Kimber's Birthday

My beautiful perfect son was born a year ago on September 4. 

Trust me when I tell you that he truly was handsome. I did not see him with rose-colored glasses. He was beautiful and perfect. 

But he was dead. 

It still hurts to say those words (or write them). They seem so harsh and cold. Whenever I have to break the news to people I haven't seen in a long time I try to use gentle soothing language. No one wants to be smacked in the face with tragic death. 

But we were. It knocked the wind right out of us. 

He was dead. And as much as I secretly begged him to breath, he remained dead. 

My sweet baby boy who had moved and grown inside me for 9 months had stopped moving. 

Words cannot express what that does to a mother, to a father, to a marriage, to a family. 

We celebrated his birthday. 

Oh yes! We celebrated it! Honestly, it was mostly selfish. I want to know that he has made a mark on this world. I want everyone to remember that he truly lived. I want people to know that I have a birth story that is worth sharing. 

I was induced, I felt labor pains, my water broke, I got an epidural, my epidural failed, I cried, I had a birth team, I pushed four times and I gave birth to a perfect little 6 pound baby. 

I feel sorry that it makes some people feel uncomfortable because they gave birth to life and I to death. But my heart cannot pretend that my birth story didn't happen. It has shaped my entire life. Not in the way, perhaps, that their birth story has shaped them, but it has changed me forever. 

He mattered. He made a difference. He counts. I may not have been able to bring him home. But he counts. 

Amongst my family and close friends it is common to speak of my son and of his birth. 

The women gather together and we share our birth stories and I know Kimber's story is treasured amongst the stories of my nieces and nephews and cousins. 

I do not pretend that he didn't exist. I comment often of my trials or joys during my pregnancy with him. I carried him for 9 months. He counted.

Sometimes, outside my common circle, I get awkward sidelong glances and sad looks when I share. I know it's often uncomfortable because it reminds women that death can happen to them as it once happened to me. So, I do try to choose my moments. Sometimes I might not even mention that he died. Because I know that fear can grip our soul and draw us far from The Lord. I do not want to instill fear in women for their babies. 

I just want to be counted. I am a mother. I am a mother whose arms have physically ached to hold her newborn and whose body has so desperately tried to recover from the shock of giving birth but not having a baby. 

I am a mother and yet I am not a mother. 

It is a terrifying place to be. 

So we celebrated his birthday. 

I believe it will be a family tradition. 

His cousins picked out figurines to place in his memorial garden. Alongside one John and I chose. 

My dear friend made sunflower cupcakes and his cousins stuffed their faces and happily said "Happy Birthday Kimber!"  

John and I purchased special outfits for babies like Kimber who are born without life and we donated them to the hospital where he was born. Our wonderful nurse from his birth even met us at the hospital and introduced us to the nurse in charge of loss. They showed us that we mattered, that he had mattered. 

We purchased beautiful outfits and soft blankets. When your baby has only one outfit, you want it to be special and beautiful. You want his blanket to be soft. When you hold him you want to feel that he is comforted by these beautiful things that you wished you never had to give him. 

We lit floating lanterns that my dear friend brought and watched as they burned bright and became dim in the distance. 

We remembered him. We celebrated who he was and how he has changed us all. We talked with his cousins and explained that Kimber was in Heaven because God had big plans for him, plans that we might never understand. 

We are his parents. He is forever a part of our hearts. It is a part of our nature to make sure you know that he mattered. That he counted. 

I may have given birth to death, but, before that, God wove together life inside of me. A beautiful perfect life. 

I read a quote the other day that said "Do not forget, in the darkness, what The Lord has revealed to you in the light". We may feel as if we are in a time of darkness but we must remember WHO God is and remember that His plan is perfect and He has promised us a future and a hope. 

God has counted Kimber amongst His own. God has shown us that Kimber mattered to Him. 

We will always celebrate. I hope you will too.