How you've changed me...so far.

via smallbirdstudios

I've spent a lot of time lately talking about how much I miss you. 
I've told people about the ache in my heart, a space that is painfully absent without you here.
Sometimes I burst into tears, often without warning. I have to cry my hurt out, every last drop, before I can continue living in my day. Otherwise, the agony of grief will clamp down on my chest like an iron vise, not allowing me to move forward.
I sometimes don't feel like my motion is even forward. It feels more like I'm maintaining, or floating.
But not a good, riding-the-Dumbo-ride-at-Disney-World sort of floating.
This is the floating you feel when you have the flu, after you've puked your guts out.
That light-headed, nearly passing out sensation of exerting every last cell of energy.

          (I don't know why I speak about such things.

          It's not as if you have any clue of this type of misery, my sweet Carlie Wren).

***

What I haven't talked about is how much you have changed me. 
Some people might not understand my need to "pay it forward."
After all, wasn't I in misery the majority of the time?
The answer is, yes and no.
In times when nurses were fishing for blood in my veins, leaving harsh bruises on my skin and offering little sympathy, I suffered. I cried. 
Sitting with my head nearly at the ground, my legs sticking straight up in the air for ten days, wasn't the most comfortable position for sleeping.  Many nights I tossed and turned, tormented by my own thoughts and inability to find the comfort I so desperately needed.
Bathing every third day, my hair becoming an angry knot of dreaded tangles.
 Maneuvering a bed pan and avoiding getting up at all, trying to defy the gravity that was working against us.
Being confined to one room, where little sunlight drifted in, knowing that my baby girl had a zero chance of survival...those were some of the darkest moments of my existence.
Each day we clung to hope, only to be told you were further into my cervix, and that it was "just a matter of time" before you passed on to heaven.
I wept with the fury of a mother who felt her baby slipping away, yet was powerless to do anything to prevent it.

 Maternal instincts are so useless in times like these.

I'd never been a patient in a hospital, and with each new revelation of hospital life, I was scared.
Catheters, I.V.s, spinal blocks, epidurals, and blood transfusions were all introduced to me for the first time.
I shook with my fear. I felt like each time I'd finally experienced peace through recovering from one procedure, another wave of terrifying experiences followed.

You want to know the crazy thing about experiencing the worst pain of your life, trudging through the blackest days, and somehow surviving?
It makes you appreciate more.

Showers were heaven on earth.

One night, a sweet, angelic nurse named Kristy, along with my mother and Wesley, helped wash my hair. I hung my head off of the side of the bed, laughing at the absurdity of the moment. It was so full of tangles, Wesley and my mom had to work on my head of hair for a good 45 minutes before a comb could travel through the strands without catching painfully.

After sponge baths, Wesley would put lotion on my legs, perpetually itchy due to the circulation cuffs that were on them nearly 24 hours a day.
I felt like I'd had a day at the spa.

My mouth burned with thirst as I labored. As my mom placed ice chips on my tongue, I'd let out small sighs of contentment as it felt like pure heaven was dissolving inside my mouth.

As I held my blood-tinted baby girl, I marveled at how much she looked like a tiny, carbon copy of her daddy. I flooded her forehead with kisses, feeling like no kisses were ever enough. My lips still long to press against her frail skin, taking in her scent and studying her features. 

Little things became grand, breathing life into my body.

Recently, my heart has been pulled toward those other mothers on bedrest in the hospital, fighting for the lives of their babies. I wonder how many of those beautiful women have someone to pamper them as they lay in bed.
The wheels started turning.
What if I could talk to the hospital and, with their permission of course, set up a volunteer service where I came to the hospital and did something as simple as pedicures?
(I'm horrible at painting toes, but I'm willing to try harder).

Then, I started thinking about how many women lose their sweet babies, just as I have, and don't get pictures.
I can't imagine how my grieving process would've gone (and continues to go) without those pictures to look at several hundred times a day. I am so grateful to Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep  and their amazing organization, which allowed me to get professional, beautiful photos of my Carlie Wren for free through Brandy Kemp. Unfortunately, there are a lot of photographers in this area who don't/won't volunteer to do this service.
Then I thought, why don't I take a digital photography class, begin practicing and building a portfolio, so that one day I can give back the same service that I feel has memorialized my baby girl's features in my mind, forever?

You taught me to be brave.
You taught me how to be strong.
You taught me to dream bigger.
You taught me to love people harder.
You taught me to try new things.  
You taught me what it means to have raw faith. 

Most of all, you taught me to be my own kind of free bird. 
And I love you so very much for it.