11 years today precious Bella
My darling Belsie, it’s your mom.
Eleven years ago today since I got to physically call you my Belsie for the last time. To hold you, cuddle you, kiss you.
You died on a Tuesday, and your anniversary today falls on a Tuesday again. This adds a different dynamic – my mind has been in overdrive the last few days, remembering so many things from 11 years ago. Some things are still just so clear in my mind around those few days before you died.
I’m am trying to sit in the discomfort of today, not really being able to be at home, especially over the time that you died because it all just feels too hard. It all quite raw and really just deeply sad.
I have photos and videos of your last few days – of you and Murray, but mainly of you. I can’t bring myself to look at them or to watch them. It still just feels too hard. Maybe one day I will be able to, but not today.
I lit your beautiful candle this morning, and it will burn all day until we go to sleep, in remembrance of you and your little brother Thomas. It fills our home with this beautiful, radiant smell, as I know you would have filled our home with your beautiful radiance in every way.
As you know, on these days I really try to hide from the world, or rather, I need to hide from the world. I need to not have to pretend to feel anything but what I feel, and I need to be quite selfish with my space and who I allow into it. This is how I have learned to cope with these days.
Those first few years after losing you were so brutal. To try to find any joy was so complicated. Grief consumed so much, and when I caught myself feeling joy, happiness, smiling, I would berate myself, shut it down, feel such shame – because how could I feel that while grieving you as well?
What I have learned in later years, thank goodness, is the ability to hold the AND with my grief. The ability to grieve you AND also be grateful for the life that we do live. And really, to be able to lean into that gratitude, lean into finding joy, lean into being able to celebrate, knowing that I am not betraying you or your memory by doing so. Knowing that, rather, I am celebrating the life that we are so grateful we get to live, even though it looks very different to how we had hoped.
It’s a beautiful life nonetheless.
With Murray going off to boarding school next year and no longer living full-time in our home, the last few months feel like they have taken on a different energy, a different intentionality, which has been wonderful to lean into. While my heart feels quite broken that I won’t get to say good night to him physically every night or see him first thing in the morning anymore, I feel in my heart that it’s also the right thing for him. He is so excited about this next chapter.
It means that I am really relishing every good morning chat, every good night cuddle, every shared reflection of a normal day, every opportunity to make memories that will live with all of us forever. We have raised him with the confidence to know who he is and what he needs, and so it’s important that he gets to walk this journey without us holding too tight because of what our hearts need and crave – we need to loosen our grip, let him fly.
I know that next year is going to be extraordinarily hard, for me mostly I think. Home is going to be so so quiet! But it will also invite in a new season for all of us. I know that it can be hard and good, all in the same breath.
Belsie, your absence in our home is felt every day. You are often in conversation, and I look at your smiling little face in the photographs dotted around our home.
I am grateful to be your mom. I am grateful that you chose us as your family. I am grateful for the life that we get to live. I am grateful that I get to make you proud.
I love you, now and always.
Your mom
isabella1509 