I have no words

Introduction:

I wrote this months ago, a few days after an event shook my life. I wrote it for me, but I have had the feeling I should post it. It is weird to go through something so life changing and not share it. Some have heard, some or the whole story. Others not at all. I kept it pretty personal for a while, but for those I wasn't able to share with I feel like you will not relate to me if you don't know. I am finally in a place where I can share this in a healthy way, where in some way I feel like it is my last step in the healing process.

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Tuesday, October 19th started like any other day. Storie and I had breakfast, played in the back yard, went to the park, had lunch. During her nap, around 2pm, I started to cramp and bleed. When you are 8 weeks pregnant that is never a good thing. I was actually calm. I called the doctor to get information and see what to do. They said it was probably fine based on information I gave them. Two hours went by and my cramps and bleeding increased. Panic then ensued as we started going to the emergency room per the doctor ( and Brandon's ) request. It is now 6:00pm and we are driving to the ER, telling each other that this is a normal thing. We know that bleeding can happen and the end result can be just fine. We also discussed what happens if this doesn't end well. We agreed to grieve hard, to remember that Storie needs us so we cannot loose ourselves in grief forever. We then turn onto Hwy 316 about to reach the hospital as I looked up. The sun was going down making a beautiful sunset. It was shining bright orange with a few scattered clouds. Then it happened, I had a God moment. I have had one of these before in the hospital with colitis. When you have had one of these moments before, you know what it is when it happens again. As I filled with warmth looking at the sunset I felt God whispering, "I am so sorry. This is happening. Life is still beautiful ". Trying to swallow what just happened, I do what I feel was normal and I went into denial. "Maybe my fear made me fabricate this 'God' moment. I am sure everything is ok, I have seen before with other people". We went through triage, explained that my doctor wanted to rule out ectopic pregnancy( where the baby plants itself outside the uterus, and needs surgery to fix) . I had not been to the OB yet, my appointment was in a week, so she hadn't actually seen the baby in the uterus. We were hopeful that we would be seen soon. Those who have been to the Gwinnett Medical emergency room before, know that doesn't happen, ever. As we waited I started feeling all of my symptoms get worse. The pain was unreal. I then realized that this is happening. I started crying like a crazy lady. The ER got silent as Brandon ran to tell the nurse what was happening. I saw them picking up the phone, and another ER person brought me a warm blanket and pillow. I heard the mother next to us telling her kids not to stare in our direction. I didn't care. Previously, teens were being obnoxious as they waited to hear about their team mate. A group of girls were acting like they needed attention. Some families were legit, I am sure worried about someone they loved. Normally I would care about each person in the waiting room and prayed for their loved ones. I couldn't have cared less in my crazy lady hour. I could have punched them in the face if they looked at me wrong. "Yes I am a mess and I am making a scene, get over it!". However, I did no punching. I calmed myself and laid in Brandon's lap. Staring at the Emergency Room sign on the wall, all i felt was the strangest feeling of being surrounded by people who could not care less I was loosing someone I loved. I was just sitting there bleeding my sane away. They finally called me back to have us wait forever in the room. We had a nurse(Charlie), a PA (Steve) and a doctor we could never remember the name, all were nice. The PA Steve comes in and tells us the news. My blood work showed my Kwan count was way below what it needed to be and the ultrasound showed our baby having a weak pulse at the bottom of my cervix, ready to be pushed out by my body. The nurse left the room so we could grieve hard for 20 minutes. It is close to midnight now. The nurse came back in and gave me some pain medicine. The pain meds didn't take away all the pain. Wonderful nurse Charlie notices I am still in pain and rushes to get me more before he took out the IV. I didn't even have to ask. As we were leaving the hospital via wheelchair, they stopped me at financial assistance on the way out as they wanted the whole copay, right then. REALLY?! Do you not have any sense of timing? What happened to billing the patient? Whatevs. That was nothing in comparison to the internal hell we were in, so we slapped a card down and kept rolling out to the car. We then drove straight to the closest McDonalds, we hadn't had anything to eat in 12 hours. Before I knew it we were home and in bed. With as much pain medicine as I had, I only grazed sleep. I was stuck in my own grief, I couldn't escape no matter what part of my brain I tried to find comfort. I tried not to wake Brandon up as I cried, though I knew he would gladly hold me if I needed it. The next day sucked just as bad. Our precious baby still had a weak pulse. Dying inside me and with every cramp I knew by body was trying to finish killing our baby. That is a whole new kind of pain I NEVER knew existed.

Thursday( 21st) we went to the OB and they confirmed no heartbeat for our sweet one. We decided against a d&c, hoping pills would help us say goodbye at home and not have to endure anything involving the hospital again. From Tuesday to Sunday I had to know a baby was not growing inside me anymore. Between having the baby barely alive in me to not alive at all in a weeks time, was more than I could bear.

As for the feelings I am having, I have no words. Ironically, all the words I have here, there are none to describe the pain I carry every minute. I have had a lot pain in my short life, emotional and physical. I have felt pain death can bring, colitis and crohns ravaging my body for years, toxemia, and almost loosing my best friend and love of my life to a bad accident. I state this because after all I have endured, I have never felt pain like this before. After having one AMAZING child, seeing how just utterly breathtaking Storie is......I know what we just lost. Medicine would tell me that something was wrong with the baby, having nothing to do with me. I will hear that one day. I don't accept that now. I could feel the baby's essence, if you will. I know precious McCormick was a sweet spirit. The kind of sweet where h/she would clean Storie's room if she was sick, or to keep her out of trouble. A very noble spirit. To know I will never see the kind of impact our baby would have on people, as Storie does on so many. I can never kiss those toes, or caress that soft face. I will not go on, I can't. It is what I have no words for, just a bleeding heart that I have no idea how to plug. I have to stay ok for Storie. I just taught her how to fly in our fort and catch the bad guys that are chasing us. I still have so much to show and teach her. I just have to find a way. It feels I will always have half my heart gone, and half my brain always silently crying. To live that wounded seems impossible. I know it is, I have seen strong people emerge from the darkness and continue to shine. I think the only way for me to function is to have perspective. I may be in unbearable pain for a long time, but I have been blessed with a great life. Such an amazing man I get to do life with. One who takes care of me like you wouldn't believe. A man whom I have loved for 10 years, who still gives me butterflies when he tells me I am beautiful. After 10 years my heart jumps when I see he is calling me. I have a kid who is so cute I can't hardly stand it. Who loves people the way I do, empathetically. She kisses every part of my face before I lay her down. Wow. That is the good life. With all I have been through I refuse to believe that my life is anything other than great, sprinkled with hard times. If anything, I will play hurt until by God's grace, it no longer hurts THIS bad. It is weird to keep moving, when every move I make tugs on that pain in my heart. Weird to look around and see the world keep moving unaware of this pain I carry. It makes you feel lonely, because unless one has been through this, they cannot know.

My old reaction was to stop life until I feel better about it all. Easy company helped me see there is another way to live. I do what I often do to help me through hard times. I pulled out my Band of Brothers book. I have little strength, so I will do what I can to explain how those men inspire me. Band of Brothers shows the journey of Easy company, 506th regiment of the 101st Airborne Division during WW2. Let me try to explain why these men, and others like them inspire me when I am down and encourage me to keep running. There is a power to a story. To seeing someone's life and how they live it, that IS there story.

Story is the language of the heart. John Eldridge puts it best in his book Epic.

It goes far deeper than entertainment, by the way. Stories nourish us. They provide a kind of food that the soul craves."Stories are equipment for living" says Hollywood screenwriting teacher Robert McKee. He believes that we go to the movies because we hope to find in someone else's story something that will help us understand our own.

Watching a movie or reading a book allows us to tap into a story, "to live in a fictional reality that illuminates our daily reality". Whenever I live in the Band of Brother world, I see many parallels with my life and their story is a pep talk for me to keep my story going. More about them. They were paratroopers, whose training started here GA at Camp Taccoa. Paratroopers were dropped in the middle of the action, with a task to help the Americans gain ground. I could friggin say so much about what researching their journey has done for me, but I will stick to what is relevant to this tragedy. These men found out about the paratroopers when the war started. They heard if you wanted to be the best, you had be a paratrooper. They wanted to be the best, and have the guy fighting next to him to be the best. Instead of waiting to be enlisted, they joined the paratroopers and trained hard for two years before being dropped into Normandy. The training was intense and painful, I am sure they hated every minute of it. However they knew it was apart of their journey to be the best fighters to survive the war. Paratroopers had to be prepared for anything, because being dropped in the middle of chaos, you are literally always surrounded! As the war progressed, replacements took the place of wounded or killed Easy company men. They were not trained as well or as long and as a result they were the usually the first to die. The veterans began to be called " Taccoa Men ". Metaphorically speaking, I want to be a Taccoa man. As they signed up before the draft took place to start training to be the best, I signed up a long time ago to walk in grace and mercy through the fires of life because I knew life wasn't fair. I knew it wasn't fair, but I serve a God who loves me and walks with me through the pain. I want to take all the good from my past pains and use what I learn to survive this part of the war called Life. I want to live through hell and come back swinging for more like Easy company did. They would sneak out of the hospital wounded because they wanted to help their guys and to prevent from being reassigned to another unit. I want to sneak out of my dark place wounded because I do not want to miss out on the joys of my 3 person unit.

I see now that like paratroopers, sometimes we are plopped down in the middle of chaos, surrounded by fear and despair and you have to learn and adapt in order to survive. Soldiers do not get the option to put life on hold when war gets hard, and as a parent I do not have that option either. As each breath I take hurts my heart, I choose to believe life is still wonderful. It hurts to keep going, when all I want to do is cry in a corner. It keeps me going to know this is apart of my journey, as Camp Taccoa was for Easy company. This is training me to be the person I am meant to be. This tragedy's pain is only but a part of my path. I am learning how to be ready for anything and still keep going until my wounds heal. To play hurt. Throughout my study of soldiers in war, anyone who has fought in a war and survived left with either physical and emotional scars. Some they carried for the rest of their loves. With the right attitude they could move on, play hurt and still live a happy life. I will do the same.

Logic will soon replace my emotional state. Peace will again soothe my heart. The blue in the sky will once again shine. I look forward to all that.

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Epilogue:

I have kind family and friends, who let me walk a little slower in life while the deepest pains healed. One month from the day we lost the baby, I got a ring. Our baby's birthstone is garnett. So, if you look on my right hand you will see a white gold ring, with a small garnnett heart. It symbolizes to me how thankful I am that I got to love my child for 8 weeks, and that is a gift I will carry forever. It also reminds me I will once again see my child one day, it soothes me. I am months out from that tornado that hit my life. I was living with a constant undercurrent of sad. At times it would peak. I survived by mourning as the peaks came and putting a time limit on it. On days I was really sad, I allowed the pain to be there and hurt. After a day I told the pain it was not allowed to come for a while and I lived my life. My visitor, pain, came about two times a months. I sat still as my visitor beat me down, but each time I chose to pick up the next day and live my blessed life. Each time I got back up after my visitor left, I was a tad stronger. I feel I am strong enough now to limit the pain to one spot in my heart that is surrounded by thanksgiving, joy and love for our baby, so the remaining pain can no longer spread to my core. It is still hard to do, but every day it takes less work.

There is a song that a dear friend Cristina pointed me to, it also helped me both mourn and celebrate a life I briefly had. I still listen to it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fUZkjbYaKPA

Life is not always fair, but that doesn't mean life is not always good!

Keep running,

Kimmie

This is me

Sometimes when life gets busy and new chapters of life start, it is good to remember who you are. I wrote the post below a while ago, and needed to read it to find myself again. I have tweeked it, but it is pretty much the same as the original. I think we all need to do this from time to time. Know who you are, rejoice in who you are: the good, bad and ugly. Constantly seek to better yourself before you try to better others ( my life lesson this month ;)

This is me

Wednesday, August 29, 2007 at 12:28pm ( original post date )

I am:

Distracted easily, hotheaded, emotions lead. If provoked I could shoot lasers of hate out of my eyes in your direction. I can say the wrong thing at the wrong time and in the wrong way, causing awkward moments. I then overcompensate other times, I think too hard about what I am about to say and give myself a headache. My humor is not always projected how I would like. My release button for my emotions is broken, I allow myself to wallow in my sad emotions for too long. I laugh when it is inappropriate, and cry at watching anything on tv. I curse when I am angry and when I am happy. I am not always liked, yet not always hated. I have an energy level that can be annoying at times. I am lazy. I am selfish. I am inconsistent.

I am not proud of my false, but I am aware they are my own. It is important to know and work on your false, but it is more important to know your strengths and rejoice in them. It is called balance.....

I am ALSO:

Loyal, focused, and courage driven. I trust my God with all my heart. I love deeply. My empathy for others can bleed my heart dry. I am a person with a gifting of mercy and understanding. I will not give up in a difficult fight ( thought I may grow weary and slow in pace, I always have a big finish). On paper my life can seem chaotic, I chose to believe in God's will for my life regardless. I laugh when I am happy, and laugh when I am sad. I know light can be found even in the darkest of places. It only takes the smallest amount of hope to keep me going, and I am able to see hope that others may not. I love my husband more than myself, and would defend him and my children to the death. I learn from my mistakes. I am in love with my family and friends, and would walk on fire to see them happy.

This is me!!!! I feel sorry for anything or anyone who tries to get in my way while I am focused on God and His plan for my life. I am not perfect, but I AM WONDERFULLY MADE by my heavenly father who loves me. It is in this I find my freedom. It is my freedom that brings me joy. Joy that will be passed on for generations.

Freedom

I started this blog months ago, and I thought I would finish it! Resistance, you got me that time.

My whole life I have been a very intuitive and empathetic person. I believe God has gives our hearts what I like to call antennas. These antennas can only pick up emotion, not radio signals. I have come to realize that one of my spiritual giftings is empathy, which I have no doubt I inherited that from my mother. My antennas are strong and love to pick up the slightest of anyone's emotions on my radar. So that means I cry at everything: when I pray, when I love, when I laugh, when I am mad. It is a good tool when it comes to loving people. The problem comes when I no longer use the empathy as a prayer tool and I keep everyone else's emotions and mine on my shoulders. That is what I have been doing the past 2 years.

In 2008 I reached my boiling point. I had so many tragedies previously that it felt as if my heart's antennas shattered from the pressure of the things that kept occurring. Instead of rebuilding them back, I wrapped my heart up in a soft blanket to shield it from pain. I stopped crying as much at movies, or at other's struggles. I no longer cried when God cried. Although I was still myself, somewhat, I was no longer letting God mold me. I realized that I wanted to not feel anything because latley it had been painful to feel. I allowed myself to feel the imense love for my daugther and family, but I was all done with everything else. In doing this, I was putting myself in a prison of my own making. A spiritual battle commenced around me, and I was too stunned to keep figthing. My weapon I fight with is love. I was created to love, not to sit in a prison cell. Sometimes you have to feel pain before you can really love.

One day I came across famialar verses in the bible.

~Galations5:1 (message) "Christ has set us free to live a free life"

This is when I realized I wanted FREEDOM! I shattered my home made prison in that moment. It was nice to breath fresh air.

~2 Corinthians 1:3-7(message) All praise to the God and Father of our Master Jesus the messiah! Father of all mercy! God of healing counsel! He comes alongside us when we go through hard times, and before you know it, he brings us alongside someone else who is going through hard times just as God was there for us. We have plenty of hard times that come from following the Messiah, but no more so than the good times of his healing comfort- we get full measure of that too.( granted, I know in this context Paul is writing to the church in Corinth to not give up following Christ even though they were being persecuted. It still spoke to me about picking up my sword again and keep running )

Do you notice how in this, God never told us because we followed him it would be easy. That because we are christians God erased all the pain and problems. He promised we would never be alone. How great is that?

So pretty much, I will feel every emotion deeply and I will cry them out with my heavenly Father to whom wants to answer my prayers. I was not meant to carry these emotions by myself, what a simple yet HARD lesson to learn. To let my pride go and ask for help from my heavenly creator requires trust and belief that is harder than I thought it would be. So I will take it day by day.

Prequel

So, I am finally doing it. I am blogging. I love to write, I just never make the time. So this is me making time!! I have many thoughts all the time, and I think I need to start jotting some of them down.

Random thought. I saw Star Trek, and loved it. I am not gonna geek out and go into all the details, but post movie I had a realization. The movie brought you back before Scotty invented transwarp beaming, before Spock and Kirk were friends, before Kirk was a Captain. Most know the stories of The Enterprise's adventures and the character's victories. How nice is it to see all the personal journey's of the crew before they were a crew. To see who they were before they were saving the world, to see the relationships being formed. A prequel. This is not the first movie to do this to a popular series. Batman Begins shows us how Bruce Wayne's personal 'demons' lead him down the path to find Batman, to find redemption. To see how he learned to fight and come up with all the cool batman weapons. George Lucas took us back in Star Wars: Episodes 1-3 and delighted us with how Padme and Anakin fell in love, devestated us to see Anakin make choices that turned a good guy into a bad one. These prequels told us the stories before the story. As I child I often wondered of my parent's prequel. Who they were before they were my parents. I always asked for more stories of them when they were young, and their adventures. There is such wisdom in there experience and such joy in their lives if I take the time to walk through memory lane with them. I saw a picture of a young group of boys, come to find out it was my dad's basketball team. He was the handsome one in the middle. What I wouldn't give to know that guy in the picture. How different was he then than he is now?

that is when it hit me. Right now I am in the prequel of my life. My relatioships are forming, I am pushing past my personal demons choosing joy that is shaping who I am. I am learning to fight and choosing paths that will hopefully not lead to the dark side. If my kids were to come back in time from 2040, what would they see now? Hopefully their mom on the path to the leader/warrior she was created to be. Hopefully they will see in me and their father where they got their fiesty and tenatious spirit that is filled with heartbreaking love for others, full of grace and understanding. Hopefully we make a path for them worth following.

Today is the day where hopefully becomes surely. Where probable becomes definate. Because it wouldn't be a good prequel without a marking moment you make for yourself. Where you choose your path and follow it until your feet are bleeding, and then you still keep going.