Christmas Past

Christmas day is nearly upon us. It can feel quite surreal since Christmas is the start of the worst three weeks of my life.  On December 26th, 2015 the shit hit the fan and the bottom fell out of my world. I can hardly bring myself to write about it. Everything was going “well” (meaning as well as it could while managing meds, seizures, headaches, and fatigue). We had gone Christmas shopping. We had made gingerbread cookies.

We had gone to look at neighborhood lights. We had handed out the year’s ornaments. We had decorated the tree. We had gone to the family Christmas Eve party. We had had a great Christmas day with aunts and uncles and grandparents.We had driven to Maryland to see more family. We had exchanged gifts with them. We were playing games. Until……..until we weren’t.

TJ was playing Settlers of Catan with his sisters and cousins while I chatted with my mom. The kids started screaming and that’s when I found TJ seizing under my mom’s Christmas tree. All the emergency meds later he was being whisked away by an ambulance to Children’s Hospital. The following two weeks were spent in two different ICUs in two different hospitals. We kept being told this was a bump in the road. Until it wasn’t.

Thursday, January 7th. MRI day. It would either tell us what we hoped or what we feared. While I knew any good news was highly improbable, I could have never been prepared to hear how badly my dear sweet son was doing. To hear doctors tell you that your son’s brainstem is herniating  is not something you could ever imagine- and my fiercest prayer is that you never will. I ran out of the room gagging and choking on tears. The end was here. I knew all along this was incurable and that no one had ever survived. It took us a day to decide to take him off life support. At my request, a doctor friend who worked with me came to the hospital and reviewed TJ’s records. I’ll never forget his words. He looked me straight in the eyes all the way to my heart and down into the depths of my soul and said, “Krissy, it’s time.” I struggled to hold back tears and just shook my head, acknowledging the terror that was in my heart.

So this is what I relive every Christmas. Really, it’s not confined to just Christmas but the thoughts and memories and sheer trauma of it all revs up in the pit of my being during this time of year. I know all the grief tips for the holidays and believe me, I do what I can to take care of me. I have visited with friends when I was up to it but also didn’t when I wasn’t. I have carved out time for myself and done things to build new memories with my kiddos. There is one thing I missed this year and I’m very disheartened about it. It has been a tradition to go to Peddler’s Village with them kids to see their tree lighting and the gingerbread houses, and then shop. I had hoped to at least get there one day on my own. There are two shops that TJ loved and I wanted to browse through, but it didn’t happen. I know this will sound silly to some, but I feel like keeping this tradition alive was part of what I do for TJ, even with TJ. I feel as though I’ve let him down, let his memory down. I know this is not the case. But this is the heart of a mama who has lost her son and at times the heart doesn’t make sense. You try to do anything you can think of that you would have done together. You know it will be hard and sad, but also happy and cathartic. So I missed this. This little bit of memory. This little piece of TJ. This little chance to reminisce. 

Fast forward to now. It’s Christmas Eve. Three of my five children are here (in the flesh) and a fourth will be coming tonight as we celebrate with extended family. Presents are wrapped. Tonight’s food is cooked. Tomorrow’s turkey is thawing (God, I pray I took it out in time to thaw!) Enjoying the festivities is always a mixed blessing. Of course seeing family is the best! But NOT seeing them is the worst. So I drift between these two, keeping an eye on my weary heart, like a boat in the vast ocean. I have only to gaze up at the stars, see the moon, and know that TJ is here with me. So if you see me biting my lip or wringing my hands, whisper in me ear, “Look at the moon.” Please and thank you.