First "Holiday" Without You

Dear Cameron,

I miss you. I wish I can just peek into heaven and see how well you're doing and see how happy you are. I want to see your precious face again, I want to hear your voice, your laugh, see your beautiful smile, feel your soft and delicate skin. All the things I wish to see will have to wait until I get there.

I survived my first "holiday". It was lonely without you. I expected to be pregnant on my birthday last week, reaching almost the end of my pregnancy. I had plans to go out to eat and watch you kick and move around after I finished my meal. I miss the pleasantly painful sudden kicks you would give me. That was the best part about being pregnant.

Instead, for my birthday, I spent most of my day sleeping. I cried a little,...well a lot... just to get it out. I really miss you.
My coworker bought me a cake, some balloons and a beautiful book called A Woman's Daily Prayer Book for women. She made me feel very special. It was in my moment of sorrow, the moment I almost allowed myself to stay in that raw place of hopelessness again when God sent my coworker with tools to help bring me out. She was just what I needed.
Thank you Lord.

I thanked her endlessly as I was fighting back tears after reading the most beautiful card I've received since Mother's Day. It was a card of strength, encouragement, celebration and friendship. It was the perfect card on a day such as that. A sad day turned beautiful knowing that someone though of me.

It wasn't until later when I realized that holidays can cause me to take a couple of steps backwards. It causes people who have lost loved ones to reminisce on their memory and what they used to do with them during that time of family and celebration.
But what about me? I never got that time with you Cam. I never got to spend Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years with you. Instead I "reminisce" on the memory I could have had. I have to imagine how your mouth would have drooled while I ate your Gigi's delicious candied yam. Or how your eyes, so bright and so beautiful as mine, would have lite up from all the lights on the decorative Christmas tree. Or how tired you would have been on New Year Eve but your older loving cousins Iris, Solomon, Cidney and Morgan would have been too loud and excited for you to fall asleep soundly. These are my memories. And they're so heart breaking because I will never get them.

I hope that makes sense.

I'm so thankful to see 23, but I just wanted to see 23 with you. This year was going to be extra special for me, and I guess it still is; in a different bittersweet kind of way. I'm thankful to have met you and to have you a part of my life forever. I wonder if 23 years from now I will be speaking of you the same way I am now.
I hope not. I hope I'm happier.

It may sound crazy, but although you're gone, you don't feel gone. I still feel you around, even as I write this letter to you, I still feel your presence, and I love it.

I love you Cameron.

Love Always,

Mommy