he juxtaposition of feelings with a a loss this great is almost like managing another full time job. I have to maintain my own whiplash day & night. In any given day, hour or minute, really, I can feel peace and gut-wrenching guilt. I can feel like I will never smile again, then realize I’m breaking into a grin over a memory or vision of my girl. I can cry and laugh in the same sentence and sleep soundly and toss and turn in one night.
We have talked about running away. Escape to another state, another existence. Drive cross country, see anything other than the four walls of our home and take off for adventures beyond once we reach the California coast. We want to do all of the things Katie never got the chance to do. But we could never escape this pain and it would follow us like our own personal rain cloud. Coming home to an empty home would be just as painful in an hour or 6 months from now.
The absolute last place in the world I want to be is in the biting cold, deep snow cemetery, yet I’m anxious as all hell for them to plow so we can get in to sit with her. To visit and tell her, as close as we can physically be, that we love her. I cry in her room at the very sight of her sweet things and smell of her yet want to be in there more than anywhere else in our home. I want to be anywhere she was – sit in her favorite spot, eat dinner at her spot at the table. I wish I could put her clothes ON just to be close to her. But then, I want to hide any evidence of her because the sight of her toys…her coats…her little shoes…it is all just too much to take in. WHERE IS SHE? WHY ISN’T SHE HERE? But oh….to put away those signs would be like she never existed. And boy did she EVER exist.
Katertot, Kit Kat, Katie Girl, doodle bug…you are my once and forever true love and there is not one second that goes by that you aren’t on my mind and in my heart. You are my favorite person in the WORLD and I love you beyond the moon and all the stars. Please don’t ever forget how very proud we are of you, how very much you are loved and how deeply and painfully you are missed. Yet for all of the pain and suffering we feel now, there is not one second I would have traded for your remarkable, extraordinary life.
