8 Months

Today is 8 months.  It hasn't been so bad.  I've thought about it a lot and talked about Madeline, but overall it wasn't such a bad day.  Part of the reason it wasn't so bad is that it is my Meme's 94th birthday today.  I went to see her and celebrate so it helped take my mind off of it a bit.  I also told her I'm pregnant.  I'd been waiting until I was a little further along.  She has dementia and memory problems, but she remembers we lost Madeline and I didn't want to put her though that again just in case.  But since everything is looking good so far I thought it was safe to tell her.  I'll be 18 weeks Saturday so I'm starting to feel a little more confident.  She was happy for us and wanted to know if we knew boy or girl yet.  I told her no but we'd tell her when we do know.  It was a nice visit and we had cupcakes to celebrate.  The rest of the day has been pretty uneventful.  I ran some errands, came home and cooked dinner, and now I'm relaxing with the animals.

I still miss her and think about her everyday.  But it's getting easier to think about how happy she made us instead of focusing on the sadness of losing her.  Now, that's not the case every day (and my emotions being all over the place doesn't help).  Last week I had a particularly bad day, but it's to be expected.  There will always be days where it really hits me.

The main thing I'm struggling with right now is guilt about this new baby.  I know logically that having this baby and loving this baby doesn't mean I love or miss Madeline any less.  But emotionally it's hard to separate.  I'm glad today was easier than a lot of the month anniversary days have been, but at the same time I feel bad.  I know I'm allowed to feel better and it's a good thing to not be focusing on only sadness.  Knowing that and actually letting myself feel OK with it are different things.

I still sometimes can't believe I was pregnant a year ago and that I'm close to where I was with Madeline right now.  I hope I'm able to separate this pregnancy from my pregnancy with Madeline through the next month.  I also still can't quite believe it's been 8 months since she was born and we lost her.  There are days it feels like it just happened and days that it feels like it was a long time ago (the past year being a lot of a blur doesn't help with telling time either).  I still wish she were here with us but I'm glad today wasn't as hard as it could have been.