Another birthday

Our little angel, Lincoln, would have turned 6 years old today.  Hard to believe since I only last knew him as a 2 year old.  What would he be like as a 6 year old?  What would he be doing?  What would we have bought him for his birthday?  His birthday each year is hard.  Especially since it comes just 9 days after the anniversary of his death.  I feel knocked down by grief and then just as we start to put ourselves back together and carry on, we get punched in the gut once again.  It's rough.  I kind of wish I could crawl into a hole and stay there all of March.  But thank goodness we have 3 other sweet children we must live on for.

Jezebel didn't want to come with us to the cemetery this year, which is ok!  Just add it to the list of things we continue to have to navigate through as parents who have lost a child.  We all grieve differently and have different ideas and ways to help us cope.  And as such, we have to respect the way that each family member chooses to do this.  There isn't a right or wrong way, just different.  Jezelle was worried that we would be mad if she didn't come with us.  It took a lot of convincing before she realized that it was absolutely ok that she was choosing not to come.  We try hard to respect the ways in which she chooses to remember him, celebrate him and to grieve as well.  She continues to hurt a lot.  And often.  More so then I ever would have imagined.

Each year we buy an ice cream cake to celebrate Lincoln.  He loved ice cream.  We light the candles and sing happy birthday but it's such a strange day; walking through the motions, doing what we decided we would do as a tradition, to help celebrate the day he was born.  But it just hurts so much that he is not here. Happy birthday sweet boy. We love you to the moon and back.

4 years later.

I can't believe I haven't posted in over a year and half.  I think of writing on here all the time, as things come up daily, and we continue to struggle through living life without our Lincoln with us. And then I just don't.  It's strange how I feel like it almost gets harder to write on here, instead of easier.  I cry just thinking about writing down my feelings and so I avoid it.  And then regret it.

How is it possible that I didn't even write last year on the anniversary of Lincoln's death, or at least on his birthday?!  I don't have an answer.  But perhaps it's because I worry I will run out of pictures of him, to post on here with each entry, or because I wonder what is really being accomplished by writing down my thoughts and experiences, other than sadness.  Mostly it's probably because I am so busy with twins, who seem to consume our lives, though we absolutely adore them.  Here is a picture of the twins visiting Lincoln's grave for the first time last March 10th, 2015.

So anyway, here we are.  4 years after our son died.  He would be turning 6 next week.  Six years old. The thought of that makes me cry too, because I don't know what he would be like as a six year old, I only know him as a two year old.  And that makes it seem like it was an eternity ago.

Really as the time goes on it never gets less sad, and I never feel less pain.  I just get use to having it with me.  I actually kind of wanted to crawl into a hole this year, and return to real life after his birthday next week.  But I have a nine year old daughter, who continues to struggle and who continues to grieve as well, and so I can't just ignore it, though sometimes that seems it would be much easier.  And yet at the same time I DO want to honor him and celebrate him and what an incredible little human being he was.

With each passing milestone there are new hurts and new pains.  Perhaps maybe that's why it never seems to get easier.  This coming May our twins will turn two.  That's how long we got to live with Lincoln in our lives.  And when I look at the twins and what a huge part of our family they have become, it makes it hard for me to breathe, knowing that after such a short, yet significant time in our family, we no longer have him with us.  And that hurts a lot too.

Today Shane took the day off from work and we just got through our day.  We took life at a slower pace and didn't do much...well, we took our day as slow as our super busy twins would allow us to.  We took Jezelle to a movie this afternoon and did something fun as a family, on a not so fun day.  And really, we don't miss him today more than any other day.  But it's a tough day to remember and think about as each hour ticks by.

We are blessed with amazing friends and family who never forget Lincoln and always loved him no matter what.