Wave Of Light 2017

This is my story of our family. In some ways it’s a story with a neat beginning and ending. Then in other ways it’s not. Here’s one way of telling my story. My name is Lourda and I have 3 beautiful children, 1 boy and 2 girls. Healthy happy kids. A beautiful family. A neat story. Then there’s the other story. This one is invisible, unknown and probably one day forgotten. Because I’m also a Mother of four 8 week old babies. How to tell this story? It’s a tough one because even though our law is insistent about the importance of unborn life, my experience is that when early life is lost naturally no one considers it important. No one considers it to be a child. Or that this child has a set of parents that are grieving. Miscarried they said. I say what a stupid word. As if they were accidentally dropped. Absentmindedly put down. As if I didn’t put enough effort into carrying them. And here’s the thing. There is nothing to see. Nothing to hold. Nothing to show people. No pictures. No hand prints. No coffin. No names. No gender. Nothing. Like wisps of smoke. Fragments of breath. A whisper. A promise of life. Here and gone. There, there, sure you’ll have another one. Once I ingrained the details of each loss into my memory. One thing they all shared was that I knew with absolute certainty from the first faint line on the test that they would not survive. Maybe a little communication from the life inside me. Warning me not to relax. I’ve allowed my fierce grip on the details to loosen over time. Just so I could keep on going. Now I can’t remember which ones I saw heartbeats for; which one a co worker told me I caused by my lunchtime run, or which one a family member said was caused by breastfeeding. I remember which two I had operations to remove. But I mix up which left me weak and grieving outside the Coombe, trapped by Obama’s motorcade and whether that was the same time a kind Anesthetist held my hand as I lay crying on the table waiting for her to drug me to sleep. For both I remember the cripplingly lonely walk to the theater. Fragments of details from scans. Stark words, “Your womb is empty” .The sense of dread sitting in the early pregnancy unit. Disappearing from work on sick leave. Research on causes. Friends that dropped everything for a coffee and others that dropped out of my life. All blended into a blur. Now the only thing I hold close is their due dates. Random numbers that never evolved into their true significance. Dates that should be a cause for celebration every year. Now I simply have a silent toast and the day slips by as usual. There we have it. Never born. Only held as memories forever in my heart. These little whispers of life that just me and their Dad were lucky enough to hear. And that, is our story. 08/10/11; 21/12/11; 23/09/12; 23/03/15. (With thanks to Marta O Leary Art for the image with this post)

Sunshine on a Rainy Day

Here’s an abbreviated account of our holidays to Wicklow.
Get into car. Sun shines
Baby D – Waaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Stop car. Lashes rain
Baby D – Waaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Get out of car. Run to shops through puddles.
Baby D – Waaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Walk around shops. Sun shines.
Baby D – Waaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Go for walk in nice scenic area. Lashes rain.
Baby D – Waaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Get into car. Sun shines
Baby D – Waaaaahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Repeat for 2 days.
(I should point out that Baby D was coming down with a cold, which explained his bad mood. Didn’t explain the weather though.)

Toy Story

I had a tough time in Smyth’s Toys recently. I went in to find some new toys for Baby D to stop him rooting around in our laundry basket. After wandering the aisles, blinded by blue and red plastic and amazed at the price tags, I eventually emerged clutching a seven euro Winnie the Pooh jigsaw. “Bargain” I thought, trying not to feel guilty as the other parents stumbled passed me struggling under the weight of Smart Trikes and life-sized Peppa Pigs.
Luckily I hadn’t just bought a jigsaw but a “valuable learning tool.”
“This will enhance your fine motor skills and hand to eye co-ordination,” I read off the side of the box to Baby D at home.
“Pooh!” said Baby D as he grabbed the box from me and tipped all the pieces onto the floor.
“And also can be used as an educational aid...”
He picked up a piece of jigsaw and chewed it thoughtfully.
“Aids problem solving...”
Baby D rambled off, jigsaw dangling from the side of his mouth.
“And helps develop reasoning and problem solving skills.” I finished as he re emerged, looking pleased with himself, the piece of jigsaw replaced by a sock.
“Toe–Toe!” he mumbled through the sock, trampling over the rest of the pieces.
“Seven euro well spent,” I thought.

And on a totally different note

And on a completely separate note, since when did people start dressing up to go to gigs? I was at the Tripod last night, in my 2007 Arcade Fire t-shirt and Dunne’s Stores jeans, and am still getting over the shock of the style on offer; designer shirts, skinny jeans, oversized bags; and that was just the men. Why would you want to get glammed up just to get hot and sticky and covered in beer? Is it because everyone watches the band through their mobile phone screens now, too busy tweeting about the gig to bother jumping up and down in an uncoordinated manner in the mosh pit? I blame it on the smoking ban myself. Clothes are no longer at risk of smelling like an ashtray after a night out, so faded second hand jeans salvaged from the mothballed recesses of a dusty shop in Temple Bar are being replaced by “vintage” denim with a three figure sales tag in BT2 and old band t-shirts are being consigned to Oxfam shops.
Or maybe it’s a leftover from the Celtic Tiger.
Or maybe I’m just getting old.