Corbin

Corbin is our 5th child.  He was supposed to be born on November 3, 2009.  Instead on October 21, 2009 he passed away at 38 weeks gestation.  Although we were never able to officially adopt Corbin, he is our son.  We were ready to take him home from the hospital, we were prepared as a family for the changes a newborn brings, we had everything ready for him to be in our room with us.  The bottles were sterilized, the clothes were washed, the blankets folded and ready.  Our hearts were open and ready to love another - then we were crushed, in a way that no one should ever be crushed. 

I received a phone call shortly after 6 am stating that she (a woman I didn't know) was so sorry to tell me that my son didn't have a heart beat any longer.  Still, almost 2 years later, I can hear her voice clear as day.  I can hear those words piercing my heart.  This isn't an outcome I had considered.  We have friends who lost a baby at 38 weeks, but that wasn't going to happen to us.  Our baby was going to come home, we were going to watch him grow.  We were going to teach him all about love, compassion and what it means to be a part of a family.  Instead we drove a long and very difficult drive to go meet our son.   Our sweet little guy was rolled into a birthing room that the nursing staff let us use to meet him.  He was so still.  I will never forget reaching for him so quickly, willing him alive, reaching into every fiber of my soul for the moment to not actually be happening.  I would close my eyes and pray that when I opened them he too would have his eyes open to meet his mommy. 

I watched my husband hold him, meet him and say goodbye.  His pain was my pain, and mine his.  I thought of our children, how would we explain this to them, how would they process this.  How would it be for them to grow up without him.  Every day I think about Corbin, many many times a day.  I think about what he would look like, what his eyes look like, what his little voice would sound like.  I think about his cry often.  What it may have sounded like.  For the first 6 months or so after he died I would wake up certain that I heard him crying, certain that it was just one big long horrible nightmare and that Corbin was just in the other room crying for me.  That happens less often now, but sometimes I still hear it.  I firmly believe in angels, even before he died I did, and I know that at times he visits.  I know he watches over his siblings, I know he watches over our family - the family he knew was his.  Sometimes I will feel his presence, at the oddest times, and not nearly as often as I'd like.  I smell him more than anything.  Usually when the house is quiet and I am doing some mundane task I will get a huge waft of him.  I breathe it in until it is gone and then I say "Hi bud, I know you are here, I love you!"  I wear his birthstone on a necklace and I will hold it often and just think of him and all that he would be. 

I try to keep his memory alive with the children.  We talk about him often, we include him in our 'family size'.  The kids know his picture, it hangs right with theirs. But they are young, and I don't ever want them to forget.  That is truly what I am afraid of most about Corbin, that people will forget him.  My worst fears already came true, he died.  I will not allow him to be forgotten.  He is our angel.