Author: Jodie Matthews

Sitting here in my local café I am surrounded by lots of people coming in on their lunch break. I come here to work and write sometimes as it gets me out of my apartment and into a different space. I believe it is important to move your energy around and do things differently each week. It helps with my creativity and flow. If I did the same thing everyday I think I would go mad. Travel and adventure are also two priorities for me right now. I love exploring new places and meeting new people. I am heading to Newcastle tomorrow for a friend Katie’s book launch. We have been part of the same blogging group for a few years and I am so excited to see her dreams come to life. She is one brave mother who inspires me so much. We also booked Tasmania for next week. I can’t wait to go and explore the nature, Hobart and surrounds. We are staying near Wine Glass Bay for a couple of nights, which will also be so relaxing. I am just allowing this year to unfold. I desire more connection, travel and fun. I know that if I focus on those things they will come my way. I also intend to run some more workshops and put myself out there for other opportunities. The book is almost finished too so that is very exciting. I am thinking of ways to promote it and get it out to mothers who need it. I know in my heart the more people that read it the better so I am going to do my best to share it from the rooftops.

I love you my boy. 

I did it. My first Facebook live video in quite some time. It was in my friend Jolinda’s facebook group ‘Fertile as I Wanna Be’. This group is for women who want to put their fertility as a focus. It is such an empowering group of women all in different stages of their journey to conceive. Jolinda is a fertility coach and it is her absolute passion to help empower women around their health and fertility. I spoke about how meditation can help you in your daily life and fertility. I know for myself in the last seven months one thing that has really helped me not only on my fertility journey but also with my grief is meditation. Coming back to the present moment and being here in the now has been a good way for me to have a daily check in. It has allowed me to listen in to my intuition more. To reduce overwhelm. Feel into my emotions each day. It has allowed me to calm my nervous system when I have needed to. I don’t believe mediation is about removing your thoughts. It is more about slowing them down a little. I have been using meditation on and off for years. This past seven months though without Hamish it has been a tool to help me on this journey. I think I will use it now forever in my life. I believe if you can take time out in your day to breathe and be mindful you can live a much more peaceful life. You can end up making decisions that don’t truly align with your soul and heart when your head is running the show and meditation can be a tool to help avoid this. I am going to start running a local beginners meditation class here in Sydney starting in a few weeks. I believe no matter where you are in your life you can benefit from meditation.

Hamish I am thinking of you today, I saw your Grandma earlier and she has a beautiful photo of you on the background of her phone. It made me realise how much you are loved. We won’t forget you my love. 

Today has been up and down. I have trust that things will work out. I am just having one of those days where nothing is going my way. It takes a lot of heart and soul to stand up for what you believe in. It takes a lot of guts to make choices that aren’t always the safe ones. I don’t want to go back to living a life that isn’t aligned. I am still feeling so confused about what I am doing and where I am going. I think because I have spent so many years working towards a societal view of success that I am finding it hard to take things at a slower pace. I am comparing myself to what I used to do and be. It is like version 2.0 is not as ‘successful’. When the truth is there is no real measure of success. It is something we find within ourselves. If my head hits the pillow and I know I have lived my day full of love and joy. If I know I have done what I can to be of service. That is all that really matters.

Hamish please keep guiding me each day. Especially the days I feel a little lost.

We spent the morning shooting hoops at a local basketball court. Something different for a Saturday. It was a lovely morning with my love. We then had a nice relaxing afternoon at home. I made up some poke bowls for lunch and then we chilled out for the rest of the day. It is so nice to have a relaxing weekend after the last one was spent at the hospital. My face is so much better today and my ear is healing. I am so grateful for my health and to know it is all back on track. I am also very lucky I didn’t have any permanent nerve damage from the shingles. I can smile again and I don’t have to tape my eye up to sleep. This little health scare has made me even more determined to live a healthy life. Since I came back from hospital I have been cooking lots of fresh healthy produce. I have been sticking to a plant based diet and it has made me feel good. I know that looking after my emotional health right now is also very important. I have been trying not to bottle things up. I have been allowing myself to cry when I need to. I know that crying is sometimes medicine for me. I know I need to keep allowing what ever needs to come up and out of me flow through.

Hamish I love you so much.

I have agreed to do a video for Gidget House the charity that helps parents with their emotional wellbeing. I had a call with the director today and it was quite emotional telling our story again. I hope that by speaking up other women going through this can feel less alone. I also hope they can feel like it is ok to go and speak to someone if they are struggling. There are no rules to grief. When or how it hits you. A perfect timeline for when you will finally feel ‘OK’. It is a rollercoaster ride with many ups and downs. There are days and moments that are very tough. There are also many light filled days full of joy. I feel like it is important to share our grief and feelings with those close to us. I also think speaking to someone that is not in your immediate circle it can also help. A non-biased opinion that can help guide you on this journey. For me the combination of my darling husband, friends, family, other loss parents and a psychologist for a few sessions have all been a part of my healing journey. I am feeling so much stronger now. I know that I will still have days where I tumble down and fall. I am feeling so much lighter now as each day passes.

Hamish you light my soul on fire. 

Dear Mother,

You are so loved

Your child was taken too soon

There are no words that will suffice

To explain the pain you are going through

I will take this time

To give you strength from one mother to another

I have been where you have

While I don’t know how things are unfolding for you

I do know that you will make it through

Be in your grief

Feel what you need to feel

Ride the rollercoaster

Know that you are loved and supported by so many

Know that my heart is sending you so much love

I send you so much light

Even though your precious child has left this earth too soon

Know that they will live through you

They will be a part of your family forever.

Never forgotten

All my love,

Jodie

This is the poem I want to get printed on a bookmark with the link to my book once it is finished.

Thank you for helping me share your story to help heal not only me but many others. I will always live in your honour each day. 

I love having deep soulful conversations. I have connected with a few of my dear soul sisters today and they have filled me up with so much love. I am feeling much more like myself now that I am getting better from the shingles. I have been working with my editor who is in the UK on my book on Navigating Baby Loss. It is now going through it’s final edit and should be all done in the next few weeks. It is giving me goosebumps knowing that this book is going to be out there to help the families that need it. It is a short book of 50 pages and contains my own story plus those of seven other bereaved families. It is something that Hamish has guided me to do and I can’t wait to share it with the world. So many women suffer in silence or don’t have a big support network around them. If you don’t live in a big city like me you might not have access to in person support groups. When you go through something like this all you crave is to talk to and read about other people who have been through it. You want to know you are not alone on this journey. That things will look up. Knowing that grief isn’t something that you just get over. You learn to live with it. It is something that stays with you and having connections with others on this journey really helps. It comes and goes in different intensities over time. What always remains is the love you have for your child.

Hamish you bring me so much joy. I am so proud to be your mother.

Today I am questioning everything again. I know what really lights my soul on fire. I know that travelling, writing, dancing, spending time in nature, painting, deep soulful conversations, reading, being in flow, feeling peaceful, meditation are all things that light me up. I know it is not about reaching a destination though. I know that when I get a certain thing or to a certain place I won’t be suddenly happy. I know I need to cultivate joy in my life daily. I have been finding it hard though to focus on what I do have this week. I wake up grateful but.. then there is this little thing inside of me that is very sad for what I have lost. A mother without a child is not what I ever wanted to be. I am that mother though and I will always be for the rest of my life. Even when my future children come along, I will still be a mother to my precious angel Hamish. I am going to acknowledge the dark thoughts that come up. I have always been good at looking at the bright side of life. I don’t want to ignore the shadows though and pretend they don’t exist. If I feel sad today I will be and that is ok. It’s seven months today since Hamish was born into this world still. Above all I am proud of the mother I have become and I am glad that he choose me to be his mummy.

Happy seven months buddy. Your Dad and I love you so much. 

I slowly wake up to the many beeps and buzzing sounds around me. The nurse call bells going off, the heart monitors and other machines going on around me. I am in a surgical ward isolated to my own room as shingles can be contagious. I am starting to get an insight into what the “Fully Sick Rapper” would have felt like in isolation for tuberculosis. This guy cracked me up so much with his random YouTube videos from hospital. If you haven’t seen them go have a watch! I don’t know if it’s just my silly sense of humour but I think he is so funny. I have had a whole troop of doctors and medical students in today to examine me. I have a rare form of shingles called Ramsay Hunt Syndrome which presents as a painful rash on your ear and also causes partial facial paralysis. Yes that is right folks I still can’t move half my face. The paralysis only really came on Friday night and now I am starting to see some improvement so that is promising. The eye doctors wanted to see me before I can get discharged as I cant close my right eye very well. I have to tape it shut to sleep until it can close on its own. Which will hopefully be in a week or so. I also have to put lots of eye drops in. I am not in pain anymore I just have some weird tingles every now and then through the nerve. I am sent home in the afternoon. I am so grateful for all the hospital staff that have looked after me for the last four days.

Hamish I love you

I cried a lot today. The specialist came into see me and I told him about Hamish. He mentioned that the emotional stress I have been under could have contributed to me getting shingles. I will try and take things a bit slower and make sure I am looking after myself. I feel like I am working through everything ok. I know though it has been only seven months this coming Tuesday. It isn’t a long time. I need to tread carefully and be kind to myself. I miss him so much. I watched an Instagram live over at Annie M’s Instagram account of a live reading of the book she wrote for bereaved parents. It also brought me to tears. Annie wrote her book ‘You Could of Been‘ in memory of her son Xavier who was stillborn. She wanted a book she could read to him at his grave. I am certain this book is going to help so many bereaved parents on their healing journey. It is also a book that can be read to the siblings who have lost their brother or sister. It is about what Xavier or any of our children that have died could of been when they would have grown up.

The book reminds me of the thoughts I had of Hamish growing up. I knew I would do my best to allow him to follow his passions. I would have given him the tools to follow his intuition each day. I wondered what his personality would be like? Would he be cheeky like his father? Or would he be a deep thinker and empath like his mum? Would he like to play and watch soccer? Would he love to sing and dance? Would he want to be a fireman, teacher, rocket scientist, artist, businessman or entrepreneur? What I do know from the nine months we spent together is that he was a caring, compassionate person. He gave me little nudges while I was pregnant to give and love more. To be there for those that need it. To be there for myself and slow down. I will keep listening to the little nudges I still get from him today. I will always live in his honour.

Hamish I hope your doing ok up there. Your mum felt extra sad today. Then she got her moon cycle. I guess that explains the never ending tears that kept flowing.