365

I always look forward to the first Tuesday in March because Jodi Picoult's new book comes out. I ordered it online this time, so I don't have it yet, but usually I go out and buy it the first day it's out, and usually have it finished by the first Thursday in March.

I've mentioned this before... the first Tuesday of March 2011 she is releasing a book where a baby dies. She wrote a cliffhanger about it on her site (where the pregnant mother starts bleeding profusely), and I wrote to her telling her my story, and wrote back "because of your circumstances I will tell you, the baby does die.." I suppose she didn't want me announcing this on the internet, but too bad. I dont follow Desperate Housewives, but I was told by a fellow bereaved mother that they did not write babyloss very well at all.

365 days until I find out if Picoult does any better. I have faith in her... she writes characters so real, I can never put her books down.

I wonder in 365 days if my life will have turned around yet. Right now, although I must admit I'm feeling better than I did in December and January, I still feel like I'm just watching life pass me by, and I'm simply an outsider passing time until I can mother a living child instead of mothering grief and heartbreak. I spent hours making those scrapbook pictures of Kathlyn, and then admiring them, instead of say, spending hours trying to get her to sleep and then admiring her once she finally slumbers quietly. Eventually, I run out of pictures, and I have to start re-using the same ones. Some of them aren't suitable for showing, either. The black and white one, which is the one I used against the black lace and yellow flowers, seems to be everyone's favorite. Or, the one where she has wings against the clouds. But in the originals, her skin looks purple and scratchy against our skin. There were spots on her back which had broken down and were peeling. Her eyelids were different colors from the still, pooling blood, behind her perfect, tiny eyelashes. The one close up of her face, you can see the eyelashes, but only in the un-retouched version. I studied those eyelashes as I knew it was the only time I would ever see them. She also had blood coming from her nose and at times, her mouth would fall open and her neck would flop. That was so upsetting to John, he let out a frustrated gasp every time it happened. She's a beautiful, lovely, pretty little baby, perfect in every way except for the few flaws that showed up because (punch me in the face again with it) she was dead.

So that's what everyone sees. The grieving, yet healing mother. The pretty baby against flowers and pink backgrounds, an angel in the clouds, safe in the arms of her Creator and her Granddad. But I still see the little details, even the morbid ones. I still watch from the outside.. trying to be happy for all my pregnant friends.. which I am, just quietly instead of outwardly. I watch as life goes on, new lives are formed and eventually born, and 365 days ago, I thought I had that too. I'm getting over a cold, so this "watching from the outside" which is normally figurative, was literal tonight at bible study... eventually, as what often happens, the guys end up talking politics or sports, and the girls gather together with the babies, but I stayed by John because I didnt want my germs near the kids. I just can't believe Kathlyn isn't part of the circle of little girls, Mommies, friends... I can't believe these conversations go on so easily without her, even the conversations of her own Daddy. I am free in this group to speak openly about Kathlyn, the dark stuff, the uplifting stuff, the bittersweet, the memories of pregnancy, they don't mind, they always listen, but since I was so tired, I didn't speak a word of her, I didnt say much all night actually. But I never break from thinking of her. I picture myself in the circle of females with a 4th baby girl in the mix trying to get her hands on the same toys as everyone else. Being passed around between loving arms of a close group of friends. Maybe it's bold and wrong to say this as a Christian, but I dont care that she's in heaven.. I believe she's missing out here. Why couldn't she experience life here, with such loving parents and friends, and THEN go to heaven like the rest of us? We would have had so, so much fun. It would have been wonderful.

Someone said something about the earthquake in Chili causing the earth to move one-one millionth of a second faster around it's axis.

I told you so. I've been saying it from the beginning. The earth was totally rocked when my baby died.

365, minus one one-millionth of a second.. so much can change in a year. I lost 2009.. completely wasted in my mind, and 2010 is following close behind. If I'm not pregnant soon, I won't have a baby in 2010 either. It's hard to process that we were barely halfway through 2009 when I was supposed to have a baby in my house, and now I wont even have one in 2010 either?!

With only 28 days in February.. March 2 marks 7 months. 7 months without those perfect little eyelashes.

I want my baby..