Hope....Time....Healing....

     I'm trying so hard to keep finding hope with our Sterling physically here. I am. I promise. It's just hard. I guess I figured that by the time we would be just days away from the 3 year mark, it would be easier. So many people really do think that time heals all wounds. I just think that when your child dies, its a whole different kind of wound. Time is not always my friend.

     This last month leading up to the days that my son died has been hard. I find myself crying more. I'm grumpier. I don't always want to be around people. I find most of the things other people stress out about to be annoying. In many ways it feels like the first months after Sterling died. But its been almost 3 years. It's harder and harder for me to find people willing to listen and not try to fix me.

     I don't need fixing. I am broken. But I also know I am healing. I have been doing this grief thing for almost 3 years now. I know there are ups and downs. I am in a down moment. I just need people to remember my son. I need people to tell me that this is the worst thing that could ever happen and they are so proud of me for choosing to live and that its ok if I can't always smile and be there for them. I need people to know how exhausting this still is for me. How much energy it takes to wake up each morning and take care of my boys and to take care of myself.

      I am lucky in that I do have a few of these people in my life. I know Sterling sent them to me. They listen when I talk and they tear up. When I beg for donations to the Pediatric Congenital Heart Association in his name for what should have been his fourth birthday, they go above and beyond to make sure I make the goal I set. They are the ones who see the same picture or video they have seen a dozen times of Sterling and they click the like button or they even take a second and comment. They have no idea what that means to me, or maybe they do. Either way, I am so grateful for them.

      Tomorrow we will celebrate Thanksgiving. I am so thankful for my children. All of them. But it will be hard. So I am going to squeeze in a few hours of working out in a few classes by my favorite instructors. I will be pushed and I will want to stop. But I won't. And when its over I will gather my boys and we will head home to make our dinner. We will likely set Sterling's picture at the table and maybe even light a candle. The boys have been asking more again. About his life and about his death.

     I miss Sterling, I always will. I will always try to live my life in such a way that makes him proud. I will never stop talking about him. I will never stop trying to save other families from knowing this pain. My heart is forever broken but healing. Time won't fix it though. My desire to heal will. Having people in my life who are willing to listen will. If you know a grieving parent or sibling, please be kind and gentle with them. They may smile and be trying to live again, but its hard. And it takes so much time, possibly a lifetime.

     Sterling, you are loved and you are missed, always and forever.

Loving this time of year.....

     I was at Target this weekend with my boys when we saw Christmas stuff out. I said how the time of year was always my favorite. The boys looked at me with perplexed looks on their faces. "You DO?" Was their response. And it ht me, like a slap across the face. This will be our 4th Christmas without Sterling physically here.

     My boys are little. Four years is a long time. They don't really remember the holidays before. It breaks my heart. Their memories are of a sad Mommy who was on edge most of the holiday season.
I know I tried to be joyful for them. I know that each year has gotten better. But my boys, they feel my longing, they long, for a holiday with Sterling.

     It is now November, a very hard month for me. A month when I can go back over pictures and see my baby's puffy eyes and hands in some pictures and wonder how I didn't see it in life?  When I can look back and think that I should've pushed the doctors to do a chest x-ray. Or wonder why didn't I get a second or third or fifth opinion? And its also the last holiday we spent with Sterling, Thanksgiving.  Sterling woke up on December 1st not feeling well. Sometime in the afternoon he left us. Our lives turned completely upside down.

     We have worked hard at healing our broken hearts. I have decided that I am going to work even harder to take back November. After all, I got two Novembers with Sterling. That is something I can't say for any other month. We got two full Novembers with Sterling. Two Thanksgivings. It is a special month. One that should be celebrated.

     December 1-3 can wait. Those will always be the worst days of my life. And I will deal with them when I get to them. Please keep our little family in your prayers, these next few months are hard for us. But we are going to find the joy in the season. We are going to remember Sterling. We are going to live.