Monday, May 8, 2017

The Finality Of Making The Call

It's over, officially over and the enormity and finality of our decision has me completely wrecked.

Bryce made the call to the adoption agency today saying that we were ending our journey, and I am forever grateful that he held the strength to make the first call (I say first call, because I want to call myself and thank our family advocate and get a little closure there, but I need a little space from today first).

I got the text that it was done while I was getting a haircut, and so my reaction to it didn't start until I walked to my car, to my beautiful Subaru Outback that Bryce bought me for Christmas (!) a year and a half ago so we'd have a safe and reliable car for our FutureBaby. The sadness started leaking out of my face and my breathing wasn't quite sobby but I could feel that my ability to hold myself together was going to be fleeting.

I got home, fed the cats, and walked up the stairs to the little room that's been closed up for a month or so.

I stood next to the crib and watched as my cat jumped nimbly inside, then sat on the soft carpeted floor and stared at all the HOPE that was contained in those 90 square feet, at all the LOVE and SUPPORT that filled it with everything we needed for the baby that didn't come to us before we lost the ability to keep pushing ourselves through uncertainty and loss for any more years, months, or weeks. The butt paste that expires in June that I bought in a fit of hope last year. The board books with personalized name plates that have messages to our Mystery Baby. The handmade blankets and hats and baby cocoons.

And I cracked into a million pieces of shattered dreams and felt the loss come howling out of me, sobbing great heaving clouds of grief into the space that held so much promise. I cried a deep animal cry, nearly identical to the one that came out of me when I found out that bed rest didn't create a miracle and my HCG numbers had plummeted from the thousands to 200 when we lost the only baby that was briefly growing in the right place.

I sat there, soaking in my grief.

And then I started picking up board books and reading them. After a few that made me very, very sad, I picked up this one:


In a moment of abject sadness, this book brought me hope. Hope of a different kind. The text goes like this (by Smriti Prasadam-Halls):

I love you most, I love you best, 
Much, much more than all the rest. 

I love you tall, I love you high, 
Way up in the sunny sky. 

I love you far, I love you wide, 
From over here... ... to the other side. 

I love you low, I love you deep, 
Down where the octopuses sleep.

I love you huge, I love you vast, 
For the fun to come and the fun that's passed. 

I love you big, I love you tough, 
When the path is smooth and when it's rough. 

I love you strong, I love you small, 
Together we have it all. 

I love you wild, I love you loud, 
I shout it out and I feel proud.

I love you soft, I love you still, 
And you know I always will...

I love you close, I love you tight, 
When you're wrong ...and when you're right. 

I love you night, I love you day, 
In every moment, come what may. 

Because I love you with my whole heart, 
From where you end...to where you start. 

All I could think was, THIS BOOK IS ABOUT US.  It was meant for our Mystery Baby, who will remain a mystery forever and who has left indelible scars on my heart, but right now it tells the story of our love. It's a book for us, in this terrible moment, celebrating what we have in each other.

When Bryce came home and found me in the nursery, we sat and were sad together and talked about the phone call and how momentous it is to be done, to have this part of our lives come to an end and not the way we'd planned. I gave him the book to read. We hugged and cried and felt all the many feelings -- the sadness, the difficulty of making a decision, the empowerment of saying ENOUGH and having hope for what is still to come, different as it may be than how we saw our future together.

Today is a hard, hard day. It's a chrysalis sort of day, full of goo and being completely deconstructed so we can emerge something new and beautiful and different than before.

Want to read some #Microblog Mondays? Not more, because this surely doesn't count but it's what I've got today? Go here and enjoy! 

37 comments:

  1. I am so, so sorry, Jess. This post made me feel all the feels, and my heart just aches for you. Wrapping you and Bryce in so much love tonight, and covering you in prayers.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much. I so appreciate the care.

      Delete
  2. Tears. Many, many tears. Wrapping you and Bryce in love tonight.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much for the love, much appreciated.

      Delete
  3. Holding you in my heart and rocking back and forth. I hate to quote the Grateful Dead (I mean, does anyone really ever want to hear a Grateful Dead quote?), but the first days ARE the hardest days. This is the suck. It will not always be the suck. But you're saying goodbye to someone you loved very very much -- that Mystery Baby.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hilarious about The Grateful Dead...I am looking forward to not having the suck anymore. I may have burst into tears with the idea of saying goodbye to Mystery Baby, even though I know that's what we're doing, it's different to see it typed out. Thank you for the heart holding, so appreciated.

      Delete
  4. It breaks my heart to read what you are going through. I hope your capacity for hope and love helps you to endure.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much. We will endure, and it will become less raw. And then more raw. And then less...

      Delete
  5. Thinking about you and Bryce And sending love and strength your way. Take care of you, ok?

    I understand the cry you described. The crib. The books. Even the goddamn red Subaru meant to drive the kids around in

    I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm here. Seriously.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much for the love and the strength and the being here... I appreciate it so much. And I'm sorry that the feels are deja vu. Freaking Subaru. Now it's a plant-driving car... :)

      Delete
  6. My heart is heavy for you and Bryce. Tearing up imagining you and then Bryce joining you in Mystery Baby's room. So very much in that special space, the enormity of it all. I am so very sorry. Beautiful words in the children's book. Sending thoughts and love your way.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much, I appreciate your tears, thoughts, and love. It was one of the hardest moments.

      Delete
  7. Oh, Jess, I'm just catching up. The image of you in that room: I am grieving with you. You are just a fantastic human being, and I hoped against hope that some child would have the privilege of being your kid, but as Ari Levy says, it doesn't always turn out the way it ought to. The universe doesn't seem to operate according to concepts of justice and what's deserved. As far as you feeling like quitter, no way! This decision requires such courage and self-awareness. I am sending healing thoughts and love your way, but I know you and Bryce will be okay. More than okay <3

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much... I am so overwhelmed with all the love, and the feelings of injustice. It's so bittersweet. And thank you for "snap out of it" smacking me on the quitter thing...it's so hard not to feel that way but it's true that we did absolutely everything we could. And probably a little more. So sucky. Eventually it will all be okay...thank you.

      Delete
  8. My heart just aches so much for you and Bryce. I'm so, so very sorry. Sending lots of thoughts and hugs during this difficult time.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much. It's a seesaw of emotions. Up and down and up and down again... but it is strangely peaceful to have resolution after so much limbo. And sad because it didn't come how we dreamed. Thank you for the hugs and thoughts.

      Delete
  9. Oh, Jess, how is it that you make me feel all the feels? Maybe because you are so adept at feeling them yourself.

    I have no words of wisdom or comfort or anything, because days like this call for no words. I'm simply abiding with you.

    I love that you and Bryce are moving through this together, and that you have each other.

    Holding you both in my heart.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for abiding with me, and with Bryce, and holding us in your heart. We are making our way through this, and it is hard, so hard. But also a lightening of a heavy weight. It will get better. It just sucks so much.

      Delete
  10. Oh Jess, so many tears. I'm so sorry that this is not the ending that you were hoping for. I'm not sure how you are so eloquent in your sadness. Sending you all kinds of hugs.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much... I appreciate the hugs. It is so hard to hope so hard for something and have it not happen before you feel it's taking over your life and your health and your sanity...but now it's a new beginning.

      Delete
  11. *sniffle* I am so sorry, Jess. :( My heart aches for you too.

    Whatever else you do with all your nursery things (and no rush to make any decisions), I think that book is a keeper.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much, such a difficult time. Oh, yes. That book is special. And thinking about the nursery makes me feel like throwing up a little, but we don't have to do anything right now. But that book is on my desk downstairs, separated a bit from the nursery and the emotional devastation that lives in it. Thank you.

      Delete
  12. I don't have the words, and maybe never will, but I am holding you closely in my thoughts and sending you hugs and love from my part of the world to yours. ((HUGS))

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much for the love and the hugs and the thoughts... so very appreciated. Your words are perfect.

      Delete
  13. My hearts breaks with you and for you...I love you, Dear....

    ReplyDelete
  14. Not much more to add except I'm holding you two dear souls close to my heart, virtually hugging you tight. May continue to find strength within and for each other as you navigate the next part of your journey together.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you...I so appreciate the hugs and the holding. It makes it a bit easier knowing how much love and support we have behind us in this new beginning.

      Delete
  15. I have absolutely no words. Sending tons of good thoughts and love to you and Bryce. *hugs*

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you for your good thoughts and love and hugs, I so appreciate it. What a year this has been so far, ugh. But it hopefully goes up from here. Thank you!

      Delete
  16. Just catching up now. So sorry Jess, it's all so hard. The limbo is hard, and the decision to leave it is hard. Wishing you strength and resilience. I think you two will be OK x

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much... yes, YES, to the limbo being hard and leaving it being just as hard, even though it is the right move at this point. Thank you for the wishes of strength and resilience. Slowly but surely, we'll get there. It will be okay, it just sucks so much now.

      Delete
  17. I hope you are doing OK Jess. I have come back and re-read this post many times, half hoping that the story has magically changed. I guess, for what it's worth, I am grieving a bit with you (in the anger/denial/bargaining stage). I'm sure you and Bryce need time to yourselves and there is an inevitable loneliness to these life changes. But I wanted to say I am thinking of you and I hope the wilderness and the storm is not too hard on you. At least if kind thoughts could make it better, here they are.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thanks for checking in again... I am writing a new post and catching up now, it's been a crazy time since I wrote this. Oh, for a magical change. thank you for grieving with me, and for continuing to let me know you are thinking of us in this shitty time. I so appreciate it.

      Delete
  18. Please keep writing. I feel like you are a friend across the pond and my heart is breaking for you, but I'm relieved for you, too. Being in limbo must be heartbreaking and awful and at least now there is a resolution, even if it isn't the one for which we all hoped. But please keep writing and sharing your journey. I want to go on the next phase as your internet passenger, too.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Oh, thank you. I will totally keep writing, it's just been a real tough week and a half for a variety of reasons and it's so emotional responding to comments and I've been shielding myself a bit. Limbo was heartbreaking and awful, and while this resolution isn't the one I wanted, to have resolution is such a relief. But also so sad. Thank you for wanting to be my internet passenger, and being my friend across the pond! I promise I'm not done. :)

      Delete
  19. Thank you so much for checking in again, I so appreciate your thoughts and love. What a crazy time it's been.

    ReplyDelete