Essays
My other angel
Post to The Halo Garden Child Loss Discussion Forum
by Cody's mom, Jo
When my son Cody died at full term more than six years ago, I was determined not to let his memory die along with him. I was out of work for a few months right after, and I took that time to teach myself Web site coding: grief therapy, I've often called it.
Only within the last months, since I've gotten back into working on Cody's Web site and others of my Web sites which had lay by the wayside as my life twisted and turned, did I realize that I had never even named my other angel.
In the winter of 1995 (I think it was February :( and not knowing makes it even worse. :(), I found out I was pregnant. I was not pleased. My son, who'd been conceived just before I started my junior year, was about two-and-a-half, and I was already staying up for days at a time to keep the house going, spend time with him and my husband, and maintain an A average in my heavy load of classes.
OMG! I thought, I will never graduate now. I'm already a year behind schedule and NOW THIS. >: And in the middle of student teaching. >:
A couple of weeks later when I started having severe pains and bleeding, I had already warmed up to the idea. My (now ex-) mother-in-law and I had gone baby shopping just the day before. I had dug out my baby books and started thinking of names.
The prognosis: miscarriage. It was a natural miscarriage, no DNC required. Just a ton of pain and a ton of heartache and mental anguish. I fell apart. I had to drop out of school for the semester (and ended up graduating two years late). I was consumed with guilt. I knew it wasn't my fault the baby died. I knew it. But that couldn't stop the guilt. If only I hadn't been so angry about it at first. If only I'd been less selfish. If only. . .
I was depressed for a long time after that. My friends tried to cheer me up, but all my smiles were all fake. All the color had drained out of my world. I sank down inside myself and felt very little. Sure, I got by. Just like I always had (besides the dropping out of school, of course.) And most of the time, no one realized I was still suffering, still missing.
We never named that baby. The thought never occurred to us. I think now that if we had, it would have been more tangible, more real, which would have aided me in my grief. As it were, though, I just buried it all.
When I got pregnant with Cody in late 1998, I was terrified that the same thing would happen all over again. It brought back all of the guilt and emptiness, the huge gaping hole that really had never closed. After the first trimester was over, I breathed a sigh of relief, thinking the dangerous part was behind me. A cruel irony, indeed, given that Cody was three days overdue when he died.
As I lay in the hospital bed knowing that Cody was gone from me, though he was still inside me, a blanket of peace came over me. I knew everything would be okay. Cody was okay. I would be okay (though it would take me a complete tranfusion to get my blood right again).
The peace that passes understanding? Maybe. It certainly passed mine. In its beautiful wake, I was mended, I was made whole. Even that hole I'd been left with for years from my other, unnamed angel was filled with it. Even that angel was okay.
Jo Hawke
codysmom(at)viabledesign.com
January 25, 2006
