Over these last two years I have learned there are certain
times as a grieving mama that will knock the wind out of me and, regardless of
the passage of time, take a good while for me to rebound from. No matter how hard I try there are days my heart just holds on to. Mother’s Day is one of those days. No matter how hard I try to get myself into a
good place, a prepared place, it is a day that I just come apart. This year made it extra complicated and,
maybe for that reason, it was extra tough to drag myself out of the funk.
Mother’s day weekend brought us to Long Island for my
cousin’s little girl’s First Communion.
So, after crying my way through Kennedy’s fifth birthday, simply unable
to fathom how we got this far already, we made our way down. Communion’s are big on Long Island, little
mini weddings for some people, and while my cousin didn’t go quite that far, it
was a great time-especially if you are a newly five-year-old, thoroughly
impressed by the big fancy dresses, and a party with a DJ, magician, candy-bar,
and make your own sundae station. It was
a good break, getting to see my family laughing in a way you can only laugh
with people that knew you when you were young.
It always gives me a chuckle to see their faces as they watch Kennedy and
then turn to me so say- always the same thing- “I could swear I’m looking at you at that age when I see her.”
Regardless of the fun we had, I could feel a nervous energy
brewing inside of me; unable to sit anywhere too long-just trying to stay busy
and keep my mind off of everything.
Wanting so badly to hold my cousin’s baby girl, yet knowing the ache in
my heart it would cause. As I rocked her
to sleep and felt her warm little body, there was a different kind of aching
though; the kind that reminded me that while I will be there again soon enough
with our new little one, there is a still a little baby boy that I would have given my last
dying breath to rock to sleep just once-and I will never be able to let go of that. Just like that, my nerves were unleashed and I felt a tiredness settle
on my heart that made itself at home for a few days.
I wanted to get back home.
I wanted to go “see” my boy at his spot.
I wanted to be with my children together. So after a long ride back home, and
unfortunately in the rain, I made my way with Kennedy, and the little boy
growing beneath my heart to go visit their brother. And it struck me as I stood there: I am a mother in every facet of life you can
be one; mother to a little girl, mother to a child that has passed before me,
and a mother-to-be. I was overcome by
the emotion that all three of my babies fill me with and by the time I had Kennedy
back in the car, I couldn’t hold it in anymore.
I sobbed. I didn’t want to; I try
not to have her see me in that state when I can help it-she’s old enough to
remember it all now and I don’t want her to remember me this way. But as I looked back at her and saw her
little, empathetic face, she just said, “I know Mommy, you just want all your
babies to be together, right?” I tried
to say yes but nothing came out, so I just nodded my head and made our way
home.
When I got home though, Kennedy wanted to give me the
presents she had made for me at school so I tried to collect myself and look as
excited as I could. I’ll tell you though
the second she handed me the big envelope that she had written on and decorated,
and she pulled out, with pride, each of the things I could feel the tears
starting up again. She gave me the
silhouette with its bejeweled frame, and the card she had written in. But it was the last thing that did me in; “I
Love My Mom Because….” I held my breath, praying when I found her name it
wouldn’t say something like, “I love my mom because even though she is a mess
most of the time she feeds me donuts for breakfast!” As I read through some of the others I knew
my fate was sealed; and then I came to her name. It said: I love my mom because…she sings me a
song when she tucks me into bed. And the
tears came; hard. I thought with relief,
maybe she wouldn’t remember the crying, or at least not only that; I was making
it count in other places. When I sing
Bob Dylan’s Forever Young to her every night, that’s what is sticking; that's what she is holding on to. Growing exasperated with my emotional
displays she said, “Why are you crying now?”
And when I told her she said, “Ok Daddy, Mommy is having happy tears
because she loves my present.” This
girl, I tell you, she soothes my broken heart in ways she might never
understand.
I made it through the day but it was long and I was beat and
so when Monday rolled around I was dragging.
The week was filled with visiting my friend and her new baby boy, pediatrician appointments where we were told to
lay off the donuts for a bit, softball games, ninety-eight degree weather,
where I got a glimpse of what this summer would feel like-which is not pretty
and to top it all off an emergency OB check-up after a scare I had at
work. Everything is fine, but I realized
that I am so bone tired. Not the “your-six-months-pregnant-what-do-you-expect”
kind of tired, but the kind of bone tired you get from being scared all of the
time. I just want to stop feeling like
the bad news is coming; stop feeling like being told Carter is healthy, and I
am healthy, and everything looks and sounds good is too-good-to-be-true. But there you have it. This is what a “rainbow pregnancy” looks and
feels like.
And so after a lot of sleepless nights we were brought to
our next family function for Sean’s cousin, graduating with her doctorate in
Physical Therapy down in Pennsylvania.
And though there was a lot of uncomfortable car time during this quick
down and back trip it was broken up with time with his family, a group of
people that love hard and laugh hard.
And if things get particularly rough, there's always fairy gardens.
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