August

I try to like the month of August. I really do. I work really hard to find all of the positives--it's my niece's birthday month (the only thing I truly find myself excited about in August), and it's also Barrett's birthday month. I do my best to try to make all of the good outweigh the bad.

It's the month I was able to hold my son. It is the month Barrett was born, and so many beautiful things and friendships that have bloomed from that.   But I am going to be incredibly real with you in this post. I am going to be 100% raw and human. I hate August. Beginning in June, I start to feel the dread. It is already hitting me so hard. August feels like a dark cloud looming over my head in the summer. I try to push it away and run away from it, but it follows me. It gets closer and closer with each passing day.   I feel like I am walking around with a weight on me and I know so many other grieving mothers feel this same feeling. In fact, there are many who share my feelings about August. Too many mothers know exactly what I am describing.  

August and it's impending arrival floods me with so many memories. The day before his birth, the day of, and the memories of the following days including his funeral are as clear in my head as they were in those moments. The moments that change your life so drastically are slow to fade. They become a part of you.   August brings those memories raging back for me. They never hit me when I expect them. It's always at random times. Like yesterday when I had a doctor's appoint on June 23...and I saw the date and thought, "Two months. Two months until his birthday". Or when I get a notice that something at work is scheduled for August, and I realize how close that is. It hits me when I realize that June has flown by and July will probably be the same way.   It hits me when I see that Audrey goes back to school on August 6, and that will be two years since we received the joyous news that our precious baby was a boy. August 6 will be two years since the last time I saw Barrett alive.

  I have moments still where all I want to do is be alone and have a good cry, even almost two years later. There are some wounds that time can't heal. The moments are fewer, but when they hit, they are still just as strong. I have so much to be grateful for, but that doesn't mean we aren't allowed to grieve as well. My two living children do not replace the one who is missing.   August, I am dreading you right now. I am trying to embrace you, but you bring so much hurt. August, you make me feel like I am having to give my baby away all over again.