After Anabelle

What is the purpose of counselling? 

I'm not sure what I want the end result to be. I'm not sure what it is supposed to be achieving. Is it to just go for a nice little chat? I know tonight was only session two but I certainly don't feel like I'm getting any answers. Just more questions, maybe feeling more uncertain. About myself and how on earth I'm supposed to navigate through. 

Counselling sessions are weird things. Half the time is spent feeling a bit nervous and awkward, not really knowing what to say. And then just as you are beginning to open up and conversation is beginning to flow better it is time to wrap it up and call it a day. 

Tonight we talked about anger.

We talked about anger long past. The anger in the beginning, who it was directed at and why. The anger, the people I feel so indifferent to now. Not angry anymore, not sadness. Just nothingness and an overwhelming couldn't care less. 

We talked about the cycles of anger, patterned anger that goes away and sometimes come back again. I guess for me that is usually God. Anger at the foreverness. Anger at the not understanding why this happened to our family. Anger that is was my baby taken away. These are my cycles of anger. Unfairness.

Then we talked about more recent anger. But then I haven't felt raging anger for a long time, just overwhelming exhaustion and sadness. 

I don't feel angry at the moment. So she talked about the different guises of anger. That anger isn't always rage but sometimes something else entirely. She said sadness can be anger. Maybe everyone has different definitions of anger but I certainly don't really know how to address my feelings at the moment, or even what label to really give them. 

Feels a bit like a PSE type lesson doesn't it. Maybe I need my own little set of emotion puppets to figure it all out! 

We're home!

It is a clique, but sometimes you really do need a holiday. A different location, or maybe just a holiday from yourself. Last week I felt like I had both. A much needed holiday after an emotionally difficult few months, quality time with my family, and a break from myself. Real breathing space. A change of scenery and a change of routine. My mind felt lighter for a week. 

Last week I remembered something that I knew. Of course I knew, but for weeks I had been pretty sucked into the big black hole. I remembered that surrounding the big black hole and the broken part of me, is a very special family. Surrounding all the hurt and the pain there are still are wonderful things in our lives. A life full of blessing and full of pain. Oxymoron. 

My attention has been drawn to The Morgan's Jar of Awesomeness 2013, that I started in January. Back when I pledged to be healthier in my grief this year. I accept that so far that hasn't really happened, back in counselling and hitting the biggest low recently, possibly since the first year of grief isn't really agreeable with being 'healthier'. But the jar is quite full now, another reminder that outside of the pain there are still happy times. At the end of the year I'll share every snippet that we put into it. I can't wait to remind myself of all the things we were excited about this year. Retaining our memories. Even the very small things. Happy times. That is progress isn't it? It is full of mainly our family moments, our special days and all the cute, crazy and clever things Alexander is doing. But mainly Xander, our rainbow. Thank goodness for our rainbows. Last week on holiday we saw lots of rainbows in the sky. More reminders or the happier things in our lives. 

Being on holiday reminded me that beyond the black hole we still enjoy many things, but also accept sometimes the black hole takes over and the happier times seem a long distant memory. A pendulum with two extremes.  Sometimes the black hole, the brokenness and the pain consume and swamp everything else; June. It will always be June and other lesser trigger points throughout the year. But now I've had my July 'recovery month' and our lovely holiday, we're on into August and I'm feeling much more refreshed than I have in a long time. 

So we've had a perfect week away. Calm, enjoyable, full of new things. Xander has been wonderful, loving and obviously thoroughly enjoyed having a Mummy, Daddy and him all the time week. Every day for him is an adventure, this is a wonderful age and I'm enjoying him so much. All week last week he was so excited by the new things he was seeing. Constantly pointing things out to us and pulling us over to where he wanted to go. He is a bright, colourful and shiny magpie my boy! Just like his Mummy, Jon might say!

"Awesome family holiday in Plymouth! Xander's favourite things were a peacock at Dartmoor Zoo, swimming, the jellyfish at the aquarium, the slide at soft play, hens and goats at Totnes farm, and little Flitwick owl, the train, Kwazzi the Octonaut at the seal sanctuary and playing on the beach. Perfect time. Smiley face." 26th July - 4th August 2013

So it looks like we're having another baby blue! This is our second son; 

Zachary Stephen Morgan 

Initial reactions; not bad! I cannot pretend there is no longing for a baby girl, there will always be longing for a baby girl, for the one we had and the one I want to one day come. Whether we have another or not, there will always be longing for Anabelle. I still want my second girl, as much as I wanted a second boy one day. I have my second boy now and I'm very happy. 

There are some mixed feelings, of course, but right now I'm mostly feeling excited. Excited that our baby has their name, that today he has become a little person. Baby Zac. I'm excited to see how alike he and Xander will be, if he'll share the same similarities with Belle. I'm excited to go and buy him his own set of babygros and the first thing he'll wear. I really like the bright dinosaur set in Next at the moment. I'm daring to be excited about choosing his coming home outfit, I'm thinking something rainbow again. My second hopeful rainbow baby boy. I'm excited about the chance to use all my favourite Alexander outfits that are in the attic again! I'm excited about the prospect of two boys and the pair of them being double trouble. I hope I get to take lots of 'guess which baby this is' photographs when I put Zac in the same clothes I had put on Xander when he was a tiny baby. I'm excited to buy matching outfits and dress them up together when I can. I'm excited to see them being brothers together.

So far Zachary is growing well and everything at the scan looked well. His measurements are more or less spot on for his age, which makes him smaller than his brother was right now and much more like his sister. At this stage of my pregnancy, Alexander was already measuring almost two weeks bigger than he should've been! I fully expect him to be a whopper by the end like his big brother though! 

For all my worrying, I've not reacted badly. This is my son and I love him very much, just as I do his bigger brother and sister. I'm really outnumbered now thought aren't I?! 

I made the list for the counsellor. Every event, every worry that seems significant at the moment. It came to at least eighteen items long... so much to deal with, a little overwhelming seeing it all written down on paper. 

It was last December when I first mentioned my nearest and dearest were suggesting accessing counselling to me again. Late last year, seven months ago when it was clear that not everything was well and I was struggling with an evolving grief and time moving on. Maybe if I had accessed it then, and not put it off, the ultimate meltdown in June wouldn't have happened. Looking back this all feels a long time coming. 

So I went last night for the first time in two years. The same place but a new counsellor because the lady I previously saw had moved on. It was all very overwhelming and I left beyond exhausted and drained. Ill even. 

Last night we talked about all my background, not in huge amounts of detail but enough for her to get a grasp of why I was there. We went back to the beginning quite literally and then I had the realisation that is where I've always been really, just below the surface. I knew my grief was still raw, still consuming, but I thought I was dealing with Anabelle's death in my own way. But maybe I haven't at all. I've talked and blogged endlessly but I've become stuck on the 'Journey' as my counsellor described it, somewhere along the way. I haven't emotionally dealt at all with what happened to our family, to our daughter. The counsellor thought a form of PTSD was entirely possible. Because as she said 'what is more traumatic than burying your child'. 

Of course, session one and I cried.

So we're starting back at the beginning and starting grief counselling again as if I never had it before. 

She talked a lot about letting Anabelle go. Not forgetting her, but letting her go to a place where I don't feel raw and longing every time I think of her. She talked about a scar then never goes away but doesn't hurt anymore. That seems impossible and something I don't even think I'm ready for. I guess she means letting go of my grief, rather than her but I'm really struggling to disentangle Belle from grief. They've always gone hand in hand and its frankly overwhelming and scary to accept there being one without the other.

I'm scared not to grieve for her. The idea of feeling no grief when I think of my daughter makes me feel very guilty, because doesn't she deserve that of me? Isn't this part of what gives her her place in our family? If the grief gets less prominent doesn't she get less prominent? The fear of her being forgotten is already too much without her fading into the background of my family too. I need her to be as included as Alexander is, and Blob hopefully will be.

She is one of them. One of us.

I don't know how I possibly begin to move past this. I'm so utterly heartbroken without her and part of me thinks I need to feel this pain.  

Just one session has already opened up so much more reality and I don't know if I'm ready to do this at all. 

Here's for some more turbulence then I guess.

Hand holding and reassurance appreciated. 

After a quieter, more settled few weeks, last night was a nightmare night again. 

Vivid and horrible. Alexander died. Vividly and before my eyes, my beautiful boy died. I could feel it, it was real, the sickening gut feeling, my chest exploding, panic rising, holding my floppy lifeless toddler in my arms and knowing there was nothing I could do to bring him back. 

We were at some sort of indoor seaside, with proper waves and a weird underwater current. We were paddling and Xander was pulled away from us by the current and under the water. The water was murky, so we couldn't see him. We dived under to find him, again and again and again, but we didn't find him until it was too late and he had drowned. Reviving him futile and I could feel it as if it was real and the realisation that my second child had died too was washing over me. I wanted to die, I couldn't do this again. 

Then I woke up. 1.30am. Flying out of bed, tears nearly there just to go to his room and listen to him breathing. 

My chest was pounding and barely able to breathe. I felt sick. I was panicking, even though I knew it wasn't real. 

Eventually I went back to sleep, but I still felt very panicky and unwell this morning. 9.00am and I was still having strong palpitations. It was nearing dinner time before I felt better, but if I'm honest my chest has felt weird all day. Deep breaths hurt a little this evening. 

I hate the effect a bad dream can have. How it eats on into the day and continues to effect your well-being long after it has passed. Its been all I can think about today. Another of my precious babies dying. I can't do it again. I won't survive again, if you can really say I survived now. Yet another dream reminding me how fragile this life is and that the lives of my children are not guaranteed.  Alexander, Blob could be taken from me just like Anabelle was. This morning, the chances of burying Alexander or Blob felt imminent. I was there, visualising Anabelle's open grave again and another tiny coffin being put next to hers. 

This morning I said to Jon I'm too scared to take Xander swimming tomorrow as usual now, or to the beach next week when we are on holiday like we had planned to, because I'm genuinely terrified some freak accident will occur and he will drown. Most of my nightmares in June were flashbacks, or the reality I know is there, but this nightmare felt like a premonition. 

Tonight I've made myself pack the swimming bag ready for tomorrow. I cannot let irrational fear induced by a bad dream stop Alexander doing something he loves, something we've done nearly every week since he was three months old. I know it will be fine. But there is this part of me screaming but what if it isn't. Tomorrow I'm going to be nervous at the pool when I haven't been before. Another nightmare to recover from and try to forget.

I know regardless now, I'm going to be feeling freaked out about the beach. We'll have to go of course, its a holiday, its what you do on holiday, our child will enjoy the beach this year, he loves his sand and water table ,its only fair we take him. But I know I'm going to be on high alert and tense now and not enjoy it properly. Is it unreasonable to insist he is holding one of our hands at all times while he paddles in the very shallows of the sea? Or should I allow him to be a step or two away from me if he wants to, while I hover over the top of him but letting him enjoy a little freedom. 

It isn't easy being a parent with a dead child. It colours all rational and irrational thought into hysterical thoughts.  And blimey after last night its been on the hysterical end of thought today. 

Now I better go and think about the list of worries and events to start exploring with my counsellor tomorrow. Nightmares and the engulfing fear my living children will die too are right up there then I guess.... 

Hoping for a quieter nights sleep tonight at least.  

This is a post I'm almost too scared to vocalise. Too scared to face. Scared of being judged. I guess this needs to be on the counselling list. 

What if we never have another daughter? 

What if, as well as grieving for Anabelle I will have to accept pink, dresses and girly things are not going to be part of our lives; at least not in the way I would love them to be or they should've been. What a new can of worms to come to terms with that would be, a new kind of grief all over again.

Our loss was two-fold that day. First and foremost we lost Anabelle, her unique little being and the beautiful child she was going to be. Then we lost the dreams and a life we had built in our imaginations with a daughter in it. A daughter we no longer have, a life and dreams that were snatched away and we're still yet to experience. Instead dreams were replaced with pain. A living nightmare.

We bought beautiful girly clothes, delicate pink and flowery bedding, cliche girly decorations for her room. Things for Anabelle, but things for a daughter. Things that are still in our roof, unused. Boxes and boxes of baby girls clothes and things. Yes I know lots of people hate the pink for a girl, blue for a boy thing but I didn't. I don't. Having Alexander was new dreams, boy dreams, a different kind of life, new different things, boy things. 

Even if this baby is a girl I'm not sure I could use Anabelle's things, not all of them, they are hers. Regardless of what this baby is it will be getting plenty of things bought just for them. Their things; not just all hand-me-downs from their brother or sister. It isn't really about using her things. It isn't about trying to replace a life we had taken away, it can't be fixed, nothing will fix my firstborn daughter being snatched away. But I'm not ready to accept a life never raising a daughter at all. Maybe because I still can't accept that the daughter I have, I had, was taken away. I don't want to face a whole new set of potential grief that the only daughter I ever had was taken away. I can barely cope with grieving for her without grieving for another girl that might never even have existed. I really don't like myself for admitting that. 

It is different to a boy isn't it.  

I don't think I'm expressing myself very well. I must sound beyond awful. Thank goodness for Beth Morey who expressed these fears much better than I have done! 

I, more than most people, know that gender is not the most important thing. It really isn't and above all else all I care about is that this little baby comes home.  But what if this is our last baby? I don't know that it is, but what if this is our 'last chance' to have a daughter that stays and comes home? People keep asking me what I want this time. I still want a living baby that is all; but I can't deny a girl, if this is our last baby, wouldn't be a bonus of sorts. On one hand at least; another chance of raising pink. Not raising Belle. 

On the other hand there is so much fear either way. 

But I'm terrified I'm not going to react well if we're told at the scan next week that this baby is a boy. I had a dream a few nights ago that it was a boy and my reaction wasn't pretty. I know it was only a dream, but what if that dream is my subconscious telling me something; I hate myself for it. I don't want to be that mother, that terrible person. I didn't want this to be an issue. So now I'm scared this beautiful bond I'm developing with my unborn child will be severed if I react badly to a boy. To a boy that already has a name if he is indeed a boy this time. How could I be like this? 

Equally I'm terrified this baby might be a girl. 

What a turmoil to deal with. Another set of emotions. As much as I don't want to face never raising a girl, I'm not sure I'm ready to face having a girl.  I'm scared its a girl. I'm scared that I can't carry girls to term and that is why Anabelle died. Mostly I'm scared that if we're told this baby is a girl there is an even bigger risk that it will be another death sentence waiting to happen and we'll be burying another daughter. Scared. 

I'm scared I would somehow compare her to Belle, or reinvent the life we were supposed to have three years ago. I don't want to do that. I would want her to know how special she was in her own right. Have dreams for her in her own right. Just as I would want another son to know how precious he was too. I would hate for this baby to be a boy then him find this post one day for example, to see never having another girl has even crossed my mind. I wouldn't want him to think he was unwanted because of his gender. That simply isn't true. I love this child so much already and I don't know who they are. 

Secretly (or not so secretly I guess!) I would love another baby after this one; another boy, another girl. A life where I had two of each maybe. But life doesn't work like that, and whatever happens I have to accept and love the children we've been given or will be given as much as I love the one that was taken away. And I will, because I adore my children, and I know, just because of Anabelle and Alexander that gender is irrelevant to love. 

Anabelle was perfect and wonderful, my world and so would another daughter be.

Alexander is perfect and wonderful, my world and so would another son be.

I know this. So why am I so scared about how I will react to finding out this time? 

But we need to find out. This child needs their identity incase the worst happens. Anabelle being Belle for 12 weeks before she died is great comfort. To us, she died a person. We need to bond with a person, not just a 'baby' just as we did with Anabelle and Alexander. And I need to know, to face my fear on both sides and sort my head out either way. 

This child currently has two names and we're just waiting to find out which one belongs to them. Please let me be a good mother and react as well as I can, with all my fears, for either one. 

Regardless of what you think of me for admitting these fears and thoughts, please be gentle in your responses to this post. 

My first counselling appointment in two years has been arranged. Next Monday. Yesterday it sounded like I was in for a bit of a wait for a space to become available. Today I've been emailed with an appointment for next week. Suddenly I'm very nervous and don't have a clue where to begin. 

What am I hoping to get out of this? I'm not really sure.  Maybe to feel stronger again, put the fragile part away for a while again, maybe not to let other people and the times they are insensitive bother and break me so much, maybe to mentally pack away the June just gone. Why was year three so much harder than year two? Maybe to prepare me for becoming a family of five while only really being a family of four, if we're lucky. Always so bittersweet. What elements need exploring as a priority? I don't know. My mind feels very jumbled. Somehow I know I need to pick it apart and write it down before I get there. 

What can they really fix for me? I'm not fixable. No amount of talking can bring my baby girl back, they can't put me back together. Somehow I just need to figure out how to cope with the foreverness of our grief. 

Blimey 2013 is a big year. I'm made enormous leaps recently but I've also taken a huge knock backwards. So much has happened, so much is happening. I guess this is the first step to trying to figure out the way forward from here.