The Importance of Time - Tennille

The “old” me was a person who liked to keep track of time. I was busy, working full time, playing sport and had a busy social life. I loved cramming as much into every day that I could. The control freak in me loved wearing a watch, I hated being late. Our son Oscar was stillborn at 33 weeks and since the day I heard the words ‘I’m sorry there is no heartbeat’ I have rarely worn a watch. I definitely never wore a watch for at least 3 years as the simple act of putting on my watch reminded me of how much I had lost and how time stood still. When your baby dies you have absolutely no control yet the irony is you have so much to organise but cannot arrange anything at the same time.

I wished I could go back in time. In the early days I so desperately wanted to be able to relive the final few days with my baby growing inside me. I was sure I could pinpoint the exact moment something may have gone wrong. I could replay the last time I actively felt him kick, I could rest more, or visit the doctor earlier. Time felt so precious and I felt I had flitted it away, while my son died.

My sense of time suddenly became very warped. In the days between finding out and delivering my baby, I couldn’t eat, couldn’t sleep, couldn’t comprehend what was going to happen to me, what our son would look like or what I would need to arrange in the coming days. Time was long and short at the same time. Time also didn't have the same importance.

Once he was born and the time I was able to hold him, bath him and introduce him to our families seemed long. We gave him a lifetime of kisses, said hellos and goodbyes in just two short days.

Once leaving hospital, I have never felt time move more slowly. My brain and body were so disconnected and the days seem to crawl. I remember feeling panicked when there felt like there was so much of the day to go. Yet as each day passed, the time since I had held Oscar quickly moved on. The four months it took to fall pregnant with another baby were excruciating. I was so driven to fall pregnant again and this waiting game was tedious. Looking back, four months seemed to go so quickly now.

I was sceptical of the phrase “time heals everything” and “give yourself time”. I was convinced that I would always feel so lost and empty and I couldn’t possibly understand how people were able to move forward from their current position with grief. Yet, five years down the track I am able to talk about Oscar, often without crying. I remember my son with a smile on my face and live a fulfilling life.

                                                                                                       Tennille

If you require support after reading this blog please contact 

Sands on 13 000 72637

Tennille Welsh

Tennille Welsh is a mother to three beautiful boys. Mark (her husband) and Tennille experienced the stillbirth of their first son Oscar, at 33 weeks gestation in 2011, cause unknown. Tennille is passionate about raising awareness of the high incidence of stillbirth in Australia and shares Oscar's story in the hope that it may help other grieving families.

Watching the Calendar Tick Over - Stevie

Our second son Elliott was born sleeping on 28/10/16 at 21 weeks gestation. My membranes ruptured and I went into labour. Our perfectly healthy baby just wasn't strong or old enough to make it through. Now I find I'm in this huge space between his birth and his due date that feels like limbo. A space between the ‘was’ and the ‘might have been’. It’s a space filled with watching the calendar tick over, day after day towards what should have been a joyous time filled with exciting anticipation, waiting for our baby to arrive safety into the world. Instead the anticipation is rife with stress and sorrow. Although he has already been born, that date, his due date, hasn't gone away.

When I woke up on New Year’s Day I didn't want to get out of bed. I didn't want it to be a new year, I didn't want a reminder that time truly does go on. Days, weeks and months had passed and now a new year. I felt like he'll be forever left in 2016, never to grow up through the years. I felt like the new year reflected how I was further away from him yet closer towards the cruelty of what was meant to be. I was supposed to be big and waddling by now like I was with my other two by this stage. I was supposed to wear that maternity dress I bought on sale. Instead the night before I could have a few drinks because I wasn't carrying a baby safely inside and I could wear my pre-pregnancy jeans because he had already been born when we were just over half way there. Having a cocktail and wearing my jeans were things I looked forward to doing again, but now both just reminded me of what I no longer had. 

I never cared for dates and now they meant everything to me. Every Friday echoes the day he was born and died, the 28th of every month tells me how old he would have been if he survived. And that date, the date that he was meant to be born healthy and alive is looming. I won't ever happily prepare a birthday party for him like I do for my other two. Instead we prepare ourselves emotionally for certain dates which bring a gutting ache of milestones we'll never get to witness. I see photos of friends who were due within weeks of Elliott’s due date and know that was meant to be me. I can't let my husband put his hand on my belly when we cuddle because it reminds me how he would rub my belly feeling the baby kick. Now there's just emptiness when there shouldn't be and it feels taunting to have his hand on it.

I had a great week last week- I felt productive, useful, purposeful. Then I woke up one day and couldn’t get out of bed. For three days, I didn't get out of bed until late in the afternoon and when I got up I felt like I had absolutely nothing left. Out of nowhere my grief had smacked me right in my face. I couldn’t stop thinking that we would be counting down the weeks now, preparing for his arrival. That if he was born now, even this early, chances are he'd be fine. It feels like every week that passes closer to his due date intensifies the thought of our baby whom we should have taken home. I began looking for answers to my grief, to solve it, to let me pass over the thoughts of "if only". I tried to be positive and held back from crying. Then I came to the realisation, with help from friends including other bereaved mums, that there are no answers and no ‘solving’ my grief. That no matter which way you looked at it, it was cruel, terrible, awful and unfair. I broke down to my husband and told him the things I couldn't stop thinking about. I cried that mournful cry you can’t fake, I curled in a ball and clutched at my stomach. When I woke up the next morning it was easier to get out of bed.

I'm now trying to accept my grief as part of who I now am. I’m trying to understand, live with and around it. I'm accepting that the time between now and that date will likely have many terrible days where I am temporarily consumed by those "if" thoughts. I'm going to let myself have those days, so the next ones are easier. I'm accepting that sometimes its ok to not be ok and that its normal to be angry and upset, feeling that it’s all so unfair. Because you know what, it is unfair-completely and utterly unfair. At my worst times, I do my best to bring myself back to the moments where I held him and remember that warm feeling of protective love. I do something to celebrate him and his life, because he deserves to be celebrated like every other baby. I’ve decided that on his due date we'll fly kites for him and write on more stones to put around his tree we have for him, like we did on a day we held for him after he was born. I know I'll count down the days until his due date, and have no idea what will happen after that, but I know every day before and every day after I’ll love him.                                                                                        

Stevie

If you require support after reading this blog please contact

Sands on 13 000 72637

Stevie Vowles

Stevie Vowles has a 7 year old daughter, 4 year old son and a son who was born sleeping on 28/10/16.  Her journey led her to the upsetting discovery that there is often a great lack of understanding and awareness of pregnancy and infant loss. She has started an open and honest blog sharing her journey of Elliott's birth and the life that leads after for herself, her husband and her two other children, who also grieve greatly, as the first step in wanting to spread awareness and help other bereaved parents the blog can be found here https://elliottsstardust.family.blog/blog/

Christmas is fast approaching - Barry

Following on from my previous entry:  life had started to get back to some degree of normality. Life will never be the same again, but Sarah and I had started to come to terms as best we can and we both were back at work. Some days were still too much, however we start to spend more time at work and less time away. I start to feel useful at work once more not just showing up.

Then I started to think about Christmas. Phoenix was due in early January, so if everything had gone to plan he may have come early,  or if not Sarah would have been heavily pregnant during Christmas celebrations. Either way he would have been a part of our celebrations and I am sure he would have got lots of presents.

Unfortunately Phoenix will not make it with us to Christmas in person, we will remember him and think of him in spirit. One night I was thinking about this and feeling down: I took some time to grieve and thought I had processed it by the next morning.  Sarah suggested we take the day off anyway just to be sure, but I think if I take a day off work every time I am feeling a bit blue I will never be at work. So off I went to work, thinking everything was good and dealt with last night.

As I prepared for my day as a school teacher, all is going well until the first bell for home group and I feel the grief rising but it is too late to deal with. I go in thinking I only have 20 minutes to deal with then I have a free lesson and can manage my grief then.  As I enter the class it must have been written on my face a student asks me “Are you OK?” I believe in being honest with my students and I shake my head but I don’t have the words and that’s it - I break down.

Luckily there is an office to the side of my classroom filled with teachers and I take refuge in there and a teacher kindly offers to take over. I spend most of the home group time in there to compose myself and worry what will happen when I have to show myself to my students. However I realise I have some important information to relay to my students and decide to face the music. The students don’t say a word about what has happened and take the information in as normal as I take over the class for the remaining 5 minutes. Some students even come up to me throughout the day to check that I am ok. It’s funny, I teach in a pretty rough school but the students constantly surprise you with kindness and compassion, I think some may relate to grief and loss.  I take my free lesson to compose myself and continue to teach for the rest of the day. It certainly was not the most successful day, I still feel raw all day but I manage to get through. After a stressful day I decide to take the next day off to recover. 

I recover and go back to work for another week and all is well until again the thought of Christmas surfaces in the car on the way to work and I think the 25th of December will be the 4 month anniversary of Phoenix’s short time on this earth.   The grief starts to swell again but I think I have it under control again. Unbeknownst to me it is just building and biding its time. I manage to get through homegroup, however in the grief and confusion I have confused my days and planned a lesson for a different class. I get to my actual class after a short detour to tomorrow’s class and start to madly think of what I can do with this science class that was supposed to be PE.

I stand in front of the class (most of whom are socialising waiting for me to call their attention), and I realise the grief is about to explode once more in front of a class.

I try deep breathing to calm myself however another kind and thoughtful student asks again “Are you ok?” and it breaks me once more. I rush out of the class luckily again another teacher is nearby to relieve me for a few moments.  I compose myself again and retake my class a short while later. On this day I have no free lessons to calm myself just recess and lunch. Again it is not the best day but I get through. I notice myself being snappy with the students and I have to apologise on more than one occasion. My students know my story and they are mostly kind and compassionate.

I decide I need to take action to try and prevent future outbursts in class. I call Dorothy from Red Nose and we discuss some strategies around preempting those bad days and using music to bring the grief on early before work. We discuss using a phrase like “thank you for asking” as a shield if someone asks “Are you OK?”. I also discuss with my partner Sarah and she tells me she talks to Phoenix every morning and that helps her.

The next morning I try many of these strategies. I feel I want to get back on the horse again immediately unlike last week when I took the day off. I think everything is working fine until I am about to leave and I realise everything is not fine. Now I know this will be a huge disruption and it will be difficult to cover my lessons but I feel I have no choice but to call in sick.  I apologise profusely and explain the circumstances of why I am calling in so late.

After another interaction at work I fall into a deep depression for most of the weekend. I was able to function:  I went Christmas shopping with Sarah but the usually joy I felt around Christmas and buying presents was not there. This felt different to the grief I had experienced up until that point. I decided I need to discuss this with a professional although admitting to potential mental health issues was not something I wanted to do. There is still a stigma attached to such an admission. However after talking to supportive friends and family I decided it is better to check it out rather than wait for it to get worse, so I set an appointment for early next week.

During the weekend however I talked about it more and discovered there are other things I could be doing for my mental health. By the end of the weekend I was feeling much better however I decide to keep my doctor’s appointment just to keep everything in check. We discuss the differences between grief and depression. I know I want to try and avoid at all costs some of the feelings of that weekend just gone. I want to be able to recognise if I am going to that place and to develop strategies to get out.

On a lighter note Sarah and I found out on Monday we are expecting twins. This delightful if slightly terrifying news has brightened our lives. As for Christmas I am sure there are ups and downs to come. We will take time to remember Phoenix on the day. Like Sarah I have been talking to him every day, and our family brought us a wonderful Christmas Tree Bauble to remember Phoenix. Next Christmas we will have two little ones to share Christmas with Sarah, Phoenix and me. One day when they grow older we will tell them the story of Phoenix on our tree. 

Barry  

If you require support after reading this blog please contact

Sands on 14 000 72637