The right words
Even when have grieved, when you’ve moved on to living and assimilated the loss of your child into your life, become your “new normal,” there’s so many little ways in which you recognize that you are different. Your normal is not THE normal. Never again. There are just some sights, some sounds, some words, that will never mean the same thing again.
Today I’m putting together some of baby girl’s ultrasound pictures into a cute little collage that I can get printed as a photo to give to family members. The collage itself is finished but I just needed a cute little quote or something to put on there to finish it off. So I looked around online for ideas.
I ran across this one: “Little girls are just angels who haven’t yet spread their wings.” It just made me shudder, like little girls are just waiting to die. Now that is not an image I want. Any mention of wings or angels just does not sit well with me anymore, not in anything to do with my still-living child. It is no longer just a cute metaphor.
I found a quote that seemed at first glance to be appropriate, not too cutesie-over-the-top-rainbows, and even was specific to the time of pregancy, before the baby is born. But then after I put it on the image I sat back and realized that it sat really wrong with me. It reads: “Before you were born… we loved you.” It’s the past-tense thing. Loved. I had also put the date of the ultrasound on the card in small print, like I would a scrapbook page, and the whole effect was rather disturbing to me, a little too close to a memorial.
So all text was erased. Maybe we’ll do without a little quote.
How about “Daughter: a little girl who will grow up to be a good friend?”
I can’t do the angel thing anymore either. There was a siggy I saw on JM a little while ago that had a picture of her sleeping daughter and a quote about an angel and it seriously took me a while to realize it wasn’t a memorial siggy. I had a sleeper given to me that said “perfect angel” on it and I gave it to my sister and told her not to give it back to me. It never went on either of my babies. Just can’t do it.
I like Debra’s quote.
Heh…. I used that before you were born quote on my sis’s photo book of Tristin for Xmas. When Kiowa read it he was like “what, nobody loves him anymore?” I was like shut up lol, I interpreted it differently. I still do but I can see how it is different to people viewing it from different contexts.
Angels and babies no longer work together anymore for me either after having friends who have lost babies.
I am a long time lurker and have a little girl myself. We have a frame with a photo of my daughter in it that reads “We dreamed of you”. I have always loved that quote and just thought I would pass it along incase you love it too. :)
I normally lurk and this might come across as assvice (which is not my intention, lol), but since you keep talking about how feisty your daughter is and how much you love her, how about something that reads like “Our daughter: Sweetness and spice” or something?