I'm Not Alright

 Today for us, is a day when most new parents celebrate the first month of their new childs life, but for us it is another reminder of our reality that our baby is gone.  To be completely honest the last two days have been nearly impossible for me to get through because the pain in my heart is unbearable.  What does depression look like?  I am sure for some people it is competely different than me, but lately it is so hard to get out of bed.  Yesterday I just laid in bed for an hour, wide awake and not even able to go back to sleep, and all I could do was just lay there.  My legs worked quite alright, and I could even move my upper body but I could not convince myself to get out of bed.  I feel like a zoombie.  The only way I know that I am alive is by the beating of my heart in my chest. 

When people ask me "how are you doing" I wonder how to even respond. Do they want to hear the truth, that I walk around from time to time in a coma because the pain of reality is too much to bear?  I doubt it.  I have thought of making business cards directing people to the blog and say, "if you really want to know go here."  I realize that this is an oversimplifacation of people, because there are many wonderful people out there who ask us how we are doing and if I do let the ugliness that lives inside out, they still love us. But sometimes I wonder how many times they hear the truth before they turn and run away from us and never ask again. 

So how did we celebrate one month of our baby living with Jesus?  We went to our favorite place...Chick-fil-a and enjoyed a free lunch because we both broke down and started crying at the cash register (just joking, they had a special going on).  We took our lunch with us and went to the park and sat in the area where we celebrated Whitney's life with our parents and enjoyed the beauty of the day.  Sitting in that place was comforting because I believe Whitney would have loved being outside hiking with her dad and Grandpa Jay.  Somehow in that comfort there is also so much anguish because I would trade anything in this world for her to be with me and her grandpa.  There are times when this life is a cruel joke.  Would that be a good answer to some unsuspecting person who flippantly askes me "how are you doing"?  A CRUEL JOKE!  That would probably envoke the same response my cats give me when I started crying uncontrolably when Sheyenne showed me her latest video. 

So how am I doing today?  I am not alright.  I thank Santus Real for writing a song that helps depict my heart and what I am feeling.  I could not have said this any better, so I want to share it with you. (You have to click on it then go to YouTube to watch it... for some reason, embeding is disabled.)

 

Please continue praying for us.  I had a great conversation today with two children that lost a sister when she was a baby.  They asked me what was Whitney's animal, and I told them it was a bunny.  Thinking that was it, they asked me what her others ones were, so I paused and thought about it and said a squirrel, and then he asked me again about other ones and I told him a penguin too.  Then I was asked about her favorite color, and I thought about it and figured it would be like her mommy and replied black and white and then I thought of all the money that would have been spent on her clothes...yikes!  As painful as it is, I love thinking about my daughter.  It hurts, but guess what...I am hurting anyways and I would like thinking about good as opposed to bad.  Please don't forget about her.  I know the reality of life will come eventually and her life will fade away from people's everday thoughts, but if you want to ask a hurting dad what he thinks Whitney's favorite flowers would be, or songs, or movies, or animals, or food I beg you to ask.