A new normal

It has been a week since the last post, and a lot has changed.

Our hearts have healed so much.  It's like God kept bringing the truth that He showed me back to mind and reminding me to keep an eternal perspective.  Our life is like a blip in light of eternity. 

Sure, we still cry.  I look at photos of Brigid every single day and long to be able to hold her again, to smell her smell and feel her soft skin and kiss her little head.  My heart hurts to think of the pain that her tiny body endured during her short life - needles and IVs and tubes in the throat and nose and a surgery and probably a hundred heel pricks to draw blood.  It's not supposed to be like that.  That's scary and painful and it makes me sad to think of her going through that alone.  It's supposed to be cuddles and warm milk and soft blankets and kisses.  That's what babies are usually greeted with shortly after they come screaming into this world.  But not our Brigid.  And yet, she hardly ever cried.  It was her normal.  It's all she knew.  I wish it could have been different.  But that wasn't God's plan, and I know her reward is great right now, and she is not feeling any discomfort at all.

And this week, I've been able to devote myself to the boys in a way I never have before.  It's the same amount of time with them that I've always had, but it's so much fuller now.  I appreciate it so much more.  I feel engaged with them in a way that I didn't before this experience.  PJ especially has been struggling with Brigid's death and having a hard time understanding what it means.  He has been fearful of being alone and clingy with me, probably because I've had to spend so much time away from him in the past few months - sometimes he'd wake up and I'd be in the hospital and I know that was scary for him, and I have to keep reassuring him that that time is over now and I'm not going away again. I think he's finally understanding that.  I love that I can devote my full attention to them right now, playing with them and being with them in a way that's not just being in the same room together doing our own things, but really doing what they want much of the time - being silly or building train tracks or reading books.  Paying attention to them.  Because that's what it's my privilege to do right now as I am able to stay home with them for these short and fleeting years until they're all in school. Patrick and and I both feel like we have so much more patience with them and we all feel that time together as a family is so much more meaningful because of the time we spent apart.

So that's our new normal.  It's funny that on the outside, it looks the same as the old normal.  We're all the same people.  But on the inside, we're all so different now.

And that's a good thing.

I'm so grateful for all the prayers and cards and kind wishes you've had for us.  I have no doubt that these prayers have helped to carry us through and bring peace and comfort to our hearts. 

Thank you!