Remembering

I was just reading a post on the blog written by one of my (too many) loss buddies. She, too, lost a son and now has a beautiful daughter at home.  Her second pregnancy was a much more difficult journey than mine, but reading her blog today about pPROM just brought memories flooding back.

It made me remember the bleeding, my water breaking (twice), the emergency room, the option to terminate the pregnancy given by one doctor, the tiny bit of hope by another, the optimism I felt at home (of course it would be okay!), the confidence I felt while doing research and doing every single thing right during those days of bedrest, and then the horrible, horrible, horrible feeling of realizing I was going into labor.  I remember my family being around me when I started to feel off, I remember going to rest in my bedroom, I remember Chris checking on me, I remember hoping hoping hoping praying hoping it was just gas. I remember realizing that I could time the pains. And that we needed to go into the hospital. And being on the maternity ward with my comparatively small belly. And god, just everything from that awful night. It was awful. I was lucky that he was born alive and I got to "meet" him, but that doesn't mitigate the fact that I have those terrible memories burned into my mind.  I left the hospital less than 24 hours later, with Chris but alone. I still have some flowers that people sent that I dried. A couple plants sit in my kitchen. A box crammed full of cards and 20 weeks of memories sits in my basement. A music box engraved with his name is in Carys's room.  Baby boys still make my heart hurt.

I was feeling terribly guilty about that; that I still hurt at announcements that people are having boys. Carys is my world. I wouldn't trade her for anything. But that doesn't mean that I stopped wondering what could have been or about the little boy who would have been her big brother.