Dear Friends,
Today I was lucky that hubby was off work, so after we ran some errands, we made time to go visit our little boy! I don’t think either of us has made it to the cemetery since before Christmas. It certainly feels like ages and ages. I was so excited to go! We took his Christmas present (an ornament, which we did last year too and plan to do every year), and opened it there for him to “show” him. To us, this is an important way of including him as our child in our holiday traditions.
We both stood there in the snow, trying to make it quick so we didn’t freeze, but we also tried not to feel rushed. We talked like you do to a toddler, simply, and as though he were standing before us. He is always with us in our hearts, and we personally also believe in Heaven (without spending time here on theological details), and we have pictures and other things around the house that remind us of him (including Pookie…), but Charlie is physically buried in that cemetery. In some way, I feel close to him there in a way I do not in other places.
After saying goodbye, usually several times, which for me includes touching his grave marker, we head to the car and point our selves toward home.
This is the hardest part.
Every time I leave the cemetery, I have to leave my son behind again. It is not as hard as the day I had to hand over his body to a nurse. It is not as hard as saying goodbye to HIM and to his future and all our hopes and dreams for him. But leaving the cemetery is still leaving him behind, while I go to the life I have at home, where he isn’t.
I often cry in the car, though less hard and less often than I used to. Not that I miss him less, just that I miss him differently, and am in a different place in my soul. Today it meant that while I drove home, I talked to hubby about how much I missed Charlie, and I had tears in my eyes, and a lump in my throat, and I felt a hard place of tears sitting in my chest.
By the time I got home, he was still on my mind, but my heart had calmed down. I miss my little boy so much. Being sad is like a wave, or a sea, going up or down, or like something that you are carrying that is heavy, but sometimes you are fresh and it’s not a burden, and sometimes you are tired, and it is hard to carry. But everything in that package is too special to leave behind.
Thank you for being with me today while I remember my beautiful little boy.
Yours, Sarah
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Resource list: www.tinyurl.com/infantloss