My very best

December 23, 2009

I'll admit it. Yesterday I indulged in a bit of "poor me" behavior on my way home from work. It started off innocently enough. I planned on stopping at Target to pick up a couple of last minute stocking stuffers for Jeremy (okay, Django too). As I pulled into the turn lane to enter the Target shopping area I gasped quietly to myself. I could be Christmas shopping for Harper this year. Hmmm . . . What would it be like? What toys would I be drawn to for her? What toys are there for 16 month old little girls? I decided I would peruse the toy section to see what I was missing out on. I know, I know. That really is just making things worse for myself isn't it? I know. I didn't actually make it to the toy section though. The children's clothing was as far as I got. It really was purposeful torture. I don't know why I did it. I don't know what sick need I was fulfilling in myself, but I browsed through the little girl Christmas dresses (what was left of them anyway). I chuckled to myself thinking about the fact that Harper would not have been in clothes typical for a 16 month old. No. She was a Cashman baby. She looked like a Cashman baby. Cashman babies are big babies. I'm sure she would have been wearing bigger-sized clothes. I was taken aback at how little girl and not baby the dresses were for her age. I reached out and touched one of the cotton PJ's that had the little footsies. It actually physically hurt me to touch them. I could see little arms and feet and a protruding toddler tummy fitting into them. I turned away quickly. That was it. That was all I could handle. Honestly though? As torturous as it sounds, it also was very reassuring to me. My daughter was not just a figment of my imagination. She was a real baby that I birthed. She was and is a part of our family. A part that I'm missing something awful this Christmas.

Last Christmas I had just gotten home from the hospital on the 22nd after my third surgery. My focus and energy was on my physical health and making it day to day. I cried for Harper on Christmas Day, but I had not yet really begun to grieve her. This year, the loss is everywhere. I cry every day on my way to work and most days on my way home. She's missing from everything. I am not sending out Christmas cards or photos or letters talking about all Harper did this year. I'm not facing the crowds at the stores to shop for her gifts. I'm not dolling her up for Christmas parties. I'm not staying up till after she's gone to bed to wrap presents and hide them in our closet till Christmas morning. We're not decorating Christmas cookies together. I'm not reading her Christmas stories or watching Christmas movies with her. We're not singing Jingle Bells together or Away in a Manger (with all the choreography). Her absence is everywhere for me. And the deeper we get into the holiday season the more I want to close my door and lock myself away from it all. It hurts and I'm sad. There's just no other way to put it.

So dear friends, please forgive me if you don't get cards or if I don't enter into the Christmas festivities this year. I'm doing my very best. I'm trying . . .