I Remember Every Day

I couldn't forget if I tried. He's part of my life story.
I can't understand how I've gone all these years not knowing about National Pregnancy and Remembrance Day which is celebrated on October 15th every year since Ronald Reagan instituted it in 1988. For people to recognize that a child lost whether in utero or after birth is still a child lost and is felt with the same pain.

I'm not sure if my baby was a girl or a boy. My gut tells me he was a boy so that is what I envision in my dreams. I still have them. I daydream about what my angel baby would be like if he were alive today. The same way I dreamed about his future while I was pregnant. He was our baby even if he never breathed the same air or held our hands.

Some people think that because he wasn't  born yet  the loss couldn't possibly be as great. Those people never went through month after month trying to get pregnant only to be met with disappointment.  Those people didn't have that sinking feeling  and dread with the sight of red.  They also weren't met with an ultrasound that showed that your precious baby, that was so longed for, hadn't grown after the last ultrasound. There are so many things those people just don't know. And they try to comfort you with hollow words like "it'll be OK.. you can try again"... "there is a reason for everything" .. or the best of all "it was God's will".  I wanted to scream at those people and shake them and tell them they were wrong.  There was no reason why my child had to die. And my heart felt as if it died with him at the time. It ached.  I just needed to be held and told that it was not OK. And that I could be angry and that I could cry as much as I wanted.  There weren't too many people that let me do that.  He wasn't a real child after all.. it wasn't a true loss of life. But he was a real child. He was our child and we lost him.

Every so often I take down the box of things I saved from that time and go through the cards and ultrasounds and just sit and remember. I think about him almost every day but those days when I get to go through the box I cherish I get to really think about all the joy he gave us in the short time we had him with us.

So now that I know about Remembrance Day I will do my best to make sure others know about it as well so all the women who have suffered a loss can find some comfort and support.