Grieve Out Loud

I had a lot of apprehension about turning 30 last year (September 2011). It wasn’t a vanity or ageist thing, it was a me thing. I wasn’t happy with where I was in life. It felt like there were still so many things left to achieve, one of which was motherhood, something that was ripped away from me on September 18, 2009 when our first child was stillborn at 37 weeks.

In the years to come I had to learn how to incorporate grief into my everyday life. It was a painful transition and my muchness was something that became completely masked by the darkness. I missed my muchness, but it seemed hopelessly lost forever.

On September 1, 2011 I announced my first muchness challenge. During those 30 days some huge milestones were reached including: attending my first baby shower since my own, my husband’s birthday, our son’s 2 year mark and my 30th birthday. (Unfortunately due to technical issues most my original posts were lost).

Participating in the challenge made me see my life different. Instead of living days or weeks or months or even years in advance, I learned to find the beauty in today. Live for now, not the past or the future.

In the end my muchness beat out the darkness. Found the strength to survive another year without my son AND survived turning 30.

Exactly 30 days later (well, 31 because it was Halloween), we found out we were expecting another baby!!!!! And just like that, I had another shot at finding my motherhood muchness.

We’re currently 30 weeks pregnant and ready for round two of Finding my Muchness: Motherhood Addition.

I am very excited to share this journey (and baby) with you. Pregnancy after Loss is an unnerving roller coaster just like grief. Every day brings on new challenges and what better way to stay focused than to fill my days with MUCHNESS?!

My new challenge will begin May 6th, 2011. You can find my journey at julie.findingmymuchness.com
For more information on baby Buttercup visit my personal blog at Tales from the Womb

Want to take on your own Muchness Challenge? For information on how to join please visit findingmymuchness.com

What were your first thoughts of motherhood when you found out you were pregnant? Were you actively trying or was your first baby a surprise? Were you scared, excited, nervous?

What was your first craving? Food or drink? Savory or sweet? Junk food or health food? How long did the cravings last?

Share your stories with us!

Welcome back for our second round of The First! writing challenge. Here is this weeks topic:

Who was the first person you told about your pregnancy (besides your significant other)? How far along were you? How did they react?

Looking forward to reading your entries!

January 2012 marks the two year anniversary of Grieve Out Loud.

I can remember our premier like it was yesterday. We weren’t entirely sure how people would find us, or if this would even “work out” — but we felt such a need and deep desire to help others who have experienced the kind of losses we had. We put together an elaborate resource page and created a unique Pen-Pal Program that has become an entire project all of its own.

We’re humbled by the families we have helped throughout the years.
Helping has always been our mission.

Today, on our two year anniversary, we are asking for your help.

We are asking you to please consider a donation to keep our website live. For the past two years our domain space has been graciously donated to us. We will lose our site come January 31, 2012 if we do not find a new provider.

If you would like to see us stick around and continue to help families, please consider a donation today.

Donations can be made through PayPal or mail (address available upon request).

First let me say thank you to all who signed up for our 1st annual Handmade Holiday Gift Exchange. I promise this will bring some extra joy into your holidays. Below is the partners list. Remember you are in charge of contacting your partner for their mailing address!

Partners are listed by e-mail address. Either click the link, or copy the address. The sooner you contact your partners the better, so get crackin’!

Please have your gifts postmarked by December 15! Most of all enjoy yourself! If you have any questions contact us!

Alysee + Emily

Amber Roseberry + Karin Olson Held

Lisa Marie Scullen + Megan Knebel

Jessica Higgins + Kanisha

Sarah Ragusa + Cindy Noble Stout

Stephanie Desjarlais + Tracey Capela

Hannah Roberts + Julie Gratton

Dayna Sabbath + Ang (altermyworld.angw@gmail.com)

Amanda (ilovemypitbull.amanda@gmail.com) + Stephanie Brown

Elizabeth Foor + Laurie Wear

Amanda Glant + Kayce Jones

Kathryn + Elizabeth Howell

Mary Pruitt + Amanda Broder

Erika Kraus + Samantha Doerfler

Ashley Nicholas + Alanna Whiteside

Courtnee Ramirez + Julie

Megan Skaggs + Alexandra Garcia

Nicole Ramsey + Cynthia Prest

Angela (jakinthebox08@gmail.com) + Sarah Casale

Anna Mireles + Sibahan Sanders

Dawn Molisky + Nneka Edwards

Heather Brown + Heather Taylor

Angela Pelissero + Cindra Fox

Tiffany Queener + Kat Davis

Michelle HS + Tanya Knepp

Cindy Carmack + Kendra Stapp

Shelly Adams + Tiffany Rodriguez

Tiffany Evans + Paula (aclassofangels@aol.com)

Toya Williams + Katie N.

Natashia + Melissa Tripp

Celeste + Liza Guillot

Michelle Seibert + Lori Lederer

Alissa + Alicia Karrick

Anna Taylor + Victoria Gregory

Melissa Terrill + Mendy Kew

Amanda Crowe + Lisa (claire2be@hotmail.com)

Koko + Shannon Hauger

Melissa (canole24@aol.com) + Amanda Lawson

Janetta Grigsby + Holly

Stephanie Sotka + Melinda Allen

Kim (kimwyman81@gmail.com) + Cathy Johnson

Melissa Kho + Adrianna Napaluch

Courtney Hagenbuch + Kimberly McIntyre

Carey Bear + Wanda Wieser

Ally (olivepit11@gmail.com) + Jen Marisi

Jenna Edgley + Erica (btrfly7565@yahoo.com)

Elaine + Sarah Dallum

Susan Franks + Kristie Weichel

Saturday, October 15th is Pregnancy and Infant Loss Remembrance Day. Everyone is invited to light a candle at 7 p.m. in ALL time zones, all over the world! Snap a picture and share who the candle is burning for.

In the past years many of you have submitted some amazing photos. I would like to keep the tradition going. If you aren’t already, please add us to your FB Page. When you have posted your pictures of your candles, tag us in the photo. In the next few days I will make us a photo collage of all the candles as a keepsake. Also looking for high-res pictures from your memorial activities that are going around in your city. These photos will be used to bring awareness on how important October 15th is and to show in picture how we find ways to remember our children. If you are not on FB please feel free to e-mail us your photos at grieveoutloud@gmail.com

Looking forward to hearing about everyone’s activities on the 15th. Every year more opportunities seem to pop up. Let us keep the awareness out there and remember our children in style!

(Photo from: Sweet Peat Project)

Today is the last day of my 30 days of muchness challenge. Want to take a moment to look back and share some of my experiences with you.

Day 1 was probably the hardest day of my entire challenge. There was a family baby shower happening over Labor Day weekend and I knew I wanted to create something unique for baby H.

It was my first creative project (and baby shower) since my own son died and just the idea of creating something for another baby (boy) had me in limbo. Found some woodblocks at the resale shop a few days prior and with a little burst of creativity I decided to create some nursery artwork. With the help of some black acrylic paint, a sharpie, a ruler and spray adhesive I began digging into my fabric stash and pulling out some of my favorite swatches.

By day 3 my present was complete with an added bonus of swatches used in my son’s nursery. Now a little piece of my son will be shared with their new family.

Day 13 was a prep day for my husband’s birthday. Decided early on that I would create monster cupcakes for him. Went to the candy store and bought loads of penny candies for decorating.

Day 14 was his birthday and so began hand-creating 30 uniquely different cupcakes. Along the way I found myself creating cupcakes for our son, since his birthday would be coming up next. Decided right then and there that this year I would ask my friends and family to honor our son by making or buying a cupcake and sending us a picture.

Day 17 I gather my son’s urn and carried him downstairs to take his annual picture next to his memorial jade plant. It’s amazing to see how much his plant has grown!

Day 18 was his 2 year birthday. We spent the day at Kings Island and made sure to walk through Planet Snoopy in his honor. When we returned home my best friend surprised me with a visit. She wrote his name out in cupcakes and goodies and it really made my day.

Later that evening a friend sent me a picture of her jade plant and a cupcake for our boy. It was another heart-warmer because I actually took a cutting from my jade plant to send to her in memory of her son R.

Day 28 I woke up to balloons and candy! I thought for sure my husband got his days mixed up. Comes to find out he wanted to kick off my 30th birthday with 3 days of celebration!

Day 29 I woke up to a beautiful fall mum with a note “A mum for Mom” (which totally melted my heart!)

Day 30 it was all about my chocolate cake!!!!!

:::::

I hope you have enjoyed the look back on my 30 days of muchness. Thanks to all who followed my journey and kept me on the muchness track. Special thanks to Tova for thinking this up and sharing it with us! If you are interested in taking the muchness challenge yourself, click here for all the info.

Our next Online Support Group Chat Session is scheduled for this Monday, August 29th, starting at 9 p.m. eastern time.
This months topic will be Baby Showers.
We will share ideas, stories and memories from our own showers along with discussing how attending baby showers for friends and family makes us feel after our loss.

Our Group Sessions are through tinychat.com and it is very simple (and free) to join us!

1) Visit http://tinychat.com/grieveoutloud

2) When prompted the password is: babyloss (the password to broadcast your webcame is also babyloss)

It’s that easy!

Hope you can join our meeting! Even if you don’t have a lot of time, we would love for you to jump in and say hello. At the end of this meeting we will talk about next months topic. What would you like the topic to be?

We would like to invite you to join us for our next online support group chat scheduled for Thursday, July 28th starting at 6 p.m. eastern time. Since it has been several months since our last meeting, it will be a meet and greet. We are planning to host these online support group chats every last Thursday of each month, so mark your calendars in advance!

To join us please visit www.tinychat.com/grieveoutloud

Tinychat is a free video chat room with no special downloads. Please visit tinychat.com to setup an account to join us!