November 4, 2024

Oh, my once wild darling,

I know things have never looked the way we had hoped or imagined. I see the weariness you hold up with your shoulders, the neck tension and pain a physical representation of the trials we have faced. As I walk, I feel the scar tissue in your hips from the braces you wore as an infant, feet turning slowly back out over time. I often trace your c-section scar, numb as it is, remembering the twenty-four hours of labor that preceded it. Lately as I do so, I weep as I long to hold my now-deceased son. Silently, and sometimes with screams unstifled, I curse childhood brain cancer and the God I can no longer believe in, all at once.

Then, after caressing and cursing, I see you rise again. I see you holding on to life with the sheer strength of your will. I see you roll your throbbing shoulders and stiff neck, and with all the weight you carry, you pick your chin up. I see the way you slowly unravel your body from the bed that has held you for hours, and slide into something less comfortable. I see you wipe the tears from your eyes and even have the gall to put on mascara. I see the way you greet your daughter with a smile each day when she gets home.

Oh, brokenhearted momma, I see you be brave, refusing to be broken. I see the softness you carry even in your pain, the love that remains despite it all. You stand up, day after day, finding a way to move forward, honoring him in every step. You are beauty forged in fire, a mother who loved deeply and a woman who keeps choosing life.

And I love you for it.

Forever in awe of you,
Me