April

April 17th: two-year anniversary of A and me splitting up
April 23rd: my darling little cat got sick
April 24th: after expensive tests, my darling little cat was diagnosed with hyperthyroid.  It could have been a lot worse, but she now has to have 2 tablets a day for the rest of her life.  There are other, more invasive, treatment options but she's going to be 19 (!) in June and I don't want to put her through anything like that
April 25th: my mother is told that she needs to have an operation on her foot which will mean 6 weeks without being able to walk and a further five months of physio before she recovers mobility.
April 28th: five-year anniversary of losing Starchild.  I don't know if A remembered, he didn't remember when we were together so I can't imagine he remembers now.  But his mother did and she sent me a lovely text message.
April 30th: vet calls to tell me that my darling little cat also has a urinary tract infection which will need 4 weeks of antibiotics

Gentle reader, April has sucked arse.

losses

Last February a friend of mine, Songbird, had a massive coronary and lapsed into a coma.  She was on the high dependancy unit of a London hospital for months, and I would go and visit her a couple of times a week.  It's tough when you can't converse with someone, but sitting and silently holding her hand doesn't seem to be enough either.  I ended up reading bits of her favourite newspaper out to her, looking for the lighter stories and also segments about London 2012.
Last Saturday, she died.  It's so sad that I'll never see her again but in truth - for me anyway - she died 14 months ago; it was the outside shell of Songbird I was reading to.  The essence of her, her laugh, her melodic voice, her expressive eyes, the sheer force of her personality, was gone.  But it's still sad.
Also, 28th April 2008 - I lost Starchild.

October 15th: Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day

I am the face of first and second trimester loss.
On the 28th April 2008 I lost my first baby at 13 weeks.  We didn't know the sex for sure, but I was convinced our baby was a boy and in my heart I named him Zachary Joseph.
On the 6th February 2009 I lost our darling daughter at 18 weeks.  We were still gently arguing over her first name but I knew I would have got my way.  Her name is Matilda Tui.
On Christmas Eve 2009 I lost our Little Stars, the two embryos we had transferred after IVF.

Later today I will be lighting my candle in memory of my children, and yours.

three years

Three years ago today we lost Starchild.

I'll always love you, my Zachary Joseph.

the importance of names

I have been thinking about writing this post for weeks now but (for reasons I find very difficult to explain) I have felt shy of doing so.  But then I was encouraged by two awesome women (from here and here) so have found the courage.

Doing a very quick search on the world's premier online market place (UK site) I found that there are at least 1,265 books of baby names.  You can get books of "unusual" names, Armenian names, Gaelic names, saints' names.  You can get bumper books, little books, greatest books, modern books.  But mostly you get the idea -  the naming of children is a very important matter.

A and I never knew Starchild's gender but I believed at the time and later (when pregnant with Bean) was convinced that he was a boy.  So in our hearts we gave our son a name: Zachary Joseph MySurname.

We found out for sure that Bean was a girl only after she had died (we hadn't wanted to know at  my 12-week scan).  Her name is Matilda Tui MySurname.

We never got that far with our Little Stars so they will always have to remain nameless.

Zachary Joseph, Matilda Tui, Little Stars.  "I'll love you forever, I'll like you for always, as long as I'm living my baby you'll be."

four candles

I think we all know that this ALI community we are part of is amazing.  I know that we all support and find support here.  I know that I have "met" some wonderful women and I know that I would not have made it through so much of these past 12 months without you all.

I know all of these things but I was still amazed and moved beyond words when I got an email to tell me about this.

These are for my babies.

Jenn - thank you.  It means more than I can say.

punched

This afternoon A was doing a back-up of all our photos and videos, clicking on the odd one now and then as he went.  Before I could stop him, he clicked open an untitled video he took of me in early April 2008 at the top of the Sk.y T0wer in Auckl@nd.  It's quite an ordinary video, I'm just walking on the glass floor and staring down.  But it's the commentary.  A is talking to Starchild-in-the-future, saying "there's mummy, isn't she pretty?"

It punched us both in the stomach.

different world

I sometimes (*cough*) think about What Might Have Been.  I wonder what our life would be like if I hadn't lost Starchild and he (we didn't know if Starchild was a boy but I was convinced) was going to celebrate his 2nd birthday next month.

Or what our life would be like if we hadn't lost Bean and we had a 15-month old daughter lighting up our days.

Or what if we hadn't lost both our Little Stars in December and we would be currently sleep-deprived and ankle deep in the nappies.

I've fallen a bit in love with the many worlds theory lately because it says that somewhere there are universes where all of those things are real.

day 16: a song that makes me cry

I have three songs that make me cry. They are all associated with different times or events, and I couldn't decide on one in particular. So here they all are:

"She G0es On" by Cr0wded H0use.
This belongs to my BFF Kay. She was in her final illness and her husband (Marathon Man) and I were at her bedside. Kay suddenly asked Marathon Man to sing this song to her, which he did. She said that it would always remind her of an afternoon only a couple of months previously when the three of us were sunning ourselves in their back garden, Marathon Man absorbed in the sports section of the Saturday Gu@rdian while Kay and I were working on the short story we were writing together. When Kay died, this song was the one Marathon Man chose to play at the start of her funeral. It was years before I could listen to it again.

"Lean 0n Me" by Beth Ort0n.
After Kay died Marathon Man and I became very close friends. We would talk to or email each other every couple of days and would spend weekends together several times a year. The weekends were invariably fuelled by wine and music and each night lasted into the small hours of the following morning. One of those Saturday-night-Sunday-mornings was played to a close by Marathon Man picking "Lean on Me". As he lined up the track he said that the song always brought me to his mind because he had leant on me since Kay died, and that he "genuinely believed" that I saved his life in those early dark and despairing months.

"Fix Y0u" by C0ldplay.
I played this over and over and over again in the days after losing Starchild, just for the lines "and the tears come streaming down your face, when you lose something you can't replace".
It is made worse because I can't stand this band or the constipated-piglet vocal stylings of the lead singer and I hate that they are the ones responsible for this song!

30 day blog journal: day 8

I'm at home sick today, coughing up bits of lung (re-vol-ting) and I can't watch tv because A is working from home in the living room (tube strike avoidance) and I'm bored.

So, after a month's hiatus, I thought I would resume the 30-day blog journal meme which I paused abruptly after day 7.
Day 8 - a photo that makes me sad. Well, it had to be really. Ironically it is a photo taken on the happiest day of A's and my lives - the morning we found out I was pregnant with Starchild.

whimpering

I know that I am on holiday in a lovely part of the world and I should really get over myself but...I'm blue. Very blue.

Significant Other is barely speaking to me and spends most of his waking time lying on the bed in our room, leaving me to pretend that everything is fine to his parents.

My tummy hurts and I have constant nausea.

I'm back in the same state as where we lost Starchild 2 years ago. And even though we are an hour away from where it all happened (Brisb@ne), every time I turn my head I seem to be back in 2008.

I know that this is pathetic but - I'm thousands of miles from home and I could really do with a hug, dear Interwebs.