A Long Time Has Passed

It has been 4 years, 7 months, 3 weeks and 1 day since we lost Emily. I think of her often. We even sing a song to our girls at night that includes saying Emily loves you. I am not sad as often as I was in the beginning. Yes, I still miss her very much, but it is different. It is easier to talk about her and share with people about our loss.
Why am I writing tonight? What is different about tonight than other nights? I don't know. For some reason I was thinking about Emily as I sung to our middle child (the daughter born just one year after we lost Emily). I thought often goes through my head that if Emily had survived S would not be here. I know God's plan is perfect, but sometimes it is confusing.
Then my thoughts turned to, maybe He did not think we could handle a child with disabilities... I don't want to think that way... We were blessed with her in our lives for a short time and she taught us a lot in that short time and continues to impact conversations that I have with people from time to time.
Once I got past the previous thought I began to think about what it felt like to hold her. I only held her for a short time right before she died, I don't remember what she felt like. The whole evening in the NICU is scattered pieces, that come to my mind once in a while. She only weighted 13 ounces, less than a pound. I can't imagine it was very hard to hold her, yet I can't remember and that makes me sad.

When we first lost Emily I spent hours reading blogs written by women who had lost a child. I often wondered why the posted just stopped. Sometimes it has been only a year, other times it was about two years, but so many of those blogs just stopped and there were no more posts. I wondered what happened to cause the mom to stop writing. I still think about why often. I wonder if someone has found my blog and read it from the beginning and then got to my last post and wondered why I have not posted in almost 3 years (until today that is). I think the reason is very simple, Life Happens. Many have gone on to have another child or children (like myself...we have had two daughters since our loss). As the loss gets further away, the pain is not as intense and we don't need to release as much as we once did. What ever the reason for each person, for all I am sure there was a reason.

I have not felt the need to blog in a long time. I probably won't feel the need to blog very often in the future, but I am so glad that this little place is here for me if I ever need it. This space will be here for anyone who wants to read it. I pray that it is a blessing and maybe even some encouragement that life does get easier and the pain does lessen over time, but it never goes away completely.