Goodbye My Loves

August 26, 2014

After the marathon of weddings (I was in two weddings in 6 days), I woke up early for Jude's memorial this last Sunday.

It was a perfect day.  The weather was sunny, and our family's followed our request to be there at 9:00am sharp.  Jude's life was short so it was fitting to have his memorial be short.  My mother is law read a beautiful letter she wrote to him-one thing that stood out to it was she pointed out to Jude that if it was for Darren and I and our love, he would never have existed and would have never had this beautiful life he has in heaven.  We gave him that because of our love-I liked it.  Then my mom shared and talked about hope. 

Then I pulled the blanket that I first held Jude in out of my purse and put his box of ashes on it-I held him for the first time and the last time in that blanket.  I thanked Jude for teaching me about empathy.  Before losing him and his sister I felt "bad" for people when they had tough news or a loss, but because of actually getting the pain of death and loss I know FEEL pain for people when they lose someone or get a bad diagnosis.  I cry for them.  He has made me more emphatic.

I thanked Jude for teaching me that stupid cliché phrases like "It will all work out" "It wasn't meant to be" "God has a plan" "Keep trying it will happen" "Relax" "why don't you adopt?" etc DO NOT HELP PEOPLE suffering.  They just don't.  I now know to look someone in the eyes-to really see them- and to be silent or to acknowledge-this is really really crappy and I'm so sorry-and mean it.

Lastly, Jude taught me about my faith.  I've always been a Christian, but it's easy to be a Christian when your life is good.  When sorrow pours down on you and you hit the cement at 10593284032 miles per hour and your prayers go unanswered and you deliver a stillborn and then another stillborn within 20 days??  That makes you question if your faith is real.  Do I still believe in His goodness?  Do I still believe in a loving God?  After ALL the loss and pain and anger and horrific sorrow of losing Jude and Brinly, I still answer yes.

Darren then thanked our family for the support they gave us in the hospital and then my Dad prayed for us.  I don't think there was a dry eye. My family then walked to the base of Multnomah Falls for a family picture and a surprise I will blog about later.

In the meantime, Darren and I walked down to a beautiful stream.  "Bye baby boy," I whispered.  I pulled him out, that small bag of ashes and released him into the stream.  I thought I would be afraid.  I was not.  I saved a tiny pinch of the ashes for a special tree that was given to me in their honor.  I love him, but I truly let him go.

The memorial of course brought up all kinds of sad emotions that had been buried for so long.  My love, my son.  I had so much hope you would make it.  But it was also healing.  And now we press on and hope for our rainbow.

Letting Go Kind Of

July 30, 2014

School starts early September and in my heart I know it's time to let Jude go by spreading his ashes.

It still feels surreal that I type that.  My daughter and son, died, and I have to plan a service for them.  Is this my life?

Brinly is buried in a mass grave the hospital does for free for babies lost before 20 weeks.  I quickly agreed to that because at the time my whole focus was on the live baby, Jude.  When he died, they asked if I wanted them cremated together.  I said no.  For some reason, they left this world at different times, it didn't bother me they wouldn't be buried together.  I'm still ok with that.

At first I wanted nothing to do with the ashes.  The whole thing scared me and made me feel creepy and weird.  My mother in law took care of the whole ordeal and found a cemetery where you could sprinkle them in a garden.  However, I panicked at that idea to and asked her to hold on while I sorted through the insane sadness and blurry grief storm I was in.

I thought of Multnomah Falls.  It's a beautiful falls here in the Northwest in the gorge.  We hike there every now and then.  It's special.  The idea came to me to spread his ashes there, in the water.  That way, I could "visit" him when I go there.  I figured that someday I could take our PLEASE GOD future kid/s there to tell them the story of Jude and Brinly, their older brother and sister. 

There is a part of me that doesn't want to spread them.  It's weird, I don't even have/want them in my house.  Pouring out the box is kind of over, the last time in this lifetime that I hold my son, even though we all know he has been in heaven for almost a year.  Someone suggested pouring out half, but we don't do that with bodies?  I just feel sad about it all.  But then I think that this might be a big step in the healing process.  Letting go.  Saying goodbye with my family with me.  Allowing myself to go there-the deepest darkest saddest places that linger in my soul that I try to forget about.  To weep yet again for the devastating loss.  The unfairness.  The pain that I felt.  That Jude and Brinly felt.

My mom asked "how do you want the day to go?"  I'm not sure.  I guess I say goodbye and my family can say anything they want.  Then, I asked my mom that maybe our family could say a prayer for us, right there, for healing and peace.  For bravery.  For courage.  For hope again.  For redemption.

I've always tried to live my life in a way honoring to God that models His values.  But I told my mom-how on earth would anyone want to choose to follow Christ when they witness something like this?  I'm a Christian, I asked for a child, I got pregnant with triplets, they all died.  From the outside, who would want anything to do with Jesus??  I know I wouldn't.  BUT Christ loves redemption.  It's not always how we plan it, see it, but over and over and over again He does make things right.  I myself have begun to lose hope in that; but of course, I want my story to end with redemption.  I still get goose bumps (in a sad way) that days before my water broke I even wrote those lyrics on a decorative board in my house I write quotes on-"let me see redemption win, let me know the struggle ends."  It was almost like my heart knew something was up.

All this to say, hopefully end of summer Darren and I will have the courage/strength to do a memorial service for him, for them, for us.  And then, take another step towards opening up to building the family. 

Lastly, as we work to slowly rebuild our faith, our hope in His goodness, our trust despite things we cannot fathom to understand, Hillsong's Ocean (acoustic version) is my current favorite worship song.  I cry every time I hear it.  Even though I still struggle to find words to say when I pray, this song helps fill in the blanks. <3