This post is not going to be as well organized as most of my others. This is a raw post where I am sharing my feelings, talking about the things that are happening in our lives right now, and sharing in how this all fits with the immense grief that I am feeling.
I am angry. I remember hearing once that if everything that you had not thanked God for or been grateful for were taken, what would you have left. From that moment on, I thanked God and was grateful for each of the kiddos and every single moment that I spent with them. I am sharing screen shots of Facebook posts from today years ago...because they show this. They show how enamored I was with Adeline and how thankful I was to be blessed with her presence each and every day.
I have realized that the moment that I lost Adeline that I wanted the world to stop. Instead the world has kept right on moving by. We have finally found a house and will take possession on June 1st. We will be having some work done, so moving will not happen for a while after that. It feels good to have found a home where Adeline had been inside. It is nice to know that I will still be living some place that she has been. This brings the tiniest bit of comfort in these very dark times.
Today marks 150 days without my girl. 150 days since I received that last kiss and hug. 150 days since I last heard her tell me that she loved me. (If I close my eyes, I can still transform myself back into time to those last few moments with her...I hope that I never lose the ability to do this.)
The house comes down in 8 days. It is a bittersweet feeling. Of course, it is nice to know that the house will be taken care one, that we will not have to worry about things any longer...but it is also horrific to think about the place where Adeline lived her entire life being gone. I miss her so much. I miss living in that house (which I thought that I hated at the time) because it was a life with her.
I am just a big ball of emotions lately. So much has been happening and yet there is a part of me that still longs for it all to stop, for the rewind button to be hit on life, and for us to be with our four children just living life. I would give anything to be able to have a do-over with the fire, with what I know now and to have gotten her out of that house and to safety.
Andrew graduated from Canton High School this past Friday night. It was a moment where I felt so much emotion. I am so proud of him for overcoming a really bad senior year. Between COVID, losing your home, and losing your closest sibling, I don't know how you go on. However, Andrew didn't just go on, he thrived. He managed to raise his GPA so that he went from being 12th in his class to graduating among the top 10! He also managed to score enough scholarships to attend the University of Illinois.
At his party, I was able to keep it all together...but I cried before the party thinking about how Adeline should be here with us. I cried during graduation because Adeline told me for quite some time that she was so excited to yell something to embarrass him when he crossed that stage. As I sat there watching him cross the stage and no one yelled, I was heartbroken. I guess I half expected to have woken up from this nightmare and for the world to be right with our little girl beside us.
I saw a video where Billy Bob Thornton was offering a Master Class for Oprah. He was talking about the death of his brother and about grief. He talked about how he would never be the same and that he could never be fully happy again. He said that he was "50% happy and 50% sad at any given moment." What resonated the loudest with me is when he said that this was okay. I have been struggling with my feelings because I am not okay. I have wanted for Adeline to be here. I have wanted to hold here to have her hand in mine, to have the life that I loved so much back. I have wanted nothing more than to ease the longing in my soul for my girl since passed. The feelings that were expressed in this video were more in line with my own feelings than anything that I have heard. I guess I just didn't know how to put such big feelings into words.
As life goes on and the kids each have different things, I am sure that there will be many more moments like this. Today, for instance, was the last day of school and I forgot to take pictures of Althea and Huxley. I have to get a picture of them tonight. I feel bad because these were the types of things that I was so good about before the fire, but it seems that since the fire...I have no way to be good about them again.
I am trying to do what I need to do to be able to finish my MA as planned in September, to have that December graduation date, and to be able to be successful in finding the type of job that I returned to school to be qualified for. I want to be able to teach so bad. I am also in training to be a yoga instructor. I am working my way through the first book and am learning so much. I need to be better and more dedicated to my own practice and to my own practice of meditation. I am going to be focussing on how I can have this daily time in the very near future.
Most of all though, I really do just miss our girl. I miss her so much. I want her here. I want her so bad. This is the worst possible thing that I can think of happening and I feel so broken and so depleted on the inside.
I went back into the house for what I assume will be the last time today. I got a few trash bags of things and am prepared to clean and hopefully be able to restore all of these. I am so thankful for each item that I have been able to bring out of the house that was hers. I am so thankful that I have been able to rescue and save so many of her things. I cherish these small items so much, knowing that these are the last things that I will have that are hers, that she touched, and that she wore or used.
I ask myself one question daily...why? Why did this have to happen? Why does my girl have to be gone? Why, oh why? I am devastated as I try to think of things that are going on and I really want for us all to have a nice life and for my girl to grow up. I will never understand why this is not the case or why this is not what happened. I will never understand why I had to be without my girl and why my girl did not get to have the long life that I had always envisioned for her.