Longing to Long

Many people asked me what I planned to do today. It felt strange to explain that the thing I most wanted on Jackson’s birthday was to have time to be by myself, without my living children.

Don’t get me wrong, I adore my children and honestly credit them with helping me rebuild my life and sense of purpose after losing Jackson. They helped me reclaim motherhood and filled the house with that familiar pitter-patter sound again. They brought back the simple toddler joys of eating cheerios on demand, imitating farm animal sounds in the bathtub, and dancing to “Run Baby Run” in circles around the living room. Six years ago, I would have given anything to know that this future was possible. I couldn’t bear to keep carrying the aching and unrelenting grief in my body or the deafening silence and painful stillness in our house. I needed to know it wouldn’t always feel this way. That I wouldn’t deeply and perpetually long for Jackson every hour of every day for the rest of my life.

Six years later, I do not long in the same way for Jackson. I suspect this is, at least in part, related to the passage of time; it just stings less the farther we get carried from the blast site of Jackson’s death. However, there is more to this. I have come to realize just how hard it is to grieve while caring for young children. It’s not that I’m hiding my feelings from them, I just don’t have the spaciousness to notice them, let alone sit with them or express them. I’m so focused on feeding them, changing them, holding them, cleaning them, soothing them, playing with them – now I find myself longing for silence, longing for stillness, longing to long for Jackson.

I decided to take the day off today and practice what I’m calling “intuitive grieving” – just following my own wants and needs on the anniversary of Jackson’s death. Much like intuitive eating, which focuses on “listening to your body” rather than adhering to rules or external constraints, I am practicing following my own lead without having to consider anyone else’s. For me, outsourcing childcare is a necessary requirement for intentionally creating this freedom to experience my grief, at my own pace, without rushing, without explaining, without the constant planning and managing and juggling of meal times, nap times, play times. Any parent can attest to how difficult it can be to get a single thought out to your partner at the dinner table without getting diverted by a question, meltdown, or sudden mess of spilled milk. Toddlers can throw-off any vibe — not just dinner-table vibes and vacation vibes, but grief vibes, too.

Today, I longed to vibe in my grief without buzzkills. Today, I longed for the spaciousness to feel my feelings, wrap myself up in a blanket, put my feet up, watch videos of Jackson, do some writing, listen to Bahamas, smile and cry, sob and laugh, and eat without sharing. Six years ago, my grief felt like hopelessness, fear, and despair. Today, my grief feels like a long walk in the park with an old friend I haven’t seen in a long time. It’s hard to explain, but I love to spend time with this friend, even if it hurts and my face is wet with tears. There is a visceralness to the pain, just as there is a visceralness to the love. Connecting with these intense feelings and sensations makes me feel alive. And it’s where my dead son lives. It comforts me to know that my grief and love for Jackson are always with me, tucked away but never gone, even when they are understandably drowned out by the chaos of day-to-day life.

By the time I pick the kids of from school, I am ready to resume being with them. I am ready to hold them and smell them and love on them. I am more tolerant of the chaos, more open to the questions, more patient when the milk spills. I will hold them extra tight tonight, knowing full well what a freaking gift they are. And I will kiss them goodnight with a touch more gravity, knowing full well how fragile and beautiful being alive truly is.

Mateo is Jackson's Brother, Too

Since before Owen was born, or even given a name, or even conceived, he was “Jackson’s brother.” And ever since he was born, we made sure he knew about his older brother by keeping him alive in photos, memories, and conversations – even if Owen couldn’t see him. We made an effort to carefully tend to this brotherhood relationship, hoping it would stick, while also being careful not to force it. We have done our best to follow Owen’s lead and allow their relationship to unfold at Owen’s pace.

It dawned on me several weeks after Mateo was born that we gave not given much thought to his relationship with Jackson at all. Maybe because we’ve been so consumed with other demands – like parenting a three-year-old, surviving the pandemic – but maybe also because it feels less salient this time around. In our minds, Mateo is “Owen’s brother”.

This was surprising for me to realize, and a little bit difficult to admit. I immediately judged myself for not dedicating the same careful attention to Jackson and Mateo’s brotherhood. And, I reminded myself that it makes perfect sense that I have made a greater effort to tend to Owen and Mateo’s brotherhood. I recalled an early conversation with Bryan, shortly after Jackson’s death, in which we told ourselves that someday we would simply have to spend more time thinking about and paying attention to our future living children—and that this was ok, healthy, and necessary. It wasn’t a sign of forgetting, it was a sign of adapting.

An interesting corollary of all of this has been the realization that I am far less afraid of Mateo dying in his sleep than I was of Owen. With Owen, we used an Owlet monitor for every single sleep episode – every night and every nap. The Owlet monitor, which continuously measured his heart rate and blood oxygen, provided “proof of life” anytime we felt anxious about a late morning wakeup or a nap-gone-longer-than-expected. We sent it to daycare and trained the teachers to use it. We ordered a backup replacement sensor for whenever the device failed. And we very reluctantly stopped using it when Owen outgrew it (around 15 months old), and purchased a Miku (another vitals monitor) in its place. The Owlet went into storage, ready for the next baby someday.

A couple years later it was time to take the Owlet back out of storage. I charged it up in our bedroom, ready for use next to Mateo’s bassinet. But our first night home I decided not to use it. A day passed. A week passed. A month passed. Then I texted my SUDC mama friend, who also happens to be a psychologist. I texted her: “Riddle me this, I haven’t used the Owlet monitor with Mateo yet. It’s out of the box, charged up, sitting on my bookshelf – what do you make of that?” She normalized this for me, as she had a similar experience with her second-child-after SUDC. After talking to her I realized there was just a part of me that wants to leave the fear of SUDC behind. Using the Owlet multiple times per day was just a multiple-times-per-day reminder of what I’m afraid of and don’t want to be afraid of anymore.

All of this to say, I am leaning into acceptance and dialectics with Mateo’s relationship to Jackson. I’m leaning into acceptance that it understandably feels different than Owen’s relationship to Jackson – and leaning into the dialectic that although I long for Mateo to be in relationship with Jackson, it’s also been helpful for me to not always readily associate him with SUDC. I also remain open to the ways in which Mateo’s relationship with Jackson will change and evolve over time, eventually into whatever Mateo wants it to be. And I hope he can count on big brother Owen to help him navigate this, too.

Half a Decade

The other day someone asked me how old Jackson would be today. I opened my mouth to respond, only to realize I wasn’t entirely sure. Five, right? No, six. Wait… seven.

Among the many things that can make parents feel like “bad parents”, forgetting your child’s age never feels good. But how am I supposed to remember how old he would be if I haven’t been shopping for his clothes, enrolling him in school, and filling out dozens of forms with his age? I also haven’t had the chance to see him tie his shoes, start to read, or go off to summer camp. I never even got the chance to agonize over whether to hold him back or not in school – to be the oldest or youngest in his class – like everyone said I would. So, of course I’ve lost track. In my mind, he’s still holding up two fingers at his backyard birthday party - “I’m two!”.

This really hit me a couple weeks ago as Jackson’s peers all turned seven. I saw a photo of one of them holding up seven fingers for a photo. On one hand, those same two little sweet fingers I remember Jackson holding up. On the other hand, five whole fingers representing Jackson’s gaping absence. I zoomed out further, taking in the sight of their body -- tall, stretched out, no more toddler-chub at their ankles -- and their suddenly grown up face. I felt almost dizzy. When did this all happen? The passage of time felt almost violent.

We sent out an invitation for Jackson’s Flower Walk last week and I wondered what it feels like for other people to keep getting requests from us to walk in Jackson’s honor, donate to SUDC Foundation, and keep remembering our son. I noticed feeling self-conscious, worried even, that someone might have the thought “Are we still doing this?”. I don’t actually think anyone would think this, and I am certain nobody would ever say it to our face, but I felt so hurt just imagining the thought entering anyone’s mind. Then I took a step back and realized, maybe it’s a thought that has entered my own mind.

Before Jackson died I did not understand grief. Grief felt heavy and fragile and awkward. Supporting a griever felt like something I couldn’t “get right.” I would hear people talk about their pain and immediately think of silver linings or ways to change their feelings to make them more comfortable… or make myself less uncomfortable. I will admit I have definitely done mental math about others’ losses (“how long ago was this?”) in order to evaluate the appropriateness of their grief. Now I know better.

What I’ve learned about grief is this: it doesn’t go away. It changes but it stays with you, and that’s ok. Our culture of toxic positivity will have you believe that at a certain point it’s “time to move on”, or that life eventually “returns to normal.” But we never move on or go back to normal – we simply move forward in our new normal. I think you have to be in the club to truly understand this. Even those of us in the club sometimes forget – as I do, from time to time.

Bryan and I are somehow “ok” after all this. We are functioning in our lives – at work, at home, in our relationships, with each other. We somehow put our kids to bed every night, not knowing if they will wake up, but trusting that they will, or perhaps just trusting we can handle any outcome. Nobody could have shown me a scene from our current lives (joyfully whipping up pancakes on a Saturday morning with Owen and Mateo) five years ago and convinced me this was even remotely possible. But here we are, enjoying our lives with two sweet living children (and Stella!), and also missing our Jackson bub. There will always be an empty chair, there will always be a pause in the conversation, there will always be a hole in my heart. The healing happens around the edges of that hole – after five years, it’s adorned with flowers and other beautiful things that have grown out of this tragedy. But the hole remains, and nobody ever could (nor would I let them if they could) fully paper-over that hole.

September is around the corner and we are feeling all the feels that come with that. I recently stumbled on this quote and it resonates deeply with why we keep inviting others to walk in Jackson’s honor, donate to SUDC Foundation, and keep remembering our son: “It’s up to all of us who are lucky to still be on this earth to make sure that what was so special about someone’s soul lives on beyond their last breath, and, even more importantly, that it’s shared with others” – Samantha Klein.

Thank you all for your support. I will keep inviting the world to flower walks for Jackson until my legs stop working. As long as my heart is beating, I’ll be saying Jackson’s name and asking you to keep saying it with me.

Completing our Incomplete Family

We are pregnant, again. We are looking forward to welcoming another little boy, Mateo Antonio Clark, into our family in February. This was a planned pregnancy, though not part of the Original plan. 

The Original plan was always to have two kids. We decided to start young – I was 27 when we got pregnant with Jackson. I figured a few years later we’d bring our second and final baby into the world. The plan was that we’d all grow up together, our family of four. 

After Jackson died, I not only mourned the end of his life, but the end of this vision. I also specifically mourned the second and final baby we would never meet. Of course, we eventually had Owen, but this was on a much different timeline than we otherwise would have planned. Owen is here because Jackson is not. Had Jackson lived, his little sibling would have been someone else. 

From time to time I find myself wondering… who would that second and final baby have been? What would they have been like? What would their relationship to Jackson have been like? What would the backseat fights have been over? What would they have enjoyed doing together? What would our complete family of four portrait have looked like? 

Whatever it would have looked like, it looks nothing like our current family portrait. Our portrait today has two entirely different kids – Owen, our other second-but-not-final-baby, and Mateo, our bonus third baby we never planned on having at all. Both Owen and Mateo are gifts we were never “supposed” to have – but they also came at the steep cost of my first set of babies I was “supposed” to raise and grow old with.

But are we ever really “supposed” to have anything? Is the reality of what we have not truer than some idea of what we thought we were entitled to? Our current family portrait, different as it may be, is also not a lesser consolation prize. I want to make sure that my living children understand they are not understudies to an original cast. 

People ask us whether we are done having kids after Mateo. The truth is I don’t know. I never planned to birth and raise three children, but I also never planned to lose one of them along the way. Physically and emotionally, we feel very ready to be “done,” but a vasectomy also feels out of the question. I am not necessarily expecting for my children to keep dying, and nor am I sure that we would continue to have kids in the event of further tragedy. It’s hard to say when our family will feel “complete,” and I am not even sure that “completeness” is what we’re striving for. I’ll always wonder what our family would have been like had Jackson lived, and I’ll also always treasure the family right in front of me, the one I (hopefully) get to keep.

Oldest

Today Owen woke up one day older than Jackson. Our baby boy leapfrogged his big brother and became our oldest son. We showed him videos of Jackson, who he loves to see, but for the first time found ourselves stumbling over our words (“This is your big brother – err, brother”), realizing that in several years, Owen might even come to think of Jackson as his baby brother.

For two years we’ve enjoyed seeing glimpses of Jackson in Owen – a fleeting expression, a similar antic, or a familiar sounding of a word. Each clothing and toy rotation, we’ve had the bittersweet experience of immersing ourselves in old memories as we bring out yet another storage box of used t-shirts and books. This month I pulled out our very last boxes, and felt the grief of “no more boxes”, much like the grief of “no more photos.”

Up until now we’ve also enjoyed the confidence that comes with second-time parenthood. We’ve journeyed through the familiar textures of babyhood and early toddlerhood, relying more on our instincts and memories than the parenting books we used to pour over. So much of Owen’s life has been a welcome déjà vu, without too many surprises.

This morning when Owen leapfrogged his brother and was promoted to “oldest”, we simultaneously leapfrogged backwards, reverting back to first time parents to a child 2 years 10 days old – and counting. From here on out, we are back in uncharted territory. I find myself googling things like “when do toddlers drop their nap”, “when to stop using a sleep sack”, and “how to respond to tantrums.” I also find myself asking for advice from the same newbie mama friends who used to ask me for advice, back when I had the oldest child. It’s disorienting, but death doesn’t play by the rules of “natural orders.” In theory, children outlive their parents, sibling orders are fixed, and if you have been a parent for 5 years then you should have a 5-year-old to show for it. But for many families like ours, reality doesn’t play out accordingly.

But here’s the thing. We are so glad that Owen will keep growing. We never want him to stop growing. And perhaps being first-time parents to a growing young boy, and eventually a growing young man, will be a gift of its own. I’ll miss easily picturing Jackson as a big brother, and yet I trust that we will all continue to adapt to the ever-evolving shape of our family in the years to come. We will keep finding ways to help Owen feel connected to his forever-two-year-old brother.

I Have Two Toddlers

Ever since Jackson died, I have longed to hear the sweet pitter patter of toddler feet in our home again. I can remember a conversation, distinctly, that I had with Bryan around Christmastime in 2017. I was tearfully explaining how torturous it felt to be at least three years away from regaining what we lost, because it would probably take at least a year to get pregnant/give birth, and then two whole years to raise our next child to be as old as Jackson was. Of course, there was no regaining Jackson himself, but there was the hope in my heart that maybe, just maybe, our pain would feel an ounce less unbearable if we could bring ourselves to become parents again. 

Time was my enemy. It was simultaneously moving too quickly and too slowly. Every day, time was taking me farther away from my last physical memories of Jackson. But time was also painfully slow; 1095 days was the bare minimum waiting period until meeting our next 2 year old child and each day of that countdown felt like an eternity. 

I felt the urge to manipulate time and I’ve since found myself rushing through life to get closer to the that jumping point, so we could pick up where we left off. I was desperate to find the portal back to our old lives. I felt like the part of me that died had a shot of being resuscitated if I could just find that moment in time to make that jump.

Owen did eventually arrive, a little more than a year after that conversation in the kitchen. Fortunately, I learned pretty quickly that Owen was his very own separate, beautiful person. He didn’t bring Jackson back, and that was OK. What he did bring back was joy, and the very welcome texture of parenthood back into our day-to-day lives. Our grief didn’t disappear, it just evolved into something new, something slightly less unbearable.

But I still found myself racing through time. I loved my new baby and I was ready for Owen to become a toddler, stat! I remember scrolling through social media posts of other mothers ‘mourning’ the end of babyhood on their child’s first birthdays. Meanwhile, I was still mourning the actual death of my child and so very eager to get this toddler show on the road. I had to remind myself, over and over again, to settle into the present moment. I had to practice what I preach in my mindfulness therapy groups, to stop trying to manipulate time: “Don’t rush the moment; don’t hang on to the moment. Be in the moment, right here, right now.”

Owen did eventually become a toddler. Here we are, 2.5 years after that conversation in the kitchen, with a 20 month old who runs around, plays, and chases his dog sister Stella all over the house. The pitter patter is back. And you know what? It’s beautiful. The pitter patter doesn’t fix our grief but it has helped us love our lives again, and love a brand new child again. Getting to know Owen has also helped us to remember Jackson. Learning that Owen loves bell peppers and avocado reminds me how much Jackson hated them (and much preferred some foods that Owen won’t eat, like melon and rice and beans!). Watching Owen play peek-a-boo in the closet reminds me of that-time-we-played-the-same-game-with-Jackson. Hearing Owen speak his first few words reminds me of how verbal Jackson was and how much I will always cherish conversations we got to have while he was here. Owen isn’t just a vehicle for helping us remember his brother, he is also uniquely himself, with his own preferences and ideas and cherished memories.  

Now I find myself experiencing a different urge to manipulate time. As we approach Owen’s second birthday, I am for the first time wanting to hit the brakes. It’s like I’ve been speeding down this road and am afraid of driving right past my destination, which is a great reminder to me that there is no destination. Perhaps my brain has romanticized this toddler age and stage, in the same way that the living often glorify the dead. Or perhaps I irrationally fear that a second birthday signals an ending that I don’t want to fully arrive at. 

There are 140 days left on my countdown. My task these days has been to continue returning to my mantra: “Don’t rush the moment; don’t hang on to the moment. Be in the moment, right here, right now.”  

I repeatedly notice the urge to hang on to Owen’s toddlerhood forever, and I repeatedly let the urge go. I remind myself I have two toddlers, one forever toddler, and one toddler who I look forward to watching grow up – not too fast, not too slow.

Feeding Three Birds with One Seed

This week, in a meeting with my advisor, I told her I would “kill two birds with one stone” when describing two tasks that I could take care of in a single action. She very kindly replied “Or, feed two birds with one seed.” This idea really stuck with me, partly because I love efficiency (I’m always on the lookout for “two-fers”, as I call them!), and partly because it connects with how I’ve come to think about Jackson’s Kindness Project. 

Allow me to explain. Yesterday, my friend Eliza went to the DMV, and unexpectedly ended up having to get her picture taken. She joked with the man helping her that she didn’t look her best, due to being up all night with her newborn. As they waited for a supervisor, they ended up making small talk and he mentioned that he had a daughter who would have turned 29 years old this fall. He shared that he had never loved anyone until his daughter was born, and that he loved her with his whole heart, more than his whole life combined, in her first and only three days of life. She died of SIDS. Eliza ended up sharing about Jackson and together they shared tears and a rare, unexpected sense of connection at the DMV. When the man left briefly to check on the supervisor, Eliza slipped him a Jackson Kindness Card and a Starbucks gift card she happened to have in her wallet, tucking them underneath his phone on his desk.

A two-fer, don’t you think? Except that it’s really a three-fer, because of the full-body goosebumps that it gave me to hear about this the next day. All three of us walked away with something as a result of this interaction. The man got to talk about his daughter to an empathetic stranger who listened to his story with care (and as a bereaved parent, I know that this is no small gift). Eliza got to walk out of the DMV with a profound sense of connection and perspective and spent the rest of her day imaging him picking up his phone and locking eyes with Jackson. As for me, I got to wake up this morning to hearing this beautiful story. A story that confirms Jackson’s continued, radiating impact on the world. A story that leaves me feeling like his life mattered, is remembered, and continues to make a difference. So yeah, I’d say that’s a three-fer. 

I think this is a powerful idea, for those who are grieving, or grief-adjacent (a term I stole from Norah McInerny). When someone dies, people tend to rush in with calls, texts, emails saying: “Let me know how I can help.” Which is lovely! But you only have room for so many flowers, and you can only eat so many casseroles. Kindness acts have been our favorite way to receive social support from others, our “grief love language”, if you will. Not only because they don’t require space on the shelf or space in our fridge, but because of the invitation they create for channeling goodwill in such a productive (efficient!), and meaningful way. Plenty of people out there (ourselves included, especially before we had experienced grief ourselves) are thinking about someone, wondering how they are doing, wishing that they could help. And due to fear, discomfort, or simply “not knowing how to help”, this well-intentioned energy simply often gets inhibited, bottled up, or set aside for another day, which often never comes. The Kindness Project has been a way of explicitly drawing out behaviors that channel this goodwill into a way that often leaves all of us (the kindness act-giver, the kindness act-recipient, and us—the parents of the child who inspired it all) feeling quite touched. 

Feeding three birds with one seed, indeed. 

Thank you to everyone who has participated in the Kindness Project and been brave enough to connect with strangers in memory of Jackson. Believe it or not, we’ve heard dozens of stories like the one above, and it always moves us to our core. 

Second-Time Parenting

For most parents, second-time parenting is all about juggling how to care for a new baby and a young child at the same time. Things like: moving the oldest to a toddler bed, dealing with conflicting nap schedules, fitting two car seats into a backseat, and protecting babies from the sweet (but sometimes-too-rough!) adorations and jealousies of the older sibling.

For us, it’s been different. And this was apparent from the get-go with things like wondering whether to join a new PEPS parenting group. On the one hand, it didn’t make sense to join a “new parents” group, because we’d done this all before. On the other hand, it also didn’t make sense to join a “second-time” parents group, because we would have had completely different experiences without a toddler at home. We felt like misfits without a home.

Now that Owen is here, we continue to notice ways that our parenting experiences are different. We sometimes wonder if these behaviors just seem like consequences of grief — but are just common, “run of the mill” second-time-parenting experiences, albeit with just a slightly different flavor after what we’ve been through:

When I was pregnant and worried I wouldn’t love my second baby as much as my first: did that mean I wasn’t ready to have another child after losing Jackson? Or, as I later learned, was this just a normal fear that almost every second-time mom worries about?

Once Owen was born and I started making side-by-side collages of our two sons at similar ages in matching outfits: were we morbidly trying to recreate Jackson? 

When we found ourselves comparing the boys’ temperaments, milestones, and behaviors (e.g., “Jackson was a better sleeper”; “Owen took longer to roll over”): were we bemoaning the ways that Owen was not “as good” as his idealized dead brother? (For the record, Owen is also gigglier!). 

When we mixed up their names and accidentally called Owen “Jackson”: were we deluded or confused? 

Or, as we had to keep reminding ourselves, were these just the behaviors of any second-time parent? Would we also be sharing clothes, making photo collages and comparisons, and occasionally mixing up their names even if Jackson was still here?

On the flip side, there are some other parenting behaviors we know are different because we lost a child. For example, we monitor Owen’s vital signs (heart rate and respiration) whenever he is asleep using an Owlet sock on his left foot. We also say “goodnight” with just a touch more gravity than we ever did before. Sleep training Owen (in Jackson’s crib, no less) has undoubtedly been made harder by the fact that the last sound I ever heard from Jackson was the sound of him crying before putting himself to sleep. And yes, we are a touch more cautious about all the other things, too, like germs and driving, because statistically he is more likely to succumb to injury or death from these dangers than from sleeping in his crib. Although it may seem like a rabbit hole to imagine all the ways Owen could be harmed, I have actually found that it helps me stay sane to recognize all the ways I already tolerate risk and uncertainty (e.g., by taking him out in public and commuting with him in my car). I tell myself “If I can drive and leave him at daycare, I can put him down to sleep in his crib.”

I’ll admit, tolerating uncertainty has never been my jam. Always a bit prone to anxiety, my brain tends to be on the lookout for ways to ensure certainty and steer clear of unpleasant surprises. This often manifests as excessive worry. But I’ve now learned that worrying doesn’t actually make things more certain or more controllable; I always used to worry about Jackson’s safety and yet we were completely blind-sided by his unpreventable death. Life simply was, is, and always will be uncertain and uncontrollable to some degree; worrying only gives us a false sense of certainty, or the illusion of control. I learned I had a choice: a) live in an uncertain world, or b) live in an uncertain world AND be consumed with useless worry. It’s not easy, but I try to let go of my worries day in and day out.

How does this look for us in practice, when we understandably worry about the possibility of Owen dying in his sleep? We remind ourselves of the facts: SUDC is rare and has never struck a family twice. This helps, but I find that a different practice, one of acceptance, helps even more. I recall my favorite passage from When Breath Becomes Air, a memoir written by a young physician while he was dying from cancer. He’s about to leave his toddler daughter behind in this world, and writes something for her that is so poignant I can never quite get through it without a tear in my eye:

“When you come to one of the many moments in life where you must give an account of yourself, provide a ledger of what you have been, and done, and meant to the world, do not, I pray, discount that you filled a dying man’s days with a sated joy, a joy unknown to me in all my prior years, a joy that does not hunger for more and more but rests, satisfied. In this time, right now, that is an enormous thing.” — Paul Kalanithi

Although Paul’s tragedy was the flip-side of ours (death was after him, not his daughter), these beautiful words speak to a sense of “enoughness” that I try to find every day in my life with my boys. Though many could (and do) say that Jackson died “too young” and “should have” lived much longer alongside us, there is something so beautiful about this father’s acceptance of, and satisfaction with, the time he was given with his child. I have worked hard myself to get to this place. Whatever time I had with Jackson, whatever time I get with Owen, it will be “enough” because they were a gift from the moment they arrived. In some ways, no length of time would ever feel like enough (either I will feel robbed of time, or they will), so I’ve made it my mission to rest satisfied each day. This, above all, brings me peace.

Second-time parenting has been a gift. Bryan and I cherish all the things we get to do again with Owen, that we either did (or never got to do) with Jackson. Second-time parenting is also at times an invisible identity. When we are out and about with Owen, everyone assumes he is our first and only child. And why would they think anything else? In some way, this is a nice reprieve from having to constantly answer “Is this your first?” while I was pregnant. But now that I no longer get asked that question, I find myself missing the invitation to bare my story and share who I am, a mother of two. 

Different and Perfect

Newborn photos of Owen at one week old. (Photographer: Ashley Mae Scott Photography.)

Part One: Shoots of Joy

“Grief is exactly as painful as you think it will be, but with time you will learn to love your sadness because of the tiny shoots of joy and gratitude that sprout around it, like new growth on scorched earth.”

— Michelle DuBarry

When Jackson died, it felt like someone came out of nowhere and carved a deep line in the sand of our life story; everything that came before was so perfectly blissful and complete, and everything after became so dreadfully empty and fractured. A crater-sized void so intolerably gaping and impossible to fill.

Owen, ever since my heart laid eyes on you I learned that my life had actually never been complete, because we didn’t have you. Although you cannot possibly replace your brother or fill the crater-sized void he left behind, we also would never task you with that or even wish you to try. You are your very own shoot of joy in our lives, an overwhelming joy we didn’t even know we could feel so deeply. You didn’t bring us Jackson back; you brought us you. And that is an equally precious gift.

---

Part Two: Different and Perfect

A few weeks before Owen was born we met with our doula to discuss our birth plan. I told her “I just want it to be like last time!”. As soon as the words escaped my lips I realized that I was overly attached to things going the exact same way. Sure, it made sense because we’d had such a positive birth experience, but so many things would inevitably be different this time and out of our control: gestational age, time of day, fetal position, rate of progress, support people in attendance, effectiveness of coping strategies, need for intervention... to name a few.

In the end, our birth plan was largely the same but our birth experience was quite different. Though I was very attached to the idea of laboring from home again as long as possible, we ended up having to go to the hospital as soon as my water broke because I couldn’t immediately confirm fetal movement to my doctor over the phone. So off to the hospital we went, and I let go of my vision of laboring on my birth ball from my own living room eating string cheese and apple slices with my doula and Stella (yup! That was my favorite memory from my first labor with Jackson!) and instead made new memories of laboring in the hospital tub by the dim light of a “brother” candle votive while Bryan, my sister, and my doula took turns pouring warm water over me between contractions.

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In the end, it was perfect. Not Merriam-Webster dictionary “perfect” — as some things certainly did not go according to plan: he came earlier than expected, my epidural malfunctioned, my mom wasn’t in Seattle to attend the birth — but it was a wonderful experience in its own right, even though it was different than the last time.

Minutes after after Owen was born, I looked at my doula and thanked her for supporting us through the perfect birth experience. But importantly, it wasn’t Jackson’s birth experience, it was Owen’s. Bryan and I looked at each other and we agreed that this was the beginning of things being “different but perfect.”

Now I know that I can, and will have to, let go of being attached to recreating all the same experiences and memories with Owen as we did with Jackson. Some things will be similar (and I’ll cherish those greatly), but most things will be different. And it will all be perfect.

Jackson & Owen

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First at-home portrait, 2015

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First at-home portrait, 2019

Mothering Jackson and His Memory

According to Thich Nhat Hanh, a Vietnamese Buddhist monk, there is no “self”. He says “true self is non-self, the awareness that the self is made only of non-self elements.” According to this idea, we walk around every day experiencing artificial boundaries; we think we are separate from others and others are separate from us. But if we force ourselves to observe these boundaries with microscopic precision, we find that they do not exist. For example, a flower is not separate from the seed, the water, or the sunlight. Similarly, a flame is not separate from the wax, the oxygen, or the heat. Take away any of these components and the flower or the flame could never have existed. 

This is about the closest I can get to the idea that “Jackson is here with us.” In many ways, he is most definitely not here with us. I no longer get to touch him, hold him, smell him, or kiss him. In fact, it has at times felt downright infuriating when well-intentioned people tell me he’s “with us” because he simply is not; yes, I carry his memory in my heart, but that is different from carrying his body on my hip. Then I started reading about the concept of “interbeing”, or interconnectedness, and it has changed the way I relate to the idea of Jackson’s continued presence. While I don’t believe that his spirit is watching over us, I do believe that if I relax my boundaries of what it means for him to “be here”, I can feel him everywhere. 

Simply put, I am filled with this sense that I am not really separate from Jackson’s life; everything I do is touched by his existence. And I am not really separate from his death, either; I am a different person because he lived and because he died. Looking back over the last year, I see so much evidence of this: our Kindness Project, friendships we’ve forged, books we’ve read, tattoos we’ve inked, trips we’ve taken, and gardens we’ve nurtured. None of these things would exist in the absence of Jackson’s life and then subsequent death. Although I wish he was still here, I see that he is still here. His life and his death simply cannot be extricated from everything that came after, and his presence continues to manifest in new ways.

The notion that we’ve been changed by both Jackson’s life and his death can bring up complex feelings. We just came back from spending a very special weekend with another SUDC family we’ve become very close with and, although we could picture Jackson sitting at the table with us, we realized that it was an impossible vision. We both wished Jackson could have joined us on this trip, and recognized the trip only existed because he died. We are weeks away from meeting our next son and, although Jackson “should” get to meet his brother, that too is an impossible vision. We both wish that both our boys could appear together in a family photo, and realize that this new baby is only alive because Jackson is not. While we would of course reverse the tragedy of losing Jackson, it’s complicated to realize that special and beautiful things have also grown out of his death.

The impact of Jacksons life and death is not only complex but also evolving. He has not simply left a permanent one-time imprint on our lives. His impact on me and the world around us, is constant, ever-changing, ongoing, and in flux. As a sweet mama friend wrote to me on Mother’s Day, “Even though Jackson isn’t here, I know you are still mothering him and his memory.” Yes. There is something quite active about how I want to keep mothering Jackson and his memory because his impact on living, changing things by default means that he continues to live and change. This also means that Jackson will continue to impact this world in ways I have yet to see. I may not get to watch him physically grow or make new memories (I don’t get to watch him learn to swim, ride his bike, graduate, or get married), but I will watch his impact grow for the rest of my life. The quote on back of our kindness cards captures this idea exactly: “A life that touches others goes on forever.”

Like the very dandelion “puff balls” he loved to blow on, Jackson has scattered his own seeds in the wind, germinating his impact farther than the eye can see. Jackson has fed and clothed the homeless, furthered the education of refugee children, put hair on the heads of cancer-survivors, fed the birds outside our window, bought coffee for strangers, and contributed to critical research on SUDC. Jackson has also taught us and others about grief and love, brought people together who otherwise wouldn’t know one another, and changed the way we all look at life and helped us stop taking a single day for granted. It has become part of our meaning making to continue spreading his impact in these ways. 

What blows my mind even more is that, despite our urge to be active in the spreading of "Jackson", his memory and impact truly seem to have a life of their own. There is something “viral” about the way his memory is spreading, even when I am not actively spreading or cultivating it. I got my haircut last month and learned that after my sister chopped and donated her hair to “Wings for Kids”, another client came in weeks later looking for a fresh chop and our hair stylist convinced her to donate her hair in honor of Jackson, too. I keep learning about people who “pay forward” our kindness acts and pass along our website and podcast link beyond the “intended” audiences. It’s comforting and moving to know I can at times rest from spreading my son’s impact, and still have the ripples continue to propagate without my effort. Like a mother who actively nurtures a child and then sends them off into the world, I am learning how to balance actively nurturing his memory while allowing it to grow on its own. 

Thank you to all who have supported us in staying connected to Jackson in so many ways. If we’ve been the water nurturing the seed, you have been the sunlight that has further allowed his memory to thrive. The seed, the water, and the sunshine are all necessary conditions for the flower to grow and we are grateful for your role in remembering and honoring Jackson.

[For more on interbeing: Hanh, T. N. (2003). No death, no fear: Comforting wisdom for life. Penguin.]