Before and After

The funny thing about "Before and After" is that you never know you were in the "Before" until you're in the "After."

I really hate the After.

Role reversal

I used to go lay by the children at bedtime to keep them from being afraid.

Now they come lay by me.

Advice

Never ask a grieving mother how they are doing. Trust me, you do not want to know.

Sunshine

Logic tells me that riding my bike or going to the gym would be positive coping strategies right now. That getting outside in the sunshine would help me. That getting my blood pumping on the track or the bike trail would be constructive ways to manage my pain. But quite frankly, doing anything other than sitting on the couch staring at the floor sounds like am impossible feat at the moment. The thought of even actually loading my bike onto the car sounds about as daunting as climbing Mount Everest right now. But if I don't do something, I'm going to drive myself insane. So I guess it's time to go outside. I think I'll take my bike to Phat Tire for a tune up. Then at least it will be ready whenever I am.

Tonight.

Tonight it will be a week.

Today

I can't breathe today. I feel like the kids are buzzing around me in colorful blurs of need. My body is here for them, but my heart isn't in it. I've got to figure out how to bring my brain into the present. 

Blessing

Right now I'm just feeling awful because it dawned on me that I never had someone come in to bless Riley. I was in such a daze once we had to let him go, I could barely even register where I was. I held him for a long time afterwards and stroked his hair and studied his face and hands and feet and kissed his cheeks, and then they told me the coroner was there and it was time to put him down. We walked out, and I never saw him again. They led us to the chapel, then told us it was time to go meet the coroner and detectives at the house (standard procedure for any death at home, but it was still awful), and then they sent him to Little Rock for the autopsy and then to the funeral home. The chaplain was right there in the room with us. How could I have not asked him to pray over Riley? What kind of mother forgets something so basic, something that has no opportunity to be fixed? I just feel like I want to throw up.