One at a time

 I’ve almost made it through. One of my firsts without you.  Now that the actually day is done and today we’re doing something together but completely different it doesn’t hurt as bad.  I’m thankful my family adjusted for me. I needed everyone to not say what day it was and do things completely different. I needed it to feel like somewhat of a normal day but be around.  I cried for a lot of the day.  A lot.  I got teary eyed most of the rest of the time.  But I was able to laugh while we played cards and just had a normal dinner together.  Extremely thankful for my brothers timing. He never is home on this day but he drove home and it made it feel just like a visit with him which is so much of what I needed.  I probably wouldn’t have left the house if he hadn’t. 

Today it’s just us. I need one day for just us. I’ve never cooked a big meal with everything so we made sure all of the kids could be home. We have already prepped the ham, the sweet potatoes, cheesy potatoes and turnips. I baked a cherry pie that I buy uncooked from a local church and I spent a whole lot of tears making Coles favorite pecan pie recipe that he and I used to make together and he learned to make on his own. 

If you’ve ever hurt this much then you know how it feels to be panicking trying to find that same recipe back and crying when you think you can’t. Crying because the crust doesn’t want to roll out or it’s too flaky to get from the counter to the pie pan.  Mostly I think I was just crying because I tried to hide what day it was from my mind but it still knew. My body still knew. I can’t hide it. 

It reminded me of 10 plus years after we lost our first baby and I was walking to work one day and felt a sudden sadness wash over me and I had tears streaming down my face.  I walked to my cube not knowing why I was crying. When I saw the date I realized it was the day we lost our first one probably more than 10 years before.  My body remembered. Something about the air, the wind, the sun that day reminded me of what happened without me really being aware.  

Those are going to come for me again now.  A mother’s body remembers when a piece of her heart was taken. 

I’m thankful for what remains   But I need grace and time to allow me to continue to grieve what I miss