In and Out

Today marks the day when Levi has been out as long as he was in!

38 weeks in: 

I was tired from pregnancy and exhausted from constantly being anxious. Levi was quite wriggly, having gone from head down, to breech, then tranverse and back again within a matter of weeks.

38 weeks out:

I am no where near as tired as I was and so much less anxious. Levi is still very wriggly and I love watching him roll and crawl around our house (it's much better than when he rolled around inside!) I tell him so often how glad I am that he is alive and how much we love him. He's a very cheeky boy and is such a delight to us daily. I'm so grateful to have the opportunity to watch him grow and he heals my heart a little bit more each day.

Always meant to be ours

When I got pregnant with Levi, I was excited, scared, thrilled and petrified. But above all the mixed emotions was one simple thought that I could not get out of my head for weeks: if Ariella had lived, this child would not have existed. You see, if our baby girl had lived, we would not have planned to get pregnant as soon as we did. I struggled with feeling guilty and wondered how I could love my second child whilst knowing that their existence was dependent on Ariella's death. It was really hard!

But then a dear friend suggested something to me. Maybe, just maybe, Levi was the child we were always going to have second; maybe all his sister's death did was bring his arrival forward in time. It was a comforting thought and one I tried to hold onto. A few months later, another friend said something very similar. After hearing it for a second time, I decided that I needed to believe it to be true. I assumed I would never really know for certain, but I liked the idea that Levi was always going to exist and that Ariella's death simply meant that he existed sooner.

By the end of my pregnancy, I had forgotten all about those thoughts. I had forgotten my initial worries and feelings completely and never thought about what Ariella's death meant in relation to my second child. After Levi was born, I had a lot of bad dreams about things happening to him. But I also had one dream that was oh so lovely while I was asleep but heartbreaking when I awoke. I dreamt that it was a lovely weekend morning, and Marcus and I were laying in bed with our two children - a curly haired, sweet faced two year old girl and a darling little baby boy. I woke up with tears streaming down my face because that dream would never be my reality. It made me miss by baby girl even more as it showed me what I would never have. For weeks I hated that dream.

And then I realised what it meant. It wasn't Ariella and some baby. It was Ariella and Levi. Ariella AND Levi both existing, just with a larger age gap between them. I don't believe that every dream is significant or has meaning (thankfully, as I can have some strange ones....drummer for Jimmy Barnes' band? I don't think so!) but I do believe that the dream I had of my two children was from God. It has put to rest any question as to whether Levi only exists because Ariella died. In the dream, both of my children were alive and the gap between their ages was closer to the gap I would have hoped for if Ariella had lived.

Levi William, always meant to be ours.

I Never Knew

I never knew it would hurt this much. That almost 13 months later the pain would be just as raw even if the tears don't always flow so freely. 

I never knew it would be so hard to use basic terminology. That words like dead, funeral and grave would be replaced by stillborn, service and special place because my broken heart can barely cope with using the others in connection with my daughter. 

I never knew that I could feel so much guilt for something that wasn't my fault. That I would have to battle so hard against the lies of the enemy in order to simply glimpse the truth, yet alone believe it. 

I never knew how desperately I would wish that I could visit Heaven. That a beautiful sunset could bring me to tears as I wished the clouds were stairs. 

I never knew how frequently I would get asked if Levi was my first child. That at least once a week my heart would begin to pound as I worked out what to say. 

I never knew that sometimes I would answer yes to that question. That I would deny Ariella's existence to protect my heart from breaking or even just to save a stranger from feeling awkward.

I never knew I could miss someone so much. That my heart could be so full and so empty at the same time.