How do you answer the question... Do you have Kids?

This was a blog I found and I just had to post it. There are many women that are going through the same journey as I and a couple of my dear friends. This is truley a hard subject to live with.

Thanks,

Well, if you dislike sensitive subjects this may not be the blog to read. In reality, we all have a curiousity about the lives of others. So this is me, sharing an event that forever changed my life, but still leaves me with one question....read on....My philosophy in life is if you can comfort, help, or teach others by sharing your own life experiences than what is there to lose? So, as to my title of this blog...how does one answer the question "Do you have kids?", when you are the the mother (albeit parent) of an angel? Do you say no? Why should you?At some point in your life you conceived a child. I believe that alone makes you a parent. Many may argue that it does not, because being a parent also includes the "act" of parenting. Well then, maybe I'm not a 'parent', but one aspect of this is that I will always be a mother.Ok, so back in time a bit. I was happily married at the time. Husband returning from Egypt after a 6 month overseas tour of duty. Ah yes, we contributed to just one of the thousands of military pre/post deployment baby booms.About 9 weeks later...it all ended. No more discussion about names, the nursery, or what he/she might look like. I lost my first child....a girl. Ironically, my husband and I had only discussed names for a girl. Thus, we had already chosen one. Yet after we lost her, the name only resurfaced during a counseling session 14 years later; long after she left us, long after my divorce was over. It was as if it was taboo to talk about losing a child. My family, my friends, never spoke of "it" or what happened. My paternal grandmother called me in the hospital and said, "I'm sorry you're sick."So, essentially, back to the angel mom part. I am the mother of 6 angels taken too soon. This is a toughy. I've heard all sorts of comments, smart cracks, cruel statements, accusations...more in the beginning. "You're young, you can try again", "It wasnt meant to be", "You need to move on", "you can't dwell on what is gone". A coworker a few years ago even had the compassion to tell me I was "cursed". So I'd like to share some important personal thoughts for all to consider. All parents of angels, moms and dads alike and all those who may one day grace the presence of a fellow human who was forced to say goodbye in some way, to their unborn or stillborn child. A child that was most likely the brightest spot, the brightest hope in the future of another's life.FIRST and foremost, no person knows how you feel unless they are you. Forget the shoes. They have to be in your skin, your heart, and your mind to know how hollow you feel, how sad, how devastated. It is a wonderful characteristic to be able to think positive about such losses or for a well meaning person to offer reassurance such as, "You are young. You can try again", "God will give you a child when He thinks you are ready."What they aren't thinking about when they offer that unsolicited sunshine is the hard fact that there are hundreds, thousands of women (couples) who experience what I did who unfortunately can't always conceive again or carry to term. We hope against all odds that this fate will never reveal itself in our lives. Some are lucky, some are not so lucky.Secondly, you MUST talk about it. If friends or family won't or can't listen, find a group, find an online community (biggest help for me), or find a counselor. Better yet, find another angel mom, angel dad, angel grandma/grandpa. Those who do have children often tend to overlook the devastating emptiness because they are blessed and sometimes forget in the day to day rush of life, that their lives are coming or have come full circle. That is a true blessing. Don't get me wrong. I have no doubt most all parents are thankful and grateful to be blessed with a child. However, that they are graced with a child, your pain may not be as comprehensible.Another hard lesson. When your mom instinct begins to kick in for various reasons...you may also get the hands off signal. Some parents will tell you to keep your parenting advice to yourself because "You don't have kids," or "You don't know what it's like to be a mother." When I think back on the times a person spoke those words to me, I now often laugh. Even if you have a child now and take a trip to the grocery store only to witness some unruly child being ignored by their mom or dad, you have to wonder to yourself, "Give em to me. I can straighten em out." Who is to say that someone whose child is not physically on this earth couldn't be just as good a parent? Everyone makes mistakes. Everyone has to learn. Some learn by watching. Others learn by doing.Essentially, being a "childless parent" is a tough job, but an endearing one. Yet, even though you may feel strong enough to handle all of it on your own, you have to talk about it, you, your child at some pont. If you do not talk about it, it will build and blow up one day...I can almost guarantee it. It is only when you do begin to reveal to yourself that you realize you must heal. Only then can others help you heal.Now for my epiphany. Throughout the 14 years following the loss of my first child, I felt as if I was in constant turmoil. Days on end of crying, wanting to be completely alone, unable to build meaning in my own life because the pain and emptiness had me by the throat. I sought counseling not only because of my losses but for other less pressing reasons, even though some would say the other reasons were just as pressing on my heart. One of my counselors (the first three never talked about the issue at all), got into the discussion about my losses during one session.She asked me to describe my experience. Mind you, I almost felt awkward talking about it that openly probably because no one had ever shown interest before that time. And this was the breaking point. I went through all the gorey details. Details that, today, still anger some of my doctors. My case became more extensive than it should have due to a physician who was quite incompetent (more later).I came to the point in my ordeal of laying in my hospital bed in the maternity ward at Cape Fear Valley Medical Center on the day of my 2oth birthday. I had suffered a life threatening rupture of an ectopic pregnancy and had been internally bleeding for a while. The situation required emergency surgery. I was not even allowed to go home and pack a suitcase or call my family. I had to be prepped for surgery while my then husband contacted our families.It took 4 days of laying in that bed after my surgery before my doctor told me what tube the baby was in. Come to think about it, it wasn't even my doctor, but his partner and some medical students who answered my question. Of course, when the question was posed the students had a look of confusion and understable concern on their faces. But when I asked, I already knew. I knew it was on the right because I felt a "pop" on that side the night before.After my surgery the nurses, aides, and so forth kept coming in my room asking if I was "nursing" or asking me if I'd had a boy or girl. I had a ceserean type incision, so they assumed I'd had a C-section. When my mother arrived, she yanked an aide out of the room and told her I'd lost the baby. The aide was horrified immediately apologized to my mother and called the charge nurse. Upon review of my chart by the charge nurse and my mother, they discovered that the doctor never documented in my chart that the baby had died.The head nurse was LIVID and basically changed the doc from a rooster to a hen with a single phone call. Each time I was asked about my baby, I just stared into space or blankly into the face of the inquiring party. I don't know exactly why. Maybe I just couldn't bring myself to say it. I wanted to wake up every minute and believe I was ok and so was my child.The charge nurse came in with my mother and compassionately apologized for the error. There are days I wish I could find her and tell her how much that meant to me. She advised that I would get much better care if they kept me on the maternity wing, so we agreed I would stay. The nurse asked me if I would like to speak to someone so a priest came to visit me. They also asked a nurse to come who had experienced a still birth. Truly heartwrenching, but still nothing like an ectopic pregnancy. So that didnt help much.I didn't talk until the priest began to leave. He came to the bed, held my hand, and asked with my family present if I had any questions. The only question I had...."Did my baby have a soul?" He didnt answer right away. My dad and brother left the room crying. He asked me a question back, "Well, what do you think?" "Good grief!", I thought. A catholic priest couldnt even tell me if my child had a soul.When I discussed my anger to his response with my counselor, she cut in immediately. "Don't you see. You already knew your baby had a soul." It caught me cold in my tracks. I didn't say another word for what seemed like eternity. I just sat with my mouth open and hands clasped to the arms of my chair.She asked me if we had chosen a name. I told her....Sammi-Gayle Lynn McCullough.She repeated her response but with changes..."So you knew Sammi-Gayle had a soul." In 14 years that was the first time I heard another person speak the name of my beloved daughter. My tiniest one, born into the arms of God on July 28, 1988.We talked a bit more about my other losses. Angels I'd never named. We talked a lot more about how I could begin to heal. She recommended a memorial service, planting a tree, and even suggested talking to my family to find out their feelings. As my session ended, I looked at my counselor and for some reason as we hugged, I knew I'd never see her again. Not for negative reasons, but for the reason of peace. She had opened a door to my life that would never be closed again. I got in my car drove one mile and stopped to sit in disbelief at what had just happened. I kept saying to myself, "I heard my daughter's name. I heard my daughter's name."This next snipit from that epiphany may sound a bit contrived, but I assure everyone who reads this, I can still not explain the emotion or events that followed. I went home, took the rest of the day off work from being totally emotionally drained and cried for 4 hours straight. As soon as I stopped crying, my hand reached for my Bible. I instinctively wrote 5 names (first and middle). The next day, I had no memory of any of those names. I called my sister crying again. "Monica, I need to talk. I named the rest of my babies."She listened. She did not scold me for focusing on the past, and asked me what were the names I picked. I had no idea. I had to get my bible and read them to her. As I read them to her I burst into bigger sobs. Each name I chose related to a member of my family that had been a very special part of my life.My sister cried. The first time I'd heard her cry in all those years. What I did was something I had needed to do for many years. It was the beginning of the healing. I had to mourn again. I had to talk about it, share about it, cry about it. I had to revel in the fact that I had the prestige of being the mother of 6 angels.My mom and dad both received hand written letters about my epiphany with the names of all 6 of their grandchildren. They called me and said thank you. My family encouraged a memorial service. I thought about it, went to a cemetary and spoke with the manager who was so kind. (Sheesh, that's another whole separate blog about that day. Truly an inspiration for me to keep living life).But today I keep them in my mind and heart...and of course my thoughts. Yet, I still have those days..."Gosh, Sammi-Gayle would be 17 today." I wonder what they would look like, what college they would go to, what talents they would have, how wonderful it would feel to hear a voice say "Hi mom," or "I love you Mommy."At times, friends are compassionate, but some friends still don't know about my losses. Then there are the times people say "You can't keep dwelling on it," because I have one day out of 6 or 8 months when I'm a bit down. One day out of a year I shed tears because I can't wrap my arms around my children out of love and the need to protect. Ah, but let me tell you, that's a far cry better than crying or being depressed every single day for 14 years because noone had the compassion, nerve, or selflessness to ask me how I was or ask about my kids.I tried support groups, but the most comfort came from an online group I joined on Yahoo many years ago. I became very active, sharing my story with moms of early pregnancy and infant loss. I made friends with women across the U.S. and across the world I never met face to face. We exchanged gifts at Christmas. I received a handmade angel doll holding hearts with each of my kids names on them. Precious. I still have the first "baby gift" I purchased myself on the way home from my life changing counseling session. A small berber wool lamb with an even tinier bell around it's neck that made the sweetest sound. Then I remembered the saying from the movie, "Every time a bell rings an angel gets it's wings."I had those days in the first year after my loss I felt helpless knowing my baby was alone, without me or her father to hold her. Exactly one year after I lost Sammi-Gayle I lost my darling grandmother to a sudden illness. I was devastated. After a long 9 hour drive I arrived at her bedside 10 minutes after she died. I had to put reason with the pain. God took Grandma so Sammi-Gayle wouldn't be alone. Birdie Click was my Grandmother's name. She was a treasure in my life. She was the only one who knew I was pregnant before I even spoke the words. I called her in the nursing home in Missouri the day I found out. When she answered, I excitedly said, "Grandma??" She giggled and asked, "Oh honey are you happy? Oh you're going to be a mommy!" Again, she lightened my heart with her sweet and charming giggles. I just about dropped the phone, but I will never forget that conversation with her. Sammi-Gayle was the first expectant granddaughter on both sides of my family. Grandma Click was going to be a Great Grandma!!!Today, I'm retired from the support group. I served for one year as the Southeastern Regional Director of PHH (Pain-Heartache-Hope). The support group is now known simple as October 15th, "Remembering Our Babies." We requested proclamations from the governors in every state to declare October 15th Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day. The proclamation was read in the Senate on CSpan. I served the states of Georgia and Wyoming. I had a letter published in People Magazine. I had a large 1/2 page story about my experience and the need for community support and education in the local paper. I had a tree planted in the Holy Land in memory of my children. I had several online memorials and eventually built a large web page that allowed angel parents to submit memorials of their children.I was better. I was healing. I was sharing. I was helping. I was never going to be the same. I was a Mom. I am a Mom. I am the mother of 6 angels.I closed my site as a personal choice. I left the support group because I felt I needed to start living and finding other ways to heal. But those days in that group were so precious, so healing.Today, when asked the all to painful question, "Do You have Kids?", I have to gauge the person who asks me. At times I even feel awkward or uncomfortable. Most times I say no. Other times, I say, yes but they are not living. Which opens to more discussion. Which usually ends up with someone realizing.."Wow , I'm lucky", or "Wow, my life hasnt been so bad."True, I'm mostly past the need to have a child. It's been a hugely large, and hard pill to swallow. Some days I want to spit the damn thing out and keep trying. Yet, those days are becoming few and far between. I'm able to find comfort in being able to recognize that I am and always will be a mother. Nature and the forces of God blessed me with 6 tiny lives I nurtured if only for a moment.Word of advice, if you lose a child, talk talk talk. Dont be ashamed to have a bad day, to remember, or to light a candle for comfort. Write a poem, a letter to your baby, or keep a journal of your thoughts. Create a memorial: physical, mental, or virtual. Online memorial's can be shared with family and friends. Do whatever your heart guides you to do. Then when the time is right, share your story to help another share their story. Just another way to keep your heart and memory of your child safe. The ability to share your experience may touch someone you don't even know. It may actually pull someone else out of the depths of darkness and in to the light they should have been feeling long ago. The light of healing.I nicknamed Sammi-Gayle my "Sweet Summer Butterfly". Those days I see a monarch drifting aloft through the thick summer air, I smile. I feel her. I feel all of them.So those days you see me a bit sad, dont be afraid to ask. Better yet, don't be afraid of my answer. All you have to do is listen. Let me remember. Let me dream of those angels I never met. How can I not feel blessed to have been chosen as the person who gave them life?How can I say I'm not a mother??? How would you answer the question, "Do you have kids?""The angel of the book of life wrote down her coming birth, and whispered as she closed the book, "Too beautiful for earth."To my children, Sammi-Gayle Lynn, Hannah Faye, Christian McKenna, Adam Nicholas, Jacob Richard, and Carly Mee....you are each forever a part of my life.Love, MommyThank you for reading this.Compassion is the key to connecting.