Sleep in heavenly peace: Emerson

“Sleep in heavenly peace”

Oh, that song will never be the same for me again. It’s on ALL the time right now and, though I love Christmas, it hurts this year. It’s about a baby and all I hear is that line – my two sweet babies who never really got to be, sleep in heavenly peace.

June 5th, we remembered baby Hattie, who we had expected on that day, “born” twenty weeks too soon. June 24th, we lost the only baby boy we’ve ever known, born twenty two weeks too soon, and on July 12th, we buried them together.

I have a wonderfully blessed life full of happiness, but I also have had very dark days this year full of pain and anger. Those days are hard, sometimes it lasts for a few days, but even in the sadness, I have so very much to be thankful for and have found smiles in my husband’s sarcastic jokes and all of the trouble my little girls can find in just one day.

I don’t write about this so people will feel sorry for me. I actually have it pretty good – I have a husband who loves me deeply and two beautiful girls, a wonderful family and amazing friends. I have a home, food, clothes and all of my basic needs are met. I have experienced deep pain this year, but who has a life free of pain?

No, I don’t write about this so you will feel sorry for me – I write so anyone who will listen knows about my baby boy. He might be the only one I’ll ever have. His name was Emerson, I delivered him, we held him and cried for him, then we buried him with the ashes of the baby we lost earlier this year. I write about this because he would have been amazing. Absolutely amazing. And I want you to know that.

I write about this to normalize talking about the loss of a baby. It’s an incredibly difficult thing to talk about, write about and discuss, but doing so makes those who experience it feel so much less alone in a time of deep pain.

This kind of experience, as do the other pains in life, comes with anger, confusion, deep sadness and often emptiness. If you are standing in a room with three other women, the odds are that AT LEAST one of them has experienced this pain, and so we need to remember to support each other.

If you have lost a baby, I very much want you to know:

that you are not alone.

that your every feeling throughout this painful experience is completely justified.

that you will hurt for a long time, but your life doesn’t have to stop every time the pain comes.

that the days you feel weak do not mean you are not a strong woman. You are a strong woman.

that you can and will be okay someday and that’s a good thing. Being happy again is not a betrayal to the baby that you lost.

that your friends want to help you and you should let them.

that your loss is not your fault.

Your loss is not your fault.

Yes, I wrote it again, because we seem to think we have control over this amazing miracle that is the process of carrying a baby. We want to believe we have control so that the next time, it can’t happen to us again. We don’t have control and that caffeinated Diet Coke you drank, or the deli meat you ate in your sandwich, or the way you twisted the wrong way in bed the other night is not the reason you lost your baby. It didn’t happen because you complained about how awful morning sickness is or wished you could have that glass of wine or hated wearing that same maternity shirt again. It was not your fault.

So, I will spend the day trying to remember these truths and instead of focusing on our losses, I plan to spend today in pajamas with the two blessings that I have been able to watch grow. If you call, we won’t answer – we’ll be hiding from the cold in our pajamas watching little girl movies all day, eating goldfish and pooh-bears {teddy grahams} on the couch {which is strictly forbidden!}, drinking hot cocoa and smiling a LOT.

As for Hattie and Emerson, we will always remember you. Always. The only comfort I have when I miss you is that your precious souls were never touched by the cruelty of this world – no broken hearts or hurt feelings. Instead, you will spend all of eternity basking in the glory of Jesus in heaven – what a beautiful existence.

Sleep in heavenly peace.