but...

(to my dear friends who follow this post who have babies: i realized that wednesday's post might have been misleading, since i didn't quite say everything. i just wanted to add that i do love holding your little ones. and thank you to those who have so kindly offered every time you see me - it's a joy to my heart and to my husbandlove's heart. i think what i was meaning to say was that i feel awkward while holding babies right now because i don't quite know what to do with the little tears of grief in my heart yet. so thanks for being patient with me as i somewhat awkwardly interact with your child. my empty arms long to be filled often.)

today i realized that i am going through another season of grief these past few weeks. i have a whole checklist of undone little things. i find myself putting off emails and phone calls for days. my house is untidy very often. i am late to just about everything. the sparkle has gone out of my piano teaching. the constant whistling wind outside is unnerving. i long for quiet company in my home. i don't get very much done during the day. i am easily teared up by other people's hurts. i forget to take care of my little birdie. i am easily distracted when people are trying to have conversations with me. i am forgetting people's names all the time. . . .  grief is a long process.

i don't want this all to go away, because i can sense my heart changing and molding in ways that are exciting. it is just a long road to walk while the heart-work is taking place... goodnight.

i don't miss my baby as often now. it's nice.

...until i find myself feeling slightly annoyed at other people's babies. i think: "why am i bugged by this little darling?" and then i think: "oh yeah, it's because i'd rather be holding my own little darling." then i feel a little better and not so badly about being slightly annoyed at the baby. i do a better job at interacting with the not-mine baby then also. i feel badly that even though i really want to hold babies sometimes, the longest i can interact with other babies is about 2 minutes. oh well. it'll get longer when it will.

if i think too long about little Emeth, i start to feel funny. and not very sure what to think. i wanted him to have a happy birthday with his Dad tomorrow, and to have fun during thanksgiving, and to visit Washington for Christmas in a little red sweater.

instead, i'm training a puppy and taking an art class.

oh well.

- says my brain. oh well.

there's a japanese word: "Shyoganai", meaning "There is no fault/reason". It's sort of like "oh well". there's just nothing to be done... type thing. i think this all falls into that category.

In my mind, Emeth was born on Sunny September 22nd. So today, he would have been one month old. happy birthday, buddy...

The 3 women who were pregnant around my time are still pregnant. One is due this month, the other next, and the third in December. to me, they all look beautiful, big, radiant, content and restful. that's probably what the third trimester feels like. i only had it for a couple weeks. and looking back, i suppose i did feel that way a little bit from what i can remember. i've mostly forgotten, though.

tomorrow is husband-love's birthday. it's the second of our celebrations that we'd anticipated having the company of our baby. the first was the Chicago marathon a couple weeks ago. i missed him there with me, cheering on his running dad. tomorrow, we'll miss him trying the tiniest smidgen of frosting.

today:

is clean the house day.

my puppydear pooped on my living room carpet this morning. husbandlove and i just stood and stared at it for a while. that sort of has a way of messing up my morning. i've almost recovered.

i'd like to paint my livingroom purple. wouldn't that look nice?

today is the day i feel slightly envious of those with huge washers and dryers in their house. only slightly. because i am thankful for my teeny sink-hook-up washer and my clothes rack outside.

today is the day i wish i were buff and strong. then i could lift my big livingroom rug and give it a good shake and beating outside to freshen it up. as it is, i'll just have to wait for husbandlove to come home from work and do it for me.

first thing on the list: clean the kitchen.

flylady says, "As the kitchen goes, so the rest of the house goes." 

i don't think that's always true, but it is mostly true most of the time.

if you are a lady, please come over and join me for a sandwich today, if you like. if you are a man, you can wait until tomorrow to come over.

i'm eating Trader Joe's Marinated Bean Salad out of the can because i can't figure out what to have for lunch and this was as good as anything else. 

yesterday i woke up and thought, "today, my baby would have been born". just a feeling that he would have come yesterday. it was a perfect day for a birth yesterday - completely sunny, warm and joy-filled.

all day now, i've been missing my baby. right now, i don't feel like having any other babies. just the one i'm missing. my small group in my women's bible study that i go to on Wednesdays has only older ladies. it makes me feel like going since i don't have to be with lots of young mothers right now.

i've been doing great. but these last days have been a little harder. someone said, "it's all the little milestones that get to you..." i think it is - giving birth this month was one of those milestones, and it's starting to get to me.

husbandlove and i are going to pull out Emeth's two boxes of clothes, stuffed animals and goodies we saved up and go through them this weekend. i just want to see everything and repack it, for some reason. i also want to find the precious little bunnydoll we got for him.

i haven't gotten much done today - just a few loads of laundry, puppy chores, bible study, eating bean salad... now i'm driving to teach a piano lesson. then i'll make some supper. then husbandlove and i are going to the park to play with Penny when he gets home from work at 6:30. i hate it when i don't get much done.

i wish my home wasn't cluttered. maybe i'll pick it up for 10 minutes with a timer. i wish someone would come over for tea. i can't think of who to call.

September 18th

was Emeth's due date. i told Kris yesterday that i would probably be calling her about now, complaining that my feet were so swollen, and about how i felt like a balloon, and about how i wished he would just hurry up and come out! probably he would have been late, since my marmie was always 2 weeks late or so. we'd have the nursery all ready, the glass bottles washed and lined up on a shelf, the changing table set up in the bathroom, the baby announcements ready to mail out after we filled in his date, weight, height and time, the family ready for a call any minute, the camera batteries charged, the hospital bag ready by the door, the little clothes washed and hung in his closet, a teacher lined up to substitute for my students, and all that. i'm probably forgetting something or another in that list.

well: as it is, i'm very comfortable and hardly swollen. i'm honestly not too gung-ho about getting pregnant again because all my memories of pregnancy are sort of normal. they're nothing special. nor are they tramatic, by any means. i think i've healed a lot. i just can't remember the joy of pregnancy, really. probably when i do that little test again someday and come up with a 'positive', i'll get the same flutter i did last time. husbandlove will cry again. i'll send cute little announcements to the family again. i'll sew some baby clothes again. i'll pour over baby-related anything again. i'll be impatient for every single day to pass again. i'll smile when he/she starts the little kicks and flutters. i'll go buy a little bunny doll from "bunnies by the bay" company when i find out if it's a boy or girl again. i'll start knitting another sweater again. and i just had a thought: i'll let myself enjoy this next one just as much as though it were my very first pregnancy. (even though i'm glad it's not!)

in the meantime: husbandlove has bought me a border collie puppy. i am having a blast and being overwhelmed by this puppy! wow. her name is Penny.

bye.

nursery rhymes:

today is a day when i, for some odd reason, feel a desperate urge to set up a baby nursery. actually, i've been feeling this need for about a week now. i keep thinking things like, 'oh yeah, the baby bed is just in the back of my closet, so i can get that out' and 'i'll have to remember to put the quilt on the rocking chair' and 'now, did i get a hanging lamp for that corner yet?' and 'let see, should i paint the little room, or just leave it creamy-white...'... each one of those thoughts has to be countered with "no, there isn't any baby nursery to be made. this month is just another month - it's not his due date on September 18th. he was born on July 7th. you can set up a nursery next year sometime." somehow i can't quite grasp this though, and i'm afraid i'll just give in and set up a whole nursery without really thinking about it.

we even had a little lambskin wool covering for his mattress. i have a nice organic wool-wash in my cleaning cupboard. and i forgot to get the cloth diapers....

this is a sad day for me. i'm trying to learn how to stay in my sadness and wait for Jesus to give me peace instead of going into other emotions like anger or despair. it's hard to stay in sadness and hard to wait for Jesus to bring me peace. and hard to counter untruths and disappointments with Truth and Hopes. 

today as i drove to my art class, i saw a little boy, about 7 years old, standing on the corner of the road with his little hoodie on - his eyes sparkling under the shadow of the hood - with a lonesome, waiting-sort-of expression. he was so tiny and precious. as i kept driving, i passed a multitude of children walking to their elementary school. i realized that i would miss seeing my little boy off to school. it was the first of those feelings i've had. i've heard about them from other moms... where i realize that i'm missing out on my little boy's life events - yes, i'll be so overjoyed to (Lord willing!) see my other children off to school, but i miss this little boy!

i met husbandlove's student's mom in the grocery store today. she had two of her four children with her, and is pregnant with her fifth. she's due in December. she saw me and waved and came closer. i asked her about her pregnancy - she happily answered my questions, then mentioned quietly how she'd heard about my baby and she was so sorry. i nodded and thanked her. her eyes filled up with tears as she offered, "well, your weight is coming off quickly..." i smiled, "yeah, it's coming." she didn't quite know what to say, and if it was anyone else but her, i could have been offended. but i wasn't - somehow, in a very awkward way, she got across what she wanted to say, and somehow, i really appreciated her attempt.

it's quite amazing how much a death will mature us. i am very happy with the change the Lord has brought about in my heart since this summer. :)

findings:

we found out yesterday that our little Emeth passed away from Amniotic Band Syndrome. there's a few articles online about it - you can look it up. basically, a small part of the tissue from the amniotic sac ruptures, and attaches itself onto the baby or the umbilical chord. it forms a band around wherever it attaches, and as the child grows, it remains constricted. when on the umbilical chord (emeth had a few wrapped around the chord), the blood supply is gradually cut off. when around the baby, it causes physical deformities. Amniotic Bands around the umbilical chord are a really really rare occurrence, most always causing of stillbirth. It's not genetic, nor is it caused by anything that they can pinpoint. It won't happen to any of my other children since it's so rare. sigh...

our reaction to the findings?... relief. i guess. and sadness... it's a little heartbreaking to imagine my little son slowly losing what he needs to live, unable to cry for the nourishment he lacks. but then the Lord mercifully intervenes into my mind and fills it with the truth - of my little child slowly losing what he needs from me, and quietly falling into the Lord's big, tender hands, gaining all he needs from his Heavenly Father. it's a big, glaring, startling truth that this child had to learn so early - how the world cannot be all we need to live, and only the Lord can give life. i wish i could've completely learned it so early. it leaves my arms feeling (necessarily) inadequate and empty. for no fault of my own, i was inadequate and Christ was adequate. under no circumstances could i have remedied this situation. overall, i am humbled before the Lord. it's a strange life, isn't it?

and yet we rejoice to know that i am able to carry perfectly healthy children. we smile at the nurse's words, "it's just basically unlucky - very very unlucky, you know?" ... she doesn't know it's my God's providence and something far from the trio of fate, chance and luck, but considered carefully and with lots of modification, her words are comforting. yes, we are comforted to find out why he passed... and we have a fresh new batch of 'why's and 'what if's to combat with the Truth. and a new bit of tears to cry.

today's thought

today, as i was driving to my drawing class, i had a thought: i don't even know what it's like to bring a baby home - the joys and the struggles are completely foreign to me. in a strange way, this is a little gift of grace. i had been thinking that losing a firstborn must be harder than losing a second or third or etc born... but you know, it must be really hard to come home from the hospital with nothing when you know what it is like to have a child to hold. i think then, that it's just a different sort of grief. if my inexperienced arms felt empty and aching, i wonder what experienced arms must feel like...

i read Solomon's story about the two harlots who were fighting over one living child with a different perspective today. i suddenly understood the desperation of the mother who stole the living child after finding her own child dead. and of her angry heart as she told Solomon to "go ahead and divide the child between us" - perhaps knowing that if the other woman's child were also dead, at least she would have someone to grieve with - someone in the same situation. boy... i couldn't imagine that case being taken to court today with lawsuits etc. there would have been DNA testing and everything.

i am doing very well now for the last 4 days. yesterday, we found out that one of our guinea pigs (for husbandlove's first grade classroom) is in fact a male, and not a female, as we'd been told. so now, instead of expecting a little boy in September, we are to expect guinea pig piglets in November! what surprises!!!  (i sincerely hope that doesn't sound inappropriate - i do try to find cheeriness where i can!) and what a fun science lesson for his little first grade class! we had the best time laughing after the shocking discovery last night.

today is sunny and quiet. 

to whoever has followed my blog thus far:

our dear little son, Emeth Lander Robins, has gone ahead to heaven and is precious in the arms of Jesus now. he passed at 29 weeks in-utero. we mourn his going - it's very hard to lose a first-born. it's very hard to lose a little one you've surrounded and held and nourished for 7 months. we've grieved well, though. we know this much. and how long has it been now since July 7th when i delivered his little body? ... let me check... 7 weeks. i was so proud to hold him and to be a mother. he was beautiful - 2 pounds 9 ounces - 15 inches long. had his daddy's hands and eyes, his grandpa's feet, his mommy's nose, mouth & chin, his grandma's nose... he was just perfect and tiny. we held him and loved him for a day, blessed and baptized him at a family memorial service, then let him go. i think that kissing his little chilly head and leaving him in the nurse's arms and walking out of the hospital with a little yellow box containing hand/foot prints, his hospital tags, and a little blue cap was the hardest thing i've ever done in my life.

yet we have grieved well. and the Lord has been so so good to us through this all.

here is something i never knew until July 7th: if you ever hear that someone has lost a little one, please take the time to ask questions... what did he/she look like? did you name him? was she just beautiful? tell me about the delivery. do you have pictures i could see? who was there with you? who was the nurse you left her with at the hospital? did you like that nurse? what was the kindest thing someone's done for you in this grief? show me, with your hands, how big your baby was. so when you held him, he was about this big? tell me about how you first found out. what were some of the things you'd done to get ready for her? did you have a crib waiting? was there something very special you'd gotten just for him? something you'd made? what did you pray over your baby while she was in the womb?

i start to wonder how many people i haven't done this for. i hope i remember from now on.

i read this poem today, and liked it:

.............

When loneliness comes stalking, go into the fields, consider

the orderliness of the world. Notice

something you have never noticed before,

like the tamourine sound of the snow-cricket

whose pale green body is no longer than your thumb.

Stare hard at the hummingbird, in the summer rain,

shaking the water-sparks from its wings.

Let grief be your sister, she will whether or no.

Rise up from the stump of sorrow, and be green also,

like the diligent leaves.

A lifetime isn't long enough for the beauty of this world

and the responsibilities of your life.

Scatter your flowers over the graves, and walk away.

Be good-natured and untidy in your exuberance.

In the glare of your mind, be modest.

And beholden to what is tactile, and thrilling.

Live with the beetle, and the wind.

This is the dark bread of the poem.

This is the dark and nourishing bread of the poem.

........by Mary Oliver.

120 more days

this morning, i looked on my i-google pregnancy calendar and read this entry: "You are 22 weeks and 6 days pregnant. Only 120 days to go!" that's not very long, is my thought.

aside from my feeling very disorganized, messy, irresponsible, un-stylish, tired and procrastinatory, today should be a fine day... these are the times when i wish so much that my mom were right in town, and could come over and help me set things right over a cup of tea. plus, you know, it really is hard to live with only 2 pairs of fitting pants (especially when one's dirty and laundry takes a total of 4 days between the tiny washer and line-drying)... well, i have two pairs of sweats, but those don't count.

well then: i suppose i should make a sandwich and do some work in the next 1.5 hours before teaching. the bells are lovely here - everyday at noon they ding away, playing tunes and dongs. love to everyone i know.

eth is quite cheery in the mornings

congrats to me: for two days i have gotten up at 5:40 to work out with eth. he is very cheery in the morning, saying optimistic things like, "well, we'll catch up on sleep eventually" and "wow, isn't that sunrise gorgeous?" and "we'll try to be on time tomorrow - we did our best today" and "it's such a sunny day today" and "boy does exercise wake me up and get me ready for the day"... he smiles a lot too. i don't smile very much, nor can i think of optimistic things to say other than things like, "wow, that bed sure looks comfy" and "i can't wait till bedtime tonight" and "aren't feather pillows soft?". maybe in a couple weeks i'll stop being grumpy at 5:40. off to teach little kindergarteners how to play piano...

hello, we are happy parents of a little boy!

in case you didn't hear, the little one growing bigger in me is a boy! we're naming him Emeth Lander. well, he's already named that, but it'll be legal when he comes out. today Husbandlove knelt down to chat with him. after a few "Emeth, Emeth?"'s, the little buddy started kicking around and doing who knows what in his warm little nest until Eth stopped talking to him. we were excited and smiled a lot. for the first time, i wasn't sure of a completely comfortable way to lean down and tie my shoes tonight.

our new home is lovely. everyone should come visit us now. the rooms that we've finished arranging are the kitchen and our bedroom. next, we tackle the office, then the bathroom, then the livingroom. Pippy (our budgie) is very happy in this home and spends most of her days chirping, fluffing her feathers, chewing her toys, eating, and whistling.

oops, i put my cookie in some milk to soak, then left it in too long and now it's crumbly mush in my cup. oh dear. off to fetch a spoon, then head to bed!

cair.

following along in my bro-in-law's footsteps, here is a new blog for our little family. it's advertisement-free, clean, clutter-free and not as complicated as xanga now is. maybe i'm getting old or something, but i can't figure out xanga's layout any more!

today is baby boo's last week as a in-utero 4 month-old babe. next thursday, we're onto month 5! and in 5 weeks, we will be half-way through this pregnancy. wow. it sure goes faster than we expected.

this is my spring break week, the loveliest week of a long time, by far. we've been able to relaxedly make it to bed by 10:30 ish, spend some afternoon/evening time together and be a little more chill. we've been wondering why i started the studio. :)

i am cramming moody bible courses, lamenting that they are taking way longer than i expected or would like, but sort of enjoying the bible study time i'm getting... and we're getting ready to move, packing a few boxes each day and switching utilities over, and requesting mail-forwarding service to start on May 1st. our new house is a little nest apartment - a studio perched on top of an old building. we're #41, and we have windows on 3 sides. i think our baby will have a happy home.

i finally purchased a watering-can, and am happily watching 8 little marigold sprouts popping up in the planter box by the window. today, i'm going to start my tomato plants - I am experimenting to see if I can get them started from seed. if not, i'll hit the gardening stores in may.

love to everyone.