I keep waiting for it to get bad.
I mean, three years and one week ago, my baby died inside of me and my world shattered and I didn't think I'd survive the day, much less make it out of the dark places.
I never thought that Novembers would start being not-hard.
But then, there's still a week to go until my girl's third {still}birthday, so I guess anything could happen. I don't want to speak too soon. I don't want to jinx myself.
Still, based on previous Novembers, I expected to feel memory's cold fingers stealing over my shoulders, pressing, clenching until I could hardly breathe.
People keep asking me (thank you, thank you, thank you for remembering) how I'm doing. And I have to shrug and say, not sure how it can be, that I think I'm doing okay, actually.
That truth sounds strange coming from my own tongue. But that doesn't make me less grateful for it.
I guess I thought that, if I ever got to this place where November doesn't sting like it used to, I'd feel guilty. That it would make me less of a mother to the daughter I never got to raise.
But I don't feel that way. Mostly I just feel glad. Maybe a little confused, and a bit nervous, afraid that November 20 is going to hit like a hurricane. But aside from that, I'm glad. Because even though I love her, I don't want to spend the rest of my life losing a month or more of my life each year in a black hole of grief's resurgence. Not on top of the grief I've already traversed. Not when I have so much life to see to.
Maybe it's just pregnancy hormones, protecting me somehow. They do that with my depression, after all. Somehow, though, I don't think that's it (although I guess we'll see next year, huh?).
And I hesitate to saw why things are different this year. Maybe it's just the passing of time. Maybe it's how deep into the darkness I let myself descend. Maybe it's the art journaling, or the questioning and pondering, or the sea of tears my eyes have poured out over her name. Maybe it's how grateful I am for the life she's given me -- I will never stop wishing she could have stayed, but treasure the many, many gifts she left for me with her absence.
I don't know. I don't know. I don't know.
I don't know what next week will bring.
I don't know how I'll spend her day.
But I am glad.
I am glad of her. I am glad of the me she birthed with her death, the greatest paradox I have yet to know. And I am glad of this calm and unexpected loveliness, three years later.
