Another Birthday

So it's birthday week.... again. They seem to come faster and faster as the years go by, don't they? This year has been a doozy for me in a number of ways. I'm not sure I even understand why yet. But my birthdaughter, Katie, messaged me and thanked me for thinking of her and sending her a card.

Thinking of her.

That really did it. I asked her if she knew that no matter what was going on in my life, no matter where I was, I started crying like a baby the night before her birthday. Then I assured her that she has never - no, never - been forgotten by me. And then I wished her a happy day celebrating with her friends and family.

My husband can't understand either. He looks at me as I'm crying and replaying the above scene and asks, "But why is this year any harder than any other year?"

Why indeed.

Grief is its own entity. And until you've experienced it firsthand, it doesn't make sense. It lives and it breathes and it comes and goes as it pleases. There is sometimes no rhyme or reason. It makes no sense why the 26th birthday was harder on me than the 20th, or the 12th or the 3rd.

My thinking that I should have this thing licked by now gets me absolutely nowhere. So I just roll with it. I cry (this year in Wal-Mart, my car and at the dinner table) and allow myself the room to breathe.

My poor kids didn't know what to do with themselves. I could tell they were trying to "make mama happy" all day because I was freaking them out.

Now I can breathe a big sigh of relief because I'm almost through it. Who knows? Maybe next year I'll get a respite and Grief won't affect me at all.

Photo credit