When Ariana was born we had several cousins pregnant at the same time as us. (Five or six I think, off the top of my head. As a matter of fact, Ari's closest cousin in age is 6 days older than she is!) So for one of the cousins who had a girl, we decided to pass down Ari's clothes to her since she's a single mom and clothes are expensive...and her baby was a couple months younger. ANNNYWAY. Long story short, we gave the clothes to Ryan's folks' to bring to the cousin's folks to give to her, but somehow or another they never ended up there. We decided to bring them home on the off chance that we have another girl at some point in our lives. ...And we gave all our boy clothes away when we found out we were having Ariana.
Anyway I picked through the bag of clothes tonight. Lots of memories. You'd be surprised what emotions such a little piece of fabric can evoke. I miss my girl so much I can almost feel her. It is so incredibly hard to know that I am never (on this earth at least) going to kiss her or hold her or feel her come to me for a hug, or to be picked up, or to be snuggled. I'm never going to hear her say "I love you" or even "I hate you!" and it's just so damn unfair. It's an absolute travesty that all I have left, physically, are some pieces of clothing, a stuffed animal or two, some blankets.
I would give anything for just one more snuggle. If I'd have known this was going to happen, I never would have stopped hugging her. If I'd have known how hard this all is, I never would have let go.
I miss our girl so much. Every day I wake up thinking maybe somehow the world has rewound itself to when we were a whole family.
....
Every day I get kicked in the gut when I realize I'm really awake, and nothing has changed.
I don't know how people live satisfying lives after they lose a child. I don't know how you are supposed to wake up every morning with this kind of crippling pain. I hope I figure it out soon...