craziest. dreams. ever.

I mentioned in my last post that I have been having nightmares about my kids almost every night since I got married. I have seriously had the craziest, most relentless dreams EVER in the past two weeks.

I had one dream in which my kids weren't actually dead, but living secretly with Steve (wtf?!). They had been in the accident and survived, but they sustained major head injuries and were more like walking zombies than kids. I found out that they were living with him and went to see them and they had no idea who I was. That was pretty awful.

In another dream, they hadn't been in the accident at all. I found out it had all been some big mistake and I was indescribably happy and relieved! Then they went to Cleveland (I have no idea why) with some cousins (not real cousins that I have ever met) and died in a car accident on the way. I was like "Are you effing kidding me?!! I just got them back and now they died?!!"

I'm happy to report that FINALLY, last night, I had a dream about them that ended well. It may sound really weird, but there was another "set" of Kate and Peter living with my mom. I don't understand it myself, but I did get to spend time with them and they were exactly like the real Kate and Peter. I played football in the park with Peter and some of his friends, and Peter and Kate were both hanging out with me and Ken.

I don't know why they were living with my mom, but right before I woke up I remember saying to Ken that I thought they should come and live with us next year - like we wanted them to stay where they were for the rest of the school year and start an new school year here. He agreed and I was extremely happy, to say the least. At the very end of my dream I texted my mom (it was obviously a dream because my mom doesn't text) to tell her to tell Kate that I loved her and that she could live with us soon.

Then I woke up.

I have no clue what any of these dreams mean or why exactly I'm having them, but I'm glad last night's dream had a happy ending. It was much easier to start the day feeling like I had just spent time with them :) Maybe something is shifting.

10.10.10

For the past week I've wanted to write about my wedding, but I've had such an assortment of intense emotions I haven't been able to figure out where to begin. So I'll start at the beginning and if my thoughts are scattered and incoherent, I apologize. It's just not fair to keep you waiting any longer.

When Ken and I decided to get married, we chose the date October 10th - 10/10/10 - for a number of reasons. We thought a fall wedding would be nice, we were able to find available venues for both our wedding and reception even though we planned everything very last-minute, and it's just a cool date - and certainly an easy one to remember. I have to tell you, it really was the perfect day!

The weather was incredible; sunny and warm with a light breeze. The park where we had our ceremony was full of beautiful flowers as well as brightly colored trees and all of our plans came together without a hitch.

We chose to have our ceremony in the Walled Garden in Mellon Park. The Garden has recently been restored as part of a memorial project. The family and friends of Annie Katharine Seamans, a young woman who died in a car accident in 1999, worked with the Pittsburgh Parks Conservancy to complete this project. Annie used to love to spend time in Mellon park, especially to look at the stars at night.


In addition to restoring the Garden's natural charm, the project included an art installation which is indescribably beautiful. Lights have been embedded in the lawn of the garden in the exact pattern of the stars over Pittsburgh on the date Annie was born. You can click on this link to read more about the Garden's restoration. If you live in Pittsburgh I strongly encourage you to check it out.

Ken and I were lucky enough to attend the Walled Garden's reopening and dedication back in June. It was then that we decided we'd like to get married there.



We did a number of things to honor Kate and Peter throughout the day, some of them thanks to suggestions from all of you.

First we included a reading from a book I used to read with the two of them. My good friend, Cindy, who is also Kate's godmother, read "I Love You Because You're You" by Liza Baker. It's basically a cute picture book about the unconditional love between a parent and child, but I think it was quite appropriate for our wedding.

About two weeks before the wedding my friend Jen surprised me with some flowers she had made out of a shirt of Peter's. (Her son is a little bit younger than Peter so she had a few hand-me-downs.) She used the shirt that Peter is wearing in this picture:



I love those flowers (!!!) and our florist, who did an amazing job with only a week's notice, was able to beautifully work the flowers into my bouquet:


Jen was also going to make flowers out of something of Kate's, but instead I asked the florist to wrap the bouquet in some material from a dress Kate wore when she was a flower girl in a wedding 4 years ago. Here's a picture of Kate in that dress:



I loved being able to work something that belonged to each of my kids into my bouquet, which I literally carried around all day. I didn't want to put it down at all... seriously.

I wanted to use butterflies in the wedding somehow, but I wasn't sure about releasing live ones. Instead, my friend Chad, who made our wedding cake, created and placed two butterflies on the cake. He did an amazing job (and I have to add that not only was the cake beautiful, but it was seriously yummy!). It was red velvet with cream cheese frosting - Peter would have been all over that!!



At the last minute I decided I needed to have a picture of my kids somewhere at the wedding, but I wasn't exactly sure where. That morning as I was leaving my house I took one of their pictures off the wall and brought it with me. The catering staff placed it on the table next to the cake. Another friend of mine ran out to a store that morning and found two candles to put next to their picture:




So now that I've given you the overall run-down of the day and how we made my kids a part of it, how do I begin to describe how it felt? That's the hard part.

Honestly, I couldn't let myself feel everything that day. If I was gonna make it through the day with some semblance of composure, I had to disconnect a little. I did my best to be in the moment and take it all in - especially when it came to feeling the love between Ken and me and the love and support of our families and friends - but I couldn't think about how much I wished my kids were there or how sad I was that they weren't.

I wish I had some incredible story about how I felt them with me all day or that there had been a rainbow or something, but I don't. I did my best to be present and I'm sure they were with me in spirit, but unfortunately I didn't really "feel"them.

I did have one moment where I stepped into a room by myself and asked them to give me something - anything - some kind of sign or wisdom or assurance that they were there. At that point the words "this is a new beginning, Mama" popped into my head.

It's so hard to explain the feelings I had that day without writing an entire book (this is the longest blog post ever!). On the one hand I felt so incredibly happy and in love and excited to be marrying Ken, who I love with all my heart. For days afterward I walked around with my head in the clouds, feeling like I was on a honeymoon even though we didn't go anywhere.

On the other hand, however, I felt a sadness that I now realize will never lessen or go away. I have had nightmares about my kids almost every night since, including my wedding night. I dream they're missing or severely injured or that they don't know who I am. It's awful. It's almost like my happiness during the day has to be balanced out by sadness and horror at night. I guess that's just how it is and how it will be.

This picture, taken by our photographer, sums it up - the bittersweetness of it all:



What I just realized is that even though the picture is both happy and sad, it's truly all about love. And as far as I'm concerned love is far stronger than death.

Octagon crackers...

I'm sitting here eating some soup, because it's a soup-eating kind of day, and wishing I had some crackers to throw in my bowl. Any crackers would be good, though I would prefer some oyster crackers - or octagon crackers, as Peter called them.

As you may know from previous posts, Peter ate predominantly beige food, and crackers were one of his favorites. Most of the time he asked for crackers with cream cheese (they're pretty good if you've never tried them, though they're far from a healthy snack) or crackers with peanut butter and marshmallow fluff (in which case he ate only the marshmallow and nothing else) but he also loved munching on octagon crackers. I think he started eating them when he was one or two because they're little and easy to pick up and as far back as I can remember he referred to them only as octagon crackers. I think oyster crackers more closely resemble hexagons, but how a two-year-old knows what an octagon is I will never know.

For some reason he was pretty knowledgeable about shapes. I know he had a Diego game for his Leapster that taught him about shapes, but still - we would be out somewhere and he'd say, "look Mama, a semi-circle" or he'd rearrange his half-eaten toast (another beige favorite) to show me what a parallelogram looked like. I honestly can't tell you what's normal for a two, three or four-year old, but he always amazed me...

Treehouse update:

Since the public meeting about Kate and Peter's Treehouse back in June, planning has slowed down quite a bit. The Parks Conservancy is in the process of updating it's Regional Parks Master Plan and part of that process includes looking at many possible sites for the Treehouse. Once the Master Plan is complete we will attempt to resume planning.

This Saturday, October 2nd, there will be another public meeting at 9:00 am at Colfax Elementary School. At 10:45, following an overview and dialogue about Frick Park's current and future needs, the meeting will move into the park itself. Four possible sites for the Treehouse will be examined during this outdoor workshop.

If you feel strongly about Frick Park and Kate and Peter's Treehouse and you are available this Saturday morning, please come to this meeting. The Parks Conservancy needs as much feedback as possible before we continue to move forward. Click here to RSVP and reserve a spot. Hope to see you there!

What can I write that I haven't already written?

Everyday is basically the same. I experience same crazy kaleidoscope of emotions with slight variations in order and intensity, but really - they're the same.

I still wake up every morning and think, "Wait...what? My kids are dead?" as I wrote many months ago. That's usually followed by my best attempt at denial and disbelief after which I inevitably move into a state of confusion and anger.

Lately I've found myself asking my friends, "Were they real? Were they really here? Are you sure?!" It's been so long since I've seen or held or talked to my kids that it doesn't seem as if they could have been real.

And I fear that I'm forgetting. That's awful.

So I sit down to blog and think, "I've already said all of this." It really is the same same shit, different day scenario. And it's getting old. Real old.

This is the point at which I wish and hope and pray that maybe this is a game and someone is gonna come down form the heavens and say, "Ok, you've done enough. You've lasted a year and a half without them, you've proved your strength and now you can have your kids back." It's completely delusional, but I don't care. I want them back.

I know you've read all of this before which is why I haven't written lately. I don't want to subject you to the same posts over and over and over again. But I guess this blog is supposed to be my journey and, unfortunately, this is it.

I'm guessing that other parents who have lost children feel the same way. I'm also guessing that this is pretty much how we're gonna feel forever.

I try really hard to experience joy and happiness in my life. And I do sometimes, really. I mean, in less than two weeks I get to marry a wonderful and amazing man, who I love very much. That's exciting! It gives me hope for the future and brings me joy! Unfortunately, that hope and joy is matched by an equal amount of sadness and guilt.

I know that it's ok to be happy. I know my kids would want me to be happy. I also know that it will never feel right to be happy when my kids are dead. It just won't. And that's the way it is.

As I'm typing I'm thinking that maybe I need to stop judging my emotions as good or bad. I'll try to take a more Buddhist approach and experience them as they come without attaching a value to them. If I'm sad I'm sad. If I'm happy, so be it. It just is. I'll see how that goes.

I have about 300,000 things to do in the next two weeks, for which I'm actually thankful. I'm looking forward to this new stage of my life. So I'm gonna go get started. I'll do my best to keep writing - happy or sad - and let you know what's going on. As always, thank you for reading and commenting and praying and sending love. It helps more than you could ever know.

I can't find the words...

Last time I wrote I was getting ready to embark on a nearly week-long camping trip with Ken and some friends. Well, that trip came and went and was both fun and challenging. On our way home I was looking through the pictures I took and thinking about what I wanted to write about my experience.

We went camping somewhere north of Toronto and the only way to get there from Pittsburgh is by driving through Buffalo. We had to drive by the site of the accident (mile 476.9 on I-90 Eastbound) on the way up and the way home. On the way to Canada I was, as always, very emotional as we drove by and had nightmares and panic attacks while trying to sleep that night. But I got through it.

On the way home, I tweeted as we drove by that particular spot, "Just passed mile 476.9 on the NY State Thruway. Again. Ugh."

Within a minute or two traffic stopped completely. We were stopped for over an hour. People got out of their cars and walked around, talking about what the hold up might be. Kids were playing in the grass. Helicopters were flying overhead. I knew it wasn't good. We heard there was an accident about a mile and a half ahead.

Traffic started to move again eventually. We passed a badly damaged van that had gone off the road and hit a tree. I immediately starting searching the internet to find out what had happened.

This is what I found: Another car went off the road and two people died. Same town. Same road. Opposite direction.

The investigator named in the article is the same man I spoke with after my kids died. It's too weird.

Since I saw this, I am plagued with so many questions. Why? How? Why was I so close when this happened? (we weren't supposed to come home until the following day, but cut our trip short because of bad weather) What does it all mean? How are people completely fine one minute and dead the next? I just don't get it.

I have no words anymore. I feel like whatever I have to say - about my camping trip or school or my wedding - doesn't matter. I mean, people died. Again. I am stunned.

I didn't see the car my kids died in. I was somewhat removed from the situation by space and time. By the time I could get there it was all cleaned up.

Seeing the scene of an accident where people just died, in such a similar circumstance, has completely freaked me out. I don't know what to say.

So sorry...

I apologize that I haven't written in such a long time!! Life has been unbelievably busy lately - I'm trying to keep up with school, working on starting my own personal chef business and planning my wedding - plus I've been really, really sad.

I do want to thank everyone who commented on my last post with suggestions for my wedding!! There were so many great ideas and I'm still figuring out which ones I want to use and which ones will fit into our small little ceremony.

Butterflies were a huge theme in the comments and continue to be a huge theme in my life (I'm working on a post about that) so I'd like to work them in somewhere. I'm not too keen on releasing real butterflies because I feel bad about keeping them all cooped up before releasing them (I'm a bit of a freak when I comes to animals). Also, October is a little late in the year for butterflies. However, I may ask the pastry chef who's making my cake if he can decorate the cake with butterflies.

I also loved the idea of including a passage from one of my kids' favorite books as a reading in the ceremony, so I'm working on finding an appropriate book. Peter's most recent favorite book was "Wacky Wednesday" and Kate was into "One Fish Two Fish Red Fish Blue Fish" so that makes it challenging. I still have a bunch of Todd Parr and Mo Willems books to look through so I'm thinking there's a good chance I'll find something. It is incredibly hard to read all of those books without them, but I know I can do it.

Thank you again for all of the suggestions! I'm still considering pansies and pictures and many of the other ideas you all came up with. I'll let you know what I finally decide on. And I'll try my best to write more often when things calm down a bit. This school quarter ends September 15th (can't wait!!!) so that should free up some time.

This week Ken and I are going to Algonquin Provincal Park in Canada for a few days of canoeing and backcountry camping. I don't think I've ever really camped - like in a tent where there are no real bathrooms or showers or cell phone towers. I'm super excited to be that close to nature and see wildlife up close, but I'm also scared out of my mind that I won't be able to pee, or let's face it - poo, for five days. I mean, I'm not real good at squatting behind a bush. Ewww.

It should be interesting and I'm sure I'll have much to tell you about that experience.