One Month

Today is August 28. Weston died one month ago. My alarm went off at 8:15 this morning; the death certificates indicates that Weston died at 8:10 a.m.

I do not feel any better, although I am able to get out of bed in the morning now. I do not miss him any less. A good day is when I cry four or five times. And I am not finding comfort where I used to.

When I was eight years old, I read through the Bible in one year. I decided to do so again this year. I started on February 15, three days before I found out I was pregnant with Weston, and I am reading chronologically instead of straight through, so it skips around some. Lately, I haven't been reading as regularly, so I did a lot of catching up while Caroline was "napping" today (she didn't sleep; she just hung out in her crib. This does not bode well for our two airplane flights tomorrow.).

Chronologically, I am reading about the rulers and people of Israel and Judah in the Old Testament, so I'm skipping around the Kings, the Chronicles, Isaiah, and, today, Amos. It is awful. God was unhappy with Israel, so he rained down judgment after judgment. It talks about fire, plagues, famine, killing, ripping open pregnant women (interesting timing on that last one). Here are some snippets:

"There will be wailing in all the streets and cries of anguish in every public square. The farmers will be summoned to weep and the mourners to wail. There will be wailing in all the vineyards, for I will pass through your midst," says the Lord. Amos 5:16-17.

"In that day," declares the Sovereign Lord, "I will make the sun go down at noon and darken the earth in broad daylight. I will turn your religious festivals into mourning and all your singing into weeping. I will make all of you wear sackcloth and shave your heads. I will make that time like mourning for an only son and the end of it like a bitter day." Amos 8:9-10.

Now, it drives me crazy when people, Christians included, take verses out of context and twist them to fit their agenda. I fully realize that I am doing that here, but I am too mentally and emotionally exhausted to try and contextualize these verses. All I know is that I turned to the Bible for comfort, and this is what I got.

Today was my six-week post-c-section appointment. I should have known that I would see many pregnant women in an OB's waiting room, but I didn't think about it until I got there and was literally surrounded by them. There was also a chubby, healthy baby boy whose mother was literally dancing and parading him around the room. These are normal things that don't even cross one's mind until experiencing the death of a child. Fortunately, my OB (first appointment with her) was very sympathetic, understanding as she could be, and patient.

I lost my watch when Weston was born. I had to take off all jewelry for my c-section, and I don't know what happened to it. Fortunately, I got my wedding ring back. It's interesting that my watch, of all things, was never recovered; time was of no consequence to me while Weston was in the NICU. It was just about surviving minute to minute.

Now, it's a paradox of time standing still and cruelly marching on. I haven't replaced my watch; in its place I now wear a black rubber bracelet that says "In Mourning." Time doesn't matter to me anymore without having my son here.

On the other hand, time takes me further and further from him. It's the little things: his smell has faded from the sweater I was wearing when he died (I will still never wash it again). When I scroll down through my blog posts, the post about his death is not on the first page anymore. The NICU doesn't pop up on my recent phone calls. Caroline turned three years old last week; she was two when he was born and died. I turn 35 in a few days. School has started. Although Caroline is not in school, it signifies another transition.

I will try to end on a positive note: although nothing makes me excited anymore, including our two-week trip to the beach that starts tomorrow, we are going to a concert tonight to hear one of my favorite bands (Old 97s, in case anyone is curious). Thankfully, their music is loud and raucous, not quiet and introspective. Hopefully I'll have a tiny bit of fun.

"Where he should be, I stare straight through...It won't stop; it keeps on going, unforgiving, unrelenting...There's nothing I can do to make it stop. Farther back and farther yet, back into the dimming past. The gap begins to gape.
Is there no one who can slow it down, make it stop, turn it back? Must we all be swept forever on, away, beyond, beauty lost, and love, sorrow hard on sorrow, until the measure of our losses has been filled?"
Nicholas Wolterstorff, Lament for a Son