Tag: loss

Celeste

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Our fostering journey has come to an end, now that we have 6 permanent children in our home, but I have been asked many times what convinced me to become a foster parent. There are actually several stories from my life that pushed me toward becoming a foster parent. I thought I’d share one of the many…

In 2005, I was 19, and found myself in a relationship with a guy about 10 years older than me. Bobby and I worked together at a hardware store. I was a manager and we worked in the same department one night and hit it off. I was very much into the Rockabilly scene at the time, and you could find me at car shows with my hair piled high, and wearing leopard pencil skirts. I listened to The Reverend Horton Heat and bought new issues of Rat Rod magazine every time it hit the rack. Bobby was very much my type. He also loved old cars and played guitar. His hair was a perfectly coiffed, high, black pompadour, built up with layers of Murray’s pomade. He wore 501s cuffed over his Chuck Taylor converse, and his deep brown skin glinted in the sunshine when he hung his arm out of the car window while smoking a Camel.

One night, I accidentally became his girlfriend. I say accidentally, because he, being much older than I, likely assumed it was a kiss and nothing more. But, having been raised in purity culture and also being quite naive, I thought that one kiss meant we had to be together. When he found out how much younger I was than he, I remember him becoming a little leery, but I was impetuous, and I have always been quite convincing, so he found himself in a relationship with me.

I was (and am) a Christian who had fiercely disagreed with people being in relationships when they came from different religions. However, young love makes you question all the things you’ve ever held to be true, and I decided instead to just hide my relationship from my family. Looking back, I realize that what transpired next was supposed to be Bobby’s way of nicely getting rid of me. He told me that we should come clean to my pastor father about our relationship. He assumed this would cause me to break it off. I didn’t want to tell my dad, but he pushed, and so we did tell my father, and I was given an ultimatum. Cease to date this much older guy, who did not share my faith, who was not a good fit for me, or go find somewhere else to live. I was given 3 days to make the decision. In hindsight, I am absolutely sure that during those 3 days, Bobby was thinking he was about to be rid of this very demanding, yet very young, naive girl. I know this because later I found out he had slept with my best friend for the first time during this deliberation period while I was at home, pining for him in my childhood bedroom.

When it was time to answer my father on leaving Bobby and abiding by the house rules or finding another place to live, I was frozen. I really didn’t think, when push came to shove, that my dad would make me answer. I had been on my way to work and tried to slip out without my dad knowing, but he stood in the door waiting for my answer. The first thing out of my mouth was, “I guess I’ll leave.”

I threw everything I could fit in my 1996 Chrysler Concorde and drove away from my childhood home, with no where to live.

Throughout the next several weeks I lived out of my car, crashing at my best friend’s house (yes, the same one he had spent the night with, unbeknownst to me at the time), crappy motels, and wherever I could lay my head. A couple of weeks after my 20th birthday, Bobby took pity on his young, homeless girlfriend, and I moved into his parents’ home with him.

Now at this point, I’m sure you are wondering a lot of things, like “what does this have to do with fostering?” Or “why was an almost 30 year old man still living with his parents?” Or “why am I still reading this?” I’ll answer the first question and let you ponder the second, but only you can answer the third.

One evening, while I was living with Bobby and his parents, there was a knock at the door, and it was Bobby’s older sister, her boyfriend, a giant dog, and a most adorable, round faced 4 year old girl. The little girl turned out to be Bobby’s niece, Celeste. To this day, I do not know the ins and outs of what the situation was, but soon, Bobby’s mom and I were cleaning out the spare bedroom and making it ready for Celeste. I remember that we were preparing the house for a social worker to approve the living situation. I remember scrubbing the bathroom, cleaning the carpet in the living room, and dusting little trinkets. I also remember hushed talks about Celeste’s mother and boyfriend needing to find another place to live in order for Celeste to stay with her grandmother.

And then Celeste was there living with us. All I had ever wanted in life was to be a wife and mother, and I suddenly had this chance to test it out. Bobby and I took Celeste to the park, and the beach. I picked her up from preschool, and cooked her breakfast. I read books to her before bed, and memorized the words to Fox in Socks from reading it so many times over. I cleaned up her vomit in the middle of the night, styled her hair, and gave her snuggles. There came a point when I was becoming disillusioned with Bobby, but I loved Celeste so much, that I couldn’t fathom a life apart from her.

But of course I was not a wife, nor a mother. I was just a rudderless 20 year old in love with a dream. I could pretend I was a mother, but I never would be her mother. Her grandmother was her legal caretaker, and she had a mother, even if we didn’t see much of her. I was playing house and there would be no happily ever after for me. Bobby cheated on me with my best friend while I was nannying in Scotland for a couple of my preschool students, and this time, I found out shortly after. I tried to stick around, and force him to love me, but we were cursed from the start. The dramatic story of my homecoming after leaving him is one for another day.

One of the hardest parts of breaking up for me was leaving Celeste. I knew leaving Bobby meant losing Celeste. I kept in contact for a while, even attending her 5th birthday, but sitting across from my ex and former best friend at Chuck E. Cheese was awkward for everyone. Bobby’s mom was incredibly sweet and arranged for me to see Celeste a few more times after that throughout the following year, but understandably, that didn’t last.

I think about Celeste often. I still have her Kindergarten school picture stowed in my jewelry box. She’s now a young adult woman, living where and with whom and doing what, I may never know. I think about how when I left Bobby, it broke my heart to leave her, and yet I was just one more unstable adult in her life to vanish. Just one more person to come and go with no explanation. There were people and situations that came before Celeste, and after her that also led me to become a foster parent, but learning that I could love a child as much as my own flesh and blood, who started out as a stranger to me was eye opening. Knowing that there were children in the world living in unstable situations and needed a safe place to land stuck with me.

Our first foster placements would come into our life 10 years after I left Celeste. One of whom was a 4 year old girl with the same smile, eye shape, and round face as Celeste. Her mom was also having a tough time and she and her little sister needed a safe place to land.

20 year old Rachel was lost and confused about why God would let her make so many stupid choices that led to some serious heartbreak. 30 year old Rachel saw that all things worked together for good, and that a foolish, young relationship may have just been a catalyst used to prepare her 10 years later to love and care for children from hard places— not for pretend with a boyfriend who was bad for her, but for real with a husband who shared her vision.

(Bobby and Celeste’s names have been changed to respect “Celeste’s” privacy.)

The Last Mile

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I have never run a marathon, and I never expect to. But I imagine how I am feeling in this moment is similar to that last mile a marathon runner runs.

After 13 months, our girls are reunifying and moving out.

I am elated. There’s no other word for it. We have advocated and pushed and done whatever we could to help make this happen. There is no greater joy than a family being put back together and getting a fresh start in a new place. Parent and child are finally starting a new chapter of their lives together. Sure they’ve been living together here in our home, but now they are on their own. It’s the next big thing.

I am terribly sad. Sad is such a general word, but it’s the only word I can find. I watched baby’s first steps, heard her first words, took her on her first Disney trip, held her when she cried, kissed her booboos. I’ve received countless kisses and cuddles from her, tickled her til we both were in stitches laughing, watched her bond with Milkman grow stronger than with any other caregiver, and felt her sleepy breathing belly on my back in the carrier for so many naps. For over 13 months she has slept in my home every single night, and awoken every single morning to the sounds of her 4 (now 5) siblings. I’ve been greeted by her big smile and loud voice yelling “MAMA!” Every time I came out of my room in the mornings. How could you not be sad saying goodbye to a child who has been as close as your own for over a year? And her mommy? The teenager I have seen from a minor to a legal adult, the girl whom I have held many evenings working through things, the girl whose gorgeous long hair I have braided countless times, with whom I have laughed so hard we’ve almost peed ourselves and cried so hard we’ve emptied ourselves of all emotion. The teenager who moved out in a fury months after she came, the teenager who returned back to our family a few months ago. This teenager that I bonded with quicker than I ever bonded with a foster baby, is leaving my home forever.

I am relieved. Both for selfless and selfish reasons— yes, I am a human and I am sometimes selfish. I am relieved because we worked so incredibly hard to make this happen. I am relieved because families belong together. I am relieved because this is the next step. But I am also relieved because I am tired. I am tired of meetings, specialist appointments, so many therapies, so much paperwork. I am relieved because I haven’t had time to bond with my 2 week old baby because from the second I got home from the hospital I have been on calls and doing interviews for next steps and trying to calm storms and repair old wounds for a hurting soul. I am relieved because I haven’t been alone with my husband in months. I’m relieved because 5 kids will seem like a breeze after 7 kids. I’m relieved because I’m tired— I’m so so so tired of having to model perfect parenting 24/7. I’m relieved because my family needs a break from the constant trauma that has washed through our home for these last 13 months, and the behaviors that trauma results in.

I am grateful. I am grateful we said yes to a teenager last year after saying we wouldn’t do that while we had young children. I’m grateful we said yes to her and her baby when we thought we wouldn’t foster moms and their babies til we were much older. I’m grateful I bugged every provider, therapist, and social worker til we got the safety nets in place for these two to set them off on the right foot. I am grateful my children have grown in patience and selflessness, sharing their mama with so many others. I am grateful that I have been stretched— not TO my limit— but BEYOND my limits, til I thought I would break and shatter into a million pieces, but didn’t. I am grateful that my life has been forever changed by these two souls.

I am hopeful. I am hopeful for their future, that they will be successful in their reunification. I am hopeful they will stay in our family’s life forever. I am hopeful they will break old cycles.

We are on the last mile. The finish line is so close I can taste the rest at the end of it, feel it in my aching soul. I can’t wait for it to be here— but I am also so scared to cross the finish line, and everything to be forever different. This is foster care: where we take the bitter along with the sweet, where our family is ripped apart, so another can be made whole.

Happy 4th Birthday, Ezra

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Dear Ezra,

Today is your 4th birthday. 4. I can’t even believe this will be the 4th year we have celebrated your birthday without you here. Wasn’t I just in the hospital waiting to deliver your tiny, lifeless body?

So much has happened since that day, Sweet Boy. 4 months after I delivered you, I became pregnant with your little sister, our rainbow, Peachy. But that’s not all. There were 4 foster children in and out of our home since then. We moved— my goodness leaving the house we lived in where you lived and died in my womb nearly shattered my heart. I’ve experienced hosts of physical ailments, and a few diagnoses. Your big brother and big sister have gone from toddlers to elementary aged kids. After saying goodbye to you and two of your baby foster brothers who came and left after you, the Lord blessed us with a forever baby boy, your brother Gordito. He’s sleeping now in my arms with a full belly of mama’s milk and swaddled like a chubby burrito.

There has been so much change since you left us, and yet? I still miss you. I still feel your loss in physical and tangible ways.

Sometimes when I am kissing your baby brother, his soft, bubble gummy cheeks, I wonder if you would have looked like him if you had made it. I sniff in his pungent smell and remember all I have of you is a little box of ashes.

Sometimes I think about how different life would be if you had lived. There would be no Peachy, in all her wild insanity, I love her so much I can’t fathom life without her, and yet if you were here, she wouldn’t be. That makes me feel guilty if I think about it too much.

Sometimes when I’m in the living room with your brothers and sisters, I count their heads “1, 2, 3, 4…” and then I go into a mild panic scanning the room looking for you. Where is my other child? There have been times where I have gotten up and looked in other rooms in the house for a fifth child, and as I do, I am overcome with sadness again remembering you aren’t here. There’s no fifth head to count.

Ezra. My beautiful, itty bitty boy. I’ll never stop grieving your loss. I’ll always have a piece of my puzzle missing with you not here. I’ll forever remember you and keep your memory alive in the hearts of your siblings, so that even when I’m dead and gone and holding you in Heaven, your name will not be forgotten on earth.

But for now my love, I know you don’t miss me. You’re complete. You have lived a fuller life in the 4 years you’ve been in the presence of the Lord than I have 32 years on earth. You are held by arms more capable than mine, you are cared for better than I could have done, and you are loved even more than this imperfect mama ever could. I have such great joy knowing you are not mourning, you never have and never will.

God is good— all the time, and I take comfort in knowing that one day, we will be reunited together with Christ.

I love you, sweet Ezra Eugene.

Love,

Your Mama

A Forever Changing Family

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First, two became one. And that was the day Milkman and I were married. We were going to wait a year before trying for a baby.

2 months into our marriage we decided to “leave it up to God and see what happens.” We were pregnant the next month. Just two weeks before our first wedding anniversary, we became a family of 3 when Captain was born.

We thought we would wait a year before trying again. And then when Captain was 8 months old, we got another positive pregnancy test. Our sweet Mamitas was born 41 weeks later, and we became a family of 4.

When Mamitas was 11 months old, we had another positive pregnancy test. We were so excited to be a family of 5! We cherished each moment we had, but at my 17 week appointment, our little baby love was no longer. I delivered Ezra’s sleeping body 4 days later, and we remained a family of 4.

4 months later, another positive test! Our rainbow baby was the greatest joy of our lives. Peachy was born that Fall, and then we were 5. We knew after such a difficult pregnancy and traumatic labor and delivery that biological babies would not be in our near future, but we had already completed our foster parenting requirements, so we trusted that our family would grow in time.

9 months later, we received a call for two sisters from our foster agency. Within 24 hours of getting a call, we were a family of 7. Three months later, they reunified, and for two weeks, we became a family of 5 yet again.

It was too quiet, so imagine our joy when we received a call for an “adoptable” 5 day old newborn baby boy. Sweet Warrior. He left us just under 3 months later to a non-family relative home. We were devastated.

And the calls stopped. We were just 5 again. For 6 months we sat by the phone, and no more children came. But then, a call. And we were 6, when little Chatito came to live with us. And 6 we have happily been, and 6 we shall remain for a little while longer. Then 5 again when he reuinifies, but not much longer after that…

And we will be a family of 6 yet again. Because the Lord has blessed us with the gift of pregnancy!

We are grateful to God for giving us another baby to love. Our hands are full, but our hearts are bursting. What a joy to have 4 children at my feet to love on while a 5th steadily grows in my womb! Join us in praying for a healthy pregnancy and a sweet, full of life baby in Summer 2018!

To the Average Foster Parent

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Thank you…

For getting up 7 times in the night with a screaming baby who doesn’t share your DNA.

For googling ways to comfort a baby born addicted to meth, when you feel at a loss.

For crying over biological parents’ loss— even if they don’t seem to feel that loss so very much.

For singing lullabies to the stranger who moved into your home today and assuring her that she is safe.

For quietly patching holes in walls after uncontrollable tantrums.

For advocating on his behalf to school teachers, coaches, and friends.

For the moments when you stand under the shower shaking with righteous anger on behalf of a child who has had their innocence robbed far too young.

For driving miles and miles and miles each week to appointments, visitation, and therapy.

For getting the cold shoulder or worse from biological family members and responding in love.

For building a relationship with her mother, and seeking to mentor and model what a healthy family looks like.

For trying every possible way to help a child with RAD, when everyone else has given up.

For supporting reunification when you know your heart will snap.

For being willing to become a forever family when her family has disappeared.

For taking the punches and responding with “I love you.”

For being willing to risk.

In case no one else has said it, I will. Thank you.

I Remember Ezra.

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I won’t forget the butterflies I felt when I saw those two lines.

I won’t forget the excited look on your daddy’s face when I told him you existed.

I won’t forget the sound of your big brother and sister praying for their “tummy baby” every night at bedtime.

I won’t forget the first time I heard your heartbeat.

I won’t forget my tummy bulging with you growing inside.

I won’t forget you moving around on the ultrasound, dancing like a little sprite on the screen.

I won’t forget the feeling that something was amiss.

I won’t forget when the Doppler was placed on my stomach and came back silent.

I won’t forget when your body was so very still on the ultrasound.

I won’t forget how hard my body shook as I wept for your short life.

I won’t forget picking out the green yarn for your baby blanket, and wanting you to be warm.

I won’t forget driving to the hospital for your induction.

I won’t forget the awful, heart breaking, soul crushing feeling of my water breaking and your body beginning to detach from mine.

I won’t forget the nurse wrapping you up in a wash cloth and exclaiming, “dear God, he’s so tiny!” As she handed your lifeless body to me.

I won’t forget how we bundled you in the little green blanket I crocheted during your labor.

I won’t forget how we sang to you. 10,000 reasons, stay awake, Jesus loves me…

I won’t forget your itty nail beds, precious earlobes, your miniature nose that looked like Captain’s, your absolutely perfect little feet.

I won’t forget parting your mouth as I dropped a single drop of mama’s milk in between your lips.

I won’t forget when we gave you one last kiss, placed your sweet, small body wrapped in that soft green blanket into the white basket so the nurse could take your body down to the hospital morgue.  

I won’t forget any of it. I will remember. I will mourn. I will miss you. I will cry. I will say your name. And I will keep telling your story, so that other people will remember you, too.

My sweet, sleeping Baby.

Happy 3rd Birthday in Heaven, Ezra Eugene. I love you. 

One Last Week

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One week from today, I will be waking up to your cries for the last time. We will be wearing you in your favorite carrier for the last time. When it is time to go, your temporary siblings will kiss you and say goodbye–not really understanding what it all means. 

I will take you to your new home. I’m not sure how I will be able to say goodbye. I can’t even imagine turning my back after I have kissed you for the last time. As cliché as it sounds, how do you willingly leave a part of your heart behind?

I will go home and while my house will be filled with the sound of 3 young children, it will be too quiet without your steady snoring underneath my chin and you will not be asleep strapped close to my heart. There will be no bottles to heat, wash, or sanitize. Your bassinet will sit empty in the living room. Your clothes will sit cold in their drawers in the nursery. The Rock’n’play still and undisturbed by chubby toddler hands trying to rock you to sleep. There will be no middle of the night bottles to feed you, no songs to sing to you. 

I will worry that you aren’t swaddled how you like, that you aren’t buckled in your seat properly, that you aren’t held in just that special position we’ve found you like. I will wonder if you are confused by your new environment, by the new people in and out of your day, the new sounds, smells, and environment. I will pray constantly that you are safe, loved, and well-cared for.

I’m sure for a week or two I’ll come across a tiny sock, a burp cloth, or a renegade pacifier and the loss will wash over me afresh. My children will see my weep. They will learn what it is to give sacrificial love. They will learn that defending the fatherless is a hard but worthwhile job. They will learn how to mourn, how to grieve. They will learn that loving as the Father loves is a great risk. Just as their father and I are learning.

But for the next week, I will hold you close, I will give you an extra kiss every night before bed and tell you it’s from your mama, I will sing to you, call you by the nickname you will no longer hear once you leave, and rub my cheek against your fuzzy little head, soaking it all in, before you are taken away and we never see you again…

Two.

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Today we will get cupcakes. We will buy 4 helium filled green balloons from the grocery store. 

This evening, we will drive to the beach, unload happy children from the van, and head to the sand. We will sing happy birthday, and eat cupcakes. I will whisper happy birthday, and let go of one green balloon, and watch it soar into the sky. The kids will run and play in the sand. We will eat a special birthday dinner. After, we will get the kids dressed into their pajamas, and head home.

We will unload them from the car, place them into their beds, and kiss them. And when I crawl into bed tonight, I will look up at the top shelf of my closet, where there is a royal blue, velour drawstring bag. In that bag is a box that holds what is left of my son. And I will fall asleep to the sounds of 3 healthy children sleeping rather than 4. And I will wonder how my heart can feel so full and so empty all at the same time.

My sweet, Ezra Eugene. Today is your 2nd birthday. You aren’t here to celebrate it, and while that is tragic for me, I know you are safely held in the arms of our Father, you are feeling no loss, only complete contentment in the presence of the One who formed your tiny, little body. I miss you every day, baby boy. I can’t wait to hold you, again. But in the mean time, I will honor your memory, never forgetting that on September 26th, you were born breathless and still, but completely loved and cherished.

And so, sweet Ezra, I do not say rest in peace, but rather, play, run, laugh, dance, and sing JOYFULLY in the presence of the Lord!

Fathers Mourn Losses, Too.

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My beloved husband Milkman wrote this and asked me to share it today for Infant and Pregnancy Loss Day. 

I’m so thankful he put his thoughts in writing– dad’s need to be remembered when it comes to pregnancy and child loss as well.

Here’s what he has to say:
  
Death is a natural occurrence and it’s something that everyone will experience one day and yet, it’s often only talked about in hushed tones. Miscarriages and child loss are much more common occurrence than most people realize and yet they rarely, if ever, are discussed. The issue is even less discussed by or in reference to fathers. That’s why I’m writing today.

 A long time ago I heard that one of the worst things that could ever happen to a parent is to bury their child, and now that I’ve experienced it, I have to agree. Before I was married, I had friends that lost their baby to miscarriage early on in the pregnancy. While I was sad for them, I didn’t truly understand what it meant, until last year, when we lost our sweet little Ezra Eugene at 17 weeks. 

 The searing pain and loss cannot be fully expressed in words. The emotions a mother experiences are often more visibly expressed and realized, because women tend to express their emotions more outwardly. The emotions of the father however, are not as realized or discussed, because men often don’t have the same outward emotional expression as women. This may be because the father wants to be strong for his wife or it could be that he doesn’t know how to express what he’s feeling (I tried crying at various times and couldn’t). Whatever the reason, chances are the father’s hurting just as much as the mother and needs support too.  

To my fellow fathers who have lost a child, by miscarriage or other loss, no matter how you express your grief, know that you’re not alone. Support your wife, love your wife, be a shoulder to cry on, but also share with her because this is just as much your loss as it is your wife’s and chances are she wants to know that you’re dealing with it too.
In honor of infant and pregnancy loss day, I wanted to write to ask you friends and relatives of those who have experienced this loss, please remember the fathers. Don’t stop supporting the mothers who went through the physical pain of carrying their child for whatever period of time, but please remember that for many fathers like myself, a simple recognition, prayer or word of encouragement is needed and can go along way. 

 “And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away” (Revelation 21:4).

It’s Your Due Date, Ezra.

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Dear Ezra,

Today is your due date. Of course being the crazy birth junkie your mama is, I call it a guess date. Had you not been born at 17 weeks and you made it to full term you would most likely have chosen your own birthday anyway.

But time is important to your mama, and milestones are important to we silly humans. I’ve always thought it a nice gesture God gives us time when it is meaningless to Him… But I digress.

Today is for warm. 77 degrees, bright blue skies, and windy. The sun is out and your big brother Captain and your big sister Mamitas have played in the backyard all day. Your little sibling, our sweet little rainbow blessing, tucked safely in my womb, is making his or her presence known by making me moan away with nausea, headaches, and an aversion to any food that isn’t a cheeto. I’ve parented from a horizontal position all day. Papa just came home. He’s worked hard all day and just came home early to help me with your energetic siblings…

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He came over to kiss and hold me and we cried a few seconds before your big brother and sister jumped on papa’s back and started talking about the cat and how many deals did papa make today and did papa bring home food. And then we watched a hummingbird drink nectar from our lemon blossoms while Captain hid behind us and asked if it was a bee, and I was reminded that grieving when children are around is done in spurts, in between kissing owies, making meals, answering questions, wiping bottoms, and nursing thirsty toddlers.

Today would have been so different if it was your birthday. There still would have been pain, tears, emotional upheaval… But there would have been much joy. We would laugh and I would be experiencing your first latch and smelling your sweet little head. I would have been gushing over tiny size 0 diapers and holding your long newborn fingers and sharing your name with the world for the first time.

Of course we know God works all things for good and for His glory. 10,000 people have read your story. People don’t refer to you as my miscarriage, they call you Ezra. Because you were a person and so very real. Your memory is loved and cherished not just by papa and me, but by our friends and family, and even strangers I’ve never met have emailed me and shared their love for you. I wouldn’t have had the same compassion I do now on families who have lost their babies. I wouldn’t have been diagnosed and treated for early stages of endometriosis, which ultimately led to becoming pregnant again… And though this child never could and never will take your place, and though this child will never fill the empty place you’ve left in my heart, I am thankful to not be at your due date with an empty womb, though my arms and heart still feel very empty without you.

It’s been 23 weeks to the day since I held you last. You were beautiful but your skin was so cold I could hardly stand it, I wanted you to be warm and breathing and living and thriving, but it was not meant to be. I wear a chain of green yarn from the blanket I made you around my wrist and it hasn’t come off since you were born. I have two necklaces from my dear friends Ashley and Jessica with your name on them and I wear them and Captain calls them “Wezza necklace” and touches the pendants gently and asks if I’m sad and I miss Wezza. I have a quilt made just to your size from my friend Melody. It sits with my pictures of you and your foot prints. And then of course I have your ashes. It’s all I have left of you physically, and every time I look at that little royal blue bag that holds the box your remains are held in, I can’t believe that you didn’t make it.

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Ezra, my sweet boy, you’ve touched my life in such big ways, and while I don’t know why you couldn’t live I know that I miss you. And more than that, I know that I love you. You will always be numbered among my living children because I grew you in my body and I loved you so intensely I can’t go an hour without thinking about you. My beautiful, sleeping baby… Mama loves you.

Love,
Mama