Lately I feel like I have a physical hole in my heart. I am missing Kenley so badly; it’s less raw but seems more intense. 

I have great days followed by really really awful days. In the beginning it was all raw; my grief just controlled my every thought. Now, it’s different. I can have normal days, and even enjoy normal things, but after that happens I wake up the next day feeling like I’ve been hit by a truck. Kind of like a “grief hangover” for lack of better term. I could lay in bed all day, cry all day, literally watch the minutes tick away on the clock and not give a shit about anything. Those are my bad days. 

I’m sure this is just another “phase” of grief, but it pisses me off to think of it that way. 

There are not multiple “phases” of grief- there is only one

Life. 

There is a lifetime of grief and that is the only phase. 

Maybe that is why the grief hits so hard? Because I know that there is no escaping it. Sure it will change, and it will become easier to carry- Hell, it’s already less challenging to carry it- but, it’s always going to be there. 

Tonight as I was feeding Alden, I realized I was holding her the exact same way I held Kenley in the hospital. I looked at her and I was hit with an enormous wave of PTSD. I felt like I was back in the OR feeling sick, and unable to cough from the spinal. I remember being given a medicine to calm me down, which also made me so nauseous, but I was unable to actually throw up because my spinal made it impossible. 

I remember the silence. 

So. Much. Silence. 

I remember how she felt in my arms. I remember feeling like I wanted to die; like I could care less about breathing. 

Maybe that’s why the bad days scare me so much?

 The bad days make me feel exactly how I felt when the Nurse handed me Kenley’s lifeless body and I finally held my daughter. 

The bad days are so bad, but I’m so glad the good days are here, too.