The Scent of Blood.......

I miss it.

That sounds so twisted, so demented, so......so fucked up. But I do. I miss the smell of blood.

It has taken me a very long time to realize, and then accept, that blood is what my baby girl smelled like. To me she smelled so good, so great. I inhaled her scent deeply from the moment her lifeless body was laid in my arms. I knew I wanted to remember the way she smelled. I needed to memorize her scent because I would only have it for a few, short, desperate hours.

She smelled like blood because that's what dead bodies do. They bleed. Unfortunately, Riley was dead inside me for almost 3 full days before she was born. Her cells began to deteriorate, to break down, immediately. She was bleeding the entire time I had her. From her nose. From her mouth. So yes, my perfect girl.....smelled like blood.

Another mom, who suffered the loss of her daughter, described her girl's scent as sweet sugar. My imagination of this sweet scent emanating from a living, breathing baby makes me ill. Because my girl didn't smell like sugar. Or candy, or baby soap, or lotion, or spit up, or newborn. She smelled like sick, like death, like blood.

I crave it. I hunted for it for the longest time.

And I miss it every day.