9 Months

Matilda - Today it's 9 months since you were born. It feels like forever and like yesterday all at the same time. I met some nice women at SIDS today and told them all about you. I cried a lot - I'm still so sad about everything you went through and that you're not here today.

Your Daddy is so proud of you. When people ask if your brother I'm pregnant with is his first baby he always says no and tells them about you.

We both love you and miss you so much. I hope you're having fun up there with all the other angel babies.

Your brother is getting bigger (well I hope so because my belly definitely is) and we know you're watching over him and helping him to get here safely.

Love Mummy xx

12 Months Ago Our World Fell Apart for the First Time

It's 12 months today since our 20 week scan where we first found out Matilda had an omphalocele. At that stage we had no idea what the implications were and we thought it probably just meant surgery after she was born. Oh how I wish that'd been our biggest concern. Even if that had been the case, our innocence in pregnancy was shattered forever and scans became a thing to fear. The week following that scan was easily the worst of my life other than the week Matilda died. I'd gone from putting books on hold about active birth and looking up pregnancy yoga classes to reading stories about terminations following 20 week scans finding major anormalities. I felt Matilda move for the first time in this middle of the scan, amino, and waiting for the results. Instead of it being a joyful thing to share with my husband, I didn't tell anyone because I was just so terrified of what was going to happen next.

It’s been 12 months of anxiety and having to deal with people just not understanding. 12 months ago yesterday I was still that naive innocent girl who assumed we’d be bringing home a healthy baby in time for Christmas. I can barely even remember who I was then.

A part of me wants to say it's been the worst 12 months of my life but how can I say that - it was the 12 months where I had my first child, my husband feeling a child of ours move for the first times, and I held my baby girl. I still don't really understand how we've survived but we have.

Matilda - I wish you were here. We love you more that ever. Mummy x

A Dad's Grief

DH's grief has always been different to mine. From talking to others and reading, it's different in the typical ways that female and male's grief generally is. I've always talked about it more, cried more, and have turned inwards rather than outwards from non babyloss friends and things I used to do. His reaction was to go back to work and try to stay busy. I'm lucky in that he does show emotion and talk about it a lot more than some other men. It's just been that generally it's only when I've instigated conversations about it. Some in ways, he hasn't had a choice. I was such a mess in the early weeks and months, that he had to be the strong one, return phone calls, do the grocery shopping, and all those other things that don't stop just because your baby died.

Lately though he's been bringing up Matilda a lot more. I'm not sure if is just his grief surfacing after a period of time, or my pregnancy progressing is bringing it all up for him, or the fact I'm coping better these days means he feels like he can. It helps me to know he thinks about Matilda so much but breaks my heart all over again to see him crying about the daughter he's never going to get to hold again. The other day a friend asked me to reply to a comment on her blog from someone who felt a early miscarriage was just a painful as a stillbirth or neonatal death and they were jealous of us having funerals and acknowledgment of our babies. My point here isn't to take away from the pain of miscarriage. I know it's devastating. But I don't think you can say you know how I feel if you've had an early miscarriage. I told DH this and he stood there with tears running down his face and said 'How could anyone be jealous of me, I had my daughter for four days and then watched her die'. Grief is selfish and sometimes I forget just how much he hurts.

Messages from Matilda

One day last week I was putting the last of Matilda's photos into her album. DH came home from work and we both cried and then I put the album away. Shortly after he came back inside with tears in his eyes and showed me my star sign from that day's paper. It was:

The last sentence in particular comforted me. DH has been very emotional about it and has showed a lot of people.

Last Thursday we had a scan (to check the growth now I've been diagnosed with gest diabetes). We got a few really good pictures and then the last one was this one:

As soon as DH looked at it, he said 'It looks like there's two babies in there'. I didn't really see it to start with and then he said look on the right and it looks like there's another baby in there giving Mungbean a kiss. And it does. We think it's his big sister.

Like so many things, all these moments are bittersweet. The scan picture in particular - I so wish Matilda was here to grow up with and give her little brother lots of kisses.

Thanks for letting us know you're out there Matilda. We love you and think about you all the time.

The World Just Isn't Fair

Please send Ashley (http://rubybaby09.blogspot.com/2010/07/charlie.html) your support.

Gestational Diabetes and a Meltdown

I have GD. I know it can be managed but when my ob's office rang with the results from the short test I completely melted down. When I was pregnant with Matilda, GD was the start of a run of bad news - GD at 26 weeks, Matilda being diagnosed with BWS at 28 weeks, and me getting PE and being hospitalised at 29 weeks. So that phone call just put me right back there and it wasn't good - I got on google and started reading about all the associated risks which was a bad idea. DH rang me and I was so upset he couldn't understand me and came home from work.

I've since calmed down but my anxiety levels have definitely gone back up and I'm feeling much more fragile generally. My endo is away this week but I'll be calling and can hopefully get an appointment next week. I'll be asking her if she recommends extra monitoring and delivery earlier than 39 weeks.

I've started following the diet and testing. I've had a couple of slightly high results (7.5 & 7.8) but my food choices weren't the best so hopefully I can get it under control with diet. I need to go shopping and get organised.

Other than the GD, things are continuing as normal (as far as I know). I'm 26 weeks now and feeling lots of movement which is wonderful. I'm actually starting to feel like I'm really pregnant - odd I know given that I'm just about in the third trimester. I've bought a book for Mungbean and DH went to the baby expo (took his sister) and got a few different MCNs for us to try.

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We passed through Matilda's 8 month birthday and it didn't send me down a black hole but I think about her all the time and still have trouble believing what happened - our baby girl died, how is that even possible.

When I first started reading blogs and glowinthewoods shortly after Matilda died and all I felt was overwhelming pain I couldn't imagine making it to here. But I have and I see new blogs and names on glow and just feel for those women going through that pain and know that nothing I say will really change it.