Try again?!?!?!

Yep...got that one today. "Hopefully you can try again, and if you do, good luck to you." Hey dumbass...he wasn't a TRY...he was my son! He had ten fingers and ten toes and a beautiful face...and a name...Alex...say it...then tell me I can try again. There will never be another one like him. Can you not understand that I can't simply replace him? My children aren't some sort of interchangeable pieces that I can just try again!

I got this from the internet and I think it's perfect to post today...


A BEREAVED PARENT'S WISH LIST

I wish my child hadn't died. I wish I had him back.

I wish you wouldn't be afraid to speak my child's name. My child lived and was very important to me. I need to hear that he was important to you also. If I cry and get emotional when you talk about my child I wish you knew that it isn't because you have hurt me. My child's death is the cause of my tears. You have talked about my child, and you have allowed me to share my grief. I thank you for both.

I wish you wouldn't "kill" my child again by removing his pictures, artwork, or other remembrances from your home. Being a bereaved parent is not contagious, so I wish you wouldn't shy away from me. I need you now more than ever. I need diversions, so I do want to hear about you; but, I also want you to hear about me. I might be sad and I might cry, but I wish you would let me talk about my child, my favorite topic of the day. I know you think of and pray for me often. I also know that my child's death pains you, too.

I wish you would let me know those things through a phone call, a card, note, or a real big hug.

I wish you wouldn't expect my grief to be over in a short period of time.
I wish you could understand that my grief will never be over.

I will suffer the death of my child until the day I die. Grief is a life long process. I am working very hard in my recovery, but I wish you could understand that I will never fully recover. I will always miss my child, and I will always grieve that he is dead.

I wish you wouldn't expect me "not to think about it" or to "be happy".
Neither will happen for a very long time, so don't frustrate yourself. I don't want to have a "pity party", but I do wish you would let me grieve. I must hurt before I can heal.

I wish you understood how my life has shattered. I know it is miserable for you to be around me when I'm feeling miserable. Please be as patient with me as I am with you.

When I say "I'm doing okay", I wish you could understand that I don't "feel" okay and that I struggle daily.

I wish you knew that all of the grief reactions I'm having are very normal. Depression, anger, hopelessness and overwhelming sadness are all to be expected. So please excuse me when I'm quiet and withdrawn or irritable and cranky. Your advice to "take one day at a time" is excellent advice. However, a day is too much and too fast for me right now.

I wish you could understand that I'm doing good to handle an hour at a time. Please excuse me if I seem rude, certainly not my intent. Sometimes the world around me goes too fast and I need to get off.

When I walk away, I wish you would let me find a quiet place to spend time alone. I wish you understood that grief changes people. When my child died, a big part of me died with him. I am not the same person I was before my child died, and I will never be that person again.

I wish very much that you could understand -- understand my loss and grief, my silence and my tears, my void and my pain. BUT...I pray daily that you will never understand.

LINK

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The same dumbass who told me I could hopefully try again is credited with being my first unsuspecting, "How's the pregnancy going?" It was on the telephone, which accounts for his lack of knowledge, so I'll cut him some slack for that. Too bad he had to follow it up with his keen "try again" insight.

You will be proud of me. I didn't burst into hysterical crying. I took a deep breath, looked up at the bare walls of my office, and said, "I lost the baby." My eyes teared up, but there was no sobbing...and I managed to squeak out a "thank you" at the end of the entire conversation. I really need to get some artwork hung on these walls...it's going to be a long summer.

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Something else I stumbled across on the internet (I was searching for the "perfect" words for Alex's headstone...I don't just obsessively cruise the net for all things stillborn)...

Losing a baby is very different from other kinds of deaths. It is a physical mourning, a bodily grief. One carries about oneself a constant, palpable absence, like wearing an empty knapsack. It is a diminishing experience. It makes you weak, depressive and slightly agoraphobic.

And it is terribly lonely. You are ostracised from the world of pregnancy and of motherhood - pregnant women and new mothers are the first to shun you - and you fast learn that it is unwise to discuss your baby or your body with anyone. To do so is to invite them to say the wrong thing. What has happened to you is unimaginable, and so, unwittingly, people say the most grievous things.

I was so shocked the first time I walked down a street not pregnant and someone bumped into me. Pregnant women are hallowed beings for whom crowds part, cars stop, strangers smile. But just as a pregnant woman is a sacred object, so a mother of a dead child becomes an object of fear, a pariah. She is the embodiment of every pregnant woman's worst phantasms; she is a living death.

LINK (an interesting read for those of us with online "relationships" that have developed out of our own personal nightmares)