Gardening in the Rain By Stephanie Marshall
Fall is a deeply meaningful time of year for our family.
To honor Bree, we’re inviting donations of $26 in recognition of her due date, November 26th.
I planted a memorial garden in my backyard a few years ago to honor my daughter Bree. It is mostly full of perennials that produce yellow flowers. Yellow is the color we chose to represent and remember Bree and I think of her every time I see a yellow flower. Working in Bree’s garden helps me feel more connected to her and seeing her garden’s beautiful blooms always fills me with joy and hope.
In late February through March, flowers begin to emerge from the cold winter. Crocuses and daffodils come first, then tulips. The perennials reappear with fresh shoots of green stems and buds that will later bloom into an array of white, yellow, and light orange flowers. I explore my local nursery looking for new treasures to add to the mix. I find white forget-me-nots, ‘Golden Baby’ goldenrod, and a plant called ‘Angel Wings.’
The flowers continue to abound in the summer with sunflowers, baby’s breath, yarrow, white finch lace, and poppies. There is a constant stream of visiting butterflies and other pollinators. I imagine Bree’s spirit dancing among the flowers and joining me for sunny afternoons in the garden. I check on my garden daily, sometimes multiple times a day, to water, weed, and revel in the exciting changes and flowers blooming. I feel hopeful and grateful for my beautiful daughter who has brought so much beauty and joy into my world.
And then slowly, the blooms fade away with the changing of the seasons. The Autumn months are a hard time for me in the garden.
The flowers stick around as long as they can but come November most everything from the spring and summer is gone. There are garden chores to be done but I can’t bring myself to do them. Sometimes I walk past Bree’s garden and see clusters of weeds that need to be pulled. The weeds have gone to seed and if I don’t pull them now, the seeds will disperse into the garden and create an exponentially greater number of weeds in the future.
I turn my head away and keep walking. — Bree’s due date was November 26. “A Thanksgiving baby!” people would say whenever I shared my pregnancy news. Even after my severe pregnancy complications, the doctors told me they would let me continue the pregnancy until 34 weeks, mid-October, and then I would be induced. I would still have my Fall baby.
I had no idea Bree would die. In retrospect, I should have known the odds didn’t look good. My placental abruption at 21 weeks along with coinciding P-PROM and loss of all amniotic fluid prevented Bree’s lungs from critical development. A neonatologist I consulted with when I was 23.5 weeks along thought Bree had an 80% chance of surviving. I can’t remember whether he was referring to her surviving the pregnancy or the just birth, or a long NICU stay. I heard 80% and thought we were good.
Bree never made it to the Fall. I went into spontaneous labor at 26 weeks on August 20th. She was born alive, sunny side up, with huge and striking eyes. I had asked the doctor on call to delay cord clamping and she agreed to allow it for one minute.
Bree was placed on her back a few inches away from me, still receiving oxygen through the umbilical cord, and we waited for essential blood from the placenta to move through the cord into her small body. It likely did not make a difference for her survival, but I am forever grateful to have had 60 seconds of watching Bree look around the room with her round, gray eyes, carefully turning her head from side to side, taking in her surroundings, seeming unphased by the bright lights and dozen or so people crowded around her.
The minute ended, the cord was cut, and the neonatologists took Bree away. I would never see her eyes open again. Bree lived 12 hours. The medical complications and interventions she suffered in the NICU were devastating. In my haze of worry, I misinterpreted information from the neonatologists and thought Bree could still pull through, but it never looked good.
We said goodbye on the morning of August 21st. The NICU nurses kept Bree on the ventilator long enough for me to hold her while she was still alive. “I love you, I love you sweet girl, I love you,” over and over I said as she rested still in my arms. Then the breathing stopped. She was gone.
— I am out in the garden in the cold and rain. As usual, I have put off my fall gardening tasks until the Pacific Northwest rainy season has officially set in. My cold fingers are gripping a wet trowel and digging an 8 inch deep hole in the soil. I reach my hand in the hole, carefully place one daffodil bulb, and cover the hole back up with dirt. I grab a nearby weed and throw it onto a messy heap next to the garden. I move on to the next spot and repeat.
When I am done, the garden looks mostly the same, except for the absence of some of the weeds. The daffodil and tulip bulbs are hidden below ground. I’ve sprinkled a few flower seeds around, but you can’t see those either. I examine the remaining plants, many of which are brown and dried up. What was once a cheerful mound of white shasta daisies is now a clump of hard stems and brown leaf bits.
I take my garden snips, cut back at the base of the stems, and throw the spent daisy blooms on top of the weed pile. The sunflowers are next. What a pleasure they were to watch sprout from seeds in the early summer. They grew beautifully and majestically. Some are several feet taller than me. Their sunny heads brightened the entire garden. They are one of my favorite flowers. And now it is time to say goodbye.
The squirrels have already taken the seeds so all that’s left is half of the flower head and the long, hollow stem. Into the weed pile it goes. Goodbye, yellow yarrow, one of my first flower friends after Bree died. I’ll look forward to seeing you again in the spring (if you’ll come back). Goodbye, lily. Goodbye, baby’s breath. Each spent bloom gets added to the pile.
It’s not all bad. I still have a few blooming calendulas and pansies, my new dahlia hasn’t fully withered yet, and the perennials, ornamental grass, and fern will always offer nice greenery. I pack up my garden tools and clear the pile of weeds and dead plants to the compost bin. I am done for now.
It had been hard to get started but I feel lighter now, and more connected to Bree. The garden looks a lot better too, which is a relief.
Grief is a journey. You can’t ignore it. It will continue reminding you it is there, even if you look away. The weeds will spread until you have no choice but to garden in the cold rain. My love for Bree is not only light and love, as much as I wish it were. It is not all spring blooming bulbs and summer flowers. My love for her is also very, very sad. Her short time on Earth was traumatic and heartbreaking. There will always be mourning.
Spring will come, it always does, and with it a renewed sense of hope. That first blooming daffodil appearance feels euphoric. Like I’ve made it through the darkness and into the light again. Summer will follow, then fall, and winter. Next November, I will gather my garden gear in the cold and damp and tend to the garden again.
Grief never ends.
Finding Healing and Strength Through RTZ Hope
I wrote my gardening story after attending RTZ's writing workshop a few months ago. It inspired me to start writing me story.
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