Trying to Refocus

Today she turns 11 weeks old not in my arms but in Heaven. I know I really need to stop counting the days/weeks but I can’t seem to stop.  I know it’s not healthy to focus on this everyday but it’s how my brain works. 

What makes it really bad is that I don’t just count the number of weeks/days since she was born or since she went to Heaven but every day I spend a great deal of time remembering what we were doing on this same day X number of weeks ago.

When your daughter’s birth and passing happens within a week, it makes it very easy to remember exactly what happened on each day.  Our days with her in a brief nutshell:

·        Wednesday:  She was born - BEST DAY EVER!

·        Thursday:  She spent most of the day/night with us in our room at the hospital, my mom made it into town and more family got to meet her.

·        Friday:  We were released from the hospital and spent our first night as a family at home.

·        Saturday:  “Lazy Saturday” as my husband referred to it, was a perfect day of us getting to know our girl, enjoying our 5 year wedding anniversary and Avery meeting more family. (But this was also the day we held her memorial service, so that is always in the back of my mind).

·        Sunday:  I was able to spend hours with her alone while my husband went to the grocery store, etc.  This was one of my favorite days.

·        Monday:  My husband decided to stay home from work one last day for extra family day; this was also our last night with her.

·        Tuesday:  The worse day of our lives, the day my world stopped, the day she went to Heaven.

Every day, I relive what we were doing on this day so many weeks ago.  Some days I find comfort in the happy memories, others, it puts me into a downward spiral realizing yet again that those memories are all we have left.  This week, I tend to be more focused on the sad rather than the happy. 

I wish I had the ability to let go of the bad memories, I’ve tried so many times but the bad always seems to find a way to creep back in and overtake my thoughts.  Unfortunately, the negative is always going to be there; it’s part of her story, it’s part of my story, it’s part of our story.  I just hope as the weeks pass, I will find a way to deal with the bad memories and not let them overtake me.  To focus on what we were blessed to have and not on the future we planned that will never happen.
I hope I find a way to take all of this-the good and bad-and allow it to shape me into a better person, a person she would be proud of.  I want to use her as my inspiration to really live life, love deeply and enjoy the beauty that each day holds.  Right now, that seems like a far off dream but I hope to be at that point one day.