Diagnosis Day, Two Months, Forever To Go

Dear Aaron,

Fifteen years ago today I went for the "routine" ultrasound that wasn't. 

I didn't really think too much about it beyond finding out if you were a boy or a girl. Daddy met Michael and I there. Michael was only 3. He was my sidekick, always with me since the big kids were in school. When the doctor started talking (for what it's worth, when the doctor comes into the ultrasound, it's never a good thing), I started crying and really couldn't stop. 

Michael told Daddy to make them stop hurting me, and we tried to explain that the doctor wasn't hurting me, but he just couldn't understand.  

Our next appointment was five days away, which felt like an eternity. 

In some ways, that day seems like an eternity ago, but my body still remembers, still hurts. Today feels heavy, dark, hard.

And it's been two months since Gramma came to join you. Did you come get her? Did you hold her hand as her spirit slipped away from her body, from the hands that were holding her earthly hands? 

While we were in Arizona, I noticed a book on the table near where she sat. I have wondered if she read it. I mean, she found out a few weeks before that she was permanently losing her eyesight and that was so hard for her. I remember her saying on more than one occasion that her eyesight was the one sense she was terrified of losing. I'm sure it was for a variety of reasons, but I know not being able to read was a big part of that.  

Gramma read voraciously. She passed that on. I don't remember not being able to read. I learned before I went to kindergarten. As she read everything, so did I. Cereal boxes in the morning, magazines in offices, even JAMA at the pediatricians. The Reader's Digest and church magazines were staples in our home, and library cards were prized. 

So when I saw the book on the table, I wanted to read it. And those library cards? Well, I still have one. I read it last week, a bittersweet experience, the last book she will recommend to me. Mom came of age during the Vietnam era. Papa was in country. She married an Air Force officer. The book was about women nurses over there. I could almost feel her spirit as I read. Oh, I hope she did get to read it. It was the kind of book that spoke to her, and maybe a bit of her. 

As I finished reading it, it was a little like saying good-by all over again.

Fifteen years since your diagnosis, two months since Gramma slipped away, and what feels like forever until I hold you both again.

The full moon rose above Box Elder Peak tonight, seemingly caught in the tree branches, watching over your grave. Did you see it? Did you see me checking on you? Did you feel the cold wind rustling your butterflies?

I love you, little man.

I miss you so much.

Love,
Mama

“Moreover, we can’t fully appreciate joyful reunions later without tearful separations now.”

Russell M. Nelson