Valentine's Day Goes By

It's midnight and Sunday February the 14th, 2010 is officially over. The holiday passed us by because our minds were still on Peanut and the small memorial we held at a local church on Saturday. There was music, prayer, and a photo montage on DVD that day. My mother in-law read a special poem that my dad sent us called "The Angel Baby". Along with it, my husband and I read a letter that we'd written to Peanut telling him how much we miss him and naming off some of the many things we wish we could share with him. When we first wrote the letter we cried a lot, but somehow we managed to read it at the church without falling apart.

After the service some of the ladies at the church served us a light lunch and people were able to visit for awhile. They also gave me a bouquet of miniature daffodils, which I took home and placed by some other bouquets near Peanut's urn. We took an evening walk with some friends in the rain and my mother in-law treated us to dinner at a nice seafood restaurant. I was really happy that a couple of my closest friends could be there. I was also very touched that one of my husband's childhood friends flew across the country to be with us.

Valentine's Day was very, very low key. I slept in and didn't go to church. My mother in-law was going through a hard time because her husband fell and broke his hip over the weekend. She kept taking phone calls and finally found out he was recovering after surgery. Even with all that going on, she decided to take a long afternoon walk with us. We got rained on again, but there were a couple sun breaks and we looked at some houses that might be fun to buy if we could afford them. My mother in-law said she wants to take us house hunting later this week.

I cooked Pad Thai for everyone tonight and we watched "Angels and Demons", which was pretty entertaining. My mother in-law slept through the whole thing, so I don't know if she liked it much though.

I did tape a few Valentine hearts to the door late Saturday night, although I did not bake cookies or send cards this year. There was no need for Hubby to buy flowers for me because the apartment is filled with flowers from the memorial and people expressing condolences. The roses my brother in-law sent from Utah are especially fragrant. I opened a window tonight and the combination of the rainy air and rose petals gave our place the most wonderful scent. It reminded me of being a young girl and staying at my grandma's house. She always had roses growing near the windows and you could smell them on cool nights with the windows open.

I noticed some of the older flower arrangements were shedding off dried petals tonight. They were beautiful in their own way. The ones near Peanut's urn were dropping petals like autumn leaves on a grave. I thought about my childhood home in the fall and all the beautiful leaves, golden sunlight, and crisp air. I remembered visiting last September and telling my dad the good news that I was pregnant. We were all so happy. Of course, it was early in the pregnancy, so I worried that I might miscarry. But I didn't. Then I figured I was in the clear and I had no idea what heart break was in store for me.

Tears in Heaven

I was thinking about that Eric Clapton song. "Tears in Heaven" today. I doubt I'll be able to hear that again without feeling very, very sad.

Overall, it was a pretty quiet day. I woke up too early again and had to go back to bed later in the morning. I know it's the grief, so I just rolled with it. I'm glad I'll be working swing shift and having classes in the afternoon next quarter.

I am waiting for the urn to arrive and hope it's ready before we pick up Peanut's ashes next week. We are planning a memorial, so I hope everything comes together in time. We meet with the Bishop on Wednesday.

My body feels pretty run down. I'm living on comfort foods like gluten free cookies, pancakes, soda pop, and soy ice creams. I'm eating stuff I avoided while pregnant because I didn't want empty calories. I'm also not doing any yoga or any other restorative activity. This is just where I'm at right now and I don't care. I know later I'll try to get healthy again, in case I try to get pregnant again. I really feel like my body needs to heal and get strong again though. Right now, I am still bleeding and passing clots from the birth and I'm lactating, which is really uncomfortable.

I was crying tonight while we were doing dishes because I miss Peanut so much. I feel so cheated that we never got to really know him like we wanted to. I mean, we know what he looked like as a tiny baby, but we don't know what his likes and dislikes were or what his talents were. I feel so sad about that. I'm pretty sure he liked pineapple and fish because he used to kick me a lot after I'd eat those foods, but I don't know what else he liked. I just wanted so much to really get to know him as a person.

Aftermath

I haven't written much lately due to exhausting amounts of grief. We found out Peanut was dead on the 26th when we went in for another ultrasound at the university. The radiologist couldn't confirm exact time of death, but we know it happened sometime between the 21st and the 26th.

I checked into the hospital for an induction on the 27th and finally gave birth on January 28th at 8 p.m. Our little boy weighed a pound and a half and he was 12 inches long. His little face and body were somewhat deteriorated after spending days in the amniotic fluid after death, but you could still see his features. He had a beautiful little face with a very distinctive nose, perfect hands and feet, and the cutest little tummy I'd ever seen. The nurse dressed him in a warm outfit with a hat and wrapped him in a blanket. We held him and looked at him for about five hours. A very kind volunteer photographer also came in and took some photos.

It's been a long week with a lot of tears. We are blessed to have the support of caring family and friends.