Griefy travels

Saint Thomas.

This was our first trip post Makenna and the anxiety leading up to it was brutal. The entire week leading up leaving I was having crying fits and moments of intense panic and regret. I was so scared to go. There wasn't really any real reason for the fear, but that's the beauty of ptsd. The intense feelings of being unsafe in a presumably completely safe situation can come on at any time for any reason or for no reason at all.

When I got on the plane I saw this little rainbow in the bottom left corner of the window and I knew Makenna had the true window seat on our flight. She stayed there the WHOLE flight. I couldn't believe it. This little rainbow basically was a passenger on the plane.

Right when we landed and this little rainbow was still there, I immediately began crying.

This flight-landing-rainbow-cry was just the first of 10 cries for day 1 alone.

Being away from home just felt so wrong. I felt wrong being away from Makenna's urn (even though Grandpa took her upstairs and babysat her while we were away); I felt wrong being away from Makenna's box with her things, and away from her pictures. It just all felt wrong.

But, if you've been following along on our journey, you know how sassy my little angel is and you know damn well she made sure we knew she was with us every second of every day. I'm going to tell you all about all of the signs Mak showed us. Somehow each one more powerful than the last.

We went to Saint Thomas for my brother in law's wedding. Now, the thought of going on this trip in the first place was especially troubling because I was supposed to have been too pregnant to travel. We had planned for Trevor to go without me and just stay Friday-Sunday since my pregnancy was high risk and the wedding was only a month out from my due date.

Of course, this didn't go to plan and I found myself on a trip I wasn't supposed to be on, surrounded my people I hadn't seen since Makenna died, in a place we planned on taking Makenna for her first Christmas.

On our way to our airbnb from the airport, we had to stop at my father in law's warehouse. My mother in law and I were walking around looking at the wild chickens (crazy animal ladies heyo) and found a dime and 3 pennies. I knew right away it was my grandpa telling me he and all 3 babies were in Saint Thomas with me. A dime has always represented him and anything in 3s I know are my babies.

My babies as siblings are also a force. I can only imagine the 3 of them are the best of friends because of how many signs they send me together.

Once we got to our airbnb, more crying commenced. It was the first time Trevor and I were alone since our travels had began earlier that morning and I was seriously struggling. It was right when we arrived in our airbnb that I realized just how incredibly difficult this trip was going to be for me.

But once again, the angels came through. This time it was Makenna as a butterfly- this was a fairly new sign for her. For a few weeks I had been seeing a yellow butterfly everyday and then Trevor and I spoke to a medium who mentioned the color yellow. Since then we've come to the conclusion that yellow is Makenna's favorite color, but purple flowers are her favorite.

Makenna was hanging out with dragonfly Shadow, who was my childhood dog that died during covid, and one of her best angel friends Hayden who visits in hummingbirds.

I immediately knew Makenna was going to be spending the week showing all of her angel buddies where her daddy grew up. And that she did. Hayden continued to visit every morning in real hummingbird form while I sat outside and drank my morning coffee.

The view from our house was just what I needed in a Saint Thomas view. The greenery, the ocean, the sky. All of it. We brought my favorite picture of Makenna with us and when I sat outside she sat with me and I kept her on the nightstand while we slept or when we went out.

This is often what parenting an angel looks like; moving pictures of your babies from room to room to feel close to them. But, we do what we have to do.

Wednesday we kind of just kept it chill. We got food, took it back to the airbnb, saw my in laws, and we were back at the house for most of the day-mostly because I literally could not keep my shit together. When I said earlier that I cried 10 times on day one, that was not an exaggeration.

By the end of the day I had this hyper fixation about going grocery shopping. We were supposed to go that day but ended up not being able to so we agreed we would go right when we woke up. But then we had to go help set up the beach for my sister in law's bachelorette party (that I was also hardcore freaking the fuck out about, but I'll get into that).

After about 30 minutes of being at the beach helping hang a banner I looked at Trevor and he knew I was minutes away from losing my shit. Now, when I say losing my shit I don't mean going full bitch mode; I mean incapable of controlling my emotions, my anxiety being at a 12, and freaking out thinking I'm on the verge of dying.

I walked off at stood by the car while Trevor graciously excused us and we finally got to go grocery shopping. This is another part of my trauma-not grocery shopping- but, completely freaking out if something that was supposed to happen doesn't happen, an unexpected change, being around too many people (like setting up for the bachelorette party). Basically, I get very overstimulated and very overwhelmed extremely easily. This is something that would happen to me occasionally pre-loss but I'd be able to handle myself and it wouldn't throw me off for the whole day like it does now.

Once we got our groceries, it was time to start mentally preparing for the bachelorette party that I was freaking out about. But, my brother in law unknowingly saved my life when he decided the guys were going to crash the party after a few hours. Now, let me add, I LOVE my in-laws. But, another piece of my trauma is being unable to cope when I'm not around Trevor. Because he wasn't in the same state when I gave birth, I immediately begin to feel like something horrible is going to happen whenever I am not near him. It has gotten significantly better over the past 3 months, but being in situations where I'm not comfortable obviously intensifies those feelings.

So, I went to the beach when Trevor did. There was a lot of people, loud music, random things happening at any given time without warning and I was internally absolutely freaking out.

When Trevor asked me I wanted to go in the water, I couldn't move fast enough.

Within a few minutes of being in the water, Trevor stepped on something. Now, the beach we were on is one of those white sand beaches that feel like you're walking on a cloud. There are almost no shells, no rocks, nothing. Trevor reached into the water and picks up this perfectly heart shaped piece of coral and we knew Makenna was in the water with us. This was just the start of all of the heart shaped rocks, glass, and coral I collected over the course of the week.

While we were there, I was teaching Trevor about some of the angel babies that I know and how they visit. One of them I told him about was Meadow and how she visits in hearts.

I knew when I saw this tree on the way to the bachelorette party, that Makenna was showing off her island to all of her little angel friends.

After I started collecting heart shaped rocks and coral, Trevor asked me how I would know if a heart was from Makenna or Meadow. I told him that I was pretty sure if it was a heart that I could take with me, it was from Makenna. If the heart had to stay where it was, it was from Meadow. A few days later on the beach I started to reach for a heart shaped rock that the ocean literally whisked right out of hands and Trevor said "guess that one was from Meadow!"

On Friday, we had more family and family friends coming in and we were responsible for getting them to their airbnb. They followed us via their car and we just kind of parked at the bottom of their hill while Trevor walked up to help get them into the driveway (roads in Saint Thomas are crazy, this probably makes no sense to anyone!)

But, while Trevor was helping them I got out of the car and was kind of just walking around on the road. It had just rained so I was peaking around to see if there were any rainbows. Out of the corner of my eye I saw this little stone just kind of poking out of trees. Makenna once again, letting me know she's with me.

"What we have once enjoyed we can never lose...memories."

Now, prior to coming to Saint Thomas, the whole week before I kept telling Mak I wasn't going to ask her for any signs because all I wanted was for her to save her energy and send me a Saint Thomas rainbow. So many friends and family have seen big, bright, beautiful rainbows since Makenna has died and I hadn't seen any. So, I told her the week before "you save your energy this week and you send me a rainbow when we go to Saint Thomas."

Let me tell you how baby girl delivered. Trevor was at his dad's house helping to set up while I was taking a social break at our airbnb. I had helped a little bit with setting up that morning and being around people was just really getting to me this day in anticipation for the wedding the next day. I knew I would have to to some extent "suck it up" when it came time for wedding.

When Trevor called me I never imagined that he would be calling with tears in his eyes telling me to look up.

Makenna couldn't just deliver a rainbow. She is too special for that. She gave us what is called a fire rainbow. Which, is apparently pretty rare. But, she couldn't even just stop there. She displayed it in the shape of angel wings.

It actually felt as if she was dancing around showing off her pair of angel wings. Ever since this moment I have not envisioned her with white wings like a "regular" angel. Little bean has rainbow wings and they fit her sassy little personality so well. She gives a whole new meaning to the term rainbow baby as she dances in the rainbows forever now.

As if that wasn't enough, she decided she wanted to show me Shadow again. She wanted to let me know that I wasn't crazy and just like I had been saying, she was absolutely with Shadow playing in the rainbows. She even gave him his own pair of rainbow wings.

Wedding day:

I will preface with, I survived.

But, it was incredibly difficult. The morning while everyone was getting ready, I was floating between upstairs with the girls and downstairs with the guys. But, my feelings just kept drifting back to I'm not supposed to be here. I had to go have myself a cry in the car for about half an hour. I knew that people knew I was escaping here and there to go cry or because things were starting to overwhelm me. I am incredibly grateful that everyone just kind of allowed me my space and didn't ask me if I was okay (I lowkey hate being asked that when it's just that question alone followed up with nothing else).

Prior to the wedding, I was very worried that Makenna wasn't going to be remembered. At our wedding a year ago, we had a memorial table filled with family we were missing on that day. I had no idea if my brother and sister in law had planned on doing that but I had a lot of anxiety that if they did, Makenna was going to be left out. A day or two before the wedding my sister in law suggested we put once of Makenna's rainbows in the garden for the wedding down by where everyone is eating.

I don't know if she could ever understand how much this gesture meant to me. There was no memorial table. There were no pictures of family that we wished were there with us. But there was Makenna.

Over the course of the next few days there, we continued to get so many signs from our babies.

333 as an angel number basically means the angels are with you. 333 is a big number for me since we have 3 angel babies. This was the road our airbnb was on.

At our airbnb on the bathroom door was this towel hanger of 3 little turtles. Trevor's Grandma Ruth's favorite animal was turtles.

At our airbnb this singular little yellow flower was growing up out of the middle of the driveway.

On one of our beach trips, the number 3 appeared in the clouds and then a minute later it rotated into the letter M.

These turtles- part of me wishes I had bought them. Not only is it 3 turtles so it represents our 3 babies and Grandma Ruth, but it's also 3 turtles in our babies' favorites colors. G-blue, B-pink, Makenna-yellow.

One morning I was headed outside to drink my morning coffee and our 3 little angel babies played their first trick on Mama. Now, I know that sounds little bit crazy. But, when I tell you this big yellow spider with 3 legs was sitting in the chair I normally sit in, I screamed.

First of all, I don't know what kind of fights this spider had to get in to lose 5 of it's legs, but also the fact it was bright yellow, told me Makenna and her siblings were behind this.

The more time we spent in Saint Thomas with Makenna, her siblings, and her little friends continuing to pay us visits multiple times a day, the calmer I felt. I really felt incredibly close to Makenna on this trip. I felt like she was stronger and maybe it was because at the beginning I needed her and by the end of the trip I was more relaxed and she has an easier time getting through. But, I also think it was because of how much time I was outside. Since Mak died, I've always felt closest to Makenna when I'm outside.

We hide rainbows all around Saint Thomas and I even had another loss mama message me telling me she found one.

On our last beach day we spent the day in the water and Trevor and I walked the beach looking for more heart shaped rocks and coral. Trevor had a very sweet moment with Makenna. We were at the far end of the beach and I told Trevor I needed to go back to go to the bathroom. He said he was going to stay out there. When we met back up he told me he was talking to Makenna while he was walking the rocks and he felt like she was asking him to continue walking the beach and clean up the trash. He ended up with a pocket full of trash that he believes Makenna wanted him to pick up. This is so heart warming to me because before Makenna died, Trevor didn't believe in angels. So just listening to his relationship with his daughter who is on the other side and still manages to have her daddy wrapped around her finger, is pure love.

While I was sitting on the beach this little bug kept crawling all over me. I'm sure a lot of you are reading this thinking wtf ew.

But, the name of this bug is a love bug. And it was just hanging out with me. I was able to snap this picture of the bug on my hand right next to my Makenna bracelet stack and it was so comforting.

On our last night, we went to Trevor's dad's house that is still under construction so it was just the two of us there. We were looking out at the view and realized that the coves formed the perfect M. I knew Makenna loved this island and she was letting us know one last time before we left just how much. She is literally part of it.

For our last sunset, she also pained the sky a beautiful pink and blue. Pink and blue are the pregnancy and infant loss awareness colors and have become incredibly meaningful in my life. When I see them together I think of my 3 angels.

Now that we've been home for about 2 weeks, Makenna has been making it very clear how badly she wants to go back. I have had this very strong feeling that she has just been pulling us back. No real reason why I felt that way; I guess you could call it mother's intuition. But, yesterday I woke up and opened my phone and zillow opened itself to Saint Thomas. Then later in the day I was on the phone with my mom talking about Saint Thomas and Alexa, unprompted started playing some random song called "Anything You Want".

I hear you Makenna. I hear you.