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| Angel Tree |
Saturday, November 30, 2013
Angel Tree
Friday, October 25, 2013
Day 25: #SayItOutLoud
Day 25: #SayItOutLoud
Oct 25, 2013
There isn't much I haven't said regarding Nolan and his death either on here or on my blog, and while some might disagree with my openness, all I can say to them is then don't read it. I thought instead of trying to rack my brain to say something I haven't already said, I would post a picture that nobody has ever seen. In fact, I myself have never even looked at it until today. This picture is probably the last truly happy picture of myself. It's the last picture of myself before my world came crashing down and my happiness ceased to be as carefree and naive as it once was. This picture was taken at my baby shower for Nolan (we refused to have any showers with Ronan). I was 35 weeks pregnant in this picture. Five weeks shy of being full term and yet had Nolan been born on the day this picture was taken, he would most likely still be with us today and as healthy and happy and normal as any other 1 1/2 year old. This picture was taken a mere 6 days before Nolan was born.
Oct 25, 2013
There isn't much I haven't said regarding Nolan and his death either on here or on my blog, and while some might disagree with my openness, all I can say to them is then don't read it. I thought instead of trying to rack my brain to say something I haven't already said, I would post a picture that nobody has ever seen. In fact, I myself have never even looked at it until today. This picture is probably the last truly happy picture of myself. It's the last picture of myself before my world came crashing down and my happiness ceased to be as carefree and naive as it once was. This picture was taken at my baby shower for Nolan (we refused to have any showers with Ronan). I was 35 weeks pregnant in this picture. Five weeks shy of being full term and yet had Nolan been born on the day this picture was taken, he would most likely still be with us today and as healthy and happy and normal as any other 1 1/2 year old. This picture was taken a mere 6 days before Nolan was born. Thursday, October 24, 2013
Day 24: Artwork
Day 24: Artwork
Oct 24, 2013
We were given several piece of artwork to remember Nolan by, all were dealing with the ocean, sand or sky. Several of the pieces were Nolan's name written in the sand with a beautiful ocean background. My favorite is the purple sky sunset with Nolan's name written in the sand given to us by several of my friends from high school. Another favorite is of an angel drawn in the sand with the ocean water rushing up to meet it. The ocean will always be a symbol to us of Nolan. We had the ocean in mind when we made his nursery and Marshall had big dreams of taking him surfing in that ocean. To me the ocean reminds me that there are forces out there much more powerful than us and to which we have no control over. Every day the tides ebbs and flows, no thanks to any human intervention. No, there's a force much greater than any we could create that moves the vast ocean back and forth. It's humbling really and makes us aware of our place in the vast universe.
Oct 24, 2013
We were given several piece of artwork to remember Nolan by, all were dealing with the ocean, sand or sky. Several of the pieces were Nolan's name written in the sand with a beautiful ocean background. My favorite is the purple sky sunset with Nolan's name written in the sand given to us by several of my friends from high school. Another favorite is of an angel drawn in the sand with the ocean water rushing up to meet it. The ocean will always be a symbol to us of Nolan. We had the ocean in mind when we made his nursery and Marshall had big dreams of taking him surfing in that ocean. To me the ocean reminds me that there are forces out there much more powerful than us and to which we have no control over. Every day the tides ebbs and flows, no thanks to any human intervention. No, there's a force much greater than any we could create that moves the vast ocean back and forth. It's humbling really and makes us aware of our place in the vast universe.Wednesday, October 23, 2013
Day 23: Tattoos/Jewelry
Day 23: Tattoos/Jewelry
Oct 23, 2013
Since Nolan's death, I've acquired several pieces of jewelry meant as a token of remembrance for him. The first such piece was a sterling silver key pendant my mother gave me while I was in the hospital with him. A note accompanied it that said it was to serve as a reminder to me that Nolan held the key to my heart and always would. The second piece of jewelry I bought for myself. It was a bracelet that I had custom made. On the outside it said, "Until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of his hand." On the inside was inscribed Nolan's name and birthdate. A small angel wing charm and an aquamarine jewel (Nolan's birthstone) hung from the side of the bracelet. I wore this bracelet every day for the next 6+ months. I also received a bracelet from my friends while in the hospital that had Nolan's name on it and on the inside it read, "I held an angel." They passed out these silicone bracelets to everyone that had been at the hospital with us.
My cousins also gave me a sterling bracelet that read "Endless love." But none of the jewelry proved to have as much significance as the one pendant I had made for myself and have worn every day since I received it in the mail. I took Nolan's footprint that the nurses had given me and sent it off to a jeweler to have him imprint it into a pendant for me along with Nolan's initials. When the jeweler found out it was to serve as a momento of my dead son, he sent me two pendants. I put that pendant on my necklace along with my key and wore the two together for the next year. On mother's day this year, Marshall and Ronan gave me another key to add to my necklace to represent Ronan. While Nolan's key is void of any color other than the sterling silver and bears a simple cross in the middle, Ronan's key is vibrant with jewels. It's a beautiful representation of the differences in my two boys. I usually wear the three pendants together, but I always wear Nolan's footprint. Since Ronan was born he has held on to the pendant whenever I'm nursing him. Now that he is more inquisitive, he is constantly grabbing at it and holding it and now even trying to chew on it. I may one day stop wearing the footprint around my neck, but I will always hold it dear and keep it close to me.
Oct 23, 2013
Since Nolan's death, I've acquired several pieces of jewelry meant as a token of remembrance for him. The first such piece was a sterling silver key pendant my mother gave me while I was in the hospital with him. A note accompanied it that said it was to serve as a reminder to me that Nolan held the key to my heart and always would. The second piece of jewelry I bought for myself. It was a bracelet that I had custom made. On the outside it said, "Until we meet again, may God hold you in the palm of his hand." On the inside was inscribed Nolan's name and birthdate. A small angel wing charm and an aquamarine jewel (Nolan's birthstone) hung from the side of the bracelet. I wore this bracelet every day for the next 6+ months. I also received a bracelet from my friends while in the hospital that had Nolan's name on it and on the inside it read, "I held an angel." They passed out these silicone bracelets to everyone that had been at the hospital with us.
My cousins also gave me a sterling bracelet that read "Endless love." But none of the jewelry proved to have as much significance as the one pendant I had made for myself and have worn every day since I received it in the mail. I took Nolan's footprint that the nurses had given me and sent it off to a jeweler to have him imprint it into a pendant for me along with Nolan's initials. When the jeweler found out it was to serve as a momento of my dead son, he sent me two pendants. I put that pendant on my necklace along with my key and wore the two together for the next year. On mother's day this year, Marshall and Ronan gave me another key to add to my necklace to represent Ronan. While Nolan's key is void of any color other than the sterling silver and bears a simple cross in the middle, Ronan's key is vibrant with jewels. It's a beautiful representation of the differences in my two boys. I usually wear the three pendants together, but I always wear Nolan's footprint. Since Ronan was born he has held on to the pendant whenever I'm nursing him. Now that he is more inquisitive, he is constantly grabbing at it and holding it and now even trying to chew on it. I may one day stop wearing the footprint around my neck, but I will always hold it dear and keep it close to me.Tuesday, October 22, 2013
Day 22: Words
Oct. 22, 2013
As evidence by my blog, there's lots I could say about Nolan, but some of the written words that speak to me and remind me of Nolan are as follows.
A saying that we read aloud during Nolan's memorial and that we later had engraved on his plaque is:
May the road rise up to meet you,
May the wind be always at your back,
May the sun shine warm upon your face,
The rains fall soft upon your fields,
And until we meet again,
May God hold you in the palm of his hand.
This is an Irish blessing and ironically Marshall has the line from it "until we meet again" tattooed on his arm long before Nolan was ever even thought about. It seemed only fitting that this saying be incorporated into Nolan's memorial and subsequently into our thoughts when remembering Nolan.
At his memorial I read a poem I had stumbled upon only days after Nolan's death. This one poem summed up every thing I was thinking and feeling at the time and still resonates with me tremendously.
Tears
If tears could build a stairway,
and memories a lane,
I'd walk right up to Heaven
and bring you home again.
No farewell words were spoken
no time to say goodbye
you were gone before I knew it,
and only God knows why.
My heart still aches in sadness
and secret tears still flow,
what it meant to lose you,
no one will ever know.
Monday, October 21, 2013
Day 21: Honor
Day 21: Honor
Oct 21, 2013
Since Nolan's death, Marshall and I have done numerous things to try to honor his memory. We held a memorial service several weeks after his death on what was supposed to be Nolan's due date. Now every year on his birthday, March 30th, we plan on doing something as a family to celebrate Nolan's life. Our intent is to do something Nolan would have enjoyed doing. This year we decided to include all our family and friends that wanted to be included in it and we held a birthday party for Nolan complete with cake, candles and a sky lantern that we lit and launched into space on the beach. This yearly celebration also includes Marshall and I to not work on March 30th. If there was one thing we learned that fateful night in March 2012, it was that family is more important that work. We want to use Nolan's birthday to remind us of this and keep us in check that we aren't letting work come in the way of family. The other yearly thing we plan on doing to honor Nolan's memory is to sponsor a little boy every Christmas. Our hope is to sponsor one around the age Nolan would have been that Christmas and buy Christmas presents for that little boy. Presents that we would have bought for Nolan had he been here.
I think there's lots of things we do on a day to day basis to honor Nolan's memory though. Some things we are not necessarily even aware that we are doing. My blog in itself is a way of honoring his memory and every time we publicly speak about him, write about him or post about him we are honoring his memory. I remember the first time I posted a picture of him online there was some backlash from people that were offended that I posted a picture of him. To those people, I have to say I am sorry that my loss offended you but he is my son and I will honor his memory any way I want.
Oct 21, 2013
Since Nolan's death, Marshall and I have done numerous things to try to honor his memory. We held a memorial service several weeks after his death on what was supposed to be Nolan's due date. Now every year on his birthday, March 30th, we plan on doing something as a family to celebrate Nolan's life. Our intent is to do something Nolan would have enjoyed doing. This year we decided to include all our family and friends that wanted to be included in it and we held a birthday party for Nolan complete with cake, candles and a sky lantern that we lit and launched into space on the beach. This yearly celebration also includes Marshall and I to not work on March 30th. If there was one thing we learned that fateful night in March 2012, it was that family is more important that work. We want to use Nolan's birthday to remind us of this and keep us in check that we aren't letting work come in the way of family. The other yearly thing we plan on doing to honor Nolan's memory is to sponsor a little boy every Christmas. Our hope is to sponsor one around the age Nolan would have been that Christmas and buy Christmas presents for that little boy. Presents that we would have bought for Nolan had he been here.
I think there's lots of things we do on a day to day basis to honor Nolan's memory though. Some things we are not necessarily even aware that we are doing. My blog in itself is a way of honoring his memory and every time we publicly speak about him, write about him or post about him we are honoring his memory. I remember the first time I posted a picture of him online there was some backlash from people that were offended that I posted a picture of him. To those people, I have to say I am sorry that my loss offended you but he is my son and I will honor his memory any way I want.
Sunday, October 20, 2013
Day 20: Hope
Day 20: Hope
Oct 20, 2013
After I lost Nolan I had hope that he wasn't my only chance to be a mother. I held out hope that I would be granted another opportunity to be the mother I always wanted to be and not just a mother with empty arms. 49 weeks and 1 day after Nolan's death I was granted that wish. 49 weeks and 1 day. Normal gestation for a baby is 40 weeks. Ronan grew inside me for 38 weeks.That means only 11 weeks after Nolan's death we conceived Ronan. Not quite 3 months. We were told to wait until I had one cycle before we tried again and longer if we needed to heal more emotionally first. But I felt like my emotional healing wouldn't begin until I had hope that I would be a mother again. That hope came in the form of a blue line on a pregnancy test. I would take 3 more tests before the week was over, each one showing an even darker blue line. Ronan became my hope for a brighter future. As he grew bigger and stronger, so did my hope. Ronan gave me hope that one day I would be able to be the mother that I thought I was about to become with Nolan. Ronan and Marshall, who after all gave me my two most precious gifts of all - my sons.
What hope do I have for others that might experience this? I would hope that no one would ever join this "club" I'm in, but I know that is unrealistic. So for those that do, I hope that they too can find something to live for, some hope for a brighter future. For some I know this doesn't include having another child. For me that was the only hope I clung to because I felt it was obtainable. But now in retrospect I realize there were other things I could have gravitated to as well to give me hope that I would smile and laugh and be happy again. There was and is my marriage, my friends, my family, and my art - my writing. Now my hope is that my writing can help someone else. I want to know that my writing isn't just helping to heal me but maybe somewhere else someone else is reading it at just the right time and it is impacting them. Maybe that's my higher purpose in having gone through this experience. I feel like it was paid forward to me and now I should pay it forward in the only way I really know how - by writing it down.
Oct 20, 2013
After I lost Nolan I had hope that he wasn't my only chance to be a mother. I held out hope that I would be granted another opportunity to be the mother I always wanted to be and not just a mother with empty arms. 49 weeks and 1 day after Nolan's death I was granted that wish. 49 weeks and 1 day. Normal gestation for a baby is 40 weeks. Ronan grew inside me for 38 weeks.That means only 11 weeks after Nolan's death we conceived Ronan. Not quite 3 months. We were told to wait until I had one cycle before we tried again and longer if we needed to heal more emotionally first. But I felt like my emotional healing wouldn't begin until I had hope that I would be a mother again. That hope came in the form of a blue line on a pregnancy test. I would take 3 more tests before the week was over, each one showing an even darker blue line. Ronan became my hope for a brighter future. As he grew bigger and stronger, so did my hope. Ronan gave me hope that one day I would be able to be the mother that I thought I was about to become with Nolan. Ronan and Marshall, who after all gave me my two most precious gifts of all - my sons.
What hope do I have for others that might experience this? I would hope that no one would ever join this "club" I'm in, but I know that is unrealistic. So for those that do, I hope that they too can find something to live for, some hope for a brighter future. For some I know this doesn't include having another child. For me that was the only hope I clung to because I felt it was obtainable. But now in retrospect I realize there were other things I could have gravitated to as well to give me hope that I would smile and laugh and be happy again. There was and is my marriage, my friends, my family, and my art - my writing. Now my hope is that my writing can help someone else. I want to know that my writing isn't just helping to heal me but maybe somewhere else someone else is reading it at just the right time and it is impacting them. Maybe that's my higher purpose in having gone through this experience. I feel like it was paid forward to me and now I should pay it forward in the only way I really know how - by writing it down.
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