Two years since goodbye

Sunday was two years since Elizabeth died.  The jasmine is blooming again.

Like last year, we went to the beach in the afternoon and wrote her name in the sand and then the waves came and washed it away.

 

I felt - for a fleeting moment there on the beach - like she was back to visit for a tiny second and then back out to sea, with the waves.  

I whispered, "Goodbye till next time, sweet girl."

Embrace the Paranoia

The question keeps surfacing in my mind, how is my parenting different as a result of losing Elizabeth?  I think I have an answer, and it has two parts: 

1.  I am calmer.  That is, I am calmer about things that aren't critical.  I've been through hell, so I'm not going to get that upset over spilled milk or a diaper blowout in the car.  Maybe I'm even more fun, because these days with Ginny seems so precious and unlikely and sweet and nostalgic, even as they are happening.

2.  I am WAY more paranoid.  No scary possibility feels impossible.  Ginny always has one, but often two, breathing monitors at night (the Snuza on her diaper and the Angel Care pad under her mattress).  She has all of her immunizations.  We take car seat safety seriously in this house.  When a dangerously bad stomach bug was going around town, we stopped going to play groups for a few weeks.  I've already been reading up on safety education for kids.  The list goes on...

And so here I am, a strange contradiction:  calmer yet paranoid.  Enjoy the bigger picture perspective on life, and embrace the paranoia as well, I say.  Ginny will be blessed with a mom who lets her make a mess and skin her knees and dress herself in mismatched clothes, but keeps her in a leash in crowds until she's 13.  I'm not entirely kidding.  Can you microchip children, like we did for our dog?

Just chill out, mommy.

The charms we wear

I'm not in the blog world much these days - a perfect storm of travel, holidays, houseguests, and now back to teaching and school for the winter quarter.  I'm only away from Ginny two half-days a week and then fit in the rest of my work around the edges, but it doesn't make for much free computer time.  Reading blogs and posting via the phone while nursing is impossible now - Ginny can sense when the iPhone is near and becomes obsessed with getting her hands on it.  To chew on, of course.  So, for at least a bit I won't be here very often.  There is a backlog of things I want to say.

This is Elizabeth's season now - she was here for all of January and February in 2011.  She is all around and profoundly absent.

Like most BLMs I know, I wear charms of my child(ren).  Recently I switched back to wearing the locket with the big "E" on the front and picture of Elizabeth in it, which I wore every time I left the house for so many long months after she died.  Here newborn Ginny is holding it:

I was wearing a different necklace this summer and fall - one with two charms that say "e" and "v" plus a little pearl.  You can see it in this picture:

I ordered this newer necklace when we picked Virginia as a name.  It was a real leap of faith for me to do that.  I brought it to the hospital for Ginny's birth and put it on right after she was born.  It felt right and fair that they would both be there together as sisters, my two daughters.  But my feelings shifted over the holidays and I gravitated back to the locket.  Elizabeth again has her own space instead of sharing it equally, since Ginny is in every part of our lives every second of the day in such a tangible way.  Her little hands play with the locket while she nurses or stands in my lap, and I tell her, "That's sister Elizabeth's necklace." and wonder how long until she starts to understand.  Does she already, in her own way?