So guys, we survived! We survived another Christmas without our precious children. I bet no one congratulated you, so let me do it : Great job, you! I don’t care if you stayed home and cried the whole day, I’m still proud of you. Because I know how hard it was.
I remember when Soley was fighting brain cancer, and we were living at the hospital. Back then we used to say : Every day is a battle, but every day is a victory. Now I’m still fighting everyday, but there is no victory. I always, always lose.
This was my second Christmas without Soley, and it wasn’t easier than the first one. On the plus side, my sunshine got a willow tree figure, a chocolate letter, and a toy pastries set (and I got her a cute minion necklace). On the down side, I couldn’t achieve my only goal for Christmas Eve: namely to avoid kids throughout the evening. I retreated to the kitchen, but still heard them open their presents. Now I know that a broken heart sounds a lot like unwrapping paper.
Since Soley was diagnosed with a rare brain tumor in October 2013, I’ve been told a lot to keep hope, to not give up, to stay strong. Things will get better. They have to. Well, they didn’t. There was no miracle for us. Our baby died in 2014, after a brave battle she could never win. 2015 – or as i call it, the year from hell – didn’t bring the solace everyone was promising us. Nope, no rainbow baby in this family, and soon, no family at all. Only grief, stress, isolation, and an expanding anxiety. As months passed by and people were expecting me to get better (whatever that means) I gradually got worse and worse. Like some kind of backward healing process, with Christmas as a deafening finale.
Now we move into yet another year without my baby and it’s hard to keep hoping for the best. I struggle to make plans for the future, to find hope and dreams when everything keeps crashing down. Plan A is long gone. So are plans B, C and D. At this point I stand utterly alone, completely unprepared, bereaved, abandoned, deserted. Raw and broken, and for the first time there is absolutely no plan.
You know how some people ask the waiter to “surprise them” when they don’t know what to order ? I’m greeting the new year the same way. I’m done trying to figure it out.
So go for it, 2016. Surprise me.
- Love After Loss – Part II - February 10, 2017
- Love After Loss – Part I - February 8, 2017
- Sorry Not Sorry - January 23, 2017