still brave

As yet another 12th comes closer I start to think about her death constantly. About what I was doing and feeling on February 9th. Remember with me.. 

That ring.. I remember that day. My friend coming to get it to try to save it for me.. How I hated having it off for a few hours.

I love it so much. Its more precious to me than any other piece of jewelry I have ever owned. There are a lot of memorial tattoos ideas I am marinating on.. But that ring marked on me forever is for sure happening.

I don’t often re-read my blogs. But I am glad I did with that one.. because it reminds me of who she was. The silly spunky way she would ask for the ring back. . and then give it to me over .. How happy she was to see me wearing it. How we talked about each bump being for the 5 loves of my life.. my kids and my husband. I was pregnant still with baby Charlotte when she gave it to me .

How perfect life was..

She would rub her fingers over it sometimes when we sat together. Oh how I miss that. just her touch. One day I will remember what it felt like. ..

I think about those final hours.. how I only knew something was wrong because tears rolled from her perfect and cruelly alert eyes.

She could move nothing but her eyes. The tumor stole everything from her before it finally stole her from us.

She suffered. So much.

Tony and I differ on why she had tears.. we even differ on why we hope she had them. Grieving for the same perfectly imperfect creature.. we are so different.  But our love for her.. for each other.. its the exact same. Which means so is our desperate pain.

I hate that. I hate knowing how much he is hurting. Although I know infertility was hard for him.. hard for him to watch me miscarriage after miscarriage.. I think it was always harder on me. And I liked that. I liked knowing that he wasn’t in the same pain..

I am not alone in this agony over Jennifer.

We may deal with it differently.. we may even interpret moments differently.. but we are both just as destroyed. I started to type that we could never be more destroyed.. but thats not true I know it could always – always be worse..I am so cautious with my thoughts now.

When we knew she had cancer.. I write and talk about that a lot.. about nursing baby Charlotte to sleep .. cancer but no prognosis attached.. when Jennifer was still 5. I was rocking my baby to sleep and my thoughts were all about my eldest.

-confession-

I was scared but not terrified. I felt defiant. I felt strong. I felt almost special. Ready for this fight… I thought about how I was going to make sure she didn’t get too far behind in school. And that I was going to make sure people didn’t treat her differently.

.. and then my thoughts wandered as I nursed my baby in the dark. To Jennifer’s funeral. …

I fought it back.. screamed at myself from the inside. How dare I think that sort of thing. Because it wasn’t a real thought. ..but maybe thinking it would make it real.

Im sorry. I am so sorry I thought it..

It wasn’t like the thoughts I had later.. the ones I had trying to make my mind come to terms with the inevitable.. It was just my mind traveling on its own ..

I replay those minutes wasted in that chair that night that feels like forever ago… over and over again. I hope that admitting it in this forum can allow me to let it go..

I wish I never left her side those last 2 weeks. I wish I held her and talked to her the way I did in those last 36 hours. ..sharing every breath.

The whole beginning of the month is so hard for me.. as we creep closer to the 12th.. I relive it all.. Her pain. Her suffering.

I should have talked to her more about what was coming..

I hope she wasn’t scared. I want a do over.

after the 12th I want a life do over.. I want her back. Complete. whole. Healthy.

..but time barreling to the 12th.. to 5 months gone.. I just want a do over with her dying.

I want to do better preparing her and helping her die. I just want to get another chance to do right by my daughter. .. It just keeps getting harder and harder. The sorrow digging into me .. new depths of pain every month.. more memories laced with regrets..

5 months. That makes me sick to my stomach. I hate time growing from the feel of her heart under my hand.

 

We have a work event for Tony coming up. He was so proud last year to show us all off.. but especially her.. Especially his little girl with the same long lashes and contagious smile as he has..

had.

Losing her stole that smile…

both of those smiles.

…are you trying hard baby girl?.. i turned on the music again tonight.. i don’t do it usually when i write… only when something compels me..

tonight all our songs. ..

i sit here and i try so hard to feel you.

trying not to move too much.. to be still and force myself to feel you again..

to feel your arms around me.

Something to let me know you are still here. i am so scared.

oh God.. please help me. help me trust I will see her again..

help me believe she isn’t gone forever.

I’m trying . I felt so much those last hours.. I remember that I felt something so incredible in that room.. I can’t even remember what it felt like.. but I remember I felt it.

oh God please help me.. I am so scared…

———

And now this song.. so I do what I did at her services and I invite you to do the same…

this is My Jennifer..

Thank you.

thank you ..

..until there is a cure