What Was and What Is

Today as I put my oldest daughter down for her nap, I had an overwhelming desire to look at Emily's things. I do not have very many things that belonged to Emily, she was only in this world for 10 hours after all. When we left the hospital the NICU nurses gave us a box that holds Emily's things. Inside are several pictures that they had printed for us, the thermometer that was used to take Emily's temperature, her blood pressure cuff, the two hats that she wore, a little gown that she would have worn if she had been alive longer, a small blanket, a little tiny diaper (just like the one that she wore while she was alive), and a piece of paper with her hand and feet prints. I also have the pink blanket that she was wrapped in. These are the only things that are Emily's.

We had bought some clothes the week after we found out we were having a girl, but in my mind they are not really Emily's. Emily never came home, we had not yet set up "her" room. Yes, there are things in the room that we had decided would be the baby's, but since we never brought Emily home, and we had never gotten "things ready" I do not think of it as Emily's room. It is just the place where we are storing all of Maddie's old baby things. The clothes that we bought for the new baby have not been washed and still have the tags on them. I had thought about taking them back to the store, but have decided instead to just fold them and put them away with the other clothes in that size.

As I read back over what I just wrote, it sounds a little sad and depressing, but I think this is how I cope. One of my first thoughts on our way home from the hospital was about the baby's room, I wanted to make sure that door was closed, so that I would not have to look inside and see the baby stuff that was in there. I am so thankful that my mom had closed the door before we got home.

The door stayed closed for about a week and then I decided I wanted to go inside and look. It was not as hard as I though it would be. Like I said before most of the stuff was Maddie's so it all has a positive thought behind it. Yes, we had planned to use it for the new baby too, but it was never used. Even looking at the clothes we had bought for the new baby was not as difficult as I had though it would be. One reason I think this was the case is that none of the clothes were for a newborn. I had purchased clothes for when she got older.

The door to the room now stays open. Basically the room is still the way it was when we left for the hospital that Saturday morning. I imagine that the room will stay the way it is for many months to come. There is really no need to do anything with the stuff that is in there right now.