Right Where I Am: Two Years, Two Months and 28 days

I've never participated in this before. I never felt like how I felt changed much until recently. I'm sitting here in the soft light of the morning, watching birds fly by our birdhouse and grab little bits of seed. Bingley, our big yellow dog, lays a few feet away, snoring like a grizzly bear. My little golden haired beautiful boy is standing at the coffee table, dancing to a Blues Clues episode.

And for a few minutes, I feel peace and contentment.

As short as six months ago, I think I wouldn't have been able to say that.

For over a year after Georgiana died, I woke up and every morning was Groundhog Day. I would painfully open my eyes, and she's dead, she's dead would run over and over in my mind. In the early days, it was so much I thought I would go insane from it. I could hardly pull myself off the pillow. As time went on, it was still there but somehow I pulled myself and dressed myself for work like an automaton, despite the horrible chorus in my head.

These days, I wake up to the sounds of Davey chatting to himself on the monitor. It's the most beautiful sweet sound, and his presence calms me.

Right where I am now, I don't go visit Georgie's grave. It brings back too many horrible memories for me, and usually puts me in a funk that lasts for days. I've just recently gotten to the point that I'm ok with not going, and don't really care too much what anyone else thinks on this. I talk to her everyday in my mind, usually in the quiet moments. Sometimes I ask her what she's doing, if she saw that, if she'll protect her little brother, watch over us. Other days, my mind drifts back to those horrible moments, when the doctor told us she couldn't find a heartbeat, laboring with her in the hospital, standing at the cemetery and wrapping my arms around her tiny coffin, wanting to take it with me and run away from everything. Those moments still flash, but thankfully their hold is not as strong.

People used to tell me that time heals all wounds after she died. No, it doesn't. Those of us who have lost a child know it's a wound that never heals. But it softens, so that I can still enjoy my life and days, something I never thought I'd be able to do again after we lost G. I can notice the birds now, my dog snoring, my son, and say a small prayer of thankfulness in those moments. I never thought I'd make my way out of the heavy fog of grief to be able to enjoy those things again. But I have. It's a whole lot of heaven punctuated by small moments of hell, but I'll take the heaven as much as I can.