Reflections
I don't do this often, write about Mazzy, because I don't want to be that person so stuck on that Thing That Happened that I don't appear to have moved on, healed, found closure, all of that. It doesn't mean that I've no thought or feelings about the daughter I lost, especially so close to her birthday. And thus, this post.
So much about that time is fuzzy, now. Memories are more like a series of stories I told enough that I know they happened, allowing me to picture it in my head. Losing that sharpness, that intensity of feeling and experience, is one of the hardest parts of the time necessary to abate the waves of grief. To function, to grow, to love the life you're currently living, you have to let that other stuff go. It's impossible to hold a period of time in stasis and still be a real person. Especially when you've a child you're bringing up and you don't want her to feel less, or inferior.
For better or worse, Mazzy has a presence in our life, in our family. We've kept pictures out and we talk about her. Not all the time, but like you would a friend or family member that lives far away, but you still love them. "Remember that time...."
Tomorrow she would have been six. I do the math and I'm still stunned. Is that right? She would be starting school? No. She was barely walking. I can't picture myself having to structure around school. It's a fairy tale.
Nora thinks all pictures of baby girls are Baby Mazzy. One day I'll have to better explain the connection, because Nora asks, but for now I give her the truth, but I don't embellish. "Mazzy was a baby and now she's gone." I don't use the word sister, not yet, because I think that would be confusing for her. Especially when starts asking for a sibling and I can't have any more.
This is another one of those Parenting in a Vacuum things because I won't know if I'm doing the right thing, saying the right thing, until Nora is older. I'll gladly pay the therapy, if it comes to that. I hope that I make Nora feel important and special, that we love her and are happy she's in our life.
I'm going to wake up tomorrow, like any other day, and help Nora with Potty Time, play racing cars, maybe craft something, but I know my attention will be distracted, trying to layer two lives into this one. There will be a moment, Nora's head down while she concentrates on something vitally Toddler Important, and I'll squint, creating a water color image of the six year old girl that could never be standing behind her, wanting to hold on to that make believe sight. My girls. In the same place at the same time. Even if I have to make it up in my mind.
So much about that time is fuzzy, now. Memories are more like a series of stories I told enough that I know they happened, allowing me to picture it in my head. Losing that sharpness, that intensity of feeling and experience, is one of the hardest parts of the time necessary to abate the waves of grief. To function, to grow, to love the life you're currently living, you have to let that other stuff go. It's impossible to hold a period of time in stasis and still be a real person. Especially when you've a child you're bringing up and you don't want her to feel less, or inferior.
For better or worse, Mazzy has a presence in our life, in our family. We've kept pictures out and we talk about her. Not all the time, but like you would a friend or family member that lives far away, but you still love them. "Remember that time...."
Tomorrow she would have been six. I do the math and I'm still stunned. Is that right? She would be starting school? No. She was barely walking. I can't picture myself having to structure around school. It's a fairy tale.
Nora thinks all pictures of baby girls are Baby Mazzy. One day I'll have to better explain the connection, because Nora asks, but for now I give her the truth, but I don't embellish. "Mazzy was a baby and now she's gone." I don't use the word sister, not yet, because I think that would be confusing for her. Especially when starts asking for a sibling and I can't have any more.
This is another one of those Parenting in a Vacuum things because I won't know if I'm doing the right thing, saying the right thing, until Nora is older. I'll gladly pay the therapy, if it comes to that. I hope that I make Nora feel important and special, that we love her and are happy she's in our life.
I'm going to wake up tomorrow, like any other day, and help Nora with Potty Time, play racing cars, maybe craft something, but I know my attention will be distracted, trying to layer two lives into this one. There will be a moment, Nora's head down while she concentrates on something vitally Toddler Important, and I'll squint, creating a water color image of the six year old girl that could never be standing behind her, wanting to hold on to that make believe sight. My girls. In the same place at the same time. Even if I have to make it up in my mind.
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