a mother to a child in heaven is a very special kind of mother on every day...but especially Mother's Day.

My arms are empty and aching for Miles on every day but especially today. At the farmer's market and during errands yesterday, several strangers said "Happy Mother's Day" referring to my baby bump; there's just so much more to the story than that.

I blindly hoped that last Mother's Day--my first one, the one where Miles was in the hospital (and had been for three months), the one that I both smiled and cried through--would be my hardest. It was a reasonable hope, I thought.  Of course that's not to be for me.

And now I know that Mother's Day won't ever be right for me.  It's easy to be Miles' mommy, to love him without boundaries. And it's painful that he's gone. It's easy to be thrilled with the little one on her way as she constantly makes her presence known (and makes us wonder just how rambunctious she will end up being if her antics now are any indication). I'm so hopeful that I'll have her with me on all of my mother's days to come, just as I know that I'll be missing Miles on those days, too. As happy and grateful as I am to be a mother on this day, it's just not right to have my child in heaven.

My number one sadness is for Miles.  That he didn't get to grow up. That he didn't get to have a full life.  That he didn't get to experience all of the important, not so important, and totally unimportant things in life.
And then I have sadness for me (and us), too. It's highlighted on Mother's Day. That I am missing out on having our son with us. It hits me like a wave that our little guy--part Mitch, part me, all himself--was born, was here, is gone.

I remember being in the hospital for Mother's Day. Without me knowing, my mom and the nurses made a flower pot full of colorful "flowers" made out of cutouts of Miles' hands with his little handprints on the sides of the pot; it makes me smile to think of how thoughtful they were for my first Mother's Day, to think of them scrubbing the green paint off of Miles' hands so I wouldn't be suspicious.  And I remember Mitch wanting to take me out to dinner, and me trading it to eat pizza, drink a beer, and cry instead.  Most of all, I remember thinking how I was a better mother than I could have ever hoped to be and that it wasn't enough. Living at the hospital, learning so much medical information, keeping track of all of Miles' procedures and medications, pumping breast milk eight times a day to freeze, working on Miles' range of motion exercises from physical therapy, using Johnson's lotion for our daily baby massages, tracking his daily spit up on a chart on the wall, comforting Miles (without being able to feed him or fully pick him up) by caressing his head, singing the Itsy Bitsy Spider and a Noah's ark song, whispering in his ear, rocking him on my forearm, shaking his booty back and forth, reading to him, standing at his bedside for hours on end...it wasn't enough to get Miles healthy and out of the hospital. And that's why there's a smile here (I'm with my Miles on Mother's Day) and, along with that, there's the rosy cheeks and nose from crying, the eyes of a mother who desperately wants her son healthy and out of the hospital so he can be at home with her where they both belong...

And now Mother's Day is worse because Miles isn't here. Sure, being in the hospital was awful, unnatural, but not like this. Simply, the most natural thing in the world would be for Miles to be with his mother, and he's not. And I'm left with the same thought: I am a better mommy than I thought I could be, and it doesn't feel like enough. I do the best I can, taking care of Miles in quite nontraditional ways now--honoring his spirit and memory, making him part of our lives as best we can now--and taking care of our baby girl during this long pregnancy. That's the best it can be now without Miles, but it doesn't feel like enough.

An anniversary

Today is our anniversary.  Four years of marriage.
"Feels like longer," Mitch says before carefully watching my reaction and adding, "in a good way" to make sure I'm not mad. But I'm not. I agree. Four years is a lot and our four years have felt like even longer.

It's hard to believe that four years ago was our wedding day.  The pictures are so beautiful (of course I think so) and full of hope. That's what a wedding day is.  And we promised to be there for each other through everything...saying the words and of course thinking that it would all be mostly good.

Now I look at those treasured wedding pictures and count.  I count time just like I do for all of the photos that were taken of me before Miles was born and, though I avoid them, the select few that have been taken since he died. Our wedding photos--I count--two years, nine months later Miles will be born. Three years, one month, nineteen days later Miles will die. "How will this couple do it?" I wonder with tears in my eyes. They were naive, I know now; blissfully unaware anyway of both the unmatchable joy of their first son being born and having him here in the world and the heartbreaking pain of him dying.

There's a lot I didn't know that day. We were in love on our wedding day. But not like we are now. Now there's a greater love for each other, a shared love of our Sweet Miles, an unmatchable life-saving level of understanding--little gifts from our little guy.  

Those were the good times

Those were the good times. We knew it then, but we really know it now.

Starting on April 17 last year, Miles' five weeks off the ventilator started. It wasn't all good (there were plenty of daily--hourly really--struggles with his health), but those were the good weeks with Miles.

We were able to hear Miles. We could finally hear his hiccups and hear his cries. We were able to scoop him up--yes, he still had the nasal canula and his broviac of medications--but without the breathing tube, we didn't have to be so careful. We could slide our arms under him and sway him, rocking him in our arms. It took no time to figure out this was what he LOVED...

And Miles didn't need as many sedation medications without the breathing tube.
So he was more awake, more alert, more Miles.

And I could no longer leave the hospital at night. Leaving the hospital at night, forcing myself to get in the elevator to go home and sleep, was practically impossible each time; it was nothing short of against nature to have to do that. It still makes me sick to my stomach.

So I stopped leaving. I moved in to 2C18 with Miles. I slept in the ridiculous sleep-chair in the back of Miles' room, learned to use Miles' boppy as a neck pillow, jumped up as soon as I heard Miles cry. I would stand by his bed, rock him on my arm for hours, then hold him while he slept--silently debating the should-I-just-keep-holding-him-so-he'll-keep-sleeping or should-I-possibly-risk-waking-him-up-by-putting-him-down?

Those are the times that I think of now when I think of us in the hospital. I think of us rocking him on our forearms until they felt like they would fall of and absolutely loving it. I think of me in Miles' dark room at night, standing by his bed in my sweatpants and socks, rocking Miles on my arm and singing to him--because that was what made him (and me) happy.

We knew those were good weeks at the time (though always believing that the really good days were still ahead, still just waiting to unfold at home). And now, well, we know those were the best times we had with Miles. Those days in the hospital were so stressful, torturous really, but they were the good times.

A Smile

Oh, the time warp.
It has been a whole year since the day that Miles first smiled. That's four seasons ago, 365 days ago, more than a lifetime on his time scale. Yet just a year ago he was here. Miles was here with us just a year ago.
Regardless of time, it's painful that he's gone. And it's joyful to see our sweet baby boy on the day he started smiling...

Subtitles, if needed: "Miles loves his new chair!" is what I say amid all of the laughter.
The laughter sounds good to me, in a bitter-sweet kind of way.  It makes me happy that, despite the stress of the PICU and the beeping of the machines, we were enjoying all of these joyful moments with Miles.