Failure

Today was a really awful day.
First of all, I had somewhat of a mental breakdown at work.
It was not pretty.


I brought it upon myself.
It's just been like everything has been piling up and today it finally came crashing down.
I'm terrified of failing at this job.


Working at Hunts is really the only thing I've ever been good at.

I almost didn't graduate high school.
I've failed at every relationship but one (so far).
I've been a terrible friend in one way or another at some point.
I failed at trying to improve with my art.
I failed at pursuing photography.
I never went to college.
I couldn't even keep my child alive.

I've given up on so much because I feel as though I can never be good enough.


I don't want this to be just another thing I fail at.

Candlelight Memorial

Tonight, I am holding a candlelight memorial for my child lost.
As I said in my previous post, I will burn my candle for one hour.
I plan to do this from 11 pm tonight until midnight.
This will mark the end of my child's birthday.


Also, tonight, I plan to write my baby a letter of all the things I would like to say to him.

In the next few days, I plan on making a memorial box. I'm looking for a fairly large shoe box, preferably one that hasn't had used shoes in it for the last year. If you can provide this, I would be oh, so thankful. I don't have any lying around and I don't intend on buying new shoes anytime. I plan on making a memorial box for my child with these things in it.

* A letter to my baby of all the things I'd like to say to him. I think every year on December 21st, I will do this and add it to the box.
*The baby blanket my grandmother got me when she found out I was pregnant, if it will fit. It not, I will find somewhere else to put that.
*My ultrasounds pictures
*The baby book I filled out while I was pregnant about my first couple of hospital visits
*a home-made birth certificate
*a photo of the tattoo I got on Baby Cay's due date.
*the poem I found shortly I lost my baby that I read time and time again and still manages to bring me to tears every time.

___________________________________

I bought my candle and watched as it burned away. At first new, shining bright.

My initial plan was to burn the candle for one full hour and take a picture every ten minutes, then print those photographs out and put them in my box. The candle didn't quite last that long. As I thought about it, I realized that the fact the candle didn't do as I had originally intended was quite appropriate. Much like my pregnancy, It started out strong and stable, appeared as though it had a lot of hope and was in it for the long run. As time went buy, the candle grew smaller and smaller. 40 minutes in, my little candle had come a long way. I looked forward to sitting there for the next twenty minutes thinking of how I would be celebrating my child's birthday, today. Just a minute or two later, I looked over and the candle had took a turn for the worse. It had melted all the way down the middle in just a moment's notice. The candle's journey would not last the expected hour as my child would not last the full 40 weeks. It's light grew dimmer and dimmer until it was just a tiny glimmer of hope. It took me back to the last time I saw my baby, the day I was worried something was terribly wrong. The doctor told me he saw the heartbeat, that nothing seemed wrong. That gave me the very same glimmer of hope. Then suddenly, that glimmer of hope was snuffed out.

December 21st, 2012

For everyone, December 21, 2012 is supposed to be "the day the world ends." The day the rapture happens, or the zombie outbreak starts, or a shit ton of natural disasters just hit all at once.

I plan on celebrating the end of the world by sitting in my warm, cozy apartment watching the movie 2012 and I am Legend.

The day holds alot more for me, though.

When I found out I got my pregnancy with Baby Cay confirmed, I learned that my due date would be December 21st, 2011. Whether I would have actually had my baby on that day is a whole different story, but as things happened, this is the day I will celebrate the memory of my child.

Last year, this was an incredibly tough day on me. Since there would be no grave for my child, no memorial service, no way to remember him but in my heart itself, I wanted to have something. So I got a tattoo in remembrance. I figured a teddy bear would be best. I wanted something to represent that I called him my Christmas baby, so I got a Santa hat. I put flowers in the teddy bear's hands. Pink and blue since we didn't actually know the sex and a black one in the middle for his death. I also wanted to incorporate the day we lost him.

For those of you who didn't read the previous post, I call my baby Cay because we had already chosen names. Kayden James for a boy or Cadence Alexis for a girl. Cay incorporated both of those.

I will never forget my child. I plan on trying to have children again someday. Someday when I'm settled down, happily married, with a stable home. Although I will hold those children tightly and love them deeply, they will not erase the memory of my first child.

Some days, when I think of the child I have lost, I wish I was religious so that I could actually believe that I will go to Heaven and someday I will meet that first child of mine and we could catch up on things and talk of what could have been. 

December 21 is in 6 days now. Since I am broke, I will not be able to do anything in memorial for my dead child. I will not be able to have a cake that I would have had for him turning one year old. I will not be able to plant a tree. I will not have anyone to talk to about my sorrows on that day. Most importantly of all, I will not have the child in my arms that should have been on this earth a full year now.

I did find a support website with one brilliant idea that I do plan on doing for my child this year. I plan on creating a memory box. I'm still working on the details of where I'm going to get the box. I need an old shoe box, so if anyone has one that they would like to donate, that would be greatly appreciated. I plan on painting it and putting some very special things inside.

-a letter to my baby telling him how much I love him and anything else I'd like to say to him

-the blanket that my grandma gave me that i planned on swaddling my little one in. The blanket i slept with every night for weeks after my miscarriage.

-a small journal detailing my feelings

-a home made death certificate

-a poem I read that helped ease the pain

-my ultrasound pictures

-my baby book as far as I filled it out into the pregnancy

-a pink and blue ribbon like the one below

I recently, actually just today, found out that there is a support month and ribbon for mother's who have lost a child. It can be all of the month of October, but is particularly targeted for October 15th.

So for all of those who have lost a child or know anyone who has lost a child, take at least this one time of the year to maybe talk to them about it. Let them know that although you may not understand to the full extent how this feels, that you are there to talk to them if they need it. Offer to be that shoulder to cry on.

Thoughts For the Child I Lost

I found this online today and it really hit home for me. Unfortunately, I cannot find an original author, but I felt the need to share it for others who have been in this situation. I also wanted to put it in a place that I knew I could always come back to it.

Thoughts For the Child I Lost
There might come a day in the future
When I don't think about you constantly,
Wonder what you would have looked like,
What color your hair would have been,
And how your smile might have looked.
There might come a day sometime in the future
When I don't wonder what I did wrong.
When I won't blame myself.
When the sharp blade of pain will become dull.
Wehn I can accept this as meant to be.
There might come a day sometime in the future
When I carry another child
And though I love him beyond measure
And though I will hold him a little tighter,
And though he will be my child,
He won't be you.
There might come a day sometime in the future
When I am happy again.
When I can let go.
When I can look at another baby without aching for you.
But it won't be today.



I also want to once again post this photo, because I can't seem to look at it enough. This was the last photo of my baby I got at roughly 10 weeks.

and a picture of a forget me not flower for, i hope, obvious reasons.