yoga.

I received this e-mail a few weeks ago and it meant so much that I wanted to share it...


Dear Lynette,

This is odd, writing a complete stranger... I know of you through some mutual friends,  and have been following your blog since right after Olive was born. I've always been too shy to comment, but I've been there, checking in and reading and tearing up...

I also wanted to tell you that last winter, I took a yoga class. A wonderful, touching, satisfying yoga class. Each week, our instructor would say, before we began: "Offer up this moment to someone. Someone who perhaps needs strength, or cannot move in the ways that you can." I always offered up my yoga sessions to Olive, and thought of her the whole way through, during every hard pose and in every quiet moment. I am not religious, but it was wonderful to connect (in some small way) with Olive on a more spiritual level through the practice of yoga...

tears.

"There is a sacredness in tears. They are not the mark of weakness, but of power. They speak more eloquently than ten thousand tongues. They are messengers of overwhelming grief...and unspeakable love.”
-Washington Irving

In his book Lament for a Son,  Nicholas Wolterstoff who lost his son to a climbing accident says, "But why celebrate stoic tearlessness? Why insist on never outwarding the inward when that inward is bleeding? Does enduring not require as much strength as never crying? Must we always mask our suffering? May we sometimes not allow people to see it and enter it?"


Another book I'm reading is "Experiencing Grief" by H. Norman Wright. Here are a few exerts from it...


Tears.
Those tiny drops of humanity. 
Those round, wet balls of fluid that tumble from our eyes
creep down our cheeks
and splash on the floor of our hearts...


They are miniature messengers; 
on call 24 hours a day to substitute for crippled words.
They drip, drop, and pour 
from the corner of our souls
carrying with them the deepest emotions we possess.


They tumble down our faces with announcements 
that range from the most blissful joy to the darkest despair. 
The principle is simple; when words are most empty
tears are most apt.

a friend's words.

Some words that were written by a friend of ours who lost her son at 28 weeks. He was born without a heartbeat.

"Here is something I never knew before July. If you ever hear that someone has lost a little one, pease 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 any pictures I could see?
• who was there with you?
• who was the nurse you left her with at the hospital?
• what was the kindest things 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 this from now on."


Just thought this might be helpful for the rest of us including myself. 


I think we often shy away from bringing up more pain and try to say positive things like, "Well, I'm sure you will have many more healthy ones to come"...etc. But it's strange how much it means to people/myself included who have lost a loved one when someone asks questions about them. It reminds the one grieving that the one they lost matters and hasn't been forgotten.

Space.

This blog has been beneficial for me in so many ways since Olive's early arrival. After her birth it was an easy way to keep family and friends up to date on how she was doing with the new drama arriving each day. It was also an avenue for us to feel their love and support from a distance, and to pray for Olive and us when we were at the end of ourselves.

After she passed away in January, it also was a nice place to come and remember her. To write posts sharing the kind things people were doing for us/for her. To try and put words to the depths of the loss we were feeling. 

But recently I've found myself becoming a bit more self-conscious about the blog. Wondering if on my bad days that I post people will be sighing to themselves, "I hope she can start to move on soon." And maybe that's the truth, or maybe I am making it up in my head. There are a few blogs I read everyday...one of them is written by a women who lost her baby a year ago. Her thoughts and reflections have been/are helpful to me. They help me to feel like I'm not going crazy, and that the sadness that comes over me regularly is normal and ok. 

There have been people who have written me numerous times thanking me for my honesty. Telling me that it has often put words to their own loss they have walked through. So I can see good things that can come from sharing the depths of a very personal and painful life experience. It's rare to peer this closely into the life of someone walking through their pain, especially into the pain of a stranger.

So rare, that other parts of me have been wondering about the need for some quiet space. Space to write, but write alone. Space to share this journey with close friends and family. Our counselor has been encouraging this (the need for more privacy in our grieving) and its resonated well with both Rusty and I.

This responsibility that I feel to continue writing is a bit strange too. It's a one way relationship for most of us. Most of the people reading this blog feel that they know me very well (at least from what I've shared on the blog) and yet I don't know anything about many of you (unless we have a relationship) except your name if you comment, or if you share more about yourself in an e-mail. 

I'm not ready to stop writing completely on the blog. I say this because there are things I really love about processing life through words. However, I am going to take a break from sharing those very raw, in-the-moment, difficult days. Mostly because I don't like the self-conscious feelings it leaves me with. And because I want to be able to take the time I need to walk through this season without feeling rushed through it.

So, the blog will probably continue and I don't know what it will look like. Olive will still come up often, because she changed my life so greatly and because she is always on my mind. All I know is that for now, some space seems appropriate.

Breast pump delivery.

Just wanted to thank those of you who donated breast pumps to the NICU in Chiang Rai, Thailand. Libby delivered them a few weeks ago, and the staff there was very grateful. Thank-you for helping in such a tangible way.

some days feel easier than others.
today is a hard day.

so much to do.
so hard to focus.
all i can think about is you.
i feel like a mess.
scattered thoughts.
confused.
sad.
tired.
missing you so much today.

this pile of sponsorship letters is not getting any smaller
and yet i can't seem to find motivation.

i want to become a better person because of you.
but today i just feel tired and sad.

we need to go and order your gravestone
but i don't want to go there.
the feelings it will bring up in me are too intense.
i'm already falling apart.

we are going to order our grave plots too,
to make sure our bodies will be laid next to yours.
never thought I would be buying my grave plot at 28.
but life is unpredictable and we never know
what tomorrow will bring us.

i miss you.
i love you.
and i will never get over you.

olive's first bath

just missing her so much today. wishing i could have something closer than a video.