I’ve been taking some time off of blogging but wanted to pop in with at least an update to explain why. When I started this website for Claire, I was very much in the mode of using every ounce of my strength to be optimistic and stay positive. I was convinced that if I tried hard enough, I could find ways to allow goodness to grow out of her loss.
What I am learning is that strength doesn’t come with a limitless reserve. I am not an invincible person while grieving. I lost a lot of my strength because I was so busy writing about it and reflecting on it, that I forgot to keep some stored away for rainy weather.
This all came to a peak during the month of February which had been engrained in my mind since Claire’s conception as “the month she would be born.” Instead, she came in October and I carried a heavier and heavier burden as each of the 28 days in February passed.
I felt some relief after February 25, her due date, because I realized I no longer had right to claim “I should be pregnant right now, I would be pregnant right now,” because I wouldn’t have been. Even in a perfect world where Claire was born and survived, I wouldn’t have been pregnant beyond that date.
None of my grief abated but some of the pain did and I’ve been spending a lot of time reflecting on how much I miss her instead of what I can do to keep her memory alive. I spent so much of my time researching memorial projects and cervical incompetence, that I didn’t take the time I needed and will always need, to just think about and miss my daughter.
I haven’t felt inclined to share those feelings but do not want this blog to lose its intended purpose of being a living memory of Claire and a resource for those who have cervical incompetence, have ever lost a child or both.
She lives in the deepest parts of my physical being having grown inside of me and delivered out of me. She lives in the crook in arm where I held her as she died, she lives in my heart which pumped her blood to give her life, she lives in my conscious which thinks about her constantly when I am awake and in my subconscious when I am asleep. She also lives in the words that I write and the love that I have for her which grows quietly around my grief in a unique relationship that only exists between parents and the children they have lost.
Every day continues to be a struggle, even if it is a gentler kind. I hope that I am able to regain the initial strength that I appeared to have had when Claire was born. If hope is a derivative of strength, than my hope will be the strength I need to make it happen.
