Thanks are due

Thank you everyone for the happy birthday wishes.

Now, don't get me wrong, I would rather never have met you all. But given that Moksha died and I cannot change it no matter how loudly I scream for my rights under the corrupt universal justice system, I find the support from the comments I get here to be absolutely amazing.

I just cannot fathom how women who thirty years ago were not allowed to see their babies who died, were told to forget about it and just try again and had no support, online or otherwise, could ever cope. As discussed on Laura's blog recently, it often feels like a dream that never happened. Did / do these women just end up having that feeling all the time instead of sometimes? They couldn't even have a burial or cremation or any type of ceremony to say goodbye.

My mother told me about two women who were our neighbours when I was growing up. One, whose youngest daughter I was "best friends" with when I was about 6 had a baby born with congenital problems who never came home from the hospital. This happened before we knew them and my mother told me she realises now that her reaction on being told this so many years ago was totally inadequate.
Update: I have since found out that this little boy was called Ben

The second was shocked and upset on being told about Moksha's death and came up to my parents to tell them she knew exactly how I felt because she had lost a six-month old baby to an infection. She said to my parents, "This year I have been thinking about him a lot because he would have been 40 years old." My parents never knew about this, it was before they met her and she never told them about it until now.
Update: I have since found out that this little boy was called Roger.

One of my paternal aunts and one of my maternal uncles in India also both lost babies, little girls, one who was a few weeks old and one who six months old. I know the name of the six month old one and that she died of encephalitis, but I don't know the name of the one who was a few weeks old. It's possible that she didn't have a name yet, for practicing Hindus there is a special naming ceremony and she may not have had time to have it. These babies would have been, no were, my cousins. My paternal aunt has always suffered from depression for as long as I've known her, and I think the depression started as post-natal depression.

I am just grateful to have the understanding, support and companionship, even if it is through the greatness of the internet, of people who sadly are also finding their way through grief, sadness and life after. So many people, I think even today, just do not have that. So thank you from the bottom of my heart.