It's been almost seven months since Andrew and Benjamin, and I don't say much about it these days because I feel like a crazy lady going on and on about something I cannot change.

Oh, how I still wish I could change this. Every single day.

There are good days and there are bad days, and more and more, I find myself surprised when grief's waves hit the shore because, from the outside looking in, we are back to normal. We work and play and serve and laugh. We live. But grief's waves still pound away, taking me by surprise with the intensity and pain of it all. There are no words for the heartbreak and pain of it all.

Disclaimer: It's not you, it's me. If you have a penchant for indignation, please stop reading now.

Since we lost the boys, 22 of my friends, family and neighbors have had babies. Four of them have had twins, and 10 more are currently expecting. I am not exaggerating when I say that I have never in my life been more surrounded by pregnancy and babies and, yes, twins. It's everywhere. Except here.

(And again, I remind you that this is all about me. I am truly happy for all you baby-making ladies and your growing families.)

Lately, I've noticed a building bitterness that I am fighting to hold back. From the outside looking in, things are working out for everyone else but me. (Of course, from the outside looking in, I am back to normal.) So while friends are quick to justify my feelings of anger at a life I never thought would be mine, I just can't sit by and watch the rest of the good fall away in the landslide that is losing two beautiful little boys. And in the quiet sleepless hours spent trying to figure out how to stave off this ruined life, I keep coming back to this: I didn't get a choice when I lost my little boys, but I do get a say in how the fallout impacts the rest of my life. I think? I hope.

And so. And so...

I am doing my best to take stock in the good. To not only count my blessings, but to enjoy them. To live in them and with them and to be grateful for them even though I am shocked and mad and heartbroken about the two little blessings that I still wish were mine.

When Nora was born, I had an amazing nurse who, while trying to get me through a drug-free delivery, scrawled a note on a paper towel, taped it to the side of a tissue box, and placed it on the table in front of me. It read,

"You can do hard things."

Ever since, every time I have been face-to-face with the harder stuff of life, I have thought of that note on a paper towel and tried to weather the storm. I can do hard things.

Unfortunately, every time I overcome something hard, it seems something more challenging still lies in its wake... You will be sick and exhausted and terrified throughout the better portion of your high risk twin pregnancy. All the while, your husband will be out of town for work, but you will make it through the temporary single motherhood with daydreams of a life with four little people—a beautifully instant family of six. You will then lose the boys who had filled all those daydreams. Not only will you lose two (TWO!) babies, but you will then struggle to get pregnant again while, literally, surrounded by the glow of pregnancy and new motherhood. You will come face-to-face on a daily basis with the one thing that will turn you green with envy, and you will retain the presence of mind amid your grief to feel guilty for the bitterness that creeps in when you stare through the window at a life you will daily wish was yours.

Sounds fun, right? But here's the thing: there is good too, and it's not always hard. And I will not sit by and wish the good stuff away while I bemoan the bad.

And so....

I am determined to end the last few months of what will likely go down as the worst year of my life with more hope and gratitude than I have yet allowed myself to find. Because I have a good marriage and two beautiful kids (four, actually) and amazing friends and a loving family and a strong body and a fun job and talent and passion and the presence of mind to know that those things count too.

And because a successful goal comes with concrete objectives, I am breaking the remaining months of now until October 12 into days. I will daily find gratitude in this life that I all too often of late wish was not mine. And because a successful goal also has some level of accountability, I will do my best to share bits of those blessings with all of you. So please hold me to it. That said, I am not a robot, and I have no doubt that there will be bad too, so please hold tight when the waves hit shore, and I will try to remember to as well. Consider this my 159-day testimony of trial. It wont always come easy, of that I am sure. But there is goodness and beauty in this almost ruined life. And I want to do my best to give that as much weight as the heartbreak.


So here goes, day one of the remaining half of the worst year of my life...

I am grateful that I can do hard things. I certainly don't like it, but at least I know I can do it.

The Big(ger) Kid Party

I know it has only been a year since his last birthday, but it seems Porter has grown three years older in the past 365 days.
He's just so big and boyish, and not at all the little guy who could barely keep up with the overzealous obstacle races I had unwittingly planned for his five-year-old birthday bash just one short year ago.

Now...

Then...

He's growing up. He's six. He can read and loves to be quizzed on math problems at the dinner table but refuses to talk about anything beyond recess if you overtly ask about the school day. He makes up his own jokes that, more often than not, actually make sense, and he takes great pride when he can sneakily work a bathroom word into the princess songs his little sister is constantly singing. He wants to take the training wheels off his bike and likes to challenge me to races, smiling from ear to ear as he lengthens his stride and strains to keep pace.  He's tall and witty and smart and strong, and every now and then I catch glimpses of the big kid he will too soon become.

I have to keep reminding myself that he is only six because I can't believe that somehow he is already six.

There's a whole lot you don't know about what kind of parent you will be until you're in it and you look at the things you are doing and can see the kind of parent you have become. Birthdays are one of those times for me. Ever since I attempted a two-tiered fondant-covered fish cake and went to six different grocery store chains to track down every fish-shaped and orange and blue snack ever made for Porter's first birthday party, I have, year after year, found myself muttering in exhaustion that maybe we did too much and that next year will be smaller. But as birthdays approach and I start to get all weepy that my kids are growing up too fast, I can't help but throw myself into party mode. The time feels fleeting, and I want to make the most of this little kid magic while it's still here for the taking.

 

So even though the  lunch conversation between my boy and his pals had a whole lot more bathroom humor than in years past (i.e. a few of the boys may have joked about dinosaur poop in the the jungle slime jello), it was every bit the magic we were after, with fossils and volcanoes and pith hats that were deemed so cool that my boy was still wearing his at bedtime—huge sigh of relief: He is only six.

The party...

Design a Dino (because no one really knows what dinosaurs looked like)

 

Catch a Paleontologist

Extinction Tug of War (the red blanket was hot lava)

They thought it would be fun to see if, together, they could defeat a T-Rex.
 

 

Have I ever mentioned how grateful I am that my husband is so good with kids? I am.

After a picnic lunch of dinosaur-shaped sandwiches, dinosaur bones (cheetos), dino eggs (watermelon balls & grapes), lava juice and the aforementioned jungle slime, our young paleontologists set off for field work with a sandbox excavation. And though I prepped them with instructions about how gentle paleontologists have to be as they carefully brush away the sand, the dino dig looked like Black Friday from the moment we said go—a mad dash of flying dirt and plastic shovels and broken salt dough fossils.

 

 

The Cake (very fitting for our volcano-obsessed son who brings home at least two drawings of volcanoes in his backpack each week)

And my very favorite part of the whole party—never changes, year after year—laughing as the birthday boy is mauled by friends who are just so excited to give him their present first—they just can't seem to get close enough to the present opening action as the circle quickly folds in to a mass of heads and "open mine next!"

See, magic.

Six

My little man is six years old. And while he seems to be marking the occasion with a whole lot more sass than I am used to from my generally much more compliant one, he still wins me over every night when he begs me to sing him the same bedtime song I have been singing since his first night home from the hospital in our tiny brown apartment in Toledo, Ohio.

I could go on for days about everything in this little man's heart that makes me smile.

But for now, I just cannot believe that he is six years old.

P.S. The giant smile above (and the pith hat, which may seem odd out of context) is from his six-year-old birthday party. More on that to come soon.