My sweet baby girl, It's hard to believe that it's been a year and almost 3 months since you've passed. It doesn't feel like it's been that long already. ......... I'm a senior now (and I still sit here wishing you would've gotten to see that.) It's hard to celebrate not just these new firsts' without you but also these seconds that are following right behind. I thought that things wouldn't feel so bad after a little bit of healing time but just seeing things that remind me of you feels like I'm losing you all over again. I wish I would've just held you close as you struggled to take your last breath and I will always live with that regret of not knowing if that would've made a difference in the pain I feel. A big part of me will always be grateful that you waited until we got home to go, but another part of me wishes you didn't, so I didn't have to see you struggle and feel so helpless knowing I couldn't do anything but wait. "It's okay to go. We'll be okay" One of the things I told you while choking back the sob in my throat; watching your chest rapidly rise and fall before no movement was made. That night was a night that I couldn't bring myself to go to sleep because nothing felt real. I remember getting up the next morning at 6 and going for a run because I needed to get out. I needed to escape the nightmare I was living in. You left me.... And I wasn't going to get you back. I want you to know that we still talk about you a lot around here. We talk about your big beautiful brown eyes and the way you'd use them to beg for a banana. We talk about how you'd nest your lamb chop in the back of the cage as if it was breathing. We talk about how funny it was to watch you get Leo into trouble when he was by your cage eating food that didn't belong to him. We talk about how you would give Meadow kisses as if she was your own baby. We live in this house that you will never get to see, but there's a wall that's blank because that's a reminder that, that's where your cage belongs (where it will always belong); where you should be at. I know that God is taking good care of you for me because you're no longer in pain, but I miss you; I miss you more than all of the words in the world can describe. I love you my sweet girl.
