2011 - Talk Birth

our stories were very different. And, our closing thoughts or insights about our trays were almost identical.
[2] While it might be hard to see everything, I chose the
bridge to symbolize my feeling of having crossed the bridge to the ”other side”—meaning first the fact that
after Noah and my second miscarriage, I felt separated from women who had not experienced loss by a bridge
and as if I’d crossed over into new territory and left my old, happy, naive pregnant self behind (along with
the other non-loss mamas. A little more about this bridge [3]here). AND, that I also felt like with Alaina’s
birth that I crossed a bridge into the unknown and to the end of the pregnancy-after-loss journey. Her
birth represented the ”other side” of PAL. So, at the end of the bridge I drew a question mark in the sand,
representing all the questions I had to get past and over in order to get to my new baby. The little baby on
the side of the bridge represents how I still had Noah with me. He didn’t get ”left behind” on the other side
of the bridge, but was next to me on my journey. The spiral on the other side represents the continuous,
unfolding spiral of life. Sitting by the question mark is a sort of Kachina-type figure holding many babies.
To me she represents all of the babyloss mamas and also reminds me of the [4]jizos who protect lost babies.
There is also a coffin on the other side of the question mark, summing up how the fear of the death was
everpresent for me and I had to pass over that fear as well to get to my new baby—my light, the candle on
the other side of death. The little sparkling gems also represent my joy at her birth and what a treasure she
is to me. The bone on the side of the candle represents the places where the ”[5]meat was chewed off my
bones” by all my births, including Noah’s (I had just attended Pam England’s birth story sharing session
prior to this sand tray session). I placed the Goddess of Willendorf figure, that I had immediately snatched
off the table as soon as I spotted her, at the top to represent how my sense of spirituality had surrounded and
enfolded both my experiences—She is ”holding” it all. And, I explained to my tablemate how the roundness
of the tray to me also represented the full circle—how Alaina’s story and Noah’s are entwined and how her
birth was the ”end” (of sorts) of his story, but that they are part of one whole.
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