I'm going to start writing for Exhale magazine...I need to work on my blog at reflectionsofabutterfly.blogspot.com...I need to focus on my family, puppy, classes...

I think I'll be taking a break from this journal...anyone who wants to read me can see my blog. 

Thanks everyone....

Early morning...

I am spending a lot of time out in the early morning air lately.  The wee hours before the sun actually lights the earth with it's warmth are fresh and cool.  The stars seem to shine more brightly just before they disappear behind the light that streams up in golden rays from behind the mountains--like a sunset in "rewind" mode. 

I've never really been a morning person.  I have woken  up slowly, reluctantly, and carefully most of my life, preferring the allure of nighttime to the buoyancy of morning.  When I had babies that nursed, I would cuddle them close in those wee hours, eyes sleepily opened to watch them happily suckling their breakfast, often drifting back to sleep with them in my arms;  A beautiful peace over me. 

This morning, I was caring for a dfferent kind of baby.  Not a nurseing child, but a silly, fluffy puppy who needed to relieve himself after a long slumber.  I walked around the yard with him at my side, and admired the sky's muted blueness sprinkled with enourmous sparkling stars.  The birds were beginning to wake, and the dew in the grass was making my toes moist through the pink flip flops I was wearing.  No cars...no voices...no lawn mowers.....no human sounds except for the flopping of my shoes in the grass. 

Today was to have been my due date had my babies lived.  August 21st.  The day that Ramadan begins. An auspicious day.  August 21st. 

Instead of preparing to give birth, possibly even passing the day with a groan of irritation at being so heavy with child, I am empty.  My babies are gone.  I will spend the day preparing emotionally to spread ashes of what was once living inside my womb.  I thought about the purple and yellow candles I wanted to light for them...and about the balloons I wanted to buy to release into the heavens; a symbol of sending them to my babies who would never see them.  Who would never feel the warmth of my milk in their tiny bellies. 

I was standing there in the dewy grass...the stars were beginning to fade, and tears were on my cheeks.  And then, there it was....warmth.  A smooth warm tongue gently caressing my damp toes.  I looked down and smiled at the sweet face of my baby Old English Sheepdog.  Bright brown eyes twinkling at me from behind an already abundant puff of fur.  I could almost hear him saying "It's o.k....I'm here for you."  I picked him up and held him.  He is such a dear cuddly baby. His weight felt so good in my arms...his baby smell so reassuring. 

I brought him inside and lay him down on his little bed next to my own.  He flopped down and fell asleep immediately, with the quick breathing that is of a baby.  I lay down in my own bed and closed my eyes...hearing his breath....with the crisp wetness of the grass still on my feet. 

It is August 21st...

So...I am "supposed" to be getting better..."supposed" to be getting over my babies dieing...."supposed" to be moving forward....Our culture demands that tears only fall for a perscribed period of time...after that, well, it's just not healthy, right? 

I smile more. I laugh more. I do more. I hold back tears more when possible. I try to think about ANYTHING else without robbing myself of the authentic presence of reality that I am faced with. I am moving forward. Doing my life. Doing Yoga. Walking every day. Homeschooling my children. Playing ABC go Fish...and Clue... Getting a darling, fuzzy, wonderful puppy to love. Being a good mother, A good wife, A good cook. Being outwardly patient and smiley with family, friends, neighbors.

So...why did I hack my hair off in tears? Jagged clumps on the floor of what was once beautiful, long, chocolate and caramel colored wavy hair.... Looking worse with every chop. Why did I start ripping off a tiny mole on my neck in complete agitation? Leaving me no choice but to call my doctor to have her remove ALL my tiny little moles to prevent me from doing it again. Here I am biting my nails, and the skin around the bed of my nails creating painful hang nails....Basically ravaging myself quietly in exchange for the tears that are no longer "healthy" tears.

Went to my hair dresser that I see about...oh...once or twice a year. Took off my hat and begged her to fix what I had done. "Why did you do it?" was her question. I just shook my head and shrugged, not wanting to explain that what I really wanted to do was to shave it all off. To be as ugly and wretched as I felt inside.

She was able to layer it nicely...lots of curls...it looks much better. It feels lighter. No trace of my hack job--except that it is much much shorter.

My doctor, cutting off my moles, asked me "Why are you having these removed, they look fine."
My reply? "because I keep ripping them off."

She looked at me and said..."I'm worried about you."

"Don't be. I'm doing fine...a lot better...really." And I smiled and laughed a little..holding back the tears.  She smiled at me, reassured by my laughter--not seeing the pain behind the smile.  Not wanting to see it. 

And that's what I tell everyone. I'm doing really good. I'm doing just fine. Getting better...see my clean house? See my happy family? See my wholesome cooking? See the folded laundry? The laughing children?

The weeded garden?

See?

You see...I am finally doing what I never could do before....I am neat...I am on top of it...I am in control. Do you like what you SEE???

I am in control of SOMETHING!!!!!

and my curls are laying in the garden...

and my scream is silent.

A good, clean, silent girl...for the first time in my life.
Nothing wrong here....nope...not a thing. All better.

silently bleeding. with a smile.

Somehow, it seems to me that tears are a lot more healthy than this repressed walk that satisfies and comforts the masses.  I think I'll take it back....my right to cry.  There isn't an alarm clock that is set after a loss that says "O.k....you've been sad about this for your allotted amount of weeks, now, BE HAPPY!!!" 

No.  No, that isn't how it works.  There are days of sunshine..and days of rain filled skies.  They balance each other.  I think the days of sunshine are all the more brilliant in contrast to the days of gray clouds.  Pretending that the clouds aren't there, when they ARE, is just denial...denial of reality. 

I am getting better....and my babies are dead.  I smile more each day...and I still find myself overcome with grief.  I help other mama's who have lost their babies find some reason to go on, just as they help me.  We are on this path...we have loss, and love, and tears and smiles.  None are present without the reality of the other side. 

Give me my tears...and let my curls grow again.

The smiles will come later, slowly at first...and then more frequently.  But I will never be the me I once was before I was the mother of dead twins.  I am a new me....a me that "gets" this kind of pain...this kind of heart break.  This me is someone who can hold the hand of another...and understand without question. 

Yes.  I am getting better---and my tears are allowed to keep falling in the sunshine.  That is how rainbows are made.

This morning I made my husband breakfast before he had to go to work. Blueberries in milk, Ezekiel toast with sunflower seed butter....and coffee with organic 1/2 and 1/2. I made him lunch...a sandwich on Ezekiel bread with Cornish game hen breast, grated carrot, and spinach with a banana. We were talking about the day ahead...making arrangements to meet after he gets the massage I scheduled for him way back in June for his birthday. I am taking my 13 year old to his bagpipe lesson...we will go to the health food store...and then pick up my guy down town after the massage.

He was looking at the calendar....and his chatting stopped. He looked at me and said..."Our babies due date is the 21st." I nodded. "That is the first day of Ramadan." he said. I nodded again.

Now...we are not Muslim. But we have made it a point in our home to honor as many spiritual holidays as we can...it is an effort to embrace all cultures..and all beautiful traditions...for us, and our children. In doing this, we try to honor different understandings and also being aware of the similarities between us all-- There isn't any place in our home for "separation" from "others"...because we really don't think anything is separate. Religion has been so divisive...we are creating unity by honoring similarity. We are all one dynamic whole interacting with itself really....I mean...maybe that sounds odd to some of you...but...even on a scientific level that is the truth...on a spiritual level...it is even more true. That is what my husbands book "Being Ourself" is all about. Not just interconnected....one whole.

So...it was significant to me that our babies ashes will be spread on such a significant day for much of the world...the first day of Ramadan. A day of introspection...of looking to the creator for guidance...to pray....and though we don't "fast"...we do often give something up as a marker.
 So, what do I plan on giving up??  I gave up my babies already. I think that was enough."

We will spread the ashes on the 21st. Releasing purple and yellow balloons.

Yes...I think we have given up quite enough this year.

I am sure God will understand.

I can hear the wind blowing through the trees in the night air. A storm is coming. The kids and I took a walk this evening, watching the storm clouds move in slowly as we walked, the wind picking up, the air getting cooler.

The boys are now in bed, with teeth brushed and stories read...and I am here, typing about the weather. But really, it isn't about the weather. The weather is just the catalyst for the story of my heart right now. It is the metaphor for how I feel right now. Like a storm is brewing. Like the rains of my heart are about to burst open in a massive outpouring.

What do you say to a person when they tell you you are lucky to have not been carrying girl twins since they had to die? As if it was more acceptable that they died because they were boys, and I already have five sons. What do you say to a person who means well and doesn't know what to say to such a horrible nightmare situation so says something unconsciously ugly to you?

I quietly replied that I love my boys...that they are sweet and tender and wonderful...and that I would have loved twin sons in my arms.

She waived that away with a laugh..."yes...but at least they weren't GIRLS...that would have driven you insane!"

wow.

The things people say.

unbelievable.

It makes me want to stick my head in the toilet and drown myself just to prevent people from saying things that rip me apart...because, just for the record in case it has escaped anyone...I want my baby boys back. I was happy to have more boys. I would have been just as happy to have girls. I wanted my babies!!! It didn't MATTER to me if they were male or female...they were my babies; and I want them back.

Someone made a mistake...a terrible error...babies aren't supposed to be born dead to their parents. I am supposed to be the lady that is "made to have babies"...isn't that what everyone always told me in response to my big healthy beautiful family? Isn't that the purpose of these wide hips and large milk giving breasts?

It isn't selfish to want my babies back. It doesn't matter that I already have five sons...that doesn't make my twins disposable. We ALL wanted them. We were excited. We were ready.

I'm going to go and hide under the covers and let the lightning and thunder muffle my sobs...the universe can cry along with me....but the one thing I am sure of is that it will stop raining before my heart stops crying. A good thing...because if it rained as long as my tears fall we would all be covered in the sea.

I wish someone would build an ark for me. Sometimes I am so afraid I will drown in this grief.

Maybe my new puppy will like to swim. Maybe he can be my life boat and bring me back to shore.

Painting.  That is what I have been doing for the past two days.  Just painting.  Nothing artistic or anything like that...nothing that required any focus really, or talent.  The covered porch on my house was showing signs of chipping and peeling from the hard winters and blistering sunny days of the past few summers.  So, I got out the scraper and the sandpaper and the primer...and went to work. 

I had this idea in my head that if I could focus on nothing, and just DO that I would be able to feel less lonely for my babies,  less anxious about waiting for my puppy, and less melancholy about the future. 

Scrape, scrape...sand, sand, sweep...prime...

I decided I wanted some new color on the porch...a new dimension to my home of grass green and yellow green...so I picked the color of vanilla ice cream..french vanilla sans the specks.  A nice deep soothing simple color to compliment the house that is the brightest color in my neighborhood. 

The paint had a lovely thick texture and I spent a fair amount of time just stirring it around staring into it's opaqueness.  Not thinking.  Just DO-ing.  hours and hours passed...I was outside painting by the light of a lantern that flickered with the illusion of candlelight.  Then, I woke up with the sun to paint again.  Stopping only to feed my children and make sure my sprinkler was positioned in various spots around my yard throughout the day...I painted and painted...amazed at how many coats were needed to cover the light yellow green that had been on the boards before...4,5,--- 8 coats! 

Not thinking...just DO-ing.

At 6 in the evening, the work was done.  I couldn't even pretend that there was more to do.  I stood there looking at the clean, freshly painted porch..admiring how it looked so soothing to my eyes.  I wished I could paint it again. 

Instead, I called to my boys that we were going on a walk to watch the sun set in the gully right after dinner. 

We walked down into the meadow, where the first rays of pink were settling around the mountain line in the distance.  Entering the field I kneeled next to the rock that would be the place we will soon spread the ashes of one of our twins...the only twin we ever saw or got to hold.  I put some purple and yellow flowers on the rock and closed my eyes, trying to find the quiet that I had held while painting...

I love you...I love you...my heart beat with the rhythm of the words...I love you.

Walking away from the rock I looked up and saw a silver balloon sailing away up into the sky.  My 13 year old saw my smile and commented that he has always found it strange that people enjoy seeing balloons float away even though it usually means that somewhere there is a small child crying that they lost their balloon. 

My youngest son laughed and said "Look Mom...It's going so high!  It's going to heaven!!  It's a present for our babies!"

I squeezed his little hand...and walked on with my boys.

Just DO-ing.

I have had heart burn all day.  Not only did it hurt physically, but it hurt emotionally because the only other time in my life that I have ever had heart burn was during my last pregnancy.  All day long I have been eating papaya enzyme tablets to sooth the burning sensation...and all day long I have felt the lump in my throat that tells me there is a scream locked in there that is unable to emerge.  It feels like are knots in my throat that go all the way down to my heart.  The burning pain is symptomatic of the burning pain I feel every day, all day long. 

I read recently that there is no such thing as "recovery" or "getting better" when you experience a traumatic loss...no such thing as going back, and collecting the you that once smiled easily.  Rather, the you that emerges from the pain is a new you, a you that has lived through trauma, a you that has now been places many others have not been, giving you a new lens with which the world is colored. 

It's not an unhappy thought...in fact, it gave me a lot of hope that though I would not be the same old me...I would be a wiser, more weathered me...a me able to help others who are in pain, because I have been there and back again...well, Actually...I don't really think I've gotten "back" yet...but, I am there now, rather...I am here now.  Here, with the knots in my throat...in my heart.  Everyday I work on uniting the knots...and in the process, sometimes I find out that I've made the tangle even worse...but sometimes...on lucky days...I work on the knots, and suddenly, I realise that I've just gotten one out.  There may be a new one, or an old one in it's place tomorrow...but the point is, I AM working them out day by day.

Healing isn't something that happens overnight...and I still have the scar on my leg from when a little boy ran me over with his bike and skidded out on my leg.  It was a deep cut when I was 8, and you can still see the tread marks today; but it has healed...I do not bleed from that spot anymore, and it doesn't hurt.  Hearts are much more tender...they bleed spiritual blood...they ache psychic tears...they hold pain that throbs against the beat of your natural rhythms, and the stress appears as heartburn, and new gray hairs that seem to sprout overnight.

I made a space for my new puppy today...next to my bed on a 50 year old sheepskin...I put his toys on his bed in expectation of two weeks from now when he will be in my arms.  I sat there for awhile with tears in my eyes.  Had things not been what they are, I would have been placing baby toys in order preparing for my babies to be in my arms.  I am getting to fulfill my nesting urges...I will get to care for a baby pup that will lick my face with love...It's o.k. that I cry for my twins...I know that I will always be sad that they aren't with me in physical reality, and I know that in spirit they will never leave me.  They are my forever babies.  My puppy is a reminder of them, and a soothing balm to my heart which is aching and morning.  I will always have the mark that they left upon me...the scar of loss...but, maybe, one day...It won't hurt as badly. 

Boy....I can't wait to hold that puppy.  He can't be here a day too soon.

I definitely need that no sting spray to sooth the inflammation I am suffering...and it's soft and furry and warm.   

Our lost twins share the names of some very important people in my life. In some ways, they are people who have been a pair of the most significant people in making me the person I am today. My eldest son's name is Sanderson...a variation of the name Alexander. The man who introduced my husband and I is a dear friend named Simon. Simon is also Sanderson's godfather.

Sanderson, who was brought into my life earlier than one would think was a good idea, was a being that altered my world for the better from the very beginning. I was quite young...but old beyond my years. He shifted my entire world. He was a true blessing to me...though...blessings, as wonderful as they may be, are not always easy. Sanderson has been what many would refer to as....high need. Not that HE felt he needed ME....but rather, keeping some semblance of order around his energy demanded a certain caliber of devotion, which I doubt many other parents would have been able to keep up. I am thankful I was so young and naive...it helped me to keep up with the demands of raising such a high spirited child. My son is a person with bi-polar disorder, and also has had a brain injury since he was 17. He has always been bi-polar. It is clearer now, as is the usual case with bi-polar children as they enter adulthood.

Simon is also a person with bipolar...I met him in New York at the age of 17. He was like a brother to me at a time when I felt more alone than I had ever felt before. He was kind, understanding, and enlightening about the world at large. I remember a friendly kiss on the cheek that turned my world upside down. It wasn't a feeling of "falling in love",for, as I said...he was like a dear brother; rather, it was a feeling of waking up. I remember feeling this flash inside of me...a flash of understanding, awakening. Suddenly...I saw the world differently...I saw everything differently. I would never be the same.

It was that opening that paved the way for me to meet my husband...Sanderson and Simon have been such important people in our lives...

and they have challenging mental illnesses.

We named our babies, unconsciously, after these two men....Simon, and Sanderson. Our babies...our twins...Simon and Alexander.

My husband and I cried over this understanding...holding each other tightly, best friends, lovers, partners on a journey that has made other raise their eyebrows in wonder...sobbing about how our babies have changed us deeply; That the people society would judge as insignificant contributors, people with mental illness...premature babies....they had some of the deepest ability to change the way we see the world, and ourselves in that world... because of them, our lives would never be the same...and will always hold a special kind of beauty which we only see because of these special, wonderful, unique people-- People of immensely significant value!! Our babies were small....so very small....but the way in which they are in our lives has, and will continue to be, huge beyond comprehension.

No...not insignificant...not defective..not just premature, or mentally ill. Brilliant. Special. Wonderful. Life altering beings. People with a unique message. People with a special kind of lesson to teach us all, if only we are willing to see.

My heart is full...my heart is bursting with love for the bringers of light that I have had the great privilege of having in my life for any period of time. I want to scream from the top of the mountain my gratitude for getting to have the opportunity to be touched by these wonderful blessings. I am surrounded by their light. It illuminates our world. It changes the future.

That is real magic.

This morning, my husband got out our tennis rackets and took my hand.  We walked to the school just up the hill from our home.  He informed me with a smile that we were going to create a new game.  Standing within a painted circle on the elementary school playground, he dubbed the name of the game "circle tennis"  We took turns serving every five points that were accumulated, and laughed like crazy as we ran around the circle hitting back and forth in flip-flops, trying to aim our shots perfectly so that they would not bounce before the line in the middle, and not hit the outside ring.  It was wonderful fun!  My husband is quite good at tennis, and as such is able to play with even amateur players like myself because he enjoys running to and fro for my not always "on" shots, delivering the play back to me with grace and precision.

When we got to the game point of 25, I was miraculously in the lead, somehow just having a string of luck I guess...or maybe...mini games and I get along better than full sized ones.  I am also pretty good at mini golf, if you can call that a sport.  It may have something to do with my short stature.  Who knows...in any case, I won the point, and my husband cried out with glee that I was the international world champion of circle tennis!  He hugged me exuberantly and said he was delighted to be married to a world champion....and you know what....I really did feel like number one, which was a pretty nice feeling after so many months of walking with my head down, heavy with grief.

We walked home holding hands, chattering about this and that, feeling happy in our love, and dear friendship.  Our sons were playing in the yard happily...everything felt just right. 

Things are not always the way we want them to be, sometimes life is almost unbearable....but sometimes...it is better than you could have imagined.  That is the way of life.  It is what makes things balanced.

Yesterday, I was watering the "Royal Plum" tree that we just planted as a memorial. It has lavender and Coriopsis flowers at it's base...purple and yellow....for my babies. I was going over names in my head for our new baby sheepdog that will soon be here...almost asking my little ones for guidance...thanking them for leading me to a warm puppy for healing. Being grateful for the gift, because, that is how I am seeing it; as a gift from our babies. I was saying the names out loud, to hear how they would sound in the air....Sirius, after the dog star in the heavens? Merlin, for the beautiful magic he is sure to bring our family? Felix, for the luck potion that points Harry Potter in the right direction for answers he MUST have to succeed on his journey? Happy? Lucky? Albert? Owen? Charlie? Baby?....Baby?.........

Tears filled my eyes and I quickly shot the hose up in the air so that little diamond droplets of water would shower my face before my boys, who were happily throwing water balloons at each other wouldn't see that I was crying...again.

I saw the mail lady drive up, and deposit something in the mailbox, so I put the hose down, and wiped my face with my now wet sleeve. I walked over to the mailbox, and opened it up, fully expecting more bills, catalogs and useless coupons for processed food that I don't buy. Instead of what I expected, there was a large box containing formula samples, and a disposable diaper sample. I looked at it for a moment, and then slammed my mailbox shut, walked briskly into the house calling out to the boys that I was going to take a little nap, and that they should stay outside unless someone was bleeding or broken. They laughed heartily at my little command, and I smiled weakly...and went inside to my bedroom, locked the door, and screamed and cursed and screamed some more into my pillow until my throat hurt.

Once done screaming, I started tapping above my eyebrow...an attempt at re-gaining control over my emotions...a technique used for healing trauma...amazingly, it does help! I lay on my bed, looking up that the lavender ceiling that my husband, a man of many many talents, has painted with stars, soft clouds, and a crescent moon...I looked up into these faux heavens, and wondered how long I would get zapped with grief from unexpected jolts that remind me of what I can not have.

Somehow, I was "accidentally" put on the same list as all the other mommies who just had babies when I gave birth to our first dead twin in the hospital, and so, because of that, I get a constant stream of e-mails informing me of my babies age and developmental milestones, a regular supply of plastic bottle samples, formula samples, diaper samples and creams, lotions and baby butt balm that I will not be using. Not that I would have used most of this stuff anyway...I use cloth diapers on my baby's, I breastfeed exclusively and for years, I don't use products on my baby's that have ingredients that I can't pronounce...so, I would have donated these things to the food bank, or teen parent shelter anyway. I wouldn't have kept them even if....even if....

But they remind me that there IS an "even if"....these samples and phone calls with telemarketers who insist I just HAVE to have the newest baby magazine, are a constant reminder that I have dead babies. That Simon and Alexander will never need baby butt cream, or diapers....or anything. It isn't them that needs something...It is ME that needs something. I need them...want them with all of my being. But---I can't have them. No matter how much I want them. No matter how much I cry. No matter how much I BEG to wake up from this hell to find it was all just the WORST dream I have ever had...but only a dream!!

No...the reality is that I will continue to get products for babies I don't get to have simply because our world runs in a "business as usual" fashion. I can write to a hundred companies, but my name is on a list that sells and re-sells to every baby product corporation that wants me to buy their stuff. They will probably keep sending this %#&*! to me for a year or so.

So, I just lay on my bed...tapping above my eyebrow...trying to find my breath again...to steady my heart, ragged and broken, trying to find a happier thought than the one that whispers maliciously "Your babies are dead..." And...there it is...the laughter of my living sons...the promise of my husbands kiss during an evening walk...and the expectation of a little baby Sheepdog arriving at my home on August 14th.

I got up...went upstairs...and made lemonade snow cones for my boys.

The response to my gesture of love was exactly what I needed at that moment..."Mom, you are the BEST!"

This time...my tears were grateful.