National Pregnancy Loss Remembrance Day

Yesterday was National Pregnancy Loss Remembrance Day. I only realised this when I checked Facebook last night and saw all the beautiful posts from my friends who were remembering their lost babies. I posted this photo in tribute to my own lost babies.

My post read “A message for my little ones on National Pregnancy Loss Remembrance Day. You are both in my heart today as you are every day.” As I typed it, tears streamed down my face. My husband heard my sniffles and asked me what was wrong. I tried to tell him about the Remembrance Day but I couldn’t get the words out. He just hugged me and left me to my tears. It’s weird the things that bring on the tears.

I think I was already emotionally strained after seeing a post from a friend on Facebook. She responded to a question about where you are in your grief journey. She’s currently pregnant after having a stillborn baby last year and said she was hoping her rainbow baby arrived safely but was worried about the extra grief that would bring. I feel exactly the same.

I know I’ve talked about it before but the grief over loosing a child, or two, or even more, doesn’t go away just because you bring a healthy child into the world. The closer I get to Sticky’s arrival, the more I grieve Peanut’s and Babs’ losses. Sticky’s imminent arrival makes me think of them more and wonder what they would have looked like or been like. I particularly struggle with how I will cope when Sticky is born given Babs isn’t with her. Knowing the bond twins have, I’m sad that Sticky won’t ever get to know that special relationship. But, I also realise she was never meant to know it. Well, at least never know it outside the womb. I like to think her and Babs shared a very special bond when they were together and I guess that is all she was meant to experience.

The other interesting thing I came across yesterday was this quote from Ronald Regan –

“A wife who loses a husband is called a widow. A husband who loses a wife is called a widower. A child who loses his parents is called an orphan. There is no word for a parent who loses a child. That’s how awful the loss is.” ~Ronald Reagan 

It’s an interesting fact that there is no adjective you can refer to yourself as when you’ve lost a baby. Even if you loose a child when they’re much older, there’s no word. I guess no one ever thought to label it in such a way because it’s not the way things are meant to happen. You’re meant to have a baby, watch them grow into an adult and live a long healthy life, and as the parent, leave the world before they do. Sadly, it happens all the time that parents loose their children before their time so whether it’s natural or not, doesn’t really matter. It’s simply reality.

In the end, I’m ok with not having a label because I can create my own. When you loose a baby, you’re a Mum to an angel baby. It’s not a succinct, one word description, but it’s the truth. And that’s how I like to think of myself – just as a Mum. I live in eternal hope that everything continues to go ok and in just over 12 weeks time, I’ll be a Mum to two angel babies and one earth baby. I won’t love my earth baby anymore or less than my angel babies. I will simply celebrate the fact that she is the one I get to hug and kiss and when I do hug and kiss her, I’ll give her extras to make up for the ones her brother and sister missed out on!