After Parker died, my obgyn prescribed me a sleep aid. Well, it was more of a "I'm gonna knock you unconscious and you're going to be dead to the world for 12+ hours" pill. I have never slept better! I didn't dream, i didn't toss and turn, and from what i could tell, I didn't even roll over during the night; since i always woke up in the same position i fell asleep!
Sadly, after we found out B was setting up shop in my uterus i had to stop taking the prescription. It really didn't help matters that i was already a train wreck about being pregnant again, especially when B's due date was Parker's birthday. That's probably about the time the nightmares started happening over and over and over and over again, night after night; after we found out his due date.
Here's where it may get hard to read. I'll italicize the rough parts so if you choose not to read it, you know where its "safe" to start reading again.
I'm sitting in that green rocker chair. The one that i wished we could have for Parker's nursery. Greg is sitting in my hospital wheelchair next to me, leaning over my shoulder peeling the adhesive from the tape out of Parker's hair. The doctor and nurse come in and tell us its time. They take Parker from me, put him back in his NICU bed, and start to disconnect all the wires and cords that he's hooked up to. The nurse hands him back to me and peels the tape off his cheeks that's holding the ventilator tube in place in his mouth and throat. I notice that he's swollen and doesn't look anything like the baby i had seen 52 hours before. As the doctor pulls out his ventilator tube, i feel a panic take over. I watch my baby, my son, slowly turn purple. I wake up and my heart is racing and feels like it may bust out of my chest.
The next one:
I am at Parker's grave site and i hear a baby crying faintly. Something inside of me tells me to dig. As I'm digging the crying gets louder and louder as i dig deeper. I grab the casket out of the ground and open it. There is my precious Parker crying, reaching for me. That's when I wake up in tears and gasping for air.
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| Mommy and Daddy Miss You So Much Buddy! |
I never can fall back asleep. I usually just turn on the tv and cant stop crying until its time to get up, or B wakes up. Then i just wipe away the tears and try to put on a happy face for him.
The rest of the day after i wake up like that is horrible, its all i think about. Somedays i can shake it off, but others, it completely consumes me.
Greg doesn't understand; it doesn't haunt him like it does me.
Do you have dreams about your baby? Are they peaceful or are they nightmares? If so, have you been able to control them. And how?
I dont have night terrors yet as I am taking a sleeping pill that quashes all that but instead I have day terrors. My mind will drift back to it all and I'll be lost in it, many a time I dont realize when someone is speaking to me. I just drift off into these thoughts and day nightmares and loose time. Its the same for me, it traumatized me alot more than my hubby and haunts me too.
ReplyDeleteI believe one of my firsts posts I wrote after starting my blog was all about nightmares. I dream a lot, usually bad dreams at that, and after Liam died I kept having dreams about babies and then losing them. They were all different and the baby wasn't necessarily Liam but centered around me getting a baby and then it getting taken away.
ReplyDeleteI am not able to control them, had them my whole life, although I haven't had any like that in a quite a few months.
@michelle- i used to get those alot, especially when i went back to work after parker died. My soon to be one year old has kept me and my mind busy since back when he started the rockem sockem with my uterus. I haven't had a day terror in over a year.
ReplyDelete@becky- Im slowly working my way through your blog. I tried to start with the first post and work my way forward, but i must have missed that one. Im glad to hear you haven't had any in a few months.