There are two letters in my nursery. On the envelope, I recognize my mother's writing. They simply say "Sweet baby girl, & Anna" on the front. One was left in April on her last visit while I was pregnant. It talks of excitement. The joy and the healing we were all so ready to feel with her arrival. The second, was left after her birth. What should have still talked of the future, only talked of the past, and what could have been.
Today I woke up to another letter. Sent across the world in seconds. My mother and I are separated in distance but together in this pain. She feels so helpless when she wants to be a mother in every way she knows possible. It is my struggle as well. Not being able to hold the one that will bring comfort. For her, her daughter dealing with this immense loss. For me, the one I did lose, Anna. Tomorrow continues to get closer & closer, and we are all feeling its presence in her absence.
This is her latest, but I am sure, not her last letter to Anna
"I find myself often in a fog, they say this is part of grief. Somehow you manage to get up and do the things you're supposed to do. I believe the only people who know how much my heart hurts are the ones that truly look into my eyes. There they would see the tears almost ready to slip out. My dear sweet Anna. You were our light at the end of a dark night. I had already imagined all I would do with you . First hairdo's, tea parties with all the dolls I had kept so lovingly , so I could share them with you.
I can't talk about May 20th without tears spilling from my eyes and blurring the words I write. When Alissa phoned to tell me she hadn't felt you moving, I felt calm. I believed that maybe you would be born that day. I stayed on the phone with your mommy, telling her she would be fine. I had no idea that the words I spoke to my daughter might have been the last she would ever hear.
When Alissa arrived on the second floor of the hospital, she let me go, and I in my trusting belief thought that I would receive a call soon to let me know everything was OK. The call I would receive shortly after from Brandon would sink my world. Our sweet baby girl was gone, and Alissa was in emergency surgery. I think when news so devastating comes to you, your only thought is I need to be there. My daughter's life was in danger, she had also lost her daughter, there was nothing that would have stopped me from going.
Somehow I made it to Las Vegas , then to the hospital. The hallway leading to a room with a picture of a purple leaf laying in a puddle of rain on the door. {this is a symbol they place on doors to represent the loss of a baby in a post partum wing of a hospital, a gentleness to let nurses who enter know that this is a sacred place of pain.} The hallway seemed to last forever, and yet somehow my legs drew me closer to the door. As a mom, this would be my greatest heartbreak to see my beautiful girl holding her sweet very still daughter. It seemed as if time stood still in the small room. I felt honored my sweet Anna that I could hold you and let my tears wash over your perfect little face.
I will never forget how you felt in my arms. I shook with all the love that I had for you, and couldn't give. As Anna's Gramma, my grief was not only for Anna, but for my beautiful daughter. I longed to give Alissa the very thing I could not, so I folded Alissa into my arms and cried with her as she prepared to say goodbye to her little girl.
Time is the only thing that softens grief. MY tears easily still slip down my face, but it is in my heart that a heaviness has slipped in. After all, we as a family had not yet accepted the loss of Kimmy, the person she used to be. The loss of Anna felt cruel. I know bad things happen all the time. Anna's death is pure heartbreak. A beautiful little girl that never had the chance to chase her brothers collecting rocks, and just spin forever until she fell down in a heap of giggles and ruffles.
Dear sweet Anna, my namesake, you have changed us all. You will never be forgotten. Your Grampa found a small white feather on the floor beside his favorite chair today. Somehow I can't help but think that you were here."
with love, Grandma