How to make a sad day just a little bit brighter

Ever since my daughter, Tessa, was born on Mother's Day 2003, this day has been extra special to me.

Honestly, no Mother's Day will ever top the one when I first held my daughter in my arms and sang "You are My Sunshine" to her.

This Mother's Day is a little bittersweet for me. I am excited to say we are expecting another child in November, but I am also sad because I should already have two children at home, Tessa and our baby, Jenna, who was stillborn last August due to the chromosomal abnormality Trisomy 18.

Many people have never heard of this disorder, which affects nearly one in 3,000 pregnancies. Trisomy 18 is a little like Down Syndrome. Where a baby with Down Syndrome has three of the number 21 chromosomes, a baby with Trisomy 18 has three of the number 18 chromosome. Doctors deem it as "incompatible with life," but Trisomy 18 advocates are trying to have the terminology changed to "incompatible with long life."

Stillbirth and miscarriage are still considered a taboo topic in many ways. A stillbirth is considered any baby born dead after 20 weeks of pregnancy. More than 26,000 occur each year, but because not every state issues a certificate of birth resulting in a stillborn, or a death certificate, those numbers aren't exactly accurate. It could be even more.

I'm not sure why people are so reluctant to talk about it. No one should be asked to sweep their child's life under the rug. Those of us who have lost our babies want to talk about them, want to hear their names and let them be remembered.

Organizations have come about to help parents remember their lost little ones. One of these is called Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep, which comes to the hospital after the baby is born and takes family pictures, so the parents will have something tangible to remember their baby by.

It may sound morbid to take photographs of a dead baby, but in so many cases, those pictures will be one of the few visible reminders their baby ever existed. We didn't have the chance to have Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep come to the hospital when our baby was delivered, but the nurses at Middle Tennessee Medical Center took some photographs for us.

I realize not everyone would want to see them, but they are precious to me and something I will treasure forever.

Nine months out from losing Jenna, I am doing pretty well. It still hurts to see babies the age she would be now, and when I hear or see the name "Jenna," my heart does an about-face. I think many people expect I would be over this by now, but I'm not. I don't think I ever will be.

I'm changed forever because of my loss. I still think about her every day, wishing she was with us and wondering what she would be like if she had lived and if she hadn't been sick.

I think most women who have had a baby that was stillborn feel this way. My granny had a stillborn baby, her very last, and she mourned that little girl until the day she died. I am sure I will be the same way.

I keep a blog about my feelings. I started it when I found out I was pregnant again last year nearly five years after I had Tessa. It then became about my feelings as we journeyed through Jenna's diagnosis and death. Now, it's about my feelings of carrying another baby and being scared this could happen again.

I've attracted quite a following, and most of them are women who have experienced a loss. For many of them, this Mother's Day is going to be very hard, especially if they have recently lost a child. Many people won't consider them a mother, simply because their child is no longer here or because their child never took a breath.

Nevertheless, they are mothers, too, and should be honored as such.

If you know of someone who has lost a baby, remember them today and mention their child by name. You might make a sad day a little brighter for them.

I'm just glad I have Tessa at home, to hug and hold, and to remember one of the best Mother's Days of my life.

-- Tamara Belinc is a staff writer for the Times-Gazette. She can be reached at tambelinc@gmail.com.