Memory Lane

Throughout the year I hit different times when I remember things from the past. In the future years there will certainly be dates when I will be thinking about things that happened in December 2015 (my mom's diagnosis) and July 2016 (her death). Around each of my children's birthdays I reflect upon their birth stories and NICU stays. There are two events that I recall each October. The happy one is that Oliver was take off of oxygen and his apnea monitor on October 17, 2012. It was such a relief to be able to carry my infant without also carrying an oxygen tank and monitor. It was such a relief to not have any tubes and wires attached to my precious five pound two month old boy. The other one is far more painful. I remember my sixth and final pregnancy which resulted in my third miscarriage. At the time it happened my first two miscarriages were much harder to take emotionally because my arms were empty at the time. I grieved the second one the shortest amount of time because a few months later I found out I was pregnant with Nadia.

The first loss and last loss are the two that I still remember the most often. I think about the first one the most in June (when I found out I was pregnant) and July (when the ectopic pregnancy was ended). Sometimes when I am interacting with a child who would be the same age (he/she would be 10.5 years old now) I again feel some grief over the child we lost in 2005. Over the past three years I have shed many tears for the baby we lost in October 2013. That little one would be two years old now, and sometimes when I am interacting with another two year old I think about how the little one we lost would be the same age. A little part of me wishes we hadn't had any frozen embryos from the third egg retrieval. It would have been nice to end the trying to conceive journey on a positive note (Oliver's birth) rather than a miscarriage. I still have a couple of the positive hpts in my pajama drawer from October 2013. It's all I have to remember that little life. If we were younger and had more money, I'd have wanted to try again (via IVF) for a fourth child (maybe just maybe the sister that Nadia has wanted for years). I am eternally grateful for the three precious miracles whom I get to hug and kiss every day, but that doesn't mean I have forgotten the babies who went straight to heaven without ever having been in my arms.