Lincoln’s Build-a-Bear “Spots”

When I first began this blog, I was telling our story day by day of our experience at Riley. I had to stop and give myself a break because I just couldn’t handle the emotions of reliving those days as I wrote. It helped at first, but with Jeremy struggling at work with PTSD and me working and also trying to keep our bills paid and everything, it proved to be too much to finish at that time.

But I think I’m finally ready to continue it next month. It feels like an unfinished book that needs an ending. I think it will help me process my grief in the upcoming month. I have to be very careful when I let myself dwell on events of that week, or I will be sinking into a bottomless hole before I know it. The memories cause extreme emotional and physical reactions. Before I know know it, I’m right there back in that little PICU room reliving every moment.

February 21st will be one year since Lincoln left us. Jeremy and I are both taking the entire week off from work. This day weighs heavy on my heart and mind as it approaches. I just can’t believe I haven’t been able to hold and kiss my sweet baby for almost a year. It doesn’t even seem real. His swing still sits over beside the tv. His play pen is still out with his folded little outfits and towels still stacked from the laundry we did the days before he died. I’ve moved a lot of his things just into his nursery because they hurt so much to look at every day. His stroller and car seat. The unopened high chair he never got to use… But those last few things I haven’t had the strength to move yet.

I tried to clean out his play pen but when I came across one of the last outfits I bought him, that I had been so excited to buy, that he never got to wear, I just couldn’t do it. Our grief counselor once told me that we shouldn’t push ourselves to clean and move things we aren’t ready to because you can only do it once. And right now we’re not ready. I don’t know when we will be. And that’s ok.    

Please keep us in prayer my friends as we approach the anniversary of the death of our son. It was truly the worst day of our lives. I actually feel guilty for even saying that because it was also the day that Lincoln was set free from his painful and diseased body, and made whole and new in Christ. So while my mommy heart knows that was truly best for my darling baby, that doesn’t mean that my heart wasn’t shattered that day too. All my hopes and dreams of a toddler running around the house this winter, first days of school, playing football and piano, years of birthdays and holidays and so, so much more were taken from me in an instant. And I have to live with that the rest of my life. Everyday he is missing. 50 years from now he will still be missing.

God give me the strength to face each day with courage!.