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My second child and our first daughter, Camille, died and was born on June, 30 2011 when I was full term at 38 weeks pregnant. I gave birth to my rainbow baby, a second daughter, on August 31, 2012. This is me trying to figure out how to be a mother to my living son and daughter and function in society after our tragic loss.

Thursday, November 3, 2011

Therapeutic?

Well my son said he wanted to draw today. We do art ALL the time...so we got out his pad and he asked for a pen said he was going to draw his family. Then he hands me a pen and asked me to draw baby Camille. UGH...um yeah I know it is good to draw and talk about your feelings and all but drawing a picture of your dead baby girl is just well a little strange. Sooooo I asked what she looked like and he said a baby. I asked if she had hair or a hat and he said curly hair, and he said she was holding flowers. Yeah I did show him the pictures the hospital took of her and they put little crocheted flowers in her hands. SIGH...I turned to my mother who was sitting there doing art work and said...Um I don't know about this whole draw your dead baby thing. And we just laughed. She said well maybe it is therapeutic :) I did draw Camille but she is smiling and her eyes are open and she is alive. She may be dead in real life but I refuse to draw her that way. I may be tempted to put little X's across her eyes or something and that wouldn't be very good. I REALLY regret not having Kai meet his sister. I kind of wanted him to but my husband didn't. We talked about it and decided against it. I think it was the wrong decision. My son would have got it. Children are so intelligent and intuitive. It's not fair we got to say goodbye and he didn't. He was really looking forward to having a sibling and I think telling him and not showing him was a mistake. DANG IT~ No Do-Overs!

14 comments:

  1. I had to laugh at the idea of putting an "x" over her eyes. Because seriously... why is this a joke? Only we can find shit like this to be humorous... even if only a little.

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  2. I agree, B. Wilson, that was funny! But if you ain't a BLM, don't you DARE make that joke!

    My husband and I are on completely different pages as to how we talk about Calla to the boys. I am not super OK with it, but that's where we're at.

    I wish Camille was there with you for real, and not just in your picture.
    Love to you, friend.
    xo

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  3. My niece in law saw Jack in the hospital and was there for the service but I guess she was to young grasp the concept. At the fundraiser she asked me "where did baby Jack go?" I stuttered, being athiest sometimes thats a hard question to answer, I never know what to say to children. I was at a loss of words until nanny piped in and said "baby Jack went to our hearts, he lives there now." That was of course for me the perfect answer.I thanked nanny of course for puting it just right.

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  4. Wow, Colin has asked me to do the same thing. He has actually created a Braedon book out of composistion book. He wanted me to draw Braedon on the first page. He says in this book he can write all of his thoughts about Braedon.
    I drew him with his eyes closed but I can totally get the whole Xs over the eyes idea. How do you draw a dead baby??
    My kids are older and I was unsure about letting them see Braedon so we decided against it. I regret that know just because of their age but I honestly was afraid of them having bad dreams about Braedon haunting them or something like that. But we have tons of pictures, I keep them in my room but I encourage them to stop in and visit anytime their hearts are sad or they need to just remember.
    But you are right No Do-overs and we can't go back. We made the best choices we could at the time and it sounds like your Kai is doing really well understanding that Camille is still his sister even if she is not right there with you guys.
    Gosh I hate these word because they so don't cover what I feel but I have to say it again, I am sorry she is not in your arms getting to know her brother.

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  5. Oh i so regret not letting sloane see hayes too. I think everything would have made so much more sense to her. Bah! I hate that we dont get a second chance to make it all right!

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  6. It sucks that when we have to make those huge, huge decisions we are hardly in the right frame of mind. I regret quite a few things from the time of Hope's birth, but I try and remind myself "I did the best I could at the time". But damn, I still long for a do-over. Even to just hold her dead body again. I'd do it all again, knowing the outcome. Just for one more chance.
    Angus is nearly two and he still doesn't really know who Hope is. We are going to have to introduce this to him very slowly. How on earth will he make sense of it when we can't?
    Love to you guys.
    xo

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  7. I love reading what you think and experience with Kai.
    I agree about being a BLM and being able to joke about it, even if only for a second.
    No- do- over's, yes, BUT we do make decisions at that moment for good reason. I would like to comfort you by saying, trust yourself. You never know how he would have really reacted and in so many ways your decision came from a place of wanted to protect Kai. I agree with Hope's Mama, it is such an intense experience and we really do our best at that time. I know for me, I was only half there at that point and my decisions were coming from a place deep deep inside of me with not a lot of thought put to them but they seemed to be very instinctual and right for our family.
    You are a wonderful mother and Kai is such a sensitive soul, I truly believe that you did the best you could by him at the time.
    I think you are wonderful and I'm reading along side you.

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  8. That is a huge major Do over for myself as well...i did not let my kids see Logan or go to his funeral and I regret it every single day. My 6 year old always includes Logan in her pictures and he has wings, but what really breaks my heart is every card she has drawn just for him since he died has one beautiful flower in the middle with rain coming down all around it...there is never any sun. They so get it more than we realize

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  9. I think it's sweet that he wanted you to draw her, that he thinks of her as part of the family. That will never, ever leave him. She will always be his sister.

    I can understand how you felt strange drawing her. I like that you chose to draw her alive. I think I probably would have gone for sleeping. (The line about the red x's made me laugh.)

    Love to you.

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  10. This was the only thing I feel so much regret over when it comes to handling the moments after my son's death and subsequent birth. I should have had his siblings come to the hospital to see him, hold him and say goodbye. I regret it every day. I completely agree- my living children would have 'gotten it'. They deserved that moment.. sigh.

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  11. So beautiful that he thinks of his little sister... your story brought tears to my eyes. I wish our daughter had met her little sister too... and you're so right in saying that kids can handle more than we think they can sometimes. Love your poem in your last post too... thank you for sharing it xoxo

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  12. I hate that there are no do-overs. So many things I would have done differently. But I always have to remind myself that you do the best you can in that horrible moment of shock/grief/confusion/devastation. It's hard to know WHAT to do so of course we don't do everything perfectly - it's such an imperfect situation to begin with!

    But I do love that he thinks of and talks about his sister - there's something so wonderfully sweet about that.

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  13. Argh no do overs. That is a real kicker. As you say about regretting Kai not meeting Camille. Oh that is a major regret of mine. That both my girls were alive in the same room but that they didn't meet. Still regret that whole no do over thing. Like Sally, I would give a lot just for one more chance to hold my little girl's dead body, to do it differently. But yes, I remind myself that it was the best I could do at the time. None of us would have wished this for ourselves or for our children and we just muddle through the best we can. Sometimes I think that muddling through has so much love in it that it was, in reality, the best we could ever do. Regret and all.

    I think it's lovely that you drew Camille for Kai, it's think it's right that he knows about her and talks about her. And obviously it's horribly wrong at the same time. Sigh. And the crosses over the eyes thing. You've made me do my best laughing / crying face.

    And I have to congratulate on the invention of the word ASHMOCOALYPSE in your comment on Angie's blog. Because that is the best, most defiant BLM word going. We don't care about your supposed apocalypse because we've already been there, stared it down and . . . . . . yawn. Bring it. You made me laugh so much with that comment that I fell off my chair with my breakfast tea in my hand!

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  14. I have also wished for a do-over, so many times. I feel like I know how to have a dead baby now. I'd take more photos. I'd spend more time with him. I'd make everyone come to visit him in the hospital so they could see how real he was, and maybe then better understand what, WHO, I am grieving for. Your little boy is making sense of things in his own way - we have so much to learn from children and the way deal with emotions and experiences in the most accepting ways. I'm so glad you have him with you.

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