It’s a land of abundant sunshine and green grass. A place that I once lived and where I only thought I had any “problems”. Really, that place is a but a memory now. One that I sometimes fondly long for. At other times, one that is laughable to me. Sometimes when I think about that foreign land called, the before, I can only shake my head. I can only think to myself “Silly girl. Poor, silly girl. You have no idea this is waiting for you”.
Before I had to learn what it feels like to be trapped in a store and suddenly lose my breath because Eliot’s sheets are on the display crib. Before I had to learn, and subsequently memorize, the path around every grocery store that let me avoid the baby section. When I didn’t rely so heavily on grocery pick up and when I didn’t actively try to avoid anything involving babies. Before I had any reason to notice such mundane things like that every laundry detergent brand has a specific baby detergent. I didn’t know that before. Those things come like a thief in the night. On a perfectly fine, functional day. Just when you least expect it. Before I wasn’t so hyper-aware.
Before, I didn’t have a dead baby. Before I wasn’t told not to use such harsh language for this, the harshest of all things, happening to me. When I didn’t feel so alone or so chastised for choosing to openly embrace all parts of grief.
Before when I didn’t know the trauma of delivering a silent child. I didn’t know the hurt and heartache of such devastating grief. I wish I still existed in that space. That space was quiet and safe. Familiar and warm.
Those days that I long for the before are often tumultuous. Catching myself daydreaming about the simplicity of those times. Then immediately feeling such guilt and shame for wishing those days were still around. Wishing those days were around would mean my sweet Eliot never existed. And I can never, despite all this heartache and grief, wish for that.
Still, I wish I could live in that place, if only for a moment. If I could, I might be able to take a full, deep breath – if only for a moment. I want to have the same naïve notion that everything will be fine, just like you have. I want to know the world I knew, the person I knew myself to be before this horrible thing happened. Before my baby died and stripped away every thread of strength or defense or normalcy I had. Before I hated you, the pregnant lady, the friend with a newborn; and then felt guilt and shame about it.
I wish I could live there, in that place, still. Before I had both post-traumatic stress and post-traumatic anxiety disorders from this trauma. Before I had a reason to question God. Before I didn’t catch myself judging whether you deserved to have a baby as much I did. Or silently scoff at the mom unnecessarily losing her patience with her toddler while I’m just trying to put bananas in the cart. Before when I didn’t think to myself that I would never have treated Eliot that way, if only he had lived.
In the before, I didn’t feel so profoundly abandoned and alone. Self-preservation was not at the top of my to-do list every single day. I didn’t have to have such harsh boundaries with those closest to me in order to protect the pieces of my already shattered heart. I didn’t know that single sentences or phrases could send me into a heap on my couch for entire days at a time. I didn’t know that grief brain was a real thing that would unapologetically take over my thought process while completing the most mundane tasks. Before, I didn’t know that even the most well-intended folks could or would say or do the most unimaginably hurtful things.
I know there are other loss parents that don’t feel this way at all. There are other grieving mothers that can still celebrate their friends’ pregnancies and babies. There are loss parents who don’t hate the stranger at the grocery store when they notice that Mama is wearing her infant in the exact carrier you have for your baby that did not live. Others who handle this with such poise and strength. I wish I could be that graceful, grieving mother. I am not. I am not sorry, though. In the before, perhaps I could have been that person, though I doubt it.
In the before, I wasn’t so heavily judged for all of this. For all these childish and unbecoming emotions. I know that it causes you to raise your eyebrow at me and shake your head. To say things like “She’s really lost it”. But, have I? Or is it just uncomfortable for you? Does it just look different? Because I will argue that all of this is normal. Despite knowing other grieving parents who don’t feel this way, I know tons of them who do.
Are you just struggling to accept the person I am now, post-losing my son? Are you longing for the days I was the same woman I was in the before?
Me too.
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Leah is a Sociologist and writer. She writes about grief, child loss, and societal standards regarding them. She became a loss mom to her son, Eliot, born sleeping in July of 2019. In addition to that, she is also a dog mom, Military Spouse, and powerlifting coach. You can find her at: http://www.notahugger.com
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