month 4

Ryder-

There are so many ways that I prayed for you to be just like your sister, but ear infections isn't one of them. Just like Q, you ended your first cold with an ear infection. You have had a double ear infection for the entire month of January. On top of that, you had pink eye and mild case of RSV. You have been one sad, sick little boy.

There isn't much this past month besides sickness to talk about. You haven't been sleeping well, you haven't been eating well. I feel so bad for you. (I kind of feel bad for me too. Sick baby not sleeping = sick mommy not sleeping) Overall you have been pretty pleasant, but you have definitely been more grumpy and whiny than usual. I am ready for you to feel better and be happy again. I feel like I was just starting to get to know you. A lot of people are saying that you are starting to look more like Q. I see it too. And as you are getting more active, some of your mannerisms remind me of her. It's hard, but I love it.

Even though you have been sick and not eating as well you have continued to grow like crazy. At your four month appointment you weighed 14lbs 13oz and were 25.5in. You are in the 31st% for weight and 59th% for height. Your head is HUGE. It is in the 99th%. Big head, big eyes. You are just a big big baby boy. You are already filling out the 3-6 months clothes. The doctor said you can tell the size of the puppy by his paws, right after he told me how big your feet are. I just can't imagine us having a big kid, I tend to think it will all even out somewhere, but we'll see. Maybe we will get to watch you play football instead of wrestle.

You have started to roll around a little and aren't quite as immobile. You are very aware of everything around you and are always craning your neck to see what's going on. You keep your eye on me a lot. If someone else is holding you, you are almost always staring at me. One day you will protect me. When I hold you up on my shoulder you play with my hair. Quincy did the same thing. I love it more than anything. You drool like crazy and almost always have your hands in your mouth. You have also started to grab blankets, toys, clothes, anything you can grab, and that all goes in your mouth as well. I'm starting to wonder if you are getting teeth. I hope so. I love the toothy grin.

You are continuing to be our joy Ryder. You give us reason to get up in the morning. You give us new meaning in our broken world. You are consistently winning our love and affection and we are growing more and more in love with you. You are our world little boy. 

Love you lots.

reflections

It's been eight months. Eight long months since we lost Quincy. Eight months of a new life. Eight months of sorrow. Eight months of change. Eight months of growth.

As I reflect on the past eight months, it's so hard for me to grasp that the world around me has continued to move forward so easily. Each day continues just as it did before. I felt like when Q died the world around me should have stopped just like my world did. But it didn't. Everyone keeps working and playing and going about their daily things as if nothing has happened. Sometimes it makes me angry. How can this world continue without these three people in it? It just doesn't seem possible.

The day that marked eight months I was sitting in the ER with Ryder getting breathing treatments for RSV. It didn't hit me that it was the 6th until I was standing a few feet away from the very spot I stood that awful day, in that Emergency Room hall, where I called my dad, giving him the devastating news of the accident. My body was weak, my mind was spinning. I was in shock. And just a few feet away was my darling baby girl being prepped for life flight and my dear mother-in-laws lifeless body. I was checking in for Ryder as I stared at that spot for quite a while and relived those minutes. It seemed like just yesterday. The shock and fear came to me so easily. Way too easily. I hate Emergency Rooms.

I have thought so much about how our life has changed. My thoughts and emotions are a roller coaster and I think if anyone could see inside my head they would think I was a crazy person. I am continuously going from being ok to not being ok. I am constantly shifting between feeling bad for myself to feeling kind of special, from being totally devastated to being happy and joyful and feeling overly blessed. I am all over the place, all the time. I'm a mess.

We often refer to our life as before Q died and after. I hate that there is a before and after. Things have changed so much since she left this earth. It really seems like a different lifetime that she was here and we lived in that happy little Center Street house with out daughter. We now live in Brady's parents peaceful home with our son. It's so very different. Everything is different.

I used to live by the motto, It's only as big a deal as you make it. I have never liked holding grudges or making big deals of things. I have tried to live carefree and let things go in one ear and out the other and not let situations that are out of my control irritate me. I have worked really hard on this especially since I have been married. I have not been living this so well the last eight months and it's really bothered me. Losing Q is a big deal. It doesn't matter what I do or tell myself, it's a big deal. I feel empty and discontent. I never feel completely at ease. I don't like it.

I am constantly looking for anything to make me feel better about my new life, the life I call "after". There is nothing I can do to change the way things are and when I look at my life, minus that fact that Q is not here anymore, I am so incredibly blessed. I have wonderful supportive family and friends, a wonderful job, a wonderful husband and a beautiful baby boy. I am so blessed. I have never had to try so hard to convince myself of this. One of the things that has helped me most is to read the words of other mothers who have lost a child. As I read these words, I am strengthened so much. There are so many strong women out there that are teaching me how to find peace and joy in the rest of my journey. Yesterday I read from a mothers Facebook page something that has been replaying in my mind all day. I love it.

She said:

"The thought that has sustained me through the loss of my precious Carson is this;

'If God our Father in Heaven had come and visited me personally and told me that He could keep Carson safe for me,

He could guarantee Carson Celestial Glory, He would promise me that Carson would  never feel the pull of the adversary. If He promised me that Carson would be happy and well;

would I, his loving mother let him go until the time He sees fit to bring us back together?'

Every single time I ask myself this question, my answer is, "Yes, Father you may take my son.'

How could I wish to deny Carson the perfection that he has been granted?

I like to think that my Heavenly Father gave me this choice before we came to live on this earth

and I willingly accepted. This gives me hope and the strength to survive this trial. I do believe there is a plan.

I like to think that if any mother was given this choice, she would choose for her child to be saved. As a parent, the thing we want most is for our children to be happy and successful. This world is evil and I dread the thought of having to watch my children deal with temptations and trials. This is when I tell myself that I am lucky. My doll is safe. She will never be tempted. I will never have to see her struggle or fail.

I don't want to say that I am thankful for this trial, because I am not. It is hard. My life has changed in ways I never wished or imagined. I look back at who I was eight months ago and I am so very different. I will never be the same. I hate that I now know the true meaning of pain. I hate that I am so terribly afraid of death. I hate that I never feel complete. I hate that I can read a story about a child dying and relate. I hate that I talk about my sweet Quincy in the past, that she is just a memory. I hate that I am so emotional all the time and that I am constantly living in a daydream of what it "should" be like. But even though there is so much that I hate about this trial, I am thankful for what I have learned and how much I have grown. I am more humble. I am more thoughtful. I am more understanding. I am more genuine. I am more grateful. I am more spiritual. I am a better me.

As we raise our children we are supposed to teach them about this life, but Q came and taught me more than I could learn any other way. She was only on this earth for a short time, but left us with a lifetime of understanding. I've said this many times and I'll say it again, Quincy was the light of our life. She was wonderful, she was adorable, she was a miracle, she was everything. She was and continues to be our biggest blessing.

desperate

I miss you so much Quincy. I think about you every day, but today it hurts especially bad.

All I can think about today is how badly I want to pick you up from daycare and talk about chicken nuggets and sand boxes all the way home. I want you to search me frantically for my phone as soon as we walk in the door while yelling "puzoos". I want to help you wash your hands while you make silly faces at yourself in the mirror. I want to make you dinner and wipe your face. I want to bath you and splash you and spy on you as you play with your "baby in the bath". I want to sing the Wheels on the Bus to calm you as I wash your stringy hair. I want so so desperately to snuggle you in your towel and lotion that cute chunky little body. I want to read stories, one, two, three times over and repeat the part where the owl says hoo hoo and talk about the cookies in cookie monsters mouth. I want to hear you say "go nigh nigh daddy. love ew" and I want to kiss your face over and over and over again as I tell you I love you and I'll see you in the morning.

Today is one of those days I have to keep reading this quote...

"We may rest assured that all things are controlled and governed by Him whose spirit children we are. He knows the end from the beginning, and He provides for each of us the testings and trials which He knows we need. President Joseph Fielding Smith once told me that we must assume that the Lord knows and arranges beforehand who shall be taken in infancy and who shall remain on earth to undergo whatever tests are needed in their cases. This accords with Joseph Smith's statement: "The Lord takes many away, even in infancy, that they may escape the envy of man, and the sorrows and evils of this present world; they were too pure, too lovely, to live on earth." It is implicit in the whole scheme of things that those of us who have arrived at the years of accountability need the tests and trials to which we are subject and that our problem is to overcome the world and attain that spotless and pure state which little children already possess."

"Joseph Smith taught the doctrine that the infant child that was laid away in death would come up in the resurrection as a child; and, pointing to the mother of a lifeless child, he said to her: 'You will have the joy, the pleasure, and satisfaction of nurturing this child, after its resurrection, until it reaches the full stature of its spirit.'"

-Bruce R. McConkie

and this quote...

"The Lord compensates the faithful for every loss. That which is taken away from those who love the Lord will be added unto them in His own way. While it may not come at the time we desire, the faithful will know that every tear today will eventually be returned a hundredfold with tears of rejoicing and gratitude."

-Joseph B. Wirthlin



over and over and over again.

I keep asking myself if I really believe these things. I believe in God right? I believe the Gospel and I believe in prophets and apostles.... right? Yes, I do. Then I believe these words. And I cling to them. I have to.

I will always be your mommy Quincy. I think about you constantly and pray for you daily. I feel protective of you and pray that you will know how much you are loved and missed and that God will tell you how special you are. I tell people I have two children because I do. You will always be my oldest, my first born, my doll. You are my baby girl, my forever 2 year old. I don't understand why you had to leave, but I believe there is a plan and I know that I will raise you, just not now, not here. I got a taste of how wonderful life is with you in it and I crave it every day. I long desperately for the time I will hold you in my arms again.

I miss you Q. So very very much.