Slow down, you're moving too fast...

The other night I was getting Colin ready for bed time routine and I went to the kitchen to get his milk and I pulled down two cups and open both tops and started to pour the milk...I stopped half way, put the milk down and just felt the familiar nauseating sadness- an emptiness that makes me feel like a shell of myself and I can feel my shattered life around me physically-its indescribably almost.  He is here...he has to be.  He is upstairs, in his room, walking through the foyer pushing his toy lawn mower.  He is supposed to be anyway..

2 weeks ago I missed our counseling sesion to bring food to Charlotte and visit with Russ's dad who just had surgery.  It was amazing to me how missing one week of talking with him felt like I sunk a little deeper.  His gift is helping us through the most difficult time of our lives---I told him how this had happened and he said something to the effect of --our brains are wired to be Jacob's mom and dad--of course you got out two cups.  The heart and mind take time to catch up to such amazing loss. Will I ever? Will I ever feel true happiness again? Will I ever be able to look at a picture of Jacob and feel grateful, smile at his memory- sure with a hole in my heart that will never go away- but with some real and true joy again?

Slow down, you're moving too fast...

He said if he was a betting man, he would say yes.  Oh how I hope this is true.  Oh, how I wish I could move fast.  I am still falling fast though--some days just deeper and deeper into missing my little man and everything about him.  I can still feel his little body against me when I would pick him up to take him upstairs.  Scarily, I feel like there are a lot of memories that I no matter how hard I try, I can't remember.  But some moments are there..and are so vivid.   I look at pictures and think..he only had two months left to live.  I think about me, my life at the time, how easy it all was and yet how sometimes I felt like it wasn't juggling trying to be the best mom to them I could, my job and being a good wife, daughter and friend---I had no idea how easy it was.  So much is now hard and the hardest thing is imagining a life missing Jacob and his sweet voice and laugh and smile and beautiful blue eyes looking at me everyday. Imagining this pain for the next 50 years, the next 1 year, the next month and sometimes the next minute is more that I feel I can handle most moments of my days.  What happened...what happened? My buddy who was so sweet, so layed back...he loved life and lived everyday like it was his last....

                                          At Nana's Beach...



I heard a voicemail message from someone so dear to me and close to my heart...he lives far away now, but he is the one pediatrician, father and person I looked up to the most as my mentor through high school and all the way through residency and later... a friend.  He was calling to say he cared-- to say he wanted to talk-- to let us know he and his wife were praying and thinking of us..(these calls mean the very most to me--even if I can't always pick up because I feel so alone a lot)...I sobbed through the whole voicemail though because hearing his voice-- in an instant I realized he might know how it might feel as a doctor to imagine this kind of pain and this kind of wondering how your baby could die 25 feet from your room, and just never being able to know the medical cause or reason...how to wrap my head around this.  It just doesn't make sense and I hate it.  I miss him and his wife and children who I used to babysit for when I was in college and high school. Now their baby is going to college and I thought of them--  This man influenced me in so many ways..to become a pediatrician..his wife made me know what kind of mom I wanted to be and how to run a big family that I knew I wanted more than anything.  I was so innocent and wide-eyed...just like I think back to how I used to be when I had both my boys with such ease and happiness, I think back to that time with them and just wish I had that again.   This just wasn't ever what I expected and now my worst fear is living in pain without my baby.  

For now, I search for hope.  I search for hope that I will someday hold my sweet Jacob again and everyday that goes by, I need to hold onto Colin and Russ tight as we journey to that day.  God give me the grace and faith to get through my days and learn how to pray to you again...really pray in faith like I used to...and to live for my husband and Colin...for now.

In Charleston..our first trip without Jake