The end of the holiday season

Thank God.

I'm so ready for it all be over and done with.  I'm so done with love and the happiness and the sadness and I am just done.

2 years is coming up soon.  In less than 3 months, she will have been gone for 2 years.   How can it be 2 years already?  Its not fair.

The anger I am feeling today is just overwhelming me.  I'm super pissed that this happened to me.  I am so angry and I feel so unsure of myself and my parenting now.  How could I have done everything that I thought was so right and she died, she died and I'm here picking up the pieces all by myself. 
This is the punishment of grief.  I/we are alone in this grief, this madness. Does that even make sense? Probably not.
 I hate that I've moved on, I realize that If I don't move on, then I will never again feel happiness and joy... but that doesn't make it any easier. 
Sometimes I wish I could go back to those first few months, to feel that grief again because no matter how sad or how much I miss her the pain is nothing like it was then.  I know that it sounds ridiculous but there are just so many times that I wish I could just wrap myself in that grief again because those tears.. that pain... it somehow proves to myself how much I love her. 

Everyone else seems to move on so easily, its not that they don't say her name or remember her (though it feels that way to me sometimes). Its that I feel like I can't breathe still, I can't believe that she is gone and this really truly happened.  I have finally stopped calling Amanda, Megan.  She is finally her own separate person.  There is nothing more comforting than holding her in  my arms.  Nuzzling that sweet spot in the back of their neck.  Just breathing her in.  Watching her breathe, seeing her breathe, feeling her breathe. Just breathe baby, don't stop breathing.  I don't think I could take it, but I find myself thinking, ya you would.  You would just move on, like you have moved on after her and its like seriously?  Why am I thinking this way? I can't.  I won't.  I could not survive another death.
There is so much  joy but there is so much fear.  I feel like I have a little better of control on my 'crazy' now, but it isn't easy.  Its a struggle.  I know that she will sleep in her arms reach cosleeper just fine at night.  I know that I would enjoy sleeping on my stomach again for a few hours.  As soon as I talk myself into it, I talk myself out of it.   Lately I've even been putting her in the bassinet.  I will lie so that my face is even with her face.  Yet I cannot go to sleep. I feel this ache and the fear and I can't breathe.  The anxiety.  The fear of another child passing all alone is so overwhelming that after 20 minutes I pull her back into my arms. 
The crazy that is better is that I no longer wake every 20 minutes with the knowledge she is dead.  However I still have to check that she is breathing multiple times of the night but it isn't as heartbreaking as it used to be.  It almost feels normal.  My heart isn't beating out my chest in panic, but there is no ignoring the need. I have to feel her heart pounding away, her chest rising with each breath before I can fall back asleep for the 20th time of the night. 

There are times where she will fall asleep upset, not wanting to nurse, just wanting her pacifier and it devastates me.  Sometimes I think its ok, this is good she fell asleep without having to nurse.... shes asleep that's all that matters.  Then I think of Megan.   Its all I wanted her to do as well. I was mad when I wanted her go to sleep, she wouldn't leave me alone and she was fussy and I just needed a few minutes to myself.
How can I ever let her fall asleep and have her think I'm mad at her?  How can I let her sleep alone with me being upset that she won't nurse and won't  shush with her crying and boy oh boy this kid can cry!? How can she just lie there, content sucking that pacifier when so many emotions are whirling around me?
So i jostle her a bit so that she opens her eyes, I pick her up and hold her.  Content because now she knows I love her, she knows that she is in my arms.  Crazy right? Sounds crazy to me.

The last month

I have had 3 people reach out to me and my heart just breaks for all of them.  3 children who have passed away in the last 2 months.  A 15 month old little boy, A 21 month old little girl, and a 13 month old little girl.   Heartbreaking, to have so many losses this close to the holidays.  Any loss is heartbreaking but it always seems more depressing when you have so many other people blissfully unaware. 

I am always humbled to have people reach out to me, I am so thankful that this blog reaches people and helps give comfort.  I know that when Megan died, it seemed like so many blogs, were fake and outdated they all just stopped writing after awhile.  Fake as in they were so full of hope and faith and that isn't something a lot of us have in the beginning.  You may find that later on, but in the beginning you are angry and you are full of guilt and the sadness is so overwhelming that you just pray that you will not wake up tomorrow.   You cry yourself to sleep every day, you cry at the drop of a hat.  You cry so much that your face no longer gets red when you cry.  
Where was all the pain? The anger?  So when I started writing, I wanted to make sure that was something I shared.  We all do it, we all think this couldn't happen to me but it can.  Writing is one way for me share the pain, to help people emphasize with us.

It breaks my heart that so many children are gone so soon.  It shouldn't be this way. This isn't the plan we had for them. 

I'm still finding my way, trying to figure out how to blog when I'm so conflicted.  Having Amanda did not fix everything, we always knew that.  No rainbows fix all the pain but they really do help.  Right now she is sitting on my chest while i type this, sleeping, content, safe in my arms.   I keep kissing the top of her head and just brushing my cheek against her fuzzy head.  Something i so desperately missed about Megan.  I miss her so much.  Sometimes I think to myself, Amanda you wouldn't be here if Megan had died, but now I just think to myself how much I wish I had all 3.  I can imagine myself with a 7year old, 3 year old and 3 month old.   Only, Amanda will never get to know Megan except through us.  

I'm still finding my balance.  I'm still perfecting my answer to the question, "How many kids do you have? "  Sometimes I let people assume that Emily and Amanda are it, but if they start asking anything about them I tend to quickly let them know about Megan.  I just pop it out there, I also have another daughter who died at 18 months. Sometimes they ask about her and sometimes they just move on in the conversation after saying their "sorrys'.  Both are ok.