Hello again and thank you for all your messages - sorry I haven't been able to post before now. The horrible storm has eased a bit, and now I feel slightly ashamed to have been so vocal on here "at my stage," when there are others here have lost their precious babies so much more recently.
peterpansmum - I hope Gregor's birthday was OK. Sometimes it's just such a relief when it's over. I think it's amazing that you're starting to fundraise already. I'm sure he'd be so proud of you.
triplets - Thank you for telling me about Matthew, and I'm sorry things are a bit tough with your husband right now. I think know what you mean though about being grateful for so many things. I feel lucky for all I've had and got too, in spite of losing my daughter. It's hard to explain that to others though isn't it, without sounding like a delusional nutcase?!
lottiejenkins - that must have been a terrible decision to have to make with your little Jack. We too had to agree to allow the doctors to stop trying to save my daughter's life when the virus caused multiple cardiac arrests. I relive the words that were used over and over.
ziggymama - that's such a beautiful symbol, the sunflower seeds for your son. I love the promise of life, sunshine and a fabulous head of yellow petals. I'm sorry you had that experience with the compassionate friends website. I must have found it at the same time as you because it had become closed then. Such a shame. I did go through the process of registering, but then lost my password, etc, and really it was all too much effort in grief. I rang (or maybe it was my sister?) for local support and a brilliant elderly couple came to see me and through them I met a mother who was four years further down the line from me - naively I thought that made her pretty sorted.. but we have become good friends and support each other now. I did go to a few local meetings but my experiences weren't always positive Are there local meetings in your area? They can be really helplful. If you ring the head office or the helpline number they would be able to tell you if you haven't already tried this.
iliketomoveitmoveit - it took me a long time to get to the stage when I thought I was ready to do the helpline and as Wednesday shows, perhaps I never will be. Thanks to shabba's and crumpette's comments I'm now re-thinking my attitude to keeping going. Before I thought to stop would be admitting failure, but now I feel that any time I give listening to people who need it is a good thing - but if I can only manage a year, or 18 months or two years before letting someone else take my place, that's ok. I can always do it again at a later stage. At the moment I'm so grateful that I'm able to do it, that by talking to someone like me who understands at least some of what they feel so they can put the phone down and have a slightly better day makes me feel like J is proud of me. Thank you both for what you said.
oh crumpette though, it is so recent that you lost your daughter, I'm so sorry. How old was she? How are you feeling as the first anniversary approaches? I agree with you about the word 'virus.' I wrote a diary in the first year we lost J and I fantasised in it that the virus had a name, wore a suit and I knew his address. I hated him so much for taking my daughter. For what?
Sorry - very long post...