Everywhere I go there are babies.
Today Brady and I were sitting in the waiting room for his ear check and in walks a family with a newborn. I'm guessing it was their 1 week visit. After checking in at the front desk the mom sat down and started feeding the baby. At that moment I was fine, but immediately got concerned about my milk coming in once again. My sweet neighbor from our old house works in the office. She quickly grabbed us and put us in an open exam room.
After the appointment we went to eat lunch at the food truck at our local airport. We walked up and another family was sitting there eating. They had an infant carrier sitting on top of the picnic table. I tried really hard not to see the baby. When they finished eating the dad had the baby in his arms while he threw away their trash. My seat was looking directly at the trash can.
Last night I was scrolling through Facebook before bed. My feed had back to back posts with videos of mothers giving birth. Baby after baby fresh out of the womb and straight into their mother's arms. I just did that too.
Only our tears were a little different. We were in awe of her beauty and disbelief that she wasn't alive. When I tell the story of the day I delivered I don't know what to say. I didn't give birth. She wasn't born. I just say she "came out" at 5:00 pm.
I can't stay at home all the time. I can't avoid babies forever. I don't really want to avoid them now. I just never know when it will be healing to see one and when it will feel like my heart is being ripped out of my chest.
The week that everyone prepares to celebrate Mother's day Craig and I went to our first grief counseling session. Our counselor told us about grief attacks - you are fine one minute and the next you are breaking down. You never know when they will hit. That's pretty much where we are right now. Slowly coming out of the fog and realizing this is not a nightmare. We can avoid the grief or lean in to it. Both options are exhausting. There is no easy way through or around this.
So we lean in. We are weary, but we are hopeful of what is to come as we see our story unfold.
