Tonight I attended the wake of a beautiful 13 month old baby boy.  This little boy was born with a cleft pallatte among other problems.  He was fed through a tube inserted directly into his stomach his entire life, suffered multiple seizures and needed an oxygen tube to help him breathe.  His mother gave up everything to take care of him.  She is only 23 years old and will bury her son tomorrow morning.  I felt horrible tonight because I had to bring my week and a half old baby boy with me to the wake.  I will not be attending the funeral tomorrow because I don't want to make this any harder on her than it already is.  I know my husband's family loves me and our son, but I also know they will understand why I can't be there. 

Tonight, people kept asking me if I was ok.  I tried so hard not to let anyone see me cry, and when I got home, I nursed my new baby boy and bawled.  I'm crying again as I type this.  I'm crying for every mother who has ever lost a child and every mother who has ever had a sick child.  I look at my precious baby boy and I can't imagine how gut-wrenching it would be to lose him.  I can't believe how incredibly lucky I am to have not one, but two beautiful, healthy children.  We have beat the odds it seems, because there is a 50/50 chance my husband will pass a genetic disorder onto his children and so far it looks as if both of them have escaped unharmed.

The truth is, I feel like hell at the moment.  I am an emotional wreck.  I am still on such a high from giving birth less than two weeks ago (having a VBAC was the most amazing experience of my life) and am still totally lost in my babymoon.  At the same time, I am mourning the loss of this little boy who was my children's cousin.  My husband thinks of him as a nephew, considering he looks at the mother as a sister more than a cousin.  My daughter saw this boy just last weekend when the family got together to celebrate his first birthday.  He and his mother were home from California where she is stationed with the US Navy.  We all agree that he knew he was home and that his mother would be taken care of here.  She has been so strong through all of this.  She took care of him by herself after his father left and I never heard her complain.

I wanted this to be a thoughtful, well-written journal about appreciating what we have, but it just turned into hormonal drivel.  I just really want to stress to everyone who reads this, cherish every moment you have with your shildren.  Don't ever take their health for granted.  Hug and kiss them every single day.  To the hundreds, maybe thousands, of moms on this site who have lost a child, my heart goes out to you.  You are the strongest people in the world to carry on with your lives after such a tragedy.  All of us are lucky to have children and I hope none of us ever forget that.

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