Newest design

I'm loving this design.

forgiveness vs. your new reality

I have been debating on whether or not I should blog about this topic. I am not the only person out there who is experiencing this feeling so I am going to just put it out there. 


The quote that really helped me to understand that is from an amazing infant loss article that was posted to facebook last week. This line made me realize that this is a common occurrence in people who have experienced infant loss : "Infant loss is pruning from your life the friends and relatives who ignore or minimize your loss. It's recognizing that, while they may not mean to be hurtful, the fact that they don't know any better doesn't make their utter lack of empathy one whit easier to bear." - Laura Schubert


One of Jeff's good friends experienced a close loss of a family member many years ago. 
Since Truman has died he hasn't called Jeff. When asked about it he says, "I just don't do well with stuff like this."


Whats really head shaking is the fact that Jeff had been there for him through a lot.
What I don't understand is who exactly loves dealing with grief and loss? This is no one's "stuff"! But thanks to Jeff and other friends, when he experienced loss he wasn't left alone, like he is now leaving Jeff.
I see it as extremely selfish. 
And pathetic that someone would rather lose a friend then just acknowledge the loss that we are experiencing.
"People say hard times build character.... I say hard times reveal character."


I'm not even going to get into the people that have left me high and dry.... 
After your child dies, you really do see all the other bullshit with clear vision. Things become very matter-of-fact.
It is not that I am not a forgiving person. I have always been extremely forgiving. It didn't do me much good to forgive the way I had in the past, because often you just open yourself up for history to repeat itself. and honestly, i am so let down in life in general, i can't have more people letting me down on top of it all.
"Even though your baby is not in your arms you still feel a mother's pride and instincts.  Protect yourself and your emotions as fiercely as you protect your child's memory. "


More so than anything its not the lack of words that hurts you, its the lack of action. 
Its way to exhausting to hear "I am sorry" and then forgive and see no change in action.
"Who you are speaks so loudly I can't hear what you're saying."- Emerson


So what it comes down to is this: this is my new reality. The people around us and the people that are missing help shape that reality.  
I really can not think of a more horrific thing that can happen to someone than losing your child. How your friends and loved ones react says so much about who they are.


During such a raw time, its easy to become vulnerable and resistant to want to let go of anything more in your life......
although it is so easy to let go when you finally know just how (un)important you are to them.

Everything is quiet today. Strangely quiet. Much more then usual.
I feel as though I am talking to myself.

My burst of color that I had is over. I'm a nervous energy today.
my mind keeps circling around topics that don't matter in the least.
Everything has changed. I am re-learning to think and live with out Truman here.
My stages of grief are so defined and separate.
I literally can call them out loud as each day passes.

I keep smelling apple cider.
There is none. but i want some.
It's fall, almost Halloween,
and I want my baby.
If only crying and wishing and wanting and deserving could bring him back.

I have spent a far amount of my life grieving in one way or another. 

This time around with Truman was by far the most difficult pain I had ever experienced.

I reached out to many woman and found a sisterhood of familiar loss and pain. That being said there are a few things that, I feel, isolate me from the group. and a major one is religion.

I want to see my son again more than anyone but I just don't find God comforting at all. 

I have been designing stuff lately as a way of healing and keeping busy. A way to feel close to my boy.

I have enjoyed it so much that I want to put out so designs that have nothing at all to do with any religion what-so-ever.

Just love. and comforting words.

Finding hope has been especially difficult for me as well. I don't have any other children. The road a head of us to try to have other children is statistically scary- well, terrifying, for me. So as I go a long my road I'll be designing my photographs with things that help me in any way. and hopefully they will help someone else too.

Would love to have the passer's-by like my facebook page: 

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Laura-Beck-Photography/321815170736

The goal is set: we want to raise $500 more in Truman's name for March of Dimes by Jan. 1st, 2011.
Please feel free to share this link!

https://www.marchofdimes.com/prematurity/b_new.asp?band_id=69655

Thank you <3

The Memorial and Color

I hit a creative burst today.
It felt SO good to get creative and was very healing.
I am starting a greeting card line and can not wait to share my creations with everyone.

This weekend was Truman's memorial. I am still recovering from it.
It was a beautiful day, one that I will remember forever.
It was a beautiful day for Humboldt county, the sun warmed us all afternoon until the fog rolled in around 4:30pm.

The ceremony was beautiful, it was just what we wanted and needed.
My Dad wrote the ceremony and we just paid a woman to read it for us, so even though he wasn't physically here with us for the memorial, his words were.

Jeff designer Truman's wreath with sunflowers, moss, succulents and mums. I chose the last of the summer dahlias (in orange and red) to symbolize his Leo-ness.
The food was delicious. After dusk we all took our flying lanterns out to the beach and it was so much fun.

It was touching to dedicate all the lanterns to the babies that have left us too soon.... along with many lanterns for our Truman.

It was an amazing day. I had hoped that it would live up to be just a fraction as special as Truman was, as a tribute. I think we accomplished that.

I loved hanging out with some friends. I felt so very proud of Truman and felt very close to him all day long.

My friend Kayla said something to me that keeps echoing in my mind over and over. We were sitting in my house playing with her 4 month old baby girl and she said something like, "This is a family house. Truman prepared you in every way for a family, and just because you can't see him doesn't mean that that has changed." I felt a release when see said it for some reason. I felt so validated. This is a family house. I am a mother and I have a son. Its not the normal situation but nothing in my life has ever been normal. It may be hard for some people to understand because they can't see my son but it is our reality.

She also told me about her sister's friend. She was 35 weeks and pre-eclamptic. No one caught it. She seizured and her and the baby both died. Even though it is so sad to hear, it made me realize how lucky I am to be alive. Even if I am sad and saturated with grief, its important for me to make the most of everyday. You never know when you body will give up on you and it will be your last.

Once the visitors left and the house was back to ours, I felt a rush color come back into my mind.
A sort of partial awakening. Part of my brain that had been asleep for at least 6 months decided to wake up.

10/15/11 Truman's Memorial Lantern from Laura Beck on Vimeo.

Truman's Due Date. So well said.

Infant loss is nature's cruelest practical joke. It's investing all of the required time and effort into pregnancy, only to be robbed of the result. It's cradling a body that grew within your own and trying to reconcile the cold, lifeless form in your arms with your memory of the baby who turned double flips in your womb.

It's worrying that you'll forget what your child looked like and snapping an album's worth of photos that no one will ever ask to see. It's sobbing so hard you can't breathe and wondering if it's possible to cry yourself to death.

Infant loss is handing off a Moses basket to the nurse who's drawn the unfortunate duty of delivering your pride and joy to the morgue and walking out of a hospital with empty arms.

It's boxing up brand new baby clothes and buying a 24-inch casket. It's sifting through sympathy cards, willing your foolish body to stop lactating, clutching your baby's blanket to your chest in hopes of soothing the piercing ache in your heart.

It's resisting the urge to smack the clueless individuals who compare your situation to the death of their dog or who tell you you'll have another baby, as if children are somehow replaceable.

Infant loss is explaining to your 7-year-old that sometimes babies die and being stumped into silence when she asks you why. It's watching other families live out your happy ending and fighting a fresh round of grief with every milestone you miss.

It's being shut out of play groups for perpetuity. It's skipping social events with expectant and newly minted mothers because, as a walking worst-case scenario, you don't want to put a damper on the party.

It's listening to other women gripe about motherhood and realizing that you no longer relate to their petty parental complaints because, frankly, when you've buried a baby, a sleepless night with a vomiting toddler sounds something like a gift.

Infant loss is pruning from your life the friends and relatives who ignore or minimize your loss. It's recognizing that, while they may not mean to be hurtful, the fact that they don't know any better doesn't make their utter lack of empathy one whit easier to bear.

My baby girl would have been 5 years old this month. I don't know what she'd look like, what her favorite food would be. I've never had the privilege of tucking her into bed, taking her to the zoo or kissing her boo-boos. I will never watch her graduate or walk down the aisle.

Infant loss is more than an empty cradle. It's a life sentence.

Laura Schubert of New Berlin

Truman's Due Date

Today is my due date.
I feel like its a disappointment on so many levels.
I will forever envy those women who are bitching away about how they are a week past their due date and wanting the baby to come.
I'm holding Truman in my mind and feeling his soft little blonde head brush my cheek.
I would do anything to be with him again.
Some how I'm grieving in another new way. I already miss that bracket of time between when he was born and today. Like it held me closer to him and our story together.
I know logically that it didn't but now that the bracket has ended, I really do feel outside of the parenthesis. The rest of time will feel like this.

I have been having a really hard time controlling my emotions this week.
I'm feeling so very fragile.
I've had many moments where my head starts to spin because its all just too much.
So much anger and sadness.
On top of it, I don't have the most peaceful situation going on at home right now. Privacy is something that is very very important to me, especially when I'm hurting. Its just who I am, I'm a Cancerian, i like to withdraw and hide.
One of Jeff's best friends, M is living up in the mountains here for a while, which is about 2 hours from us.
M and his girlfriend came to visit us on friday and one of their dogs Ruby was very sick.
She was straining to deficate and vocalizing in pain.
I'm not sure if I have posted yet about my inability to see animals in pain lately, so I'll just re-itterate if I have.
I am a Vet Tech, I went to college for it, I am NYS board certified to practice (which is no easy feat), and I was doing well with my career when I got pregnant with Truman. I decided to lay off of the Veterinary medicine thing while pregnant due to the radiation from X-rays, the chemicals, the drugs, the gases from surgery, the parasites, etc. If you ask me a Vet hospital is no place for a pregnant woman, you're pretty much useless.
Anyways, now, after everything that Truman and I went through, all the suffering, I can not see an animal in pain. It literally feels like my soul is breaking.
Its crazy because I thought that I was meant to heal animals. But my emotional capacity is full which leaves me torn. I have a strong desire to help them because i know that I'm good at it and they need people to help them and then there is the clear realization that if i tried it would push me to a very bad place.
Maybe with time. But for now and the near future, no way. and this leaves me having no idea what to do with myself and my future. I very much identify myself as being a Tech. Who am i now? I have no idea.

This is why I don't like leaving the house. Its either something in pain, or a baby in my face, or a laughing child, or someone being rude to me and I just can not handle any of it. The whole situation was very hard for me.

So, the dog. Her name is Ruby. and she was in PAIN. As soon as I saw her my empathic soul was breaking. Her pain was pulsating at me. They had just picked her up from a Vet down in Garberville.... which for those of you who don't know, its way more country down there then here.

I felt panicked for Ruby and I knew something was wrong. Seeing her in so much pain deeply bothered and upset me. The Vet said that she was just constipated but I was not believeing it for a second. I knew there was a blockage somewhere. She was just way too visiably in angony to just be constipated.

She had spent the night at the Garberville Vet's and it was beyond me that they sent her home when she was in that much pain. So I started asking them questions and the Vet did not take x-rays, she did not give any fluids, she did nothing for Ruby's pain besides try and enema.
I had to tell my friends that they just paid some shitty Vet to do absolutly nothing to help their dog. I usually don't judge Vets, I'm usually on their side, they usually know way more then I do but not this time. I just don't understand why the Vet would keep her over night and not give fluids and not take an X-ray. Its just not logical at all. She had been vocalizing then and visibly in excruciating pain.

Long story short, after she barked in pain all. night. long. trying to poop but nothing coming out I talked them into taking her to another Vet here in town for a second opinion.
Ruby was making it pretty obvious that she had a blockage.

Turns out I was right. She has a serious blockage in her rectum, the Vet took x-rays and got her on fluids and gave her something for her discomfort so she could finally sleep. Poor girl had been crying in pain for 4 days at this point.

So basically, their Vet bill keeps going up and up and up because Ruby is hospitalized as they try and try and try to unblock her. They come home every day from visiting her, with stress in their eyes and talk with me about their concerns. and honestly it brings back memories about me and Truman in the hospital and honestly I can not take it. and I don't want to see it and I don't want to be near it. but I also can not be rude and heartless, so i listen. and they are still here, staying at my house. its been 6 days.

and I am starting to lose it.
and i feel really guilty about not being able to take it.
because M is our good friend.

Our house is very very small. Its basically a studio apartment with a small sitting room down stairs.
All I want is quiet and privacy.
It has been days of me wanting this. not even wanting, but needing.
I have to keep it together when they are here.
When every time they leave to go see Ruby in the hospital I just break down and cry because I'm finally alone to let it out.
I know that I could cry in front of them, but I don't want to. I just don't feel comfortable doing that.

I wanted this to be over by my due date so that I could spend my day alone, with Truman in heart.
and now, not only do I not have Truman but I don't even get that.

I feel so guilty for feeling this way.
its honestly the last thing that I need right now.
I feel so conflicted because I want to be a good friend but I also feel like its making me lose my mind.

Sometimes, there is SO much going on inside of me and I control it all, at least attempt to, so much that
But i can't say anything, because I know that would stress them out. and i'd be filled with guilt.

I wish so much that I could take a vacation from grief.
I'm so confused and tired all of the time.
I feel like I just need some protecting from the world for a little while.

At this very moment I feel very sorry for myself. For so many reasons.
I can't help but feel like i'm going to fail horribly at learning how to live a normal life with all of this pain.

I love Truman, my sweet boy, so much. Man, it feels good to weep and let some of this out.
I really hope the weather is nice on Saturday for his memorial.