Family

Pop's 80th birthday party is rapidly approaching. It's being held in July. I'm worried already.

Since the last time I have seen the majority of my family, pregnancies have been announced and babies have been born. I'm starting to feel a bit resentful of things. I hate this feeling. How come their babies are here safely and alive? Are they going to ask me about it or just brush it under the rug? Or are they pregnant and just as afraid to talk to me as I am to talk to them?

What happens when an otherwise close family gets this wedge placed between them?

It's the big elephant in the room. Everyone sees it, but no one wants to talk about it. No one wants to hear that my babies died, although I want desperately to tell them about it. No one asks what they looked like, but I want so desperately to show them their pictures. And no one even asks what their names are, but they are my sons.

Are they afraid to upset me? That's not the case. I can talk about things much more freely than I have ever before. Are they afraid to bring things up because they don't want to admit that babies do die? As if admitting that babies die would somehow jinx their own family. Are they happier believing that bad things happen to people who deserve it? Maybe. But if that's what they think of me than I don't need them in my life anyway.

The bottom line is that they are still blissful. Death hasn't touched them. They don't feel as if a black flag is hovering over their home as it is mine. They are innocent. Believing that babies don't get sick and babies don't die. Yet that isn't even close to being true. Because if it were, I would have a complete family. Not a heart with holes in it.

So my question is this....how do I get past that resentment to be able to embrace the new children and be happy for their families? Obviously it's not something that will happen overnight, so I need to start preparing myself now. Start working through these things. It's not something that I want to pass along to my children. I don't want them to live their lives with a mother who is still emotionally hung up on the fairness of life and the impact that it has had on my life. I don't want to be their burden because I can't take care of myself. I don't want to be Derick's burden because he got stuck with a wife who can't carry a child. He was cheated out of the family that he deserves. My body is MY burden. But I need to learn to deal with that now because if I let it go, it will fester and ferment and in 10 years I will still be harboring these feelings and it's liable to tear my family apart.