April 19th, 2010 – Julia Rose

Yesterday was a day full of emotion. Happiness, love, feeling blessed, sadness, enjoyment, contentment, feeling peaceful, anger, and bitterness. For the most part, I truly enjoyed our day yesterday, and I felt Julia’s presence with us.

We had a trip planned to Niagara Falls, and it was the perfect day. Not a cloud in the sky. It was sunny and about 15C (~60F). First off, I brought out Julia’s pictures and her things and we all looked at them. I told Ethan about Julia, and how today we were going to do some special things to remember her and honour her on her special day. We started off with some special packages to open. My dear friend Katy sent me a special gift in remembrance of Julia. When I opened it, I cried as it reminded me of my Julia. It was a beautiful globe candle holder/candle with lovely pink roses all over it. I lit it, and it looked absolutely lovely. Thank you so much Katy, I love it!! I also received a scroll with a special poem on it from my bereavement group councillor. It was such a lovely poem and brought tears of love and remembrance.

To the Child in My Heart
Author Unknown

O precious, tiny, sweet little one
You will always be to me
So perfect, pure, and innocent
Just as you were meant to be.
We dreamed of you and of your life
And all that it would be
We waited and longed for you to come
And join our family.

We never had the chance to play,
To laugh, to rock, to wiggle.
We long to hold you, touch you now
And listen to you giggle.
I’ll always be your mother.
He’ll always be your dad.

But now you’re gone…but yet you’re here.
We’ll sense you everywhere.
You are our sorrow and our joy.
There’s love in every tear.
Just know our love goes deep and strong.
We’ll forget you never –
The child we had, but never had,
And yet will have forever.

In Niagara Falls we first went to the Butterfly conservatory. Near the entrance to the tropical gardens there was a sign with all the butterflies listed with their pictures. To my surprise and delight, there was a butterfly named Julia. It is a lovely orange.

Inside the gardens, we all felt so peaceful and the butterflies were so uplifting, which brings me to the symbolism of a butterfly. I can’t say I ever looked it up before, but butterflies have always been something that I loved. I have jewelry, plant accents, several mugs, and home decorations that have butterflies on them. For our wedding we had centerpieces with butterflies in them. To me, butterflies meant peace, tranquility, beauty – mainly the things I feel when I see them. But today, I looked up what others symbolize them as, and I got goosebumps. Below I have listed a couple excerpts from Google searches.

There are many links with butterflies in mythology from all over the world, many of which, in particular Greek mythology, link butterflies to the human soul. The Ancient Greeks also considered butterflies as the souls of those who had passed away. In ancient Greek the word for butterfly is "Psyche", which translated means "soul".

The butterfly exists in four distinct forms. Some consider that so do we: The fertilized egg is planted in our mother's womb. From our day of birth we are like the caterpillar which can only eat and creep along. At death we are like the dormant pupa in its chrysalis. After that, our consciousness emerges from the cast off body, and some see in this the emergence of the butterfly. Therefore, the butterfly is symbolic of rebirth after death.

You see, there was a butterfly which landed on my arm at the conservatory near the beginning of our visit. It was the butterfly Julia. It was so special to me at that moment, but considering some of the symbolism above I have to wonder if Julia’s soul came to visit to bring me peace.

We all had a lovely time at the conservatory. Ethan didn’t want to leave. He was as touched with all the butterflies as were.

Our next stop after lunch was to purchase some balloons. We purchased three pink ones, one for each of us to write a message on and to let go by the falls.

We drove down closer to the falls and parked. On our walk down to the falls we passed through some beautiful gardens. Many perennials were starting to come up and the daffodils were blooming everywhere. There was a special moment when Ethan spotted the falls and was in awe of them. We continued down to the pathway along the falls. We had our balloons tied to the stroller, and I couldn’t have felt happier. We were all together on our family outing and we were all so happy. We stopped several times to take a look at the falls and we took several pictures. We took a break for a snack and wrote our messages to Julia on the balloons. Ethan drew a picture for Julia. Since it was so windy, our balloons got hopelessly tangled together and we decided to let Ethan let them all go together. It was such a special moment. I felt as though we were letting Julia go (not from our hearts but to be free to explore, make friends and to go on her own adventure – to run, jump, skip and laugh like little girls aught to). I know she will always be there, looking over us, and I will always feel her presence. It was nice watching the balloons all float up together as a “family”. I told Ethan they were going on an adventure. They floated by some birds, passed the moon and eventually went over the falls.

We watched them float up until they were just a dot in the sky.

We headed back to our car and drove along the Niagara River for a while before heading back home. We stopped at a restaurant on the way and shared a lovely dinner together.

When we got home, I couldn’t believe that Ethan was still awake. I read him a bed time story and we talked a little about the day. He was adamant that Julia was going to come back. He just doesn’t understand death, but what can you expect? He is just 2 ½ years old. There was one special moment though, when I was telling him that Julia was “broken” (I had to simplify it so much, in trying to make him understand she was not coming back). He looked at me with determination and said “Mama, I’m going to go on my firetruck with “A” (his best friend at school) and we are going to go and get Julia and bring her back and put her back in your tummy so she can be safe and be with us.” I couldn’t help but cry. Such simplicity, such love. He said, “Mama, what are those things on your cheeks?” I told him Mommy was crying because she was sad, but that she was also really happy that he wanted to help mommy and Julia. I kissed him and hugged him, sang to him and put him to bed.

That was what I thought was the ending to a perfect day. A day dedicated to only Julia, to remembering her and honouring her.

But my husband had to call our friends (who were due near the end of April) regarding some time sensitive business stuff. As I was getting ready for bed, I heard his voice go ridgid as he said “Oh, congratulations.” My heart sank. I asked him when, and he said 5 o’clock this morning. Oh the anger, the bitterness I felt. I cried and cried. How dare this happen and ruin Julia’s day? It is one thing to have babies born around the day when Julia was born, but for our friends to have their baby on the day she was due??? I felt so bitter. I felt soooo angry that there would be this reminder, forever facing us whenever we see their baby. All the milestones, staring us right in the face. The birthday invitations on his birthday, THE FACT THAT THIS DAY WAS NOT SPECIAL JUST TO OUR JULIA ANYMORE!!!

I had to try and make myself not think of it, I had to try to remind myself to be happy, to remember our Julia…but it was so hard. I felt so deflated. We went to sleep hugging each other for comfort. I needed that closeness, that love.