by Heather Plett | Sep 28, 2006 | Uncategorized
Before you all run screaming from my blog for fear that I might drag you deep into the pit of despair, I promise I’ll place a moratorium on depressing posts for awhile. Seriously, now that that’s out of my system, I will turn to happy thoughts.
Our life is good. Really good. Sometimes we miss our son, and sometimes we commemorate some of the pain that has shaped us over the years, but mostly, we are a complete and content family. We rejoice in life. We rejoice that even though Matthew didn’t survive, Marcel did, and so did the three beautiful girls we are so honoured to raise.
And because we’re all a little tired of heavy stuff, we decided that instead of a memorial, we’d throw a party for Matthew. First there were the balloons at his grave, then there was the ice cream. Doesn’t every six year old want ice cream at their party?
We have so much to celebrate. Matthew came to our lives, touched us, and then left us. We are grateful for the brief moments he lived in our midst.
Maybe next year, I’ll start a new tradition. We’ll throw an annual “September’s not such a bad month after all” party. Wanna come?
by Heather Plett | Sep 26, 2006 | Uncategorized
Warning: This is not an easy-to-read post and should not be read by children. If you’re one of the children connected to GNF who likes to blog or read blogs, PLEASE don’t read this. You can read the post below this one instead.
Eleven years ago yesterday was quite possibly the most horrible day of my life. I’m not sure on what scale you measure “horrible” when the events were so different, but in some ways it was even worse than the days I lost my dad and my son. It was the darkest, most hopeless day I have ever known. I don’t normally remember this anniversary, but Marcel’s mom always does. She reminded him of it yesterday.
Eleven years ago, I was pregnant with Nicole, our first-born. I had a decent job with the government, we’d moved into our first house that year, and Marcel had left his trucking job and moved into the office so that he could have more regular hours and spend more time at home with his emerging family. It should have been a good time – a hopeful time. It wasn’t.
Due to a combination of new job stress, new parenthood stress (throw in a fairly major pregnancy scare which landed me in the hospital for 3 days), and a condition later diagnosed as anxiety disorder, Marcel plunged into the deepest darkest depression I have ever seen. It was really, really scary. He was a shell of his former self. He couldn’t handle the simplest tasks. He couldn’t get out of bed in the morning and get himself off to work. He couldn’t sleep at night. He paced the floors, and regularly lost all control of emotions. If you’ve never seen anyone in this state before, just believe me – it is completely horrible. There’s no way to describe it. The man I loved was unrecognizable.
We tried repeatedly to get him help. We checked him into an overnight treatment facility, but they didn’t do much for him and he was home the next day no better off. He went to see a psychologist who basically told him he should grow up (which still makes me angry). We didn’t know where to turn. Nothing seemed to help and nobody seemed equipped to help us.
Eleven years ago yesterday, he got up early in the morning (he was starting work around 4 a.m. those days) and kissed me good-bye. I was hopeful. I thought he had turned the corner and was ready to go back to work. The night before, he’d said he’d try the next day. When he said good-bye, he said “take care of my baby,” probably patting my tummy while he did so. I said I would, and I wished him well. And then I went back to sleep, because it felt like life might be returning to normal.
When I got to work a few hours later, I phoned his office to see how things were going. They were surprised at my phone call. They said that Marcel had phoned a few hours earlier and said that he wasn’t coming back to work. Ever.
I can’t even begin to describe the panic that set in when I heard those words. What did that mean? Where was he? Why hadn’t he called me?
I rushed out of the office, shouting to someone that something had happened and I needed to go home. Now. My former boss and mentor heard me and followed me to the elevator. She wanted to know what was going on. I said I didn’t know for sure but that I would let her know. I think she hugged me.
My memory of the rest of the day is a combination of blurred surreal images and sharp crisp moments that are forever burned in my brain. I took the bus home, not knowing where else to go. I started phoning some of the people who might know where he was – his mom, his brother, I can’t remember whom. At some point, I phoned my Mom, partly because in my desperate brain I thought he might have fled to the farm because that was a place where he found peace. Mom hadn’t heard from him but said she was jumping in the car to come to me.
Throughout the day, some friends and family showed up at the house, everyone desperate to help me find him. His cousin came and said that he had driven to all of his favourite childhood haunts, hoping to find him somewhere. Others phoned to say they were praying or looking or doing whatever they could think of to help. Some just phoned to cry or to let me cry. Because we couldn’t just sit still, my mom and I drove to Marcel’s favourite lake – the place where he loved to fish and where he’d always said his ashes should be released when he died. He wasn’t there.
Mom tried to get me to rest, but there was no rest to be had. I think I fell into a fitful sleep at some point. That part’s a blur. I’m sure she also tried to get me to eat. At some point, we phoned the police. They sounded skeptical on the phone, like they were fairly certain he’d skipped town to escape a nagging wife. They said they couldn’t look for him until he’d been gone longer – maybe 24 or 48 hours, I don’t remember.
As I relive these memories, my throat feels tight and my eyes are fighting tears. I hardly know how I lived through that long, long day. It felt like someone had stuck a large syringe into my body and drained every last drop of hope from my life. Although I didn’t say it out loud, I was certain that Marcel was somewhere dying. Alone. Lost. Frightened. Unable to cope with where his mind had gone since the illness took away his will to live.
Late that night, the phone rang. It was Marcel’s brother. “We’ve found him.” He said. “He’s alive. But he’s at the hospital and he’s in pretty rough shape. You need to come here. Now.”
We raced to the hospital. I don’t think J-L gave me many details over the phone, but I found out later that Marcel had checked himself into the hospital. He was very near death after a nearly successful repeated suicide attempt. He had sliced his throat and his wrists, and plunged a knife into his chest. I can hardly type those words, because even eleven years later, it seems too gruesome to be true.
He told me later that he was sure an angel must have driven him to the hospital, because he didn’t know how he’d gotten there. He did remember waking up in the back of the truck, realizing that he was still alive, deciding there must be a reason why he was still alive, and choosing to get himself to a hospital.
Throughout the long night, we waited (his family, some members of my family, and me) while the doctors performed surgery on him. We didn’t know what to expect. We didn’t know how serious the damage was. We only knew we needed to keep vigil and pray that he would live.
Needless to say, he survived. There was no long-term damage, except that he says it changed his ability to sing the high notes and he’ll wear scars for the rest of his life. A week later, he was released from the hospital. We finally found him some good help. He joined an anxiety disorder support group, learned a lot more about the demons that were haunting him, saw a more reasonable psychologist, and went on medication.
He has never suffered such debilitating depression again. Once in awhile, he recognizes himself slipping into that pit, but he knows how to get help now, and he knows how to spot the signs. He’s done a lot of really positive things to fight these demons, because he knows how important it is to live a healthy life – for himself, for me, and for our daughters.
Why am I telling you all this? Well, sometimes the memories are overwhelming and I find I need to write them down. And sometimes I think of all the other people who suffer through depression – either their own or someone they love – and they need to hear other people’s stories to know that they are not alone.
Unfortunately, not everyone knows how to get help and a lot of people still don’t know how to talk about mental illness. For us, it took a near tragedy to learn to recognize the signs. If you’re in the middle of this yourself, please don’t let it come to that.
(In case you’re wondering, Marcel read this first and I have his permission to
post it.)
by Heather Plett | Sep 26, 2006 | Uncategorized
As I’ve said before, Maddie and I have the best conversations in the bathtub. This one happened last night:
Maddie (pointing to my tummy): Do you have a baby in your tummy?
Me: Nope. You were the last baby I had in my tummy.
Maddie: What about Matthew?
Me: Matthew was in my tummy before you were.
Maddie: Is he still a baby?
Me: No. He’s almost 6 years old.
Maddie: What’s he doing right now?
Me: Well, he’s probably hanging out with Grandpa. Maybe they’re feeding cows right now.
Maddie (looking doubtful): But they don’t have farms in heaven.
Me: How do you know? Have you been there?
Maddie: Yes.
Me: When have you been to heaven?
Maddie: Whenever I close my eyes.
Me: And what do you see when you close your eyes?
Maddie: (grinning at me) Flying pigs! (laughs) And flying cows! And flying sheep!
So… what does heaven look like when YOU close your eyes?
by Heather Plett | Sep 25, 2006 | Uncategorized
Yesterday morning in church, I put my arms around a young mother who’d lost her first baby to miscarriage (yes she IS a mother none-the-less). My eyes filled with tears as I expressed my sadness for the life she’d lost. It’s never fair. It’s never easy. And even though I’ve had a similar loss, I never know the right words to say.
Later that day, I looked over at my sister holding her beautiful dark-eyed baby girl. My eyes filled with tears again as I gazed upon one of the most beautiful images in the world – mother and child. In this case, the picture is made more beautiful because it’s been preceded with more than a little pain along the way. After years of perfecting the auntie role, and quietly longing for her own child, my sister came to motherhood late and now wears the cloak with beauty and grace.
It struck me, as I sat there next to her and reached over to pluck Abigail out of her hands, that the “successful” birth of a child almost seems against the odds sometimes. In between hugging the mother-without-child and sitting next to the mother-with-child yesterday, we had 2 families in our home for lunch, both of whom have adopted at least some of their children. One family adopted all four of their children, and another adopted the two in between their biological children because it seemed they wouldn’t give birth again.
I just need to look at my own family to know that babies cannot be planned or even expected – they can only be hoped for. There are four siblings in my family (including me). None of us have had the family we “planned”. My oldest brother and his wife ached through years of infertility before they adopted their first child. The second child they adopted was only in their home for one night before the birth mother changed her mind. After their third adoption, their family is as complete as it can be while there’s still a hole in it from the one that didn’t stay.
My second brother and his wife had 2 sons in quick succession. They hoped for more, but cancer took that hope away. We are so grateful that my sister-in-law survived the cancer, but we know that there’s still a tiny hole in their life too.
We have our hole too. After 2 beautiful daughters, our son was born lifeless. This week, we remember his sixth birthday. About six months after we lost him, we miscarried another baby. The next year, Maddie brought us joy and comfort after our losses, but while I was pregnant with her (and for several years after) I had an irrational fear that we would lose her too. When you’ve lost one, you keep company with death, and you are forever reminded that life is temporary. It didn’t help that we lost my dad, my uncle, and my grandma just over a year after she was born. The grim reaper seemed too close at hand, and Maddie seemed almost too precious to stay. When she was diagnosed with a heart murmur, I thought my fears would be realized. She’s four now, and couldn’t be healthier, but that doesn’t stop the irrational fear from surfacing now and then.
As I mentioned earlier, the fourth in my family, my sister, waited for years to become a mom. In between, she nurtured her nieces and nephews, but always had to go home alone. The fact that she’s a mother now doesn’t make that pain any less relevant.
When I look around the blogosphere, I’m reminded of the same thing. Anvilcloud and Cuppa rejoice in their daughter’s pregnancy, but this is only after long months and years of living with the pain of infertility. Karla lives with the same fear I did while she goes through her third pregnancy. Her first baby, Ava, lived only a few short hours. Her second pregnancy ended in miscarriage. Gina longs to have a second child, but health concerns have made that difficult. Those are just a few of the examples I’ve come across. I’m sure there are others of you who have unspoken pain. Some of you, for example, may cringe a little when you look at pictures of my daughters because it may not seem fair that I got to have three when you had none. I don’t know your pain, but I validate it none-the-less. (And if I have shown insensitivity in any way, by talking too much about my children and not leaving space for your reality, please forgive me.)
My heart aches for each person whose life didn’t go quite according to plan – for those who lost babies, those who lost hope, those who cried alone in their rooms when other people brought babies home, and those who had to give theirs up because of circumstances outside of their control. Sometimes, we are fortunate enough to birth and raise our babies, but sometimes we have to live with a different reality.
For all of you who have children, remember to be grateful. Hold them close and enjoy them. Be mindful of the moments you have with them. Don’t take that for granted.
For those whose children didn’t get a chance to grow up in your home, if you feel comfortable doing so, please share their names or stories in the comments, and I will commemorate them the next time I visit my son’s grave. For those whose longed-for children remain only a dream, I’d like to remember them too.
On September 27, our son Matthew would be six years old. When I visit the menagerie at his grave this week, I’d like to take with me each of the names of your beloved missing children – whether they died, went away, or lived only in your dreams. You can simply send me a name, or you can send me a poem or some other memento. If you want to post something on your blog, let me know and I will print it and bring it with me. If you had an early miscarriage, and never got around to naming your child, you may want to consider doing so now. A name can be a powerful way to make the memory or dream of your child more real and your pain more valid.
If you don’t feel comfortable sharing in the comments, send me an e-mail instead. If your pain is too raw or too personal, I will respect your privacy.
I will try to honour each of your children and your memory of them in a fitting way. I will post a picture of whatever mementos I place at the grave. If you do not have a sacred space for your memories or your sorrows, I hope this can serve as a virtual memorial for you.
