Written by Sarah, Jasper’s Mum, for Still Aware.

 

“As long as I live, you will live.

As long as I live, you will be remembered.

As long as I live, you will be loved”

Author Unknown

Whilst writing this blog it is just under a month until it would have been Jasper’s second birthday (by the time the blog gets published his anniversary/birthday would have been and gone for another year). There are many things that I think about and reflect on in the lead up to important and meaningful dates such as Mother’s Day, Jasper’s birthday/angelversary, Christmas and many other times of the year – sometimes it is just random days when the wave of grief once again consumes me. Lately, I have been reflecting and thinking a lot about what it would be like if I was able to have another moment with my son.

I am sure that plenty of people out there think about this as well – but I always seem to be thinking about it lately – if by some miracle someone said to me that I was able to have an hour with him (even a moment with him), I think about what I would want to ask him and what I would do for that hour. There are only two questions that I would want to ask him…one would be was he in pain? – I always wonder if he passed quickly or if it was slow and painful. To be honest I am not sure why I want to know, because if the answer was slow and painful I don’t think I could ever move forward from knowing that – but it is a question that I have always wanted an answer to and will never have an answer for.

The other question would be has he been at peace? Some people probably wonder why I would ask a question like that – well, when you bury someone and leave them in their final resting place you always say (or hear other people say to you) about your loved one ‘resting in peace’ and it is something that I have always wondered – the day that we buried Jasper and then had that final moment where we had to turn our back and walk away and leave him resting in his grave was he at peace? Did he find peace? Has he been at peace? It is just something I have always wanted to know and without being able to ask the person it is again another question that will never be answered.

I also think about what I would do with Jasper if I was given any amount of time to see him again, and I guess for me the answer is quite simple really – I would analyse every each of him, I would take in as much as I could….the colour of his eyes and the colour of his hair (things I wish I knew but never will), every inch of his hands, his face and every other part of him – I would imprint it all in my mind for safekeeping. I would also give him a hug and never let go and I would spend that time wondering what he thought of me – hopefully he would be proud.

When I found out that I was pregnant I did change quite a bit – I really thought about the type of mother I wanted to be and what I wanted for Jasper. I wanted him to be able to look up to me and I wanted him to be proud to call me his mother – I wanted to stand right by his side and support him during his failures and I wanted to be there to celebrate with him during his triumphs. Why am I talking about this? – good question. Well, death doesn’t change the fact that I am his mother and even in death I can still try to do what I can to make Jasper proud.

It would be so much easier to give up – to quit my job and to spend every day at home, hidden away, laying on the couch and avoiding people in general but this wouldn’t honour his memory in any way and it wouldn’t make him proud of me, so instead I continue to try to face each day one at a time and I continue to do what I can in the hopes that he would be proud to call me his mother. I do this through writing my blogs, through the fundraisers that I have carried out (and continue to carry out), through donations to local hospitals of items that will continue to support other bereaved parents during the loss of their baby and through honouring him during special times of the year like Christmas and Mother’s Day. Whatever I do, in whatever way I can I will continue to try to imagine that the decisions and choices that I make, that the path that I continue to lead would result in my son being proud of the mother that I am, because death will never change the fact that I am a mother – I am Jasper’s mother. “In life, I loved you dearly, in death, I love you still”.

 

“If we could visit heaven, even for a day,

Maybe for a moment, the pain would go away.

We’d put our arms around you, and whisper words so true,

That living life without you, Is the hardest thing to do.

No matter how we’d spend our days, no matter what we’d do,

No morning dawns or evening falls, when we don’t think of you”

Author Unknown