It happened to me.

There have been a few times in life when I heard a sad story and in the back of my mind a voice that I almost didn’t know belonged to me would say, “that won’t ever happen to me”.

 Maybe you’ve even heard that voice too.

The first time was when my sister died in a car accident at 23. I knew other families that lost their daughters and siblings in car accidents and it was sad and unimaginable, but it wouldn’t ever happen in my family. And then it did.

It happened again during my first pregnancy. I skipped over the part about Caesareans in “What to Expect” telling my family I knew I wouldn’t ever need to have a C-Section, and then I did.

Then my daughter was born with a rare genetic condition and that really threw me for a loop. We get over these hurdles, we talk about them, we grieve them, and then we get on with our lives.

 And I got through this, but it has to be said that this too, threw me for a loop.

I knew my period was approaching, but I took a pregnancy test anyways. Maybe something in me just knew. It said negative though and sure enough later that day I got my period. It lasted only a couple days and thinking back it was lighter than usual. A couple days later I couldn’t imagine my bad luck when I came down with the flu for the second time this winter.  Then there was nothing until the morning I woke up with what I thought was a period again just over a week later. I called the Health Link number I was given when we had our daughter and they said what I had dismissed, maybe I was pregnant. Then they said another word I never thought I would hear, miscarriage.

I took another pregnancy test and it said positive creating an exciting possibility of a baby. But, I kept bleeding. The doctor we saw said it is possible to spot and even lose clots and continue on to have a healthy pregnancy. About half of women do, but something in me knew it didn’t seem right.

I’ve known other women who miscarried and I might have even heard them says this, but for some reason I didn’t know. I didn’t know it was longer than a day long process. I didn’t know that even though we weren’t trying or even really ready I would still need to grieve the loss of baby I didn’t know was growing inside me. I didn’t know it would take a couple trips to the hospital, blood tests, an ultrasound, and how hard the waiting would be. Waiting to know if the pregnancy would progress, if the bleeding would stop, or if it wouldn’t. I didn’t know when they called to say I was an “8” that it meant on a scale of 0-25 that’s how much pregnancy hormone was in my body and what that really meant. I didn’t know that a piece of my heart would race with the possibility of another baby playing over details of what that would mean in our lives.

 I didn’t consider the hormones racing through my body from carrying and then losing a baby and the impact that would play on my emotions, or the impact the cramping and loss of blood would have on my body. I guess what I am getting at is that, I just didn’t know and I never thought it would happen to me, but it did.

This post is for all women who’ve gone through this before me and will go through it after me. For the woman who miscarried at five weeks and at five months. For the ones that tell themselves “it won’t happen to me” and how awful it feels when it actually does.  

A Letter to a Lady I've Never Met

Today would have been my sister's 30th birthday. She passed away seven years ago in a single car accident on March 1st 2008. Every year on her birthday I have celebrated with dinner, drinks, spa days, anything to try to do something in her memory, but also selfishly make me feel better.

This year I wanted to do something different. A lady I've never met, but who works in the same hospital recently lost her son. I put together a little healing pack and wrote her a letter. I thought I would share this letter on the blog today in hopes of sending love to anyone else out there right now suffering from loss and the pain of grief.

Today I will remember my sister and also think of all others suffering from loss and pain.

Hello,

Although we've never met, I feel connected to you in way that only someone who has experienced loss would understand.  I could never begin to imagine what you are going through, but I have watched my mother relearn to navigate life the past seven years after losing my sister.

Today would have been her 30^th birthday.

I wanted to reach out to you to try and offer some words of hope because I know the journey you are facing is not easy and I still see it in my mother’s eyes. Seven years later, there are good days and there are bad days, but as you go along I hope you allow yourself to never feel guilty for being happy, for laughing, or for going a whole day without being sad. You are still here and that matters to so many people. I hope you allow yourself to feel your grief and take all the time you need to begin your way through the storm because, although you will not be the same person that walked in, you will come out of this with a new understanding of life, loss, and love.

I know that seven years after losing my sister I have a heart that is still wounded, a wound that has and will continue to close over time, but it will always leave a very deep scar that reminds me not only of the journey of life without her, but of her life.

I asked my mother for advice on what I could include in your “healing pack” and she said very soft Kleenex, the advice to allow yourself to stay in bed all day and cry when you need to, and something that smells good because for some time after her loss nothing seemed to smell good anymore.

I hope these small tokens of my love and hope for you can bring you a moment or two of peace knowing someone out there cares about you and what you’re going through.

Your friend,

Katie

If only heaven had a phone

Or does it??

Over the weekend I received a call from my college roommate who told me she had just gone to a psychic. The lady told her she knew two women who had passed away and one of them was quite young. This was true. She said the girl had died from loss of control. She then said this spirit was trying to channel to my friend and wanted her to tell her friend that she is okay.

Five years ago while living with my college roommate I lost my sister in a car accident. A loss of control one could say. My sister and my friends older aunt are the only two females my friend knew who had passed. How could this woman have made this up? It brought me to tears and gave me a sense of peace that day.

Grief begins as an open wound and over time the wound starts to heal but there will always be a scar serving to remind us of our loved ones, the storm the hit us, and the person we became when the storm was over.

To everyone who has lost some one, I commend you for keeping going and finding reasons to smile. Xo