Not Fair.

{A letter to you both}

Today, a young couple that your dad works with lost their baby. She was due in two weeks. I met her for the first time this summer. It was at the local fair and she was glowing. My belly was about to pop with you Brynn and Elle, you were whining for a snowcone. She was saying how excited she was that they were going to find out the sex of the baby. I remember thinking oh yes, it is all fun and giggles when your belly is the size of a softball, just wait till that baby is kicking you all.night.long. It won't be so magical then. She found out a couple weeks later that the baby was a girl.

She stopped feeling the baby and came to the fire station to have her emt husband listen in the ambulance with the doppler. He told her heard a faint heartbeat. That was probably all in his mind. His mind making up that tiny pitter patter to save her heart. She left him at work and drove to the doctor where she found that the life that had been growing her belly for so many months, was gone.

I do not believe in god. I never have, despite studying religion extensively in college and growing up in a small, mostly christian town, where my beliefs made me the outcast. For whatever reason, the idea of an all knowing god who decides our fate and judges us by our choices just never made sense. And as much as I wanted to believe- to make things easier on myself, to fit in- I just couldn't ever do it. The religious answer to this sort of loss is that the baby is in a better place and they will meet again.

In my mind, my set of beliefs, all I can think is that is not fair. That a mother, so excited to meet her baby daughter would instead have to bury her in a tiny grave. That a mother, who has been running her fingers over her tightened skin waiting for kicks, must leave the hospital empty handed because there is a god somewhere who needed that baby more than her. No one needed that baby more than she did.

It is not fair that women, who do not want children, get pregnant easily while women who have been dreaming of motherhood since childhood experience infertility. It is not fair that one woman rocks her baby to sleep while another rocks alone in the dark, holding her knees wondering if she will ever in her life see anything as beautiful as that lost baby. Life is not a test. You don't experience loss, hardship or pain because you are the person who is strong enough to carry that weight.

Life is a series of events. Some beautiful. So beautiful that you can hardly breathe. Some so sad, the sorrow feels like a sea that might swallow you whole. No one is deciding who gets what burden. We are, ultimately, alone. We have this one life. A life that clips along at terrifying pace. A pace you become acutly aware of as a mother. As little tiny babies grow into blabbering, toddling people in a matter of months.

When someone experiences a loss like this, it is always so hard for me to know what to say. I won't be the one saying it is in god's hands or she is an angel now, even though I understand how comforting those ideas can be. If I were to say anything, it would be that I am sorry. And things are sometimes totally unfair. And I would undoubtedly cry because I am sure her grief would radiate off her and take over me.

Nothing is personal. Nothing is fair. You will both experience pain. I have. Your father has. Everyone on this planet has or will. But the wonderful news is that you have so many people here who love you. People who will offer a shoulder to cry on, a lap to snuggle in, an ear to listen. They are here in the present. When life turns down an unstable, seemingly unbeatable path- call to us. We will be here to help show you the way, hold you, put you back together. Just as in my hour of need, the closeness of your hugs will bring me much comfort. Know beautiful things are just around the corner, behind that closed door, hidden in the smile of a stranger or waiting for us in the next week, month or year. Grieve, cry and while you will never completely move on, tomorrow will come. And with it, light.

Tonight, I held you both a bit closer. We have been lucky. But I am not blessed. I am just another mother who loves her babies. We will do our best should our luck turn. I love both of you so much and have thankful for each day I have with you.

Mama.

(when you read this letter, I don't know what you will believe. I am never going to push you to believe in any one god, religion or in anything at all. But I had to write this letter with my own voice. The voice of a woman who has love, passion, forgiveness, humility but no god in her heart)