This little lady. She can light up the darkest day, make me feel like I am superwoman, and just fills my heart with so much love that I feel I could burst. I never really appreciated how much love having a baby can bring but with this little one I understand. She is teaching me patience, understanding, how to learn and grow and how to see things with fresh eyes. I appreciate things that I would never have given a second chance. I want to share so much with her already and we have our whole lives ahead of us to explore and learn #lovebeingamum #lifeisgood #liveloveenjoy #completelyinlove

A lovely day at the farm with the little munchkin enjoying herself on the swing #weekendfun #familytime #somuchlove (at Cefn Mably Farm Park)

My 🌍 in one picture

Facebook decided to remind me this week that two years ago I endured the worst pain and hurt that I had ever experienced. 

Then today there was a link to the above article and I can again understand all of the points. 

Two years after the pain that I felt, I am sat at my computer whilst my rainbow baby sleeps in the next room. Nearing seven months she is becoming a little girl, her personality is really starting to shine and she is quite literally my world.

It doesn’t stop we wondering what if. It sounds daft but if everything had gone well two years ago then my little Alleria would not be here, I would be run ragged by eighteen month old twins. 

Pregnancy was not a good time for me. I was constantly afraid of it all ending in a similar fashion to previous pregnancies. I paid a fortune on private scans until I realised that if I continued that way then I would just drive myself insane and not be able to provide for the child that I so eagerly awaited. 

As the pregnancy progressed, I became a little more at ease with the thought that this was different, but my mind would not shake the fear. There were several instances when I would confide in my best friend and she would find me in tears. 

I am a strong believer in God giving you experiences for a reason, and so I will never hide my thoughts and my feelings about the miscarriage that I suffered. I will never turn away anyone that experiences the same thing, I will always be there to talk. When my world fell apart I felt alone, I do not want anyone to feel alone in what they are going through. No one should feel that they have nowhere to turn

Torc Waterfall, Killarney

One of our favourite places in 2015 :)

Understanding

Over the last few months I have had people ask me why I am still hurting and why I still cry. I agree that I thought that I would be able to live a little better nowadays, but unfortunately there is no easy fix. 

Again I found some writing on a forum that I used to help people understand how it feels to love and lose a child. It’s isn’t just the here and now we lose when a little light goes out but we lose all the hopes and the dreams that come with that positive result. 

For those few weeks- I had you to myself. And that seems too short a time To be changed so profoundly. In those few weeks- I came to know you... And to love you. You came to trust me with your life. Oh, what a life I had planned for you! Just those few weeks. When I lost you, I lost a lifetime of hopes,plans, dreams, and aspirations... A slice of my future simply vanished overnight. Just those few weeks- It wasn't enough time to convince others How special and important you were. How odd, a truly unique person has recently died And no one is mourning the passing. Just a mere few weeks- And no "normal" person would cry all night Over a tiny, unfinished baby, Or get depressed and withdraw day after endless day. No one would, so why am I? You were just those few weeks my little one You darted in and out of my life too quickly. But it seems that's all the time you needed To make my life so much richer- And give me a small glimpse of eternity.

The Date Is Almost Here

The date that our lives should have changed for the better is almost upon us. Sometimes I wonder if it would have happened  but we’ll never know now.

I found this poem online that pretty much sums up all the feelings that I am feeling for the day that our babies should have been welcomed to the world and wanted to share:

Today a tear falls. They start to fall like rain. My heart feels broken. Forever there will be pain. There is a cloud in my life now. Even on sunny days. An emptiness, a longing, A sadness that forever stays. A sadness that is lonely. A silent tear sneaks out. My voice fails to scream, What my heart wants to shout. Unborn babies are precious. Their brief moments with us mattered. We feel love from the beginning. Love continues after our hearts were shattered. Today I should have had my baby. A Baby Angel to love and touch. But instead I have barely a reminder Of one I love so much. No one in my family Has cried a single tear. They move on with their lives Unaware of my pain and fear. Sometimes I can peak beyond the clouds To feel a little joy. I feel the hope of a future That includes a baby girl or boy. But what if it never happens. That's more than I can bear. So I pray and try again. I can't handle more despair. Today's tears keep falling. They rain and then they pour. My babies may never be in my arms, But they're in my heart forevermore.

Finding the Good in the Bad

So here we are, another month since it felt like my world imploded and I am still standing. Not sure how, or even why but I am still standing. They say that time is a healer and to be honest until recent events I would have agreed with them but now I'm not so sure.

Some days go by in a blur, others are really clear and then there are those days when the realisation hits me hard. On those days I feel like I have been hit by a truck and I can barely function. It’s those days that are the ones that supposedly make you stronger, the days when you literally feel like just by getting up in the morning you are achieving something great, but at the time they just feel like an effort.

I know that this may sound all doom and gloom and to some extent it is but trying to find the light in the dark is a little harder than normal. There are so many positives that we can take from this experience:

1. Now we know that we can. We never thought that this could happen. Until April we were under the impression we would never be parents. We had gone through all the myriad of tests, been told that nothing was wrong it was just our bodies not speaking to each other, been informed that our only option to conceive was IVF and that I was to lose the weight in preparation for the treatment in December and we had accepted that this was our life.

2. It has made us closer as a couple. Most people boast that they have a fantastic marriage and that life couldn't get any better but having the news that your family will be completed with the arrival of a new baby just seems to bring everything together. On the flip side, going through the loss of a child can bring you even closer. I have heard horror stories about how marriages have fallen apart because the strain of the loss was too much, or that a life without children is too unbearable to think about and at one point I actually considered leaving my husband, not for me and my want of a family, but to try and give him the chance to meet someone that can provide the family that he craves. When I actually told my husband this he told me not to be so silly and then hugged me that little bit longer. The attitude that we are taking is one of ‘we married each other and the arrival of little ones is a bonus’. It seems to be working for us.

3. It made us actually reassess our financial situation. Being told that you are having one baby is scary enough but when you find out that your miracle baby is actually plural and that there are twins on the way your head spins out of control. We actually started to cut back on the non-essentials and learnt to be restrained each month and we are now saving a lot more so when the time does come that we are buying the cot and the pram, we are in a good position

But how do you really overcome grief? When you lose someone close to you do you ever really move on or do you just find a way to put a bandage on the pain and soldier on? Plus, how do you overcome not just the loss of your unborn baby but the loss of the future that you start to plan as soon as the test says yes?

I keep hoping that as our due date passes then the healing will start but as the due date nears all I feel is hurt and overwhelming loss. I guess time will tell because that is all we have is time.

the hardest thing in this world... is to live in it. Be brave. Live.

Sarah Michelle Gellar, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 5, Episode 22 ‘The Gift’

Three months on and it still stings

There’s nothing like this. The moment when you know it for sure. You imagine them, you know they’re growing inside you, you can feel them. Your babies.

You imagine them, the moment when they’re born, when you first see them. You imagine how it feels to hold them, and when they hold your hand. You imagine that first Christmas, the first steps, the first words, the first time when they say ‘mum’. The first day at school. You’re sure either one will be good at science and even better at music. You’re proud. They are smaller than peas, but you’re so proud of them. For being, for existing, for being so perfect. You imagine them on the sofa, playing with daddy and this feeling warms your heart. The true loves of your life, the most important persons together.

You can live all this, see all these things in that split second when you see those two lines. The best feeling in the world, knowing that you created something amazingly, truly magical and beautiful.

And then suddenly it’s all over. It all ends. In that first drop of blood. You know something is wrong, you know because you’re a mum. You’re in pain but it doesn’t matter, you would take any pain just to save them. But the sad thing is that it doesn’t matter how much pain you go through, how hard you want it, that you would give anything for them, to bring them back, but they are gone. And with the babies, everything is gone. Your plans, your dreams, your visions of them. Your hope. Nothing left to hold on to. All you have got is this emptiness. The worst feeling in the world. Along with the hopelessness and grief and the fact that you cannot do anything to make it right.

This is how you turn from to the happiest woman in the world to the saddest. This is something you will never forget, and your little angels will always be in your heart.

In the last week my husband and I were devastated by the news that we were no longer going to be parents. My husband isn’t really a talker, but this is a song that he said pretty much summed up his feeling on Monday after hearing the news. I wanted to share as the lyrics are few but the sentiment is beautiful. 

The Blanket of Life (Just a little something that I wrote)

The patchwork blanket lay on the bed beside me, memories of a different life sewn and woven into each little patch, each one telling its own tale. Age has crept upon me and taken my health but it has not taken my memories and as I lay here, pondering when the time will come, when I will not be able to recall the reasons behind stealing little reminders of the life of the child that I loved, the child that had become the woman that you are today, my mind is drawn back to the day when I first held you.

                The first patch was taken on the day that you breathed your first breathe.  It was such a hard time, pregnancy I mean, not the actual taking care of you, but looking back it seemed to be nothing but a bump in the road that was to become our life. The day that you were born is such a blur, but time stopped the second that they placed you in my arms. You were such a small baby, so fragile and doll like, I was afraid that the tiniest movement would hurt you. Your father put a stop to that fear when at eighteen months you decided that you enjoyed being thrown into the air ‘just like superman’. You always seemed so happy in his arms, so safe and warm. He insisted that we dress you in a little pink and white polka dot dress, with matching booties and, as he was dressing you the watch that I had bought for him as a present on the event of your birth caught the hem on the dress and tore it, like it was a sheet of paper. Your daddy was so angry with himself that he almost wept when we had to dress you in the blue baby-gro. You were born to be ‘Daddy’s Little Princess’ and he knew it. It was that patch of dress that started the blanket that I am now passing to you. You may notice a small stain on the fabric, that there was the first tear that I ever witnessed your father shed and but it was not the last when it came to you sweet Lily.

                I slowly finger the second patch that was added five years after the first following the first day at school. I remember sobbing into the sleeve of my coat as I left you at the school gate. You were such a content child, always smiling and playful. That day I was proud to call you my little one, and that never changed even though now you have a family of your own. I remember that day as if it was yesterday. School didn’t open until eight-thirty but six o’clock on the dot, you came bounding into the bedroom that your father and I shared yelling for me to get up and help get you ready. You brushed your teeth with such care, and dressed so that your grey pleated skirt wouldn’t crease. I even remember the little white bows that we tied in your pigtails. ‘Mummy, it’s wrong,’ you yelled when one of the bunches was lower than the other. Your little knee high socks kept falling down on the way to the schoolyard and the amount of times that we had to stop to pull them up were too many to remember. The little black shoes on your perfect little feet shone in the morning sun as we walked and greeted everyone we met. Three o’clock that afternoon came in no time at all, and when I saw you come out of the school with all those children, you looked so lost. It took me a while to see that you were crying. You came over to me sobbing that you were sorry and that you didn’t mean for it to happen. You gingerly asked me to look at the back of your skirt and there I saw what all the fuss was about. There, stuck in the crease, was a smudge of gum. Not even freezing the skirt helped get it out. Patch number two came into existence and you sat there watching me sew the patches together.

                A buckle catches my nail as I smooth over the different textures beneath my fingers. Ah, the dungarees that we bought when you decided that you wanted to be a mechanic. You and your father were inseparable, and when you were ten years old, you decided that to spend more time with your father you wanted to be a ‘grease monkey like the lady of Grease Two’. I can picture the moment that you climbed the ladder that was in the yard and started singing at the top of your lungs. It was only a step ladder but you didn’t half cause a stir. The neighbours came out of their houses to watch the show. There you were in your dungarees and t-shirt, singing along to no music covered in grease from the car that was in pieces on the driveway. You were always the centre of attention, but as you reached the crescendo of the song you lost your footing and you fell with an awful crash. If you look closely at the dungaree patch, you may notice a small brown smudge and a bead of plaster. The dungarees were ruined; you had cut your left leg on a screw that had been protruding from the ladder and broken your left arm in the fall. It hurt to see our little girl crumpled on the ground but you cried for a second and then looked at us, smile on face and said, ‘see I’m a big girl.’ When the doctors saw you, they fell in love with you. You were such a pleasure to treat, so patient and quiet. That day will always remain, in my mind, the day that my baby girl became a little lady.

                A spec of gold catches my eye and I can feel tears forming. This was the dress, the dress that made you shine. You were thirteen and had never really been interested in the school parties before but there was a boy, always a boy, and he had asked you to the party. We had shopped for hours for this dress and when you first put it on we knew that this was the dress for you. It was a red dress that came to just below the knee, and it had gold detail around the hips to make it look as if there were little pockets. Your golden curls had started to grow out and you insisted that you were to wear your hair down so that it sat on your delicate shoulders. You dazzled, even in a simple dress, you blew everyone away, no longer the ‘grease monkey’ of the past three years, but a proper little girl. I always wondered if this was where the tomboy period ended and the princess phase began. I remember the blush that rose to your cheeks when Richard came to collect you for the party and the look on your face when he presented you with the single flower.  It was the most wonderful night and at the end of it, you sat on my bed for over an hour retelling the story of how you shared your first kiss and how he held your hand all evening. You were no longer my little lady; you had blossomed into a beautiful young woman, right there in front of my eyes.

                The next memory that had been captured in this tapestry of your life was that of your sixth form prom. You looked so elegant, in your a-line skirt and bodice. At just eighteen you had met your first serious boyfriend, and you had just finished the hardest year in your education. You had flourished in every way that was possible and this was it, the big night that you had worked yourself up over. I remember the tears that were shed when Greg had broken your heart and then again when he realised that he wanted to be with you regardless of the fact that he feared that university would break you apart, the dress search that took us to what felt like a million dress shops to find the right outfit, all of them little things to an outsider but to you they were big events. This dress was your doorway into the world of womanhood and you looked the part. Greg collected you from the house and presented you with a single lily, because that was your name and your favourite flower. He looked so handsome. I had never seen you so at ease or so happy, that when you left the house, I cried. Lily, I wept. The tears were tears of joy, joy that you had found that one special person to make you feel comfortable in your skin, and sadness at the realisation that you no longer needed me or your father to lean on anymore. After the night was over, you came home and, just as you had when you were thirteen, sat on the end of my bed and retold every little detail of the evening, only the vision I had was not that of the eighteen year old but that of the thirteen year old retelling her first kiss. At the end of what seemed a fairy-tale, you presented me with the fabric that was to be added and ended the night with a gentle kiss on my forehead. It was like an unspoken arrangement, you were my only daughter and it was if you knew that I was still collecting these little bits of you. For this, I will be forever grateful.

                University came and went in a bit of a haze. Graduation, however, will stay in all of our memories. By the time you were sixteen, you had decided that you no longer wanted to study law, but you wanted to write so went to study journalism, I still have the early writings in a scrapbook. You are my inspiration my darling, you always have been. It had been a hard three years. Greg and you had gone to different places of study so commuting was taking up so much of your time that we hardly ever saw you. As I hold this patch I remember a phone call that you made to me and your father when you were in your second year of study. That is pain that I would never get used to and pain I would never want to hear in your voice again. The evening was cold and dark and your father and I had just settled down for the evening when the phone rang. We were so settled we almost ignored the call and I am ever so thankful that we didn’t. Lily, you rang so shaken and so scared that I felt helpless. I’m sure you remember the incident. That day your world fell apart and you were two hundred miles away from my embrace. Greg loved you deeply and I still struggle to think of how one random act of violence destroyed so many lives.

That day had started out so joyous, you had called to tell us of how, even though you were still studying, you and Greg were pregnant. Our lives were complete at that moment in time; we were going to be grandparents. You spoke of how you would take a year out and that you would go back to finish your degree once the baby was settled. You spoke of the names that you and Greg had chosen and spoke of the towns that you had been discussing moving to so that we were all together. And finally, before saying goodbye, Greg asked your father for permission to marry you. My darling, your father was so proud and honoured that Greg has asked him. He was going to ask you that night. He spoke of how he was going to take you out for dinner in celebration of the happy news. With that, Greg left and that was the last that we heard until that call. This patch reminds me of a happy time and a sad time all in one and how not only did you lose the love of your life that night because of the hit and run driver but the one thing that was binding you to him. When Greg died Lily, a little part of you gave up living and so did your little boy. I remember sitting, holding you when you gave me these patches and when I asked why, your response was that you wanted a reminder of the worst day of your life so you could move on with the days that were to follow. You were so strong, but I had never seen you so vulnerable and it was at that point I realised that my little girl was still there. At nineteen, you had lost everything, and you had to rebuild your life.

One the day that you graduated, it finished the trilogy of patches, the first being part of the shirt that Greg had been wearing when he proposed and was killed, the second part of the blanket that was meant to hold your newborn, but instead it were to serve as a reminder of the pain of loss and finally part of the graduation gown that you wore in honour of the partner that was meant to finish this journey with you. To this day I will never understand why you felt it so important to add these patches but I am sure, in time to come, all will be explained.

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­_____________________________________

As I read this my mind is pulled back to that dreaded day and all of the feelings come flooding back. The dread at the news of the pregnancy and the excitement of the proposal, and then the pain as I witnessed the light of my life be snuffed out. Mum, Dad.... I only gave you the brief version of the events that night and as you lay sleeping, mum, exhausted from the trip down the lane of memories, my own resurface.

I too remember that phone call. The one that told you that you were to be grandparents. I had been feeling tender for a few days and I knew something was wrong. Greg had insisted that I go to the doctor even though I tried to pass it off as an upset stomach. I wasn’t ready to be a parent, god why had I been so stupid? I sat in the doctor’s office waiting for a stick to turn pink and the only thoughts running through my head were, ‘please lord no’ and ‘please say I’m sick’. When he turned to us and we saw that the stick was indeed pink, my heart sank as Greg beamed with joy. I was nineteen, too young in my opinion to be a mother, and I was scared. This meant that my life would have halted. All my plans, my dreams and hopes dashed in a moment of passion. But you and Dad were so excited at the prospect of becoming grandparents I felt that I was unable to speak to you about that affect that the news was having on me.

Greg had already booked a table for dinner that night and I didn’t really want to upset his plans. All I really wanted to do was to hide. Whilst getting ready all I could do was think how the clothes that I love would no longer fit, and how my body was going to change and I had no control over it. I was so selfish mum, so selfish. I just kept asking ‘why’, did I not deserve to finish my studies, make something of my life because I had always worked so hard for that. It was not the best day of my life, but everyone else around me seemed to be elated, I felt so alone.

We had arrived at the restaurant and I put all the upset and loneliness aside and tried to enjoy myself. Greg looked like he was ready to burst with happiness and to begin with I thought that it was at the news that we were going to have a family. The proposal was beautiful, you would have been in tears Mum, and you would have seen me so happy. Everything seemed to fall into place. We were going to be a family, I was going to marry my high school sweetheart and we were going to have a baby. All of my worries and my cares fell away and there was just the prospect of loving this man for the rest of my life and raising our child, and I was happy once more. We enjoyed the meal and decided against taking a taxi. It was such a clear night and Greg wanted to walk under the stars. It was only a few streets from where we were living and a walk seemed like a good idea. How wrong we were.

It was on the street where we lived. Greg was being his usual self. He was quiet one minute and then suddenly burst into song. I just stood on the corner and laughed as he started singing a number from ‘My Fair Lady’. You would have been weak Mum, and Dad, would have been stood, shaking his head as he so often did. Then it happened. One minute he was laughing and singing in the street and next you could hear his bones shatter as he hit the tarmac. The car came out of nowhere and there was no way that the driver was able to stop in time. Greg wasn’t even on the road; he was barely on the edge of the pavement. My worst day had slowly become my best day and now it was turning into a nightmare. The ambulance arrived and I rode with him to the hospital but it wasn’t enough. He was gone. His spark had gone. I felt numb, I couldn’t move. The world was moving in slow motion and I could do nothing to regain composure. The father of my unborn child was gone and I was alone. If there were sirens, I didn’t hear them. The sound of doctors just became white noise. There was nothing but a void in the night.

I remember making the call to you. I didn’t want to as it was so late, but I had no one to drive me from the hospital and the doctors had recommended that I go home and rest especially with the pregnancy. I didn’t want to leave him just in case he woke up. I didn’t want to him to wake up in a strange place without a friendly face, and I tried to tell them this. Oh, I tried to tell them but it was only when they started looking at me with such pity that I realised that that was never going to happen and that I sounded like a crazy person. So, I called and went home to an empty house.

Grief is a crippling thing. I don’t remember the time between the two worst days of my life but I do remember that there wasn’t much in the passing of time. I didn’t leave my bed. I didn’t answer the door. I didn’t eat. I had forgotten that there were two lives affected by the loss and not just my own. The doctors said that I should have looked after myself better and that I should have remembered. But how was that possible when I couldn’t focus? I just wanted to be left alone.

The day that the final piece of Greg left my life was a typical day. I woke up, and put on one of his shirts. I just wanted to pretend that he was there. I used his aftershave and I rolled up the right sleeve like he used to. All of a sudden there was a blinding pain and a lot of blood. There was so much blood, and I couldn’t stop it. I felt helpless, and I think in that moment I knew that it was my fault.  For the second time in such a short period I called for an ambulance. Some of the nurses that were on duty that day were on duty the night we lost Greg. They looked on as I slowly lost everything and the same look of pity appeared in their eyes. Once I had been admitted, seen to and discharged, I returned home to the deafening sound of silence. You never knew how I grieved mother, because I didn’t want to worry you but I wish I had let you in; maybe the pain would have been easier to bear.

Once I had gotten over the sting of pain and the loss had sunk in, I realised that I had no one, and pushed myself into my studies. I had lost a month of work but I was in need of the distraction. My lecturers were horrified when I arrived at their offices asking for the work so I could catch up to ensure that I graduated on time.  I had no one but that driver to blame for Greg’s death and I certainly had no one to blame but myself for the loss of our child. I didn’t deserve to grieve properly so I forced myself to study. Looking back I realise that it just made me look cold and uncaring but it was the only way I knew how to deal with it. I only knew how to bury my head and finish what Greg and I had started. I could at least do that for him.

I gingerly finger the last piece that you had recalled and remembered looking to the sky for approval as if he could see me. I felt weak and emotionally spent when I received my degree paperwork but it was over. The worst year of my life over and I felt that I wanted to spend the rest of my life alone. That was to be my punishment for losing everything and that was how I would live for five years following Greg and our child’s death.

__________________________________

Five years passed before we resumed work on the blanket. You threw yourself into your work to bury whatever pain it was that needed numbing and your father and I just sat and watched as you nearly burnt yourself out. By this point you were writing for a newspaper, living the dream that you had worked so hard for, but you never seemed happy, you always seemed empty. We were so worried that you would never move on, never let anyone else in, and never love again. One thing that we can never learn as parents is how to let your child grieve. It concerned us for so long, but in time I guess that you just learn to let go, and I guess at that point you learn to let love back in. We were so happy when you met Peter. He was the missing part of you and I guess that is where the relationship gained its strength. He was so friendly and warm and that helped whilst you had slowly regained the vivacity that you used to live life. It was like new experiences, watching you develop the crush, learn all there was to know and then fall in love.

The relationship was never going to be an easy one and the next patch of the blanket was to remind us of the day that you met the new man in your life. You never told anyone how you met, but the one thing we did know was that he was good for you. He made you sparkle, and I mean really sparkle. His was the only name on your lips and for months we did not know what to make of him. He was a stranger to us but he seemed to take over your every thought. The patch was an unconventional patch. Not from a dress or a shirt, but from a hospital issue bandage following surgery.

When we were discussing the significance of this patch as we always did before sewing the memory in place, you detailed someone that had started as a friend, a support through a difficult time. Nothing ever seemed to come easy to you sometimes and you always said that you felt that you were always fighting for the good things in life and that applied to your health. Doctors diagnosed you with a rare, but operable tumour in the spring of your twenty fourth year. The shock was bad enough but you had felt alone in the run up to the surgery. Enter the mystery man, although to you he was not a mystery. I remember wondering who this person was but as you sat at my sewing machine, you started smiling at the memory of him keeping you company in the hospital after surgery and even though there were several hundred miles between you, he had become your best friend, and your love. It was the first time I had seen you smile since Greg and to see you so animated and lively made me realise that this is what you had been missing. You had been missing someone that could be yours in every way possible. Peter kept you safe when we could not, he made you feel things only a lover could and he made you see things in the way only a best friend could. He was the entire package Lily and I think you realised that. You had feared that he wouldn’t wait for you to deal with the baggage that you had carried around for so long but he waited.

The courtship was a hard one with many obstacles to overcome but once everything had been laid on the table, you both decided that you wanted to be together and made the decision to try and explore the feelings that had lingered for so long. The travel was never a problem and with every visit, we could see that we were slowly losing our little girl. But it wasn’t a bad thing. Your father and I had waited so long for you to let love back in, we were happy for you to live life as if each day were your last. You threw caution to the wind and you flourished my darling. Whatever this person was doing, we wanted him to never stop showing you what an amazing and extraordinary young woman you were. After a year of distance, you decided to relocate and with the pain of losing a daughter came the joy of gaining a son. The next patch was from the first set of curtains you decided on in your new life, a symbol of new beginnings and the turning point for a relationship that we had the pleasure of witnessing. You were a girl is simple tastes and I remember you deliberating for hours on which colour to decorate the living room. You finally decided on creams and chocolate shades and so the patch was that of chocolate brown curtains that you still have to this day. Decorating the room was a task; you were so fussy Lily, repositioning painting and photos that you and Peter had taken on your travels but to you always had an eye for display and looking back to that room, everything was perfect. You were perfect.

I sit here, writing this letter to you and I suddenly realise that there are only three patches remaining. You are now twenty eight and in my hands I hold your life, memories of our life together. Memories that only a mother and daughter could appreciate. They are memories of good times and bad times, but more importantly they are snapshots and memories that you can pass onto your children.

The next patch is a reminder of the day we had prayed for and a day that will always be in our hearts. The patch is white with small beading designed to look like flowers, and when you cut this fabric for me and gave it to me, my heart lifted. It was your wedding day and it had been the most magical day. The flower of choice was the lily and the colour was white and blue. Peter looked so dashing in charcoal and pastel blue and even with his dark colouring, he made a dashing groom. You were dressed in white with a posy of lilies and blue feathers. You looked like the princess we had always known you to be. Seeing you walk down that aisle with your father filled me with immense pride and to see the love in Peter’s eyes as he saw you enter the church made me realise that you had made the right decision. It has been a year since you had left us and we had felt so isolated and worried that the relationship would turn sour and you would be stranded in a strange town, but seeing you on this day quashed any worries we had. Your father cried, only the second time in your entire life, as he gave you to the man who would replace him in your life but they were tears of joy. At just twenty six, you were embarking on a new life, new man and new prospects.

The penultimate patch was from that very same day and you may or may not recognise the material. You and Peter shared everything is seemed and two weeks after the wedding and the honeymoon, I received a letter. In the envelope was a patch of charcoal fabric and a handwritten note

‘I hope that I am not imposing by sending you this but Lily told me about her dress square and I was hoping that the two could be attached as a symbol of my unending love for your daughter’

Taken aback was not the right word but I felt that it was the right thing to do. The grey patch that you were wondering over is from your husband, the love of your life and the son that we never had. Your love and commitment is forever remembered in the blanket that we had spent so many years preserving.

My eyes are now starting to sting with the determination of finishing this letter and in the vain attempt to hold back that tears that are starting to push their way forward. It is the final piece of our jigsaw and the piece that will start your journey, the journey that we started twenty eight years ago. The final piece is a delicate square of blue.

I remember the panic in your voice as you made the phone call to tell me that you and Peter were expecting your first child. The fear in your voice just mirrored that fear and pain that I hadn’t heard since Greg and I was so worried that you would panic yourself into a frenzy. The nine months went quickly for us, but not so quick for you it seemed. You complained about your ankles swelling, about clothes not fitting and about constantly wanting to eat marmite, but you never lost you glow. Your father had passed away shortly after the wedding and I had moved closer to you both to be on hand for the pregnancy and I was so thankful I did. The labour was long and slow, with you being sent home from hospital several times. Poor Peter was bruised and yelled at but he never faltered. He was there from beginning to end and to see him with you reminded me of the day you were born. Noah came into this world a perfect little boy with ten beautiful toes and ten cute fingers, and as I write this he is sleeping in the next room.

That is our story Lily. Little reminders of a life that we shared and enjoyed, memories both happy and sad and whilst I write this all I can say is sorry. Sorry that I will not be here to experience Noah growing up, to see you and Peter grow as husband and wife and as parents. But it is my time and I can leave this world knowing that our lives will be immortalised in a blanket. My last wish is that you continue to add to it and cherish the blanket as I have cherished you, keep it safe and ensure that everything of significance to you and to Noah and to other children to come is written down and remembered as I have done with every little detail of you.