Baby Weight

I am two months postpartum and my pre-baby jeans are too big.

Cue the I hate you’s.

But this is not a statement of bragging, this is a statement of grieving, of deep loss. 

All tangible signs of her are gone. All physical reminders of her existence have disappeared.

And so, I mourn. I mourn the loss of the belly that carried her. I mourn the loss of the milk that would have sustained her. I mourn the loss of all extra weight that kept her strong and healthy for nine months. 

The weight of this loss is so much greater. 

I am alone. I am just Deanne. You can no longer tell I bore a child, the most beautiful and perfect child.

So please, don’t tell me I look 'back to normal'. There is nothing normal about this. Tell me I look changed, tell me I look different, tell me I look like her mother. 

She is (was) here.

Her name is Quinn Olivia.

She is my daughter.

I got everything I ever dreamed of. I am a mother.

I got to be her mommy… for 24 hours.

Who could imagine that the next words I would be writing on this blog would be those of my baby’s birth and death. After everything we’d been through. No one could have prepared us for this.

I am not certain why I feel the need to share these sentiments publicly. Perhaps it is because I want the world to know her. I don’t want her beautiful face to be forgotten. If she were here with me right now, I would already have an album on facebook full of every new and exciting thing she did. Look, this is her face when she’s pooping! Look, isn’t she cute when she sleeps? Look, she smiled! Look, she smiled a little bit bigger than the last time! Typical Mom stuff, thinking their baby is the only one to have ever done anything that cute. But instead I have 88 pictures, my memories of those blissful moments and these words to share with the world. To introduce my baby to them. That’s it. That’s all I have.

She was so beautiful. Every mother says they have the most beautiful baby in the world. I did. I do. None can compare to her. She was absolutely perfect in every way. So delicate, so feminine, so Quinn. She took my breath away when I looked into her face for the first time.

   

“She looks like me!”

It is the most miraculous thing to look upon the child you have created and see yourself. That’s yours. You made that. She belongs to you. She is a part of your very being, your soul. Forever and ever.

Simple words cannot express the depth of love I feel for her. I love my baby. I love my little girl. But she is not here. I cannot lavish that love upon her. And so, it hurts. It hurts so very badly. Simple words cannot express the depth of pain I feel for her.

To the world,
Please don’t forget her. Don’t forget that she fleeting existence. Don’t forget her beauty. Don’t forget that I am her Mommy, that Daniel is her Daddy, that we are a family. Don’t forget my firstborn baby girl, my Quinny bear.