Her Milk.
(part 2)
Yes. YES. YES it would have been OK.
It would have been absolutely OK to have gently compressed my breast to release a single drop of colostrum. To watch it slowly come forth and then slowly release and drop upon her darkened lips...
Maybe there would have been, could have been some magical elixir within the properties of her milk to revive her stopped heart, something that science would not ever be able to explain to ever so gently rock and palpitate her blood...rushing surges of the life giving milk that was meant only for her. Perhaps as her mama, with the milk coming into my breasts there could have been a glimmer of miracle milk!
Many who know me now, as I am, as a Mama to my living child know of my loss but I don't know that they are fully aware or think about this part of my loss. I don't know that many people who knew me then, friend or family even gave a thought to the additional loss that losing Birdie's milk felt like. It was a double heart break, a second shattering of the future.
In hindsight it feels as though the importance of her milk was completely ignored because "they" were scared of allowing it to come. I don't know that I was. I don't know that I really thought about it until those around me were trying so many things to get it to cease.
NOW. I want her milk back. I want her milk to rush in, I want to know what that first experience of engorgement. I want her milk back.
OK. So, now that I have gotten here, now that I am in this head space knowing what I now know about Mama Milk and the MAGIC it really does behold I can share that there is a glimmer, a whisper of Birdie's milk that is still present, it is present every single time that Holdyn nurses from my breasts...as after each birth of a baby the Mama's breasts lay down more Oxytocin receptors. So, when I think about the loss of being able to nurse her, the loss of her milk coming forth, it comes forth now for her little brother and in a very generous way even now 2 years after his miraculous birth...her milk is here now in harmony with his milk.
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Friday, October 22, 2010
Her Milk.
(part one)
I have been thinking about Birdie's milk a lot as my nursing relationship with Holdyn so lovingly continues on it's path. I have been thinking about Birdie's milk more after I took part in a SHARE parent panel that was speaking about baby loss to hospital staff/nurses/doctors/doula's etc. a few weeks ago. While I always truly love to speak of my bird, of course speaking about the experience of the events leading up to her death brings so much to the surface...emotions that now 3 years later, as Mama to a living child are quited a little.
It has been a long time coming for me to really speak to this. As I sit here now, quite in my home, on the couch...I think hard back to the talk, the chatter around me, the almost rush to protect me from the milk that would come. My little bird's milk, HER MILK. Milk that she couldn't suckle to remove from my breasts, and milk that I was encouraged to almost immediately to slow from coming if not stop it from coming. I asked one time if maybe I should donate my milk to help another, I was gently discouraged from this.
I wish that I had not been. I wish that I would have been told that that would be OK. I wish that our midwives/nurses/doctor would have had information about milk donation after a baby dies. In addition to the more than 100 photographs that we were blessed to be given by NILMDTS, donating Birdie's milk would have been an additional way to heal. It's only in hindsight that I see how cathartic it would have been.
I can remember the mention of Sage tea as a sort of "prescription" that I would drink to keep my milk at bay, or slow it down. Cabbage and cabbage leaves were in abundance in our hospital room, it was incredibly devastating to have Matt be in charge of making sure that I had cold cabbage on my breasts, changing cabbage leaves numerous times a day for many days. It was beyond sad and devastating to have done this.
I wish I had just let the milk come in as it should have, as it was meant to be there filling my breasts, ready to pour forth to my sweet smelling newborn.
But there was no baby to suckle at my breasts, no baby to give this incredible living food too. No.
I wish that I would have held strong to my instinct to see my breasts fill, to allow my body to feel what would have been, I SO badly wanted to see what my milk looked like, would it have poured forth as I took a scalding hot shower after scalding hot shower? Would it have been creamy white? Yellow?
Would it have been OK to squeeze some colostrum out and into her mouth...?
YES. YES. It would have been OK.
(part one)
I have been thinking about Birdie's milk a lot as my nursing relationship with Holdyn so lovingly continues on it's path. I have been thinking about Birdie's milk more after I took part in a SHARE parent panel that was speaking about baby loss to hospital staff/nurses/doctors/doula's etc. a few weeks ago. While I always truly love to speak of my bird, of course speaking about the experience of the events leading up to her death brings so much to the surface...emotions that now 3 years later, as Mama to a living child are quited a little.
It has been a long time coming for me to really speak to this. As I sit here now, quite in my home, on the couch...I think hard back to the talk, the chatter around me, the almost rush to protect me from the milk that would come. My little bird's milk, HER MILK. Milk that she couldn't suckle to remove from my breasts, and milk that I was encouraged to almost immediately to slow from coming if not stop it from coming. I asked one time if maybe I should donate my milk to help another, I was gently discouraged from this.
I wish that I had not been. I wish that I would have been told that that would be OK. I wish that our midwives/nurses/doctor would have had information about milk donation after a baby dies. In addition to the more than 100 photographs that we were blessed to be given by NILMDTS, donating Birdie's milk would have been an additional way to heal. It's only in hindsight that I see how cathartic it would have been.
I can remember the mention of Sage tea as a sort of "prescription" that I would drink to keep my milk at bay, or slow it down. Cabbage and cabbage leaves were in abundance in our hospital room, it was incredibly devastating to have Matt be in charge of making sure that I had cold cabbage on my breasts, changing cabbage leaves numerous times a day for many days. It was beyond sad and devastating to have done this.
I wish I had just let the milk come in as it should have, as it was meant to be there filling my breasts, ready to pour forth to my sweet smelling newborn.
But there was no baby to suckle at my breasts, no baby to give this incredible living food too. No.
I wish that I would have held strong to my instinct to see my breasts fill, to allow my body to feel what would have been, I SO badly wanted to see what my milk looked like, would it have poured forth as I took a scalding hot shower after scalding hot shower? Would it have been creamy white? Yellow?
Would it have been OK to squeeze some colostrum out and into her mouth...?
YES. YES. It would have been OK.
Monday, October 04, 2010
2 Years
My boy, sweet snuggly delicious little Holdyn is now a 2 year old.
How did we get here? I can still feel the surge of adrenaline and hormones rushing through my body when I recall his birth. I can still feel that insanely intense pull for want of my baby to be right there with me as his lungs were quickly checked by the pediatrician immediately after birth...I can feel that rushing of tears, hot tears, tears of joy, tears of a most tremendous love for the baby that lived, our baby. Our MIRACLE, our Holdyn.
This tremendous boy, this bright, compassionate and empathetic boy, he has grown. I see the evidence of who he will become. I am passionately and patiently encouraging a child of wonder and joy...the freedom of exploration is molding him into a beautiful person, a self reliant and self confident boy. He is a lover of nature, of animals, of books of music. Surely, Holdyn is nothing short of AMAZING.
There is so much love poured into each day with my boy. There is the tremendous love that I have for him, and in addition the tremendous love for my Birdie. All of this love is just so huge that my words here will never properly be able to express or describe the true nature and size of the love that I behold for Holdyn.
Does this make any sense? What I want to say is that because of my loss, because of my first experience as a mama that I feel a doubling or layering of love for my boy. There was so much love that I never got to give to my girl...
Oh, my Holdyn my beloved one. You are so trusting of yourself, and of your world. To watch you play and experiment in nature is so very heartwarming and lovely. Your curiosity is so free and seemingly endless. You are teaching me so much, you are teaching me to follow my curiousities and re-embrace creative endevours...your gentle way, your gentle soul makes me want to be a better person and strive to become only the best most gentle mama that I can.
Your ability to speak in complete sentences is remarkable, you can count 1 to 10 (and then some), you can say the AbC's (which you do randomly at your leisure)...you recite humpty dumpty and little miss muffett among other nursery rymes and snippets from books and songs. Your intelligence is very apparent and reafirrming to me that simple choices we have made in raising you are being realized through your nature, your personality, your bright starlit way about you.
You speak of your sister, you speak of her in gentle ways...
At random you spoke of her a few weeks ago, "Birdie died" you repeated slowly and lovingly as we cooked dinner together. My heart melted as you spoke those words, and then we talked for a bit about Birdie.
You are a wise soul. You are my world Holdyn (of course Papa is too!), but without you here, now, I don't know who I would be...if I don't know how I would have been able to carry on with the weight of your sisters death. You, little you, you have brought great healing and joy to our family. You are a miracle of life, you are a wonder that I will forever ponder, and I will continue to snuggle and nuzzle you as a mama bear would her cub for as long as you will let me. I love you forever sweet Holdyn, you are my greatest wish come true.
Happy 2nd Birthday my love.
Mama
My boy, sweet snuggly delicious little Holdyn is now a 2 year old.
How did we get here? I can still feel the surge of adrenaline and hormones rushing through my body when I recall his birth. I can still feel that insanely intense pull for want of my baby to be right there with me as his lungs were quickly checked by the pediatrician immediately after birth...I can feel that rushing of tears, hot tears, tears of joy, tears of a most tremendous love for the baby that lived, our baby. Our MIRACLE, our Holdyn.
This tremendous boy, this bright, compassionate and empathetic boy, he has grown. I see the evidence of who he will become. I am passionately and patiently encouraging a child of wonder and joy...the freedom of exploration is molding him into a beautiful person, a self reliant and self confident boy. He is a lover of nature, of animals, of books of music. Surely, Holdyn is nothing short of AMAZING.
There is so much love poured into each day with my boy. There is the tremendous love that I have for him, and in addition the tremendous love for my Birdie. All of this love is just so huge that my words here will never properly be able to express or describe the true nature and size of the love that I behold for Holdyn.
Does this make any sense? What I want to say is that because of my loss, because of my first experience as a mama that I feel a doubling or layering of love for my boy. There was so much love that I never got to give to my girl...
Oh, my Holdyn my beloved one. You are so trusting of yourself, and of your world. To watch you play and experiment in nature is so very heartwarming and lovely. Your curiosity is so free and seemingly endless. You are teaching me so much, you are teaching me to follow my curiousities and re-embrace creative endevours...your gentle way, your gentle soul makes me want to be a better person and strive to become only the best most gentle mama that I can.
Your ability to speak in complete sentences is remarkable, you can count 1 to 10 (and then some), you can say the AbC's (which you do randomly at your leisure)...you recite humpty dumpty and little miss muffett among other nursery rymes and snippets from books and songs. Your intelligence is very apparent and reafirrming to me that simple choices we have made in raising you are being realized through your nature, your personality, your bright starlit way about you.
You speak of your sister, you speak of her in gentle ways...
At random you spoke of her a few weeks ago, "Birdie died" you repeated slowly and lovingly as we cooked dinner together. My heart melted as you spoke those words, and then we talked for a bit about Birdie.
You are a wise soul. You are my world Holdyn (of course Papa is too!), but without you here, now, I don't know who I would be...if I don't know how I would have been able to carry on with the weight of your sisters death. You, little you, you have brought great healing and joy to our family. You are a miracle of life, you are a wonder that I will forever ponder, and I will continue to snuggle and nuzzle you as a mama bear would her cub for as long as you will let me. I love you forever sweet Holdyn, you are my greatest wish come true.
Happy 2nd Birthday my love.
Mama
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)