I am sitting here at the kitchen table contemplating, thinking, wondering, remembering what it was like to have you in my womb dearest Sebastian.  But you’re not here.  You are probably somewhere up in heaven singing songs of praises to our heavenly Father.    I am sitting, thinking about all the things I was doing to prepare for your arrival into this world.  Not in my wildest dreams did I ever contemplate that you would die.  I was so naïve back then.  Naïve and stupid.  Naïve and stupid not to realize the dangers that lurked behind the delicate existence of life.  If you think about it, life is so fragile that it can break easily.  Anyone can come into this life, and leave, passed away, gone back to dust.

So much has happened in two years.  I had to process so much anger, so much grief, so much anxiety, so much fear, and the list goes on and on.  It is an endless list.  I am still battling the ferocious feelings, intense emotions that grip themselves so tightly around my body as I battle onwards against the unruly wind learning to cling onto my only stronghold and that is the Lord my God.

Life in a nutshell since you passed away.  Did life continue after you die?  For a long time I felt like I was trapped in an elevator neither moving down or up, although I don’t think the elevator could go down, because we were after all already right smack at the bottom.  How much more could I fall?  I don’t think I could have fallen much further down.  I mean to lose you and then too steadily climb back up, whilst my feet kept slipping is one way of describing how life was after you died. Did I pick myself up and carry on?  Some may say I did.  Others think I am stuck in ‘grief’.  Whilst others have forgotten about you.  But my dear child I will not forget you.  You are on my heart always.  You are probably the first thing I think about in the morning.  And then the actuality hits me once more, and I groan and I moan, and I beg my God why did you do this?

I probably moved on, though I felt like I was trapped in this timeless tunnel.  Not knowing which way to go forward, or how to go forward.  It was excruciatingly painful to walk through this impassable tunnel.  You have to be truly blessed to walk it.  The chosen one to live without your child/ren.  Tough.  Heartbreaking.  Incomprehensible. Painful.  Sheer human anguish.  You question your mere existence.  The point of life.  What was the point in carrying you for nine long months for you to have to die at the end?  What can I take from that experience?  What can I learn from this painful lesson? Was I going to be a good mom to you?  Or did I somehow fail you as a mom? Did I somehow do something wrong?  Did I get punished for some past sin that I must have committed?  The question that will never really be answered is why did you die?  And what is my purpose now?

Sometimes God gives us trials so that we hit rock bottom so that we can learn from it. So that we can help others to overcome their loss. Suppose it happened to you and you lost a child.  How would you react?  How would you cope with the situation?  Would you collapse into a heap and never move on?  I remember so clearly that hospital room when they told me you had died.  I didn’t believe it.  I probably didn’t understand what they were saying.  I was praying for a miracle.  Hoping.  Hopeful.  That somehow all of this was some terrible mistake.  But was it a terrible mistake? Or was it by some divine intervention that you had to die, so that you could be safe from any harm and any evil that could fall onto your fragile world.  Oh Sebby I did want you so much.  But I also know that you are in the best place.  The best place anyone could be.

Two years on, I am sitting in the kitchen in my parents’ home. Thinking how different life would have been if you were here.  You’d be running around. Almost two years old. We’d go for a walk with Lucy (the dog) and feed the ducks at the canal.  I would put you in the swing in our back garden and push you, and hear your sweet laugher as you get pushed.  I would do anything to be able to hear you say ‘mommy’.  But I won’t hear those words. Not from you ever dear child.  I wonder what it would have been like to have your sticky little hands holding my neck as you hug me tightly.  I wonder what it would have been like to give you a good night kiss and tuck you in quietly and pray with you to God.  I wonder what it would have been like to be mothering you right now.  But I didn’t get that chance.  All of this seems to be part of a forgotten past, a forgotten dream. Now I am just watching the abandoned swing and I watch it as it stands abandoned in the garden.

I remember when my life changed forever, I was so scared of the future.  I didn’t trust the future.  I was out of my comfort zone, and I build up a wall around me to protect myself from further deep hurt.  From further deep anguish.  I didn’t want to believe that you were gone.  I didn’t want to believe that there could be a life after you died.  Except life did move on.  Somehow, begrudgingly it moved on slowly without you.  I have lived without you for nearly two years.  And yet the love I have for you is so powerful.  How can that be?  For someone you have never met. Bar you lived in my womb for nine long months.  I felt you move, I loved you from within, and you loved me.  Pure unconditional love.  Pure joy.  How I loved you, love you dear boy.  How I wish I could have held you. Better not to dwell on these things.  I just know this one fact that mothering you was the best thing that I could have ever done, and I pray and I hope that in some small way I can help others overcome their loss, that there is hope in this strange world of grief. And that really our children will never really be forgotten.  They will always remain the children of our hearts.