I opened it today and cried, cried, cried. Today my grief feels so heavy. I had a few weeks where things seemed to be getting better. [“Getting better” – I use those words carefully because how could things ever really get better when I’ll never get to see you or hold you again? At least, not in this lifetime. Maybe when I pass. For that I pray. When I say “getting better,” what I mean is that I have been more functional and less consumed by my grief.]

And then last night and today it hit me like a ton of bricks again. I’ve been moving things around in preparation for our move move back to LA, and I ended up going through your memory box that Tiffaney the nurse gave us in the hospital. Your feet Noa. They were so tiny! And your hat, still smells like your precious little head. You are my firstborn, my daughter, you always will be. I would give anything for things to have ended differently.

So many questions remain. Why were you taken from me? Why did I not deserve you? Why do other moms get to keep their baby and I could not? Did G-d decide that I wasn’t fit to be your mother? Was I not worthy? You were perfect, and me, I am a mess. Maybe I really didn’t deserve you. Maybe I was too ungrateful during pregnancy. I had no concept of what it meant to be your mom. I was so messed up Noa and I still am. I did many things wrong and sometimes I feel I am being punished. But what kind of G-d punishes a woman in this way? It’s too cruel. There has to be something more. Another explanation. Something bigger than me. I just can’t make sense of it yet.

All I know for sure is that I miss you so much that my longing for you reverberates throughout my bones. It’s a dull, ringing pain that never leaves, and sometimes something triggers a much sharper piercing pain within. I guess from now on, I’ll never know what kind of day I’m going to have. Just the slightest innocent thing can set me off. Last night it was that your dad spent time with an old friend who happened to be 26 weeks pregnant. I was 26 weeks pregnant when I found out you were gone. Gone are those days of pregnancy bliss. Gone is my innocence, and gone is my sense of safety and security. Gone is my wholeness of a person. I really feel as though I am broken now, I have trouble seeing the bright side of things at all. I go through the motions, but I don’t feel true joy anymore. I just keep going because people tell me to. They tell me to get through the days, because one day the pain won’t be so all-consuming, one day I will feel true joy again.