We got to say goodbye!

Today I just share a raw letter my daughter wrote …. 

 Day 257. . .

My Liefste Liam,

I got to say goodbye. I got to hold you in my arms as you let out your final breath. I got to say goodbye.

Knowing this and saying it out loud doesn't make it any easier. It doesn't hurt less. I don't miss you less. I read a wonderful book that a father wrote after losing his son. In the book he wrote about how he never knew this kind of pain existed. He knew of it, but he didn't understand just how truly painful and cruel this pain is. Another thing about this book is that his son died in an accident. He wasn't sick. He didn't have cancer. So why did I read it? I don't know. I couldn't stop. 

Some parts made me cry. Some parts left me at loss for words. After reading the book I felt a sense of deeper loss. Parents who have had to outlive their children share this pain. Yet we are all on our own. We grieve together, yet all in different ways. I know my pain. I know the year we went through. I know the challenges we had to face. I know the pain. I know the good days and the bad days. I know what we shared. I know our love and most of all I got to say goodbye.

The book made me sort of understand another's pain. The parent who didn't get to say goodbye. I got to experience a glimpse of what that must feel like. To get a phone call or a knock at the door and have another person tell you that your child is gone. I don't know that pain. I don't know the pain of not saying goodbye. To me it is unimaginable. How do you survive that pain? How do you continue when in a split second your world has changed and no one prepared you? God didn't give you time? God didn't help you explain to your child that you would be okay? That your baby doesn't have to worry about you, the one that stays behind. There was no time. It all just ended. I am so sorry that there are parents who know this kind of pain. There aren't enough words, but I am sorry. Oh my soul I am sorry. I want to scream it out loud. I want to hold the parent who has experienced this; not because I understand, but because I care. With all my heart.

When our children are born, when he hear their first cry and when we hold them in our arms for the first time, we realise that God had changed our lives forever. We become parents.  We guide them, love them, protect them, raise them. We give so much of ourselves to prepare them for life. When a child dies, we realise, we tried to do our best to prepare our children for life, but all the while no one ever, ever could have prepared us for what would happen if one day it all stopped.

When I read that part in the book my heart broke. A new pain filled my soul. Cancer is a hell of a journey. . .one pain isn't harder than the other. . .one parent's grief isn't easier than the other. . .and even though some parents get to say goodbye. . .nothing makes any of this easier. But I got to say goodbye.

I know each grieves differently. Each one's pain is his own. I wouldn't even pretend to truly know, but I am glad I got to sit on another's mourning bench. Even if only for a second. My heart is with you.

Liam I miss you so very much. I am so grateful and thankful I got kiss your cheek as your final breath escaped you. I have a little bit of peace knowing I got to speak to you about death, about love, about being okay. I got to say goodbye.

I love you Liam. So very much. With every fibre of my being. 

"THE TEARS ... streamed down, and I let them flow as freely as they would, making of them a pillow for my heart. On them it rested."

-AUGUSTINE,Confessions IX

Forever and always and always and forever more.

Al my liefde,

Mamma.