I wrote this last Thursday, August 11.
9 months.
It's been 9 months.
For 9 months I carried you in my belly. I was your source of food, oxygen, life.
And for 9 months you've been gone.
For 9 months I have carried you again...undergoing a process of separation.
But this time, it's not to let you breathe on your own,
It's to learn to breathe on my own...without you.
For 9 months I have held on to my grief as mine. I have owned it. I didn't want to share it.
Selfishly it was all mine.
For 9 months I couldn't afford to look around and see anyone else's pain.
It was mine.
Today sucks. And I hate that word- but it does.
I'm with friends. There will be laughter, but for now...it just sucks.
You aren't here, physically.
And you never will be again.
I'll never have the privilege of seeing who you grow into.
Never meet you as wife, mother. I won't get to plan a wedding with you. j
Instead, I plan a memorial with cheese whiz and butterflies, daisies and softball, pointe shoes and poms.
For the first time in almost a year, I'm beginning to look up; look out.
I'm returning a little to who I was before.
Prior to November 11, 2021.
I will never be the same, but I'm feeling some of the joy in glow sticks,
and dancing,
and the toothy grin of the most adorable grandbaby.
Savoring the warmth of a friend's hug instead of clinging to the buoy in the midst of my pain.
There's a difference in that.
Savoring vs clinging.
Early on, Cassie stated it so well.
"We are so full of our own pain, we can't hold a drop of anyone else's."
9 months.
I'm at a point that, while I'm not sure I can hold anyone else's grief, I can at least stand next to you in yours.
The Sorensen's can stand alongside you.
And allow you to stand next to us in ours.
Andrea's Celebration of Life
Sunday, September 4, 2022
1:00p.m. at the Dryden Softball Fields
I know Pandi's Prayer would be that you would feel loved today.
That you would KNOW you are loved today.
You matter.
My life is better because you are in it.
You are God's masterpiece.