Anger Issues

"How are you feeling?" one of the secretaries at work asked me.

There was that question again.  How do you answer such a question after you have just lost a baby?  After you have just given a part of yourself away and buried it in the ground?  After your heart has been shattered into a billion pieces, never to be quite the same again?  

"I am angry all the time," I confided, slightly ashamed, slightly confused.

Grief is a funny thing. They say that you go through stages of grief - denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance.  I think I am abnormal, because I think I only experienced three of those - denial, anger, and depression.  I don't think I had made it to the acceptance stage yet.  Well, maybe I had, but it was coming in steps - not all at once like I thought acceptance did.

I experienced denial at the doctor's office when they told me that my baby had died.

I experienced denial at the hospital when those two words, "Fetal demise," came from the mouth of the front desk lady.

I experienced denial when the somber mortician walked into the room and started discussing options with Jayze and me.

I experienced depression in the weeks ahead.  I cried.  I cried a lot.

There were times when I didn't want to do homework, get out of bed, see anyone, clean the house...

But anger, boy did I experience anger.  I was angry at everything.  I was angry when someone told me his pregnant wife was complaining that she was sick and that she wouldn't be able to enjoy Thanksgiving this year.  "We'll have to get pregnant at a different time other than Thanksgiving," he told me she had told him.  Bah, be grateful you are pregnant, my bitter heart said inside.

I was angry when people asked me how I was doing.

I was angry when people stopped asking me how I was doing. 

I was angry whenever I checked the mail and there were a million sympathy letters.  I didn't want letters.  I just wanted my baby.   

But then I was angry when I didn't get anything in the mail.  Did people already forget?  How could people go on living their lives when my baby was no longer living his?

I was angry when I went back for a check-up at the doctor's and the secretary at the front desk asked me as I was leaving if I wanted the "baby packet" they gave to the women who had just had a baby.  And when I told her no, she pressed, "Are you sure?"  Of course I'm sure!  Don't you know who I am?  Don't you know that I don't have a baby at home?  Don't you know that that packet is useless to me?  Don't you know who I am - the woman who was having a perfect pregnancy and then lost her perfect baby?  Someone, tell that woman to get a clue and to not talk to me ever again.  

I was angry when I heard about the birth of other babies.  I was angry when those same people posted pictures of their babies on Facebook.  Were they trying to pour salt into a fresh wound?

I was angry when I saw and heard about pregnancy announcements.  How dare they be happy?  Didn't they know it could happen to them too?

I was angry when other people admired other people's babies in front of me.  Didn't they know I had just lost a baby and that no one could admire him with me?

I was angry when a mom complained about their babies or children.  Be grateful you have a baby.  Be grateful you have children.  Be grateful you can practice being a mom right now. 

It wasn't just about babies, pregnancy, or motherhood either...

I was angry when Jayze asked me what was for dinner.  Oh, you're hungry?  Well, I don't know what's for dinner.  Why do I have to be in charge of it all the time, anyway?  Take your turn.

I was angry when Jayze didn't cry with me.  When the way we grieved was different from each other's. Aren't you sad all the time too?  Don't you feel the same way?  How can you already be over it?

I was angry when Jayze didn't answer my texts or phone calls right away.  Wasn't I more important than whatever he was doing right then?  Was he okay?  Didn't he know that I worried something had happened to him when he didn't answer me right away?  Was he trying to scare me?

I was angry when Jayze asked me to pick my clothes off the floor (a bad habit I have when I get stressed).  Just deal with it, okay?  It's not that big a deal.

In fact, I was angry with Jayze ALL the time.  Why was I so angry with him? 

Because I had to go throughout the whole day answering thoughtless, not really wanting an answer, "How are you's?"  At the grocery store when the cashier asked me, when someone came into the office, when my teacher walked into the classroom and asked how everyone was doing...

Because I had to go through the whole day with a forced smile on my face, pretending everything was fine.

Because I had to go through the whole day feeling guilty for smiling, when I didn't even want to smile anyway.  Isn't it a lie smiling when all you feel is empty and brokenhearted?

Because I had to go through the whole day not being able to explode.

Because I had to go through the whole day wondering who knew what had happened.

Because I had to go six whole stinkin' weeks without exercising because I gave birth to a baby I didn't have with me anymore.  Six weeks of not being able to vent in any way at all.  Six weeks of not being able to punch a bag, kick an imaginary villain, run until I couldn't run anymore - and then run some more.

So what did I do?  I went home with all of those vent up feelings and took it all out on Jayze. 

Let me tell you, grief is funny.  Grief is sarcastic, bitter, selfish, idle, pathetic, and angry. 

People said they admired me because I had every right to be angry at God, but I didn't seem to be.  They were right.  I wasn't angry at God...I was angry because I couldn't control anything.  I couldn't escape from the comments of others.  I couldn't escape from the million, every day reminders that my baby was gone.  I couldn't escape from the stares of others, wondering how I was dealing with it all.  I couldn't escape from thoughts that Satan put into my heart - that I was contaminated, that it was my fault, that I couldn't protect my own baby.

I was right in one thing.  I couldn't control anything.  I can't control anything.

But God can.  So why was it so hard for me to trust in Him?

When I first moved into our new ward and was still happy and pregnant with Alma, the Relief Society president gave a talk about wives loving their husbands.  I didn't really think it applied to me.  Then Alma died, and I couldn't stop thinking about the story she shared about a woman who prayed to love her husband again.  The story is called, "Falling Out of Love...and Climbing Back In."  You can find it here.

This woman just didn't love her husband anymore.  She had two options: divorce or a marriage full of unhappiness.  Another choice popped in her head, why not try to fall in love again?

The story goes on to say how she fell back in love with her husband.  It wasn't easy, and she couldn't have done it without Heavenly Father's help.

Well, I needed help.  I needed help with my anger issues.  I needed God to help me not be angry anymore with Jayze, with other people, and with myself.  Could that be possible?

So, I prayed and prayed.  And prayed.  And prayed again.

A few weeks went by.  I was able to exercise again and vent my anger through that instead of at Jayze.  I started looking for the positive things in Jayze, rather than all the negative things.  Once I started looking for the positive things, I saw them, and there were a lot!  I started forgiving people for their comments.  After all, didn't I say the same things when I was pregnant?  They didn't know they were hurting me, so I tried not to take offense.  Instead, I focused on them and kind of just brushed off the comments that didn't seem so offending after all.

I cried when I received sympathy letters - this time because I was happy someone had remembered me.

It felt good to hear things like, "What color was Alma's hair?"  "How old would Alma be now?" 

Even though I broke down into a watery mess every time someone sincerely, front-up asked me, while looking me in the eyes, "How are you doing?"  I was grateful they cared.  I could suddenly feel their love.  I could feel that they really wanted to know because they took time out of their busy schedule to listen and to give comforting words.  They forgot that it might be awkward, that I might be uncomfortable talking about it, and that they might be going out of their comfort zone to ask.  That meant the world to me.  Because I don't mind talking about Alma.  I love it when people use his name.  He is a real person.  I had a real baby, with a real birth weight and height, with real fingers and toes, with real, beautiful dark hair.

It meant so much to me when one of my co-workers followed me to the bathroom when I had a breakdown at work and gave me the biggest, best hug ever and just let me cry on her shoulder for a little bit.

When that same day, that same breakdown, a woman I didn't even work with and had barely talked to had seen me booking it down the hall to the bathroom in tears and stopped me on my way back to let me know she cared.  To let me know that the same thing happened to her daughter and that life is just hard sometimes.   
Remembering people from my work offering their free flight points so Jayze and I wouldn't have to pay for the flight down to Arizona.  When the secretaries from my work stopped by the same day Alma died, with a basket full of food and goodies, and tears and hugs and love.

When the Relief Society brought Jayze and me dinner before and after we came back from Arizona.

When my sister-in-law and brother-in-law brought us dinner and flowers the same day Alma died.

 

When the two doctors at the clinic I go to sent me a huge bouquet of pink and white flowers, letting me know they cared.

When I couldn't stop crying at night, so Jayze brought me the soft, baby blue blanket that reminded me of Alma.  I clutched it, still crying, but able to cling to something solid that reminded me of my baby boy.

It meant so much when the same woman who gave me that blue blanket came to my home and gave me casts of Alma's feet and hands, a beautiful red rose, and a glass block with a Rexburg Temple figurine in it.

When my mom sent me a book she, my dad, and my sister made.  I cried when I opened it.  Jayze and I sat down together and read all of the quotes.  It has been such a comfort.  Just another reminder that my family loves me, that people have remembered my little Alma, and that my Heavenly Father loves me too.

   

When I started crying at the end of a visiting teaching lesson (one that I was giving), and my friend came over and sat by me, cried with me, and said, "It may sometimes seem that people have forgotten, but they haven't.  They just don't really know what to say.  But we love you."

And I totally understood.  What would I say to someone in my situation if I hadn't gone through it myself?  I felt other people's love, and that's all I needed.

I could go on and on and on about all of the good things people did or said to Jayze and me.  The positive things were there, I just hadn't been looking for them.  Once I started noticing the positive things, I realized that the good far outweighed the bad. 

And slowly, gradually, little by little, I wasn't angry anymore.  I stopped yelling.  I stopped slamming doors.  I stopped bristling when Jayze asked me to do a favor or when he told me something that would have made me angry before.

I started loving my husband again, with a fiercer feeling than I had ever felt before.  I deeply love him.

I started loving others more, too.

And I thanked my Heavenly Father for my Savior Jesus Christ's grace.  I thanked Him for loving me anyway.  I thanked Him for giving me just a tiny amount of His love that made all the difference.

Things are still hard.  My heart is still healing.  But I am no longer angry.