One year three months

It has been one year and three months today since Harry died.

Life with Harry seems like a dream. I look at his pictures on my office wall and I wonder to myself, "Is that really me? Was that my life? Did that really happen?" In many ways it feels like a lifetime ago. In one more month it will be a lifetime ago, Harry's lifetime ago. That seems so impossible to me, that in one months time he will have been gone for as long as he was here.

It is so strange. I will never forget him. He is still so much of a daily presence in our lives, and yet, his life seems like a dream that happened long ago.

A family friend asked me recently if being pregnant helped to ease the pain over the loss of Harry. Yes and no. It is wonderful to have something so hopeful to look forward to. I adore being pregnant. If I had known how much I was going to love it, I would have started much younger and have planned on at least 6 kids! I love watching my belly grow and feeling the baby's gentle kicks and flutters. I am now 20 weeks and half way through. I feel wonderful - just so content and happy to be growing this blessed child in my womb.

We love him so much already.

So, yes, in a way having something so exciting to look forward to helps me stay grounded in a place of joy and hope. Yet, no, too. Nothing can take the pain of losing Harry away. His absence will always be such an ovewhelming presence in our lives, I can't imagine anything easing the pain of his loss.

It *is* nice to have the baby to look forward to. I hear a baby cry in church and I cannot wait to comfort my crying son. To hold him and nurse him and take care of him. I feel so overwhelmingly blessed to be given the chance to welcome another child into our lives.

Lydia has overcome her initial anger at having another brother, "I don't need another brother she insisted, I already have one. I want a sister!" But, fortunately, the thrill of having another sibling has overtaken her initial reluctance and she already tells the baby daily how much she loves him. She is looking forward to being able to read him stories, playing with him, and helping me take care of him. She wants to share a room with him, too. Something she always wanted to do with Harry. We have started talking about what the baby will be like and do at different ages and what Lydia will do with him then. Lydia already anticipates that when he is five, he will chase her down the street when she goes to a friend's house, wanting to come too. And she tells me, "It's okay Mommy, I'll bring him with me to Eva's house, he'll be able to play there with us." She hopes that she can be his reading buddy, when he is in nursery and kindergarten and she is in grades 5 and 6.

I think once she was able to express her fears to me, "Will this brother die like Harry?" And I was able to reassure her as best as I could, "No, I don't think so sweetie. Harry's life was his own and this baby is coming for his own life and I think he is coming to be with us for a long time. Harry's cancer was so unique, it is just not something that will happen again," that she has been able to become excited about the baby.

I, of course, wish I could outright tell her with certainty, "No this baby won't die". I believe he is completely healthy and coming for a very different experience from Harry, but my crystal ball is as blurry as the next. And I can't bring myself to lie to Lydia. And I'd of course be lying to myself, if I said the fear hasn't crossed my mind, too. But I won't tell *that* to Lydia. And I cancel that fear and send it packing as soon as it emerges. I won't even entertain that thought.

I rub my belly and smile, and yet in the next instance look up and see Harry's smiling face shining down on me from my wall and a tear rolls down my cheek. How is it that we can hold two such opposed feelings in our hearts at once? But I guess that isn't true. It is one emotion, one and the same. It is love. I look at Harry and I feel such overwhelming love for him and it makes me cry. I rub my belly and I feel such overwhelming love for my baby and it makes me smile. I'm glad I can feel such overwhelming love for both of my boys. That the love for one in no way diminishes or changes the love for the other. They are unique and wonderful and good.

I like to imagine Harry and his little brother, talking in heaven. Or well, as Lydia describes it, the baby is in "waiting to be born Heaven, where she and Harry were before they were born and where they looked down at the party of possible parents from a balcony and choose Daddy and I" and that Harry visits him there. And Harry tells him all of the wonderful things to expect in our family. How much love there is waiting for him here. I always ask the baby to make sure he gets to know his brother well in heaven, since he won't get to know him here.

I wonder what I will tell the baby about Harry. He'll see his pictures and I am sure wonder and ask. But he'll know about Harry from the time he is born, because Lydia talks about Harry every day.

Harry and his brother and sister. Three kids. I never thought I'd have three kids, certainly not two boys. I always thought I'd have girls. Maybe it sounds weird that we aleady think of ourselves as a family of five (not four). I can't unmake Harry. He's not here, exactly, but he most certainly isn't 'gone' either. Oh, but I do wish I could talk to him. Hear him talk. Oh and what I would give to hold him again.

It scares me that life moves on and that we move on and keep going, because we have no choice but to do othersise. While Harry, Harry will always be that little boy who was with us for just 16 months and died of this ridiculously rare cancer. That is what I worry about now, the distance, the ever growing distance between Harry and where life is now and making sure I always have a way to cross that chasm to never lose touch or hold on Harry. On who he was and how wonderful those 16 months were with him.

On an entirely different note, our home renovations are coming along slowly but surely. The siding started going on yesterday and it promises to be a good week weather wise, so hopefully they'll get most of the exterior done now. We can't wait to move back home. As wonderful as it is to have a great place to stay. This experience is making us appreciate our home more than ever! I *really* will post pictures soon!

Love,
Cynthia