The Hole in My Favorite Sweater

I asked Drazil at It's Just Me, Drazil & Sheniqua to do a guest post for me today.  I absolutely knew she could articulate my thoughts right now better than I could and, as usual, she does not disappoint.  I also knew that she would give me a message that would lift my spirit and, again, she does not disappoint.  I asked her to lift my spirits and while you may not be dealing with a miscarriage, I believe this post will lift your spirits, too.

Love you, Drazil!

The hole in my favorite sweater….


We’ve all heard the old cliché….time heals everything. Blech. When you’re in the middle of heart gripping pain and someone says those words to you – you want to crunch them up like a piece of paper and shove them down that person’s throat and light them on fire and watch. Well okay – a bit extreme – but still. You know what I mean. And yet in your heart you know – the person saying it is hurting too – and they have no idea what the hell to say so they say things over and over like….time heals everything.

And though I hate to admit it…this stupid cliché is true. It has been for me anyway. I’ve seen pain. Enough to last a lifetime. Death of people who have lived long lives until cancer took their very soul. Death of people just 22 who died by their own hand because I couldn’t stop them. Death of infants – perfect babies with 10 fingers and toes, born and dead within two weeks. Death of a baby not even born…my own…I wanted so badly. Unexplicable pain and death. And today? I’ve healed from every one of those deaths. And I’ve healed from a million other painful things too.

Time indeed – heals everything. And when time is done with its job – that’s when I think the reasons walk right in. It’s like we roll out the welcome mat for reasons…after we’re through with the pain. And though we heal, our hearts remain torn forever.

It feels like there is a physical, literal hole in our heart and no time can ever fill it or heal it completely. It’s almost like a hole in your favorite sweater…and your heart is the sweater. When you first realize it…man it pisses you off. How did it get there? Why? Why this sweater? Why not someone else’s sweater? And as time goes on you realize – dammit – hole or not – you’re keeping it. There are too many memories and good times and things wrapped up in that sweater and you can’t throw it out. It’s staying with you. So you keep wearing it. And some days you try to cover up the hole. You roll up the sleeve so no one can see it…yet you always know it’s there…hiding, making you angry or hurt – just below the cuff. It taints a special thing of yours and you hate that.

There are other days when you wear it proudly. Someone compliments your sweater and you make a point to say, “Look! It has a hole in it. And it’s still beautiful.” You go on to tell how the hole happened. How it made you feel. How it made you love your sweater even more. How you’ll never get rid of the sweater because it represents so much. And even though the hole is hard to look at it – the good that the sweater has brought you outweighs the bad in that hole a thousand fold.

That hole in your sweater – that’s the pain we suffer and again, the sweater is your heart. Over time there’s going to be more holes – some tiny, some large…but the beauty in the heart remains. You have to keep wearing the sweater…you have to keep risking your heart. Patches can be sewed on holes after all. You just have to learn how to sew.

I believe pain teaches us to feel joy. I believe without ever experiencing real pain and loss…we’d never know how to feel pure joy. We’d miss the significance behind things. And I believe many of us believe that when we experience pain – no one else can possibly feel what we feel. No one else knows the right thing to say. They say stupid things like “time heals everything” right? Wrong. It’s not stupid. People usually say that because they are coming from a place of knowing. If you can – try to listen. Hear what’s behind the cliché. Realize YOUR pain teaches that person something too.

When Lori miscarried recently – though I didn’t say to her out loud that time heals everything…..I said it in my head to her heart. And I know she heard me. She has the strength I haven’t seen a lot in my lifetime and though I know she’s been in pain – at the same time I know she’s completely alright.

Through her pain, one of the holes in my sweater got a little smaller once again. I miscarried once too. In that moment you lose a baby – but you also lose hope, dreams, and a family – and it opens a hole you think will never close. But it does. And even I found a reason and Lori reminded me of that.

Last night thinking of what I wanted to write for Lori today….I sat in the chair in our living room. I looked over at the brightly lit Christmas tree we had just put up that afternoon. It was dark now and the whole room seemed to glow. And as my eyes went down the tree….there, under it, laid my 5 year old, Banana. Quiet. Just laying there. Under the tree on the hard floor – looking up – in awe at the colors and the glow and the beauty that is Christmas to a child. And I caught my breath in my throat.

Like a ton of bricks it hit me.

If we hadn’t have miscarried….there would be no Banana. We kept trying and had Banana BECAUSE we miscarried.

Would I take back the pain of the miscarriage if I had to give up Banana?

Well, I think you all know the answer to that. I’ll keep Banana. And I’ll keep the tiny hole in my favorite sweater that baby I never had represents.

So Lori….your little baby never born and the pain it caused you and your husband….well little did you know it taught another mother across the country the reason for her similar pain years ago.

And cemented the fact that indeed – time does heal everything. This is my wish for you too…..