changing topography

Group is over. I was so sad driving there tonight. Partly because my car smells inexplicably like vitamins (?) but mainly because the six weekly group meetings went by much, much too quickly. I know I've gained so much from the group. J and I have been able to talk openly about subjects we'd never touched on before, our grief has been validated as real and hurtful and our babies as worth our grief, and we've learned a lot about one another and ourselves and how we deal with sadness and loss. But creeping along in traffic towards our group meeting, I wondered whether I was "better" yet or not. I remember when we started I thought that by the end of the six weeks, I'd be fixed or on my way to fixed- I'd be somehow "better". Since I'm still often some combination of sad, mad, and confused....I wasn't sure that I had changed.

Then came our final discussion at group tonight. See, at the very first meeting, we were asked to describe our pain as an object or physical thing. My pain was easy to describe- it was a mountain. A big, rigid, scratchy, black mountain. (I may have talked about this in an earlier post, I don't remember, and I'm too tired to go back and investigate.) Anyway, back to me and my feelings (me, me, meeee). There was that mountain. I was on top of the mountan during my pregnancy. Excited, proud, happy. Nervous about it, but more comfortable every day. The miscarriage shoved me off the mountain, plunged me down to my worst fear. And there I was, 6 weeks ago, laying at the bottom of this intimidating, frightening mountain. It stood in the way of everything- I couldn't focus on anything but that damn mountain or see any light behind it. Afraid to look up at it, no choice but to climb back up it if I wanted to have a baby. But totally terrified of what it would take to get there and how much it would hurt to get back on it.

Tonight, our counselor (W) asked us what our pain was now, whether it had changed since the beginning. Without having to think about it, I immediately pictured my pain as a hill. Specifically, a hill beside the road leading to my grandpa's farm. It's a bigass hill. But it's rolling, it's soft, it's more green and grassy than black and rough. It's do-able. It's one I can picture us walking up steadily. Not so intimidating like that mountain, just a challenge I know we can overcome. Wow! Somehow, the mighty W had led us through our darkest weeks and brought us to this new place. A place where the next steps are ones I know we can take, instead of ones that appear so harrowing that I'd prefer to just lay on the ground and cry with helplessness (or eat cookie dough and go back to bed). I could just hug W for shaving down that mountain a bit for us. And I did.

At the end of our group, W played the song of a very talented Austin musician, Sarah Hickman (you've heard her voice- the "dollop of daisy" sour cream commercials?) Sarah was kind enough to sing for our remembrance ceremony a few weeks ago, and her song about angels will forever make me cry, but in that good and cleansing way. While listening to it tonight, I was comforted by the thought that Grover and Baby F are our little angels. And as Sarah says, we will meet when it is time.

Sometimes you'll stumble
Sometimes you'll just lie down
Sometimes you will get lonely
With all these people around
Ohh Oh
You might shiver when the wind blows
Yea, you might get blown away
Ohh Oh
You might lose a little colours
You... you might lose a little faith...
Ohh Oh
But we are each other's angels
Ohh Oh
And we meet when it is time
Ohh Oh
We keep each other going
And we show each other signs...
Well, I reached my destination
Yea, I finally made it home
God sent ten thousand angels
To make me one of his own...

Here's a link to Sarah Hickman's album if you want to hear a preview of this song:
http://www.sarahickman.com/music/spiritualappliances/#angels