Adeline has been leaving me dimes in different places. At first I did not realize that they were from her, but the third time I knew that it was my sweet girl. There are no coincidences like that. Every single day I have been having a really bad day and just struggling to get through. Every single time the dime was somewhere that I had recently looked and it was not there. Then all of a sudden it was there and it was tails up each time. My Sweet Adeline getting those dimes made me feel so close to you.
Two years ago we were celebrating your birthday late with your friends. This was one of the best birthday parties and you got to do mommy's make up with a blindfold on. It was so much fun. You laughed and giggled, played with your friends, created unicorn dream catchers, and we celebrated you! You are the most amazing little girl that I have ever known my Sweet Adeline and I would give anything to go back to any moment that we shard whether it be something big like a birthday party or vacation or something small like you sitting next to me with your little pink headphones on while I worked or studied. You were always beside me and you were always there...like an extension of my own body and I miss you so much. I miss you with a longing and a desire that I have never known and hope to never know again.
There are some things about the grief of losing a child that you can never know until you experience them. There are moments that you awaken from a dead sleep, startled and hoping that you are waking up from a nightmare...unfortunately you awaken to your nightmare instead. The longing that is present constantly in your soul is just so painful, if you allow it to, it would be the only thing that you can think about and it would debilitate you.
You just want to scream and wail in pain because the pain is so bad. You want to hurt someone else to make someone feel the same pain that you do. You want to feel physical pain because that at least takes your mind temporarily off of the emotional turmoil and pain that feels as though it never stops. There is the constant struggle to just breathe. Your pain is so intense that you literally feel as though you cannot breathe, that you have to make yourself take a breath over and over again and will yourself to do something that once came so natural.
For me there is also the intense fear that something bad will happen to one of the kids or something bad will happen to Shane. There is a constant fear that something else will go wrong and at a point where the grief is too much to bear, the thought of something bad happening is a thought that is literally too much to comprehend, too much to bear.
Some days I wake up so sad and sobbing because I just miss my little girl so much. I miss the simple moments, like holding her hand, hearing her singing along to a song on a car ride, running into the grocery store with me and asking for candy, or just the laughter. As I sit here unable to sleep this morning, I am sobbing. I am sobbing for so many reasons. I am sad that my baby girl only got to spend nine years of life on earth. I am sad that God chose her to fulfill a greater purpose, a purpose that I truly do not understand.
There are only three things that get me through each and every day. There is the promise of an eternity with her through God. I was not a religious person at all before I lost Adeline. I had been raised in church, but had questioned so many of my beliefs for a very long time and wondered how God could let such bad things happen in the world. Since losing Adeline I have the strongest faith that I have ever had. (I am so sorry baby girl that it took losing you to have that faith. I should have been better and I wish that I had been better. I hope and pray that God did not take your life to teach me faith.) I have to have this faith because it is the only promise that I can see her again, the only promise that she will one day be in my arms and I can hold onto her and never let her go. Baby girl, I will be so happy when the times comes and I get to go to the castle that you are preparing for me. I no longer fear dying. I know it is in death that I will be given a great gift, so when my time comes (which I hope for the other kids and Shane is a long time from now, sorry Adeline I know that you are waiting for mommy but I know that I am needed here longer and that God won't take me until some things here on earth are finished up).
The second thing that gets me through the very long days is the fact that I know that Adeline always wanted me to be my best. She was my only child to express that she was proud of me for things, for returning to school and trying to get a better career to better take care of them, for writing and being published (she told me one time that she knew that I would write a great book one day and I am determined to do so in honor of her), and for the mom that I was. I am trying hard to be that mom again for Huxley, Althea, and Andrew. I am trying my hardest to really focus on the kids and to be a mom that Adeline would be proud of. I am trying to be happy and to create happy memories for them because I do not want their lives and memories of me to be completely focussed on when Adeline was alive and after Adeline had passed the rainbow bridge. Baby girl, mommy needs you to give me strength through your presence...when I feel you I know that I can do these things, I know that I can be my best me.
The third thing that gets me through the day are my memories of my Sweet Adeline. The fact that I am able to think back to all of those beautiful and cherished moments that we spent together. Her laughter and giggles as we were wading through the ocean after the hurricane and picking up hundreds of connected shells. The giggle when we got live shells and saw the sea creatures inside. That little scream that she had when her feet were forced to wade through the seaweed to get out into the waves. Every single time that she crawled into bed with us much to her dad's annoyance (LOL! he didn't like not having much bed room) and I reminded him that she would only be little once. I had so much more patience and was so much more open to love after Adeline was born. She changed me in ways that I never understood. She made me the best that I could be. She made me a better me and she continues to do this with her memories.
As I sit here, at moments having to stop writing because I am sobbing so hard and my entire body is shaking, I am flooded by the love that I have for my precious angel...the love that is the only thing that can carry me through....the love that I know that I will express when one day we can be together again. No parent should ever have to go through the pain of losing a child...ever, but to lose my sweet angel at just nine years old is a devastating loss that I will never be able to understand.