The loss with a miscarriage is a lot the loss of dreams, but that loss is compounded with the guilt and at times self loathing that comes from believing that the only thing that life needed was your protection and you failed it horribly! I personally struggled with that for a very long time. To have your children die and fall from your body, is not something you get over real quick, if ever to be entirely honest. I still have moments where I don't understand what I did wrong. Where I grieve and guilt swarms my heart. Yes I know all the medical facts of miscarriage, so please don't try and tell me I did nothing wrong, it doesn't matter and it doesn't help. I still feel what I feel. However, I've been thinking about those particular babies recently, Lucas and Grace were the names chosen for those little lives and though I never got a chance to count how many fingers and toes each had, and I never knew what color their eyes or hair were, I never saw them or heard their hearts beat, they were very alive to me and to a degree they still live with me to this day.
Through all this I had no one really to cling to, no one to help me through the pain, no one who really even cared. My husband was dealing with his own issues, my sister and I weren't speaking, my mother was mostly concerned with how this was going to affect her life in someway... it was a really dark time in my life and through my pain, I hurt the two wonderful children I already had, because I was not able to be there for them for nearly a full year and those scars still exist on each of us today.
Though both my children couldn't have lived, because had I not lost the first one, I never would have become pregnant with the second, that was just physically impossible --my second baby only existed because my first had died-- I grieve the loss of two souls, but I also feel the presence of those souls here with me like soft whispers and most recently...
I've been seeing how their purpose in this life was never to live in this world at all. Their purpose was to push me down a life path I never would have found if not for them.
Being a wife, mom, and homemaker, were all I really ever wanted to do from the time I was a child. I still feel as though I was created for that task and should have excelled at it. So many dreams of my marriage and our family never became more than that, dreams and though I will never say I'm glad my babies died, I have come to a place of peace realizing that they were never intended to live any longer than they did.
Their purpose was not to do great things personally in this life. Lucas was not to become a neurosurgeon saving countless lives. Grace was not to become a classically trained musician touching the souls of millions as she sang or played an instrument in one of the premier orchestras of the world. Theirs was to touch only the lives of those of us who knew them, if only briefly.
So much of my life since that point has been spurred on by them. I only pursued getting published because focusing on that eased some of my pain. I left my husband after those miscarriages and though I won't say I've built a successful life on my own-- yet-- I will and that would not have happened if they had lived. I never would have left my husband if I'd had young children. Those babies giving up their lives and what they could have done in this world, to change my life trajectory, only makes them more precious to me. Without them I would not be here now. I would not be headed to Florida, and though I still can't quite explain it, I know Florida is destiny for me. Something important is there, something I'll do or find or become... but it's essential to my life's journey to get there. It took those little lives to set me back on course from the detour I took twenty years before settling into a marriage and a life that wasn't the right fit for me.
Florida isn't just about me, or about living a life of comfort and beauty. It isn't just about fixing things for my living children, it isn't about the hope of finding my soul mate, or becoming a hugely successful author, its about allowing Lucas and Grace to fulfill their destiny. They gave up their lives to wake me up and though its been a slow awakening, I'm getting there. Everything coming together as it is now is like my life coming full circle back to seventeen when I made the first of many HUGE mistakes and took my life off line. That cannot be a coincidence. The opportunity to do things differently, to take your second chance and grab for the brass ring, that's a gift and I'm humbled to the core of my being over being given that gift.
Florida will be the greatest honor I can give those lives. When I think of achieving the dreams and goals I have set, I can feel them smile, I can sense their joy and how pleased they are with the choices they made. I am so grateful to those little lives and the never ending gifts they have given me. I've been in a place of weakness for a long time now. I took a beating the last few years that left me lifeless on the floor, but I'm coming back from the ashes. I'm stronger. I'm more determined. For myself, my god, my Alec and Finneus, and for my Lucas and Grace... I will see this through. I will find my strength again and get back on track. I will see Florida come the spring.
Thank you Lucas. Thank you Grace. Your gift will not be lost. I will love you always. ~ Your mom here on Earth.
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