Owen

Since Oct 15th was the National Day of Loss Remembrance I've been thinking more about Owen and all the losses many of my friends have had. I try not to go down the path of "what if". I try to stay on the path of what is in front of me. But every now and then I go back and remember. Like today. I'm remembering Owen.

If you don't know about Owen here is a re-post that I wrote a few years ago on Oct 15, 2008.

While catching up on blogs I realized that today was the National Day of Loss Remembrance. And while I have posted about our situation before (here) I have never blogged specifically about Owen.

We found out at our 20 week ultrasound (Jan 2002) that we were having twin boys and that one of them was not going to go home with us. That was Owen. He had anencephaly, which is a structural defect where the neural tube doesn't close all the way. There are varying degrees of anencephaly (just the skull is missing, or most of the brain). In Owen's case he had no skull, brain or brain stem. We knew he would die shortly after birth, but we just didn't know how long. Owen was my firstborn. When he was born I saw him staring at me, almost as if he could see me. I saw him blink his big eyes once and then he didn't do anything else. I just held onto him as his heartbeat slowly faded away. We snuggled him tightly and said goodbye. We cried and cried and cried. We still cry when we talk about him.

He is a part of our lives and we have always talked quite openly with the kids about him. Two years ago, when Riley was 4, he was mentioning Owen quite a lot. He was crying about him, wishing he was here and it was happening almost nightly. I decided that we would have a little memorial/chat about Owen for Riley to say goodbye to Owen. After all, they had shared a tight space for 33 weeks. I retrieved my "Owen" stuff from the top of my closet. I opened up my special remembrance box that has some of Owen's hair (he had some above his forehead) his handprints and footprints. I shared the story of Owen with Riley and Katie. We talked about Owen being up in heaven. I showed them the blue square urn that held Owen's ashes. The urn has a little bear engraved on it.

Riley asked me if he could hug Owen and proceeded to cuddle the little urn and then said the sweetest things to Owen: "I'm sorry that God didn't make your head right and I'm sorry that you have to be in the closet all the time. Sorry you can't come in the car with us."

We all had a good cry that afternoon. I packed away all my Owen stuff and haven't taken it down since. I wrote down all the things that Riley and Katie did and said about Owen. One day I'm sure they would like to know. Today I remember Owen and wish he was here. But I'm so glad Owen has his perfect Heavenly Father. Today I think about all the women who have lost their sweet babies whether through miscarriage,abortion, birth, SIDs or through some other way. Saying goodbye to any child is the hardest thing a mom can go through.