(these random entries are over the course of 1 month back in Nov 21’-Dec 21’)
Last week it was confirmed to me by my caseworker that Cami and Sofi’s mom had a baby at 29 weeks. I wish I could know more information as my caseworker only stated what she saw on the CPS report. Obviously there are no confirmations on whether or not this new baby will be removed from mother but the context of case should be telling. Mom just lost parent rights to cami and sofi last month after 1.5 years of refusal to interact and communicate with not only her children but any caseworker. Even through the termination process, there has been zero effort from mom and no one has known her whereabouts.
-I am not sure how to feel. I am a mix of emotions that I didn’t know I could feel at the same time. Full of grief and joy. I’m directly in the middle of 2 opposing forces of emotions. How do I live with both?
-Consistent thoughts that go through my head, with complete honesty, is if this is just some sick and twisted game. My confusion pours into my thoughts of wondering why this is happening. Is my life just a sick twisted game to God that He would allow my baby to be taken and then hand me a new one? As if that’s all that’s needed to fix losing Alba. I think of the ignorant group of people who have expressed to me that ATLEAST I can have more kids. Right….because your children are just so easily replaceable right? That we can just lose one but bank on getting another so its fineeeee. Just fine. NO! NO. My baby is not replaceable. My LIFE that was Alba can’t be given back to me. I literally lost a part of myself when I lost her. And we still don’t even know if I can physically have more kids yet! Handing me a newborn baby to love directly after losing my own newborn is sick and twisted. Ill do it and ill do it with joy…..that really just makes it more sick and twisted to me.
-I think about having to open back up those storage boxes of baby products that Kyle and I packed up as soon as we got home from the hospital that final time. We cried as we stored away baby items that we thought we were going to use. But we packed them up with hope for the future, that we would one day unload these boxes with a newfound hope and joy for a new baby. Now, 2 months later and we are potentially having to get these boxes back out from storage and use them on another baby.
-Gods glory is in this. It’s so evident that this is His working. A baby boy? I think the world knows by now that we have always wanted boys and laughed as we grew more and more into parents to 2 then 3 then almost 4 girls. We accepted our call to be girl parents once Alba as confirmed to be a girl. We embraced it finally. Now, we lose our baby girl and are potentially given a baby boy to look after. Back to thinking about how sick and twisted this is.
-“you don’t have to take this child in” ….. is told to me by many who aren’t in foster care. Because everyone else I’ve spoken with who is a foster parent understands exactly by not even questioning the fact that I am. That I have to. Cami and Sofi are mine….any future siblings that come into this world (disclaimer: if they need to be in foster care) will be mine too. The mama bear in me jumps out at the thought of more cami and sofis coming into the world. Those kids are mine IF they need to be. I hope that makes sense. I hope for miraculous healing in parents and for kids to never have to be in foster care. However, IF their siblings are born and then need to be put into the system, I will always want to be their mama. I wouldn’t have this attachment if I were told of a random baby. Not that I wouldn’t take them in, I’m saying that my emotions run deep with cami and sofis blood line. Sometimes I think I over explain my emotions too much on here when this blog is meant for just me really….or is it?
-am I cheating grief by getting another newborn baby right after losing my own? I don’t feel like it, because ill forever want Alba. If anything, I feel like this will be so much harder than if this situation wasn’t happening. So let me get this straight. I have to take in a newborn baby to love on and care for and provide a nurturing home for when I wasn’t able to bring my baby home only 2 months ago? My body is still broken from the delivery of my own baby Alba but now God is expecting me to pour love into another baby?
-the first night Kyle and I found out about the new baby boy, it ended in a complete meltdown of a fight. The nitty details of finding out include us sitting over food in Detroit while we enjoyed a babysitter. Once the news was broke to us, we quickly left the restaurant and retreated to our car to process. Kyle’s Ford Broncho has really held some horrible emotions and moments for us. Grief over Alba had filled the car as if we were hot boxing ourselves into a deep depression high but what filled the car more was a knot of new emotions that needed to be sorted out. These new emotions would later be recognized as excitement, shock, relief, CONFUSION. Our biggest emotion was confusion. What is going on in my life?!?! Why are you doing this God? Oh so you think this just makes it better?! I have to even if I don’t know if I want to right now, don’t I, God? What is the point of this?!
Super hard questions and emotions right? So obviously, as Kyle and I faced all of those things separately in our own hearts, we made the attempt to unravel the knot of these emotions together. It didn’t go well. Grief is so fluid and risky almost,a weird way to describe it. When you talk to anyone dealing with grief about a serious topic, a triggering topic, you may have no idea what to expect from the individual. The response could be rational or severely opposite. That night it was severely opposite. We both quickly fell into projecting our broken hearts instead of managing them together like we usually do. We were unable to hold in the new crack that had formed in our hearts with this news and we needed to let every single raging thought out. Not raging thoughts about each other or even towards each other but instead AT each other in a feeble attempt to get rid of the sadness that had completely overflowed at that point.
The next morning we woke up with emotional hangovers and stubbornness to move forward with each other but also an aching to just drop it because we knew what the fight had been. A grief fight. One of those really hard types of fights in marriage that makes me understand why couples break up after experiencing trauma together. A huge reason why I was so happy when Kyle pushed for therapy right away. Better to be self aware and proactive towards preventing strain in our marriage due to grief right?