13

I know there is much to celebrate right now.  I know that this day is a happy one for many. 

If I'm being honest, it's not for me.  The dates between January 26 and January 29 are possibly the most painful of the year for me.  It has been 13 years today.  I have two children who have been incredibly loving and fun today.  I've run my fingers over the beautiful skin of my husband, kissed the golden curls of my littlest love and had deep and beautiful conversations with my big boy.

But there is a little piece of my heart that none of them can have.  It belongs to you, my first little love.  It's yours and yours alone.  You have two brothers now - and they are wonderful.  I wonder which of them you would have been like?  Would you have been sweet and tender and earnest like Alexander?  Would you have been ebullient and mischievious and fierce in your love like Samuel?  Would you have been like me or your Daddy?  Or a mix of us both?

I think about you, you know.  All the time.  I don't want you to think that because I don't talk about you much, I've forgotten.  I'll never forget you.  Not ever.  It will never matter where my life takes me, whatever joys or losses I suffer - you will be there, nestled in that part of my heart that is only yours.

You were our first.  You were the first thing your Daddy and I created together.   So young, so in love, so scared and excited we were to meet you.  Such wonder we felt at the thought of you growing inside of me.  Real tears we shed at the pictures of you on that ultrasound- healthy, heart beating, moving around.  Daddy saved that picture for me, packed it away, taking it out those times I really needed to see it.

You were gone just days later.  Born into my hands where we sat, together, just you and I.  I cried, my tears falling onto your beautiful, perfect, tiny little body. I told you how sorry I was to have let you down.  I'm still so sorry.  Losing you is still my life's biggest regret.  I have lost 3 more since you, my little love, other brothers or sisters. 

Is it wrong that you are different? It's not just because you were my first, little one.  It's because I held you in my hands.  I touched you, examined you.   You were perfectly formed, but only 13 weeks along.  Isn't it amazing what can be created in such a short time?  Not just the miracle of your body.  But the bond I felt (feel) to you.  I knew real, unconditonal love for you the moment I knew you existed.  And I felt raw, horrific, soul destroying pain when I lost you. 

I remember the months that followed.  The keening sound of my cries.  I remember that when I started, I simply couldn't stop - collapsing onto the bed or the floor, my soul simply emptying all of my pain, making room for more.

It's not gone, you know.  I recovered, somewhat.  Your Daddy and our friends Kim and Marcus and Jonathan and Vivien and my Daddy - they helped us.  They showed me it was ok to be happy again.  I remember sitting with Kim in her living room and bursting into tears when I realised I was laughing - for the first time since I lost you.  I remember her sweet arms around me, as she let me cry, talked me through it (she had suffered her own terrible loss) and taught me to keep getting up every day.  She helped me work through my anger at the doctors and my hatred of myself.  She's gone now, she died just a few weeks ago, and I've found myself thinking even more about you since then.  She drove me to the hospital that horrible day, me sitting in the back seat, with you cushioned in your little box.


Daddy and the boys have gone out with Grandma.  I couldn't go.   Today, and Friday - they are yours. Of course, they are not the only days I think of you - there are so many.  But they are just yours - days I really reflect, remember, grieve.

I miss you.  I think about you, wonder about you.  You'd be 12 right now - starting high school.  There's a scary thought!  I just know you would have been wonderful and we would have loved you completely.  I wish you could have stayed.  I wish I had more than just my memories - as traumatic as they were to remember you by.  I wish I had done something, gotten something meaningful, tangible that I could have kept close to me.

But, I have this: I love you, still.  Always.  And again, Mummy is so sorry she let you down.   You deserved better.  I wish you'd stayed - you were gone too soon.