Disconnect

My last post was about connections with amazing babylost mamas and papas who hold me up, but this post is about the people who knock me down.

I've been keeping a list in my head of the idiotic things that people have said to me in the wake of Ezra dying. But someone today won the grand prize. I thought it had gone to the person who sent me a card after Ezra died saying "as a health professional, I believe these things are generally for the best" (as a health professional apparently she's an idiot, there was nothing wrong with Ezra!) But a woman today just stole the trophy.

Some of you know that I'm a lawyer who represents parents in the child welfare system (more on that some other time, this post is not about my personal crisis of whether I can still do my work or not). So I run into a children and youth caseworker I know today on the bus, a woman with whom I have a friendly relationship. And the following conversation ensues between me and this dumb idiot bitch (we'll call her DIB)...i'm not usually one to call names but this calls for it.

DIB: Oh hi Sarah, how ARE you? You headed to court?
Me: Um no, I'm not handling cases right now, you know what happened right, my baby died (I knew she knew)
DIB: Oh yes, I try to forget about things like that.
...long pause while I pick my jaw off the floor...
Me: Well I can't forget.
DIB: Oh of course, you shouldn't...

DIB then spends the rest of the bus ride talking about herself. About how she still hasn't divorced her husband who hits her. About how she relapsed and went on a one month drinking binge. About how she came to work drunk and is now on probation submitting to random urine screens.

So I guess her life is screwed up. But as Barbara wrote about the other day, I didn't realize this was a grief competition. And while her problems are obviously awful, they are all fixable. Sure it will take hard work, but it is within her power. No amount of effort on my part will ever bring back Ezra. I only wish.

I don't care enough about this woman to put her in her place and tell her how inappropriate her response was. But I guess what it underscored for me is what a lonely misfit I feel like these days. I just feel so disconnected. Although some people have been wonderful and supportive, many seem to have absolutely no ability to understand that my heart will always be broken, that I will never be the same person I was before and I will continue to need lots and lots of support going forward. Gal posted a wonderful list that I have seen a few times before about how to support a babylost mama. I feel like I should have cards with this list printed up to hand out wherever I go.

Its a lonely world out here without my baby...