Merry Christmas Eve

Today my heart is in all places at once. I am excited about Christmas on the verge of joyful bittersweet tears. Yet my heart also aches.

It's been awhile since I have felt this joy despite the heart wrenching emotions that "naturally" come with missing Lilly.

Of course there is no doubt I wish she were here to celebrate the birth of Christ with us. To open presents. To join in our family traditions.

I am also mourning the loss of another sweet life gone too soon this holiday season as well as the 26 lives who so recently and painfully left this world.

I think about the beginning of my journey after Lilly died and my heart aches thinking of the parents who have started their own journey after the loss of their child.  As well as the heartache the siblings feel beginning their journey without their brother or sister.

I feel for every one of them.

So while this is a joyous Christmas for me just a month and a half shy of the three year mark since Lilly died, it is also still a sad one. It will always be both.

I wish the families who have been asked to walk through life without their loved ones as much joy and peace during this holiday season.

Though it may sound odd for me to say I still can feel joy along with  this pain of having to survive a child, I don't feel that it means I miss her any less. In fact, I feel closer to how I felt when Lilly was here, than I have in awhile. I still miss her, I will always miss her. There will always be a lump in my throat, a hole in my heart so long as I live. 

I have always said I want her life to be bigger than her death and the joy I feel today coincides with my wish for that to be how she is remembered.

My Outlet

It's been awhile...again.

I have been wanting to write more often than I have been because in the past this has been such a great outlet for me, and lately I have been feeling the need to have an outlet.

To be honest, that feeling has never truly left, and it pains me to admit that I have allowed myself to make excuses for not having time. I feel it means I am not making time for Lilly, which I know is not true, but my heart feels guilty anyway.  I know at times the reason I stopped writing here was because in those moments, I felt I no longer needed to vent about my grief as often as I was in the beginning.

I have often wondered if perhaps that's why I feel the first year of living without Lilly was in a way more manageable than this year has been, because I had an outlet.

I have been missing the moments of peace I would get. I feel like those are fewer and farther between than before. I can not even remember the last time I felt a moment of peace wash over me. I do remember feeling them as I wrote how I felt. So I hope in writing this I am able to feel a moment of peace again. The same peace I felt wash over me the day of her funeral.

I have gotten to the place where I cry when I talk about her. Maybe its guilt. I want to talk about her but feel joy not sadness. Maybe its a balance; I felt the joy more immensely than the sorrow and now its time for me to feel the sorrow more than the joy.

I still don't want her death to be more important than her life. I think that I am conflicted because what I want is not coincidung with how I feel.

I know I can't control it. I also know the pain is a reminder that she was physically here. I just feel sad.

Before Lilly I did not like the feeling of not being in control, and after she died I could accept that I am not in control easily. Now I am back to not liking that feeling. It's a lot more stressful feeling this way though. I miss letting go and trusting and accepting what is meant to happen will happen.

In a way I still feel that way, just not nearly as dominant as before.

I need to remind myself that it is ok to feel conflicted. There is no manual for losing a child. There is no right or wrong way, and grief changes and grows as we do. Losing a child is still new to me. I have a lifetime of learning how to live with it. I won't ever get it right, I will not get used to it, and that's ok. I am not meant to.

Dark day...

*** I wrote this on Lilly's birthday. It was a tough one for me this year and I thought I had published it. I am posting this as is without editing.

First off let me say that some of this is gonna sound selfish.  And I am at peace with that because this is my space to feel free to say what is on my heart in relation to a life lived without Lilly. 

This has definitely been a difficult birthday for me.  I spent a lot of Monday in tears. I left work early and drove to the cemetery to visit her and had a good cry.  Then I headed to the church but it was locked so I ended up at a lake.  I sat on a swinging bench just basking in the beauty that is nature. 

I spent most of Tuesday in bed just not finding the strength to pull myself up.  I was in a dark place and yes I was feeling sorry for myself and I feel moments of that are allowable and should be expected for one who has lost a child.  I also feel I know what I can take and I knew I didn't need any outside pressures on top of the pain in my heart I was already experiencing so me lying in bed watching re runs was all I could take.  I feel I have to have those moments where its just about how I feel because for those of you who have not lost a child believe me when I say those moments are much needed. Those of you who can only imagine how losing a child feels its that and ten times a million more painful than you can fathom.

I have struggled with myself with guilt mostly. Guilt of letting others down by choosing to take these moments these last couple of days. While I expect difficult and dark moments to happen it still hits me. In some small way its like seeing someone about to punch you and you brace for impact and know the pain is coming but you never really can prepare for the impact. Only with a punch coming your way (unless someone comes from behind and sucker punches you) there is a slight moment of preparing for impact. Well with waves of grief while I know they are coming it doesn't make it less painful and there is no bracing for impact. We call them waves because they come over you and then you have to kick like hell to get to the surface and catch your breath and for those of you who have ever been hit by a wave and swallowed under water know that's not an easy task.

For me when I feel this way I limit interaction with anything or anyone I feel in my perception which of course is my reality (told you I was gonna be selfish in this post) are holding my head under the water so to speak unintentional or otherwise.  I say that because intentional or not it still hurts and when you are in this dark place of grief that I speak of you don't need anyone or anything putting salt on an unhealed wound.  And I feel people might misunderstand. I don't mean we have more of a right to be sad than the next person.  Pain is pain, it hurts and we all have a right to feel as we do. What I am saying is I just want the same right as anyone else and sometimes I don't have room for anything else but to be sad. My daughter is dead can you really blame me for wanting moments of selfishness.

There are those who miss Lilly and remember her daily with us and I love that we can share our memories and our thoughts about Lilly. I am grateful in ways words may never express.  We have had such a great support system starting for me with God.

There have been moments throughout this journey where I felt it was so dark and God has given me lights to help me find my way out of the muddy and slippery pit of grief. 

People have said we have a great support system and we do and I don't take that for granted.

I also can't imagine going through this without God.  I feel He is my strongest supporter whether I always know it or not. 

Knowing He is with me has helped me even in my darkest moments.  Just accepting His unconditional love for me helps me to always know that no matter how dark it gets, with Him there is always Hope.

I am reminded of a quote I heard a little bit after we buried Lilly's vessel. "God never promised us a road filled without strife. But in our darkest moments it is important to remember that He did promise to never abandon us." I have never forgotten that and I feel that along with the support system we have been fortunate to have I know there is always a light at the end of the tunnel or a hand to help me out of the pit.

I wouldn't trade a single second of her nine months in utero and six days, five hours, and thirty minutes on earth for not having the pain of not having her here with me.

I recently heard that if to love and have your heart broken means "tragedy", then give me "tragedy" I agree if not having this pain means losing Lilly in the sense that she never existed, I would rather live with this pain. Because with this pain there is still Love :)

I also feel we wouldn't know love without pain. We would take it for granted, take the ones we love for granted if we didn't feel that they at any moment could disappear from our world.  I truly believe one cannot exist without the other.

And if to know true love is to know pain then I welcome love with open arms.

A new year's wish to all

First off I would like to wish everyone a "happy" new year. I hope this year brings as much peace and fulfillment that can be brought to those of us on this journey.

I am a little cautious on seeing how this year without Lilly will be "different" from 2011. I have heard people say that some years are harder than others and I feel I defintely experienced that in 2011. My wish is that 2012 will not be one of the "harder" years for myself and especially for others.

I feel like I experienced the deepest part of my despair in missing Lilly and though I know there will be more moments during my lifetime like this I have yet to experience I just want to make sure I never lose sight of the one thing I have said from the beginning that I do not want Lilly's death to be bigger than her life! I get so mad when I lose my grip on that thought.

I feel I was very close to losing sight of that in 2011. So here I start  another year living without Lilly. May all of us who walk this journey find as much peace and joy that can be found. Though the tears will never cease and the heartache never end, may we all find some comfort in the year 2012. I have a feeling all our children want that for us. *hugs*