Dear Angela, It’s Momma, Today is a tender day for me, 3 years without you my Brave mighty little warrior 🧡. You were such a fighter in everything you did. Number 3 was your favorite number. I remember begging God for that miracle 3 years ago today….I’m now realizing the miracle was eternity. I prayed for your healing as if I were chanting. Three years ago I lived a completely different life. I remember looking at you and thinking is this really going to happen, are you leaving me. How do I stop it. What do I say. How do I remain strong so you could transition into what is the unknown for me. How do I continue to help you be strong for all the hard and heavy reality of it all. How do I quickly say all the things before you don’t hear my voice anymore and you’re gone. How do I help you to surrender, and for those around us those last days, that needed to surrender to it all too. That last week with you was like an out of body experience. . . No parts of this was suppose to be your life or even our life, too. I cry for all the steps you will never take again. That last Sunday night together we watched our last romcom. I’ll never forget it. Sweet Home Alabama… Then you drifted off to sleep. I was so numb for all the parts of that last week with you. Truly I was still numb from the beginning of your diagnosis. My body really had no unthawing whatsoever. Trying to be present and oh so ever aware this was our last everything. It still feels like an out of body experience. I in myself, am both the same person, and yet a new being altogether. It is a grief within itself to recognize that my own beating heart will never be the same again. We are never the same on the other side of loss. Three years ago, so many rallied around you as we were saying our last goodbye. The fact that watching you slowly fade away didn’t altogether kill me, is a miracle. At times it felt like my heart would stop before yours on that day. Three years have passed and life is completely changed. I’m still wandering around heartbroken, confused and trying to unthaw. Being disappointed in parts of your story Angela, doesn’t mean I am ungrateful, it just means I am human. It’s a real struggle to keep walking out this life without you. But I do. I keep stepping forward, I keep showing up and I do it second by second, minute by minute. I walk it out for dad, for your brother, for your new sister in law, for your husband, for a bonus daughter in law, for your PawPaw, for Buoy and a many dogs that I have fallen in love with. I walk it out for myself, too. But most importantly, when you’re a mom it means you must keep showing up no matter how hard life has broken you. Your brother is on this side of heaven. So I must keep moving forward for him. Our time here on earth is finite. He deserves the best parts of me too! So I dig deep to give him my best, because I am the only one who can give him a happy mom. No one else can do that for him, but me. Grief is a crazy animal. It never goes away. But it softens. It doesn’t always mean losing a person either. Sometimes it’s the loss of hope. Not going to lie, hope hurts. Grief is a valid feeling that needs to be slow & felt. I’m realizing that acceptance is the final step on my journey. It is the place I must eventually land. But the heart doesn’t want to land there yet. Don’t know that it ever will, sweetie. Between now and this moment 3 years ago, I have walked out every emotion you could imagine. Disbelief, sadness, anger, confusion, envy, it’s a ride at times I want to get off of. Your life cut to short , our dream of what could have been is now no more. The wisdom I carry, is to allow myself to process and feel all the emotions because it’s necessary. It’s part of my healing. This is my forever now so I give myself grace when needed. I don’t think I’ll ever rush to the acceptance part even though that’s probably where peace is waiting. I’ve learned that when the weight of it all is pressing in, it helps to make myself small and step outside and walk. I sit in the sun. I surround myself with the love from many dogs, and I’m always looking for that feather. I like to feel the wind, the rain, the cold, and the warmth. The outside reminds me that I am part of something that is much larger in this place we call universe. We can no more control the outcome of our lives than we can control the tides. Learning to control what I have control over and accepting the truth, which is I really miss you. Then I release my emotions, which brings me to a place of peace. I’m realizing that grief just follows me. Suffering, just survive it. Don’t try to figure it out or understand it. Don’t ask it questions. Just keep moving forward. Power through it. Those baby steps you taught me are coming in handy. Grief has become an exercise of endurance like nothing else in my life.How deeply can I miss you without it being completely consumed with longing for you. How much ache can my heart sustain without closing itself off and becoming bitter. How much courage is required to reinvent a life worth living in the absence of you. I’m learning grievers keep secrets. We don’t tell you about the sick feeling of envy we feel as life goes on for others, as birthdays, holidays, special occasions, etc. are celebrated. I’ve never carried envy in my heart before. So this feels so hard to wear for me. We don’t tell you about the dull celebratory mood we carry often, that we try to hide from those around us. I’m still trying to figure out all these emotions and how to wear them gracefully. They are confusing for a person that loves to look at life in a positive light. I walked around looking for the positive & good being keenly aware of it, in the simplest of form, before you left. It’s a struggle, but I’m fighting to see again. Whereas before it was like a second skin for me. It’s a weird place to be. I never took any parts of this life for granted, or to what had been placed in my heart & hands to hold and care for. Dad & I have become old tethered souls these days, securing ourselves for eternity, because we both know what it means to have loved fully and lost suddenly…Because we both are trying to survive the unthinkable. Our love looks different than it did before. It’s raw it’s vulnerable it’s humble it’s selfless, it’s messy and it’s beautifully broken. But when our eyes meet it’s a subtleness that says I see you and I feel you and I miss her too. We are breaking together & rising together, loving, losing and relearning how to live. Who would have thought in our 60’s we would have to relearn how to live, and yes when you have child loss you do have to figure that out too. Angela, you taught me that mundane only feels mundane when we forget it isn’t guaranteed. These days I look for my purpose in the here and now, in the mundane, and that is where I find my peace, in those very simple spaces. I cherish mundane after what we’ve been through. As I walk out life here on earth I’m ever so aware of the miracle of being here with good health after having a front row seat to your blood cancer battle. As I navigate this path I will always remember the light you brought into my life. Your laughter, your heart, your love and your FIRE. I miss your FIRE. I’m still missing it everyday. I was given 30 years with you. Not long enough. Precious memories carry my journey forward, it’s my reminder of the bond between you & I. Loving you was and still is a privilege. If God himself had come to me when I was young and said, you’re going to marry a great Italian man one day. You’re going to have a wonderful amazing life with him. Some parts of this life will be easy and beautiful and then there will moments of hardships, too. Then you both will walk out the longest & hardest road you have ever endured. I’m going to give you children. Your 1st will be a girl . Her name will be Angela Francesca. She is going to bring you much love, laughter, fun and joy. She’s going to love her dad fiercely and be your best friend. She’s going to play sports, and have a passion for softball. She’s going to have gut wrenching laughter, a beautiful smile and heart. She will get to be a big sister, a cousin, a niece, a granddaughter, a student, a teammate, a co-worker, a wife, a daughter in law, a sister in law and a friend to many. She will also be a blood cancer warrior and a bone marrow transplant recipient. She will go on through her life being an amazing extraordinary human and leave a beautiful legacy. She will have some fire about her, and be very headstrong and independent. Just allow it. Because she will need it later on in her life. She will excel at everything she does. But remember when I told you she was going to be a blood cancer warrior? Well she’s going to become very sick and she will fight because she has fire. She will relapse again and need more fire and a Holy Person to give her some extra time to spend with you here on earth. There will be lots of suffering to watch your child endure. It’s going to be a long road with many ups and downs. A lot of unknowns. She will receive many miracles and healing. She will touch many lives with her story. Then her body will literally break and grow tired of the fight. Then I’m going to need her back. Do you want to sign up for this? No one wants to sign up to see a child suffer. My selfish human heart says YES! Bring it on…all of it. All the good, all the hard all the suffering and all the sad. I’d sign up in a heart beat. I consider myself lucky to have only gotten 30 years than no time with you at all. I’ll never understand why only 30. I’m greedy. Why couldn’t you live to be old, a full lifetime. The hardest lesson life has taught me is your absence…memories come to life and roll down my cheeks. In your absence I’ve learned the true meaning of resilience because I’ve had no choice. Grief is proceeding on its own terms these days. I need your presence. But I know it’s never coming, so I’ll keep moving forward learning to live with the love you left behind. Love Momma🧡
And now I’m glad I didn’t know,The way it all would endThe way it all would goOur lives are better left to chanceI could have missed the painBut I’d have had to miss the dance.”~Garth Brooks, The Dance