Introductions and Sweet Potatoes

Introductions and sweet potatoes-two things that sent me into tears today. As fall rolls around I am finding myself involved in more and more things...which is fine, except with all those new things comes new introductions. You know- the usual- tell us your name, where you are from and a little about yourself.

 My name is RyAnne, I am from Peoria.... and that is about as far as I get. My mind races-"Do I "tell them" about Caleb? Do I not? If I do, how do I phrase it? Will they care, will they think its weird, wait its not weird, its my son. Am I making too big of a deal about it by including him? Wait, no he is my son. What if they ask more questions about him? Worse, what if they dont?"

And my mind goes in circles until its my turn to speak and I blurt out- "I have a son, he is in Heaven, and another child the Lord blessed us with, Abigail who is 7 months." I can almost always feel the silent relief of the people around me. They never expect death, so when it comes out I can feel the air being sucked out of the room, but then my rainbow baby appears and ahhhh, everything is alright again. Nothing to cure a little death than a happy live baby..... and then my turn is over and onto the next person. And I always feel awkward, I always feel like I am hiding a part of me but at the same time exposing a huge part of me. I feel vulnerable, confused, panicked, queasy, and overall just tired of explaining and feeling different.

These introduction leave me a complete mess and it frustrates me, but like all things grief I have learned to just give into them. Give into the fact that something as simple as "tell us about yourself," is enough to relocate me to the coach all afternoon and  wanting to order take out for dinner. I know its hard to understand for outsiders, but something as simple as an introduction can bring on so much for a griever.

And then the sweet potatoes- Abigail has tried them 3 times now and each time afterwards she spits up for the like next 3 hours. So, something in them doesn't sit right with her. Which is fine, but then it lead me to think "I have no idea what would upset Caleb's stomach. I have no idea what he would or wouldn't like." And that is so hard for me as a mom to him. I am his mom but I know virtually nothing about him. How is that possible? How can you grow a human being inside of you for 9 months and then get deprived of ever knowing them? How do I still not know anything new about him even though he would be 17 months old????

The rational side of me knows and believes that one day I will know him in Heaven. Its just one day seems a long time from now and this afternoon not knowing what he would like for food makes me cry. Big old ugly tears that just keep coming. So a double whammy of sorts today- introductions and sweet potatoes.......again I end with- grief is random and doesn't make sense, but boy is it real.

Fairy Tales for Hope

Wanting to promote this awesome project. I have followed this woman's blog for about a year. Her witness to her healing and just trying to live again after losing her firstborn, Hope, at 40 weeks gave me someone to relate to. For Hope's 4th birthday she started a project called "Fairy Tales for Hope." Ill let you read all about it below. The money all goes to charity to help stillbirth prevention. And the prints are super cute! Just wanted to pass this along...

Fairy Tales for Hope

So its safe to say that Im a little in love with Taylor Swift. I spent almost my whole pregnancy with Caleb driving to work everyday listening to her songs. I would tell Caleb "I know you are a boy, but its ok to like Taylor Swift songs and sing alone once you get here." It was like a little inside joke between us. Me making this BOY inside of me listen to girly girl music. 

Well today I saw this new song from Taylor Swift and the tears started flowing. She wrote it about a 4 year old boy who lost his fight to cancer. The song is from his mother's perspective. Loving this song and its lyrics:

"And its about to be Halloween, you could be anything you wanted it you were still here.."

 

Missing Caleb today...

You can buy this song on ITunes and all the proceeds go to the fight against cancer.