tears.

i'm tired of crying.
tired of hurting.
tired of carrying this sadness around.
this sadness that isn't even my own.

a little baby girl went back to be with Jesus last week.
she choked in her sleep.
the reality of that astounds me.
choked on her mother's sweet milk.
it pierces.
she was the daughter of friends.
a niece of dear friends.
a granddaughter of friends.
only seven weeks old.
my heart hurts.
aches.
the tears are so near the surface.
always.

i hide them.
my children don't understand.
don't need to know.
they don't need the burden of mommy's sadness.
but it weighs on me.
a layer of melancholy surrounds.

every time i bring naomi to my breast...i hurt anew.
tears leak from my eyes even as i savor that tender moment with my baby girl.
i think of the physical pain the mother must be in as her body continues to make milk.
make milk for a baby that exists on this earth no longer.
the milk that stopped her breath.
bittersweet.
staggering in its harsh reality.
if only there were a valve to turn it off...instead of the continuous flow of nourishment.
my breasts seem to be mourning with her.
they've clogged themselves more in the past week than they have in the last six months.
blisters and cracks have appeared and not healed.
it physically hurts to nurse naomi now.
i have a piece of her pain.

and so i cry.
i cry for the lost life.
i cry for the missing face from the christmas photo on the mantle.
i cry for me and my selfish self...so thankful it wasn't me.
i cry for the absolute devastation they must feel.
i cry.
and i cry.
and i cry.

and i'm tired of it.
which makes me cry even more...
because of how awful that thought even is.

i don't know why her passing has affected me so very deeply.
i never even got to hold her.
i picked her paci off the floor, gave it a rinse and gave it back to her.
that's it.
that's all.
the whole of my interaction with her.
yet.
yet.
yet her passing has broken me.
daily.

i'm frustrated with myself.
so selfish i am.
so self centered.
i've been trying to write out my feelings for the past five days.
but i can't get past the fact that this is all about me.
me.
me.
me.
what about them?
what about her? the mother of that sweet baby girl?
surely, my pain doesn't even begin scratch the surface what what they must be thinking and feeling.
i'm annoyed with my own vanity.
yet, still.
the tears come.
they drip off my nose and soak my shirt.
i weep.
uncontrollably.
for the memories that will never be.
for the memories of those awful moments upon finding her...lifeless.
those memories that will be burned forever on the inside of their eyelids.
for the sweet milk that is being made...never to be drunk.
for the absolute agony.
despair.
anguish.

never before have i better understood that scripture in romans that says, "we do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express."

i don't know what to pray.
i don't know how to pray.
for the most part, my prayers have been wordless groans of desperation.
there is a small comfort knowing that though i have no words, the holy spirit can translate my silence.
God knows.
He knows.
He knows.
and right now, He's holding her.
both of them.
mother and baby.
together in His hand.
they will be together again.
but oh...
how my heart aches.
and the tears still fall.
silent.