Today in grief 9-29-16. 20 1/2 months after

Baby girl did not want to get dressed for school.  Didn’t want to go, wanted to snuggle. I get it, but were going to school. Had to motivate and motivate her to get dressed by saying “come on we can do it’ “its going to be a good day today not like yesterday” “come on lets go” “ya mommy” she says “not like yesterday”

In the car I suggest to baby girl that when her tummy hurts (her phrase for anxiety) she could go see the school counselor just to have a nice place to take a break for 10 minutes or so. “no mommy I’m not doing that”

Get to school. Take her to class. Teacher approaches me about email I sent her about yesterday. We talk about it in code that I’m pretty certain baby girl can understand and hear even though she is on the other side of the room. She knows we were talking about yesterday. Mom of another student approaches me about blog I wrote about yesterday. Says how she can relate, we talk about it for a few, again sure baby girl knows were talking about her.

Leave classroom and go talk to school counselor. She knows our story but I’ve never really talked to her before.  Try to come up with a plan to help baby girl’s anxiety.  Talk about all we have gone through and how hard it’s been. And now I’m crying in front of the school counselor. My five minute ‘I’ll just run this thought by her’ turned into a half hour conversation about how hard it is without Dan, complete with a sobbing widow trying to keep it together.

Left school and went to pick up wedding paraphernalia with baby sister (three days until her wedding) go to the adorable rental store. Walk around, there’s a sign that says “I am my beloveds and my beloved is mine” Dan always use to tell me that. Heavy sigh. Another sign “Always and forever” That WAS us but not anymore. Deep breathe. Everywhere I turn things about true love.  Can we leave now?

Drive home with baby sister. Discuss how she is incorporating Dan into the wedding. It’s a good plan, I like it. I hold back tears, can’t lose it while I’m driving.

Go to Costco for wedding food. That’s just plain exhausting for anyone.

Go to pharmacy to pick up my my monthly prescriptions of anti-depressants and anxiety pills. They help keep me somewhat sane. Pharmacy tech is a mom from school, she tells me how much she appreciates my blog. "Thank you" I say, continually surprised that people actually read it.

Take baby girl to dentist for the first time since my husband died and we lost the good insurance through his work and we had to sign up for state health insurance.  I feel like I tried about 50 times to find a dentist that took our state health insurance and I gave up. Who needs a dentist anyway? Grandma found and made this appointment for baby girl, all I had to do was take her. All went well they were incredibly nice and baby girl has no cavities. Upon leaving I made an appointment for her next checkup in 6 months. The receptionist said is 503-775-2453 still the best number to reach you at. That's Dan's phone number. Thus I was taken aback and said “what did you just say.” She repeated his number again. I don't even know. How did they get that number when we signed up for this insurance after he had died? I didn’t give them that number. How is it in their system? Still flabbergasted and trying not to cry I said something about how no that was the wrong number. Baby girl then asked what was going on and I told her they had daddy's number written down and not mine. Then baby girl proceeded to ignore (that’s what she does when we talk about daddy) But the receptionist could tell I was distraught and was giving me wondering looks to which I said “it's a long story” and she shook her head and said “It’s ok I get it.”  No you don’t get it, because I can almost guarantee she was thinking we were going through some sort of nasty divorce and I didn’t want any contact with him. So then I wanted to tell her he died because for some reason that was better but I also wanted to get out of their so we just left.

Went and got our nails done for baby sister’s wedding. By chance a man was doing my nails. I came to the realization that no man has held my hands since Dan died. O how I missed Dan's hands. Spent a long time comparing Dan’s hands and the manicurist’s hands in my head. Got a French manicure, pretty sure the last time I got one of those was at my own wedding. Close my eyes to hold in tears.  Hear baby sister across the room, she is getting a pedicure. Her lady is asking her about her tattoo on her ankle. “That’s for my brother in law who passed away…a seizure… That’s his wife over there… ya that’s his daughter…” Close my eyes some more. I am tired.

I wrote a book about my grief, you can read it here: Carry on Castle