The Looming Holiday Season

It's that time of year again. I am really looking forward to Thanksgiving and Christmas, which have been two of my favorite holidays since I was a small child.

This is also a very difficult times of year since Luke and I lost our baby girl. For one thing, she was born just a couple of weeks before Thanksgiving, and she died on New Years Day. So all the major milestones of her life happen during this holiday season. And secondly, any holiday is difficult for parents who have lost a child, no matter when they were born or when they died.

So, it's time for us to decide how we want to remember her birthday (November 12th). And it's time to face the emotional rollercoaster of the holiday season in general. It is so nice to have extra time to spend with loved ones, but every time we are together as a family, her absence looms large in front of me.

There is a hole in our family where a little Liza Jane should be. She would have been right in between my two sisters' kids ages. I love my niece and nephew, but every time I see them, I cannot avoid the painful thoughts of her.

What helps is when people talk about her, when they acknowledge her absence. One of the fears that comes up when somebody dies is that we will forget them. So when people remember her, it makes such a difference.

And I think that's something that makes us human: we remember people after they are gone. It's a way to honor the preciousness of each and every life.

So as we work our way through the emotional rollercoaster of the holiday season, I hope we can appreciate how precious our loved ones are, both those who are here, and the ones who have gone before us into the next life.

Happy New Year

Would Liza have liked this?

That's the question that goes through my mind just about anywhere I go. We got to visit the floor of the Grand Canyon during our New Years trip, and it was all I could think about the entire time.

In the past, I would have been much more focused on absorbing the colors and the sights, capturing forever in my memory the experience, being thankful that I have eyes that can see and legs that can carry me to places like this.

Don't get me wrong, I am truly grateful that I have had the opportunity to visit such an amazing sight. Since she left us, though, everything is different. My first thought at very turn is, "would she like this? Would she have wanted to do this with us?"

We will never know, though, what our little girl's preferences would have been, what she would like and dislike. What her favorite color would have been, or her favorite bedtime story, or her favorite bath toy.

I don't know what is more difficult for parents who have lost a child: losing them young enough that they have to wonder who they would have become, or losing them at an older age. One family I have been following tragically lost a daughter at 5 years old, and many of her favorite things bring back constant memories of her. Each circumstance is difficult and unique.

What further complicates the questions about Liza's preferences for me is the fact that she was born with Down syndrome. I haven't written yet about how we were prenatally diagnosed, which I will do someday. Suffice it to say that Luke and I knew our girl would come with a special extra chromosome in every cell of her body. About half of the individuals born with Down syndrome also have a congenital heart defect. Usually these are very operable, but in Liza's case, it was a more complicated defect, and in the end she did not survive the recovery after surgery. She passed away at just over seven weeks of age.

I don't know very many people with Down syndrome, but from talking with friends who are priveleged enough to have close family members with this condition, I know they don't always enjoy the same things as others might.

So on this trip, I was wondering, would Liza have liked the helicopter ride that brought us to the Grand Canyon floor? Would she have enjoyed the experience of being in these surroundings like her daddy and I did? Or maybe she would not have been comfortable in this environment, would not have found it fun, but rather scary or irritating. It's one of many questions to which we'll never know the answer.

In the meantime, I think of her wherever I am, wondering what it would be like if she were here. This poem has been on my heart today as I remember her, one day after the anniversary of her death, so I will close with these words.

Only Wanted You

They say memories are golden, well, maybe that is true.

I never wanted memories, I only wanted you.

A million times I cried.

If love alone could have saved you, you never would have died.

In life I loved you dearly, in death I love you still.

In my heart you hold a place no one else could fill.

If tears could build a stairway and heartache make a lane,

I'd walk the path to Heaven and bring you back again.

Our family chain is broken, and nothing seems the same.

But as God calls us back one by one, the chain will link again.

- Vicky Holder

Have a blessed year in 2012, everyone. Hold close those that you love and thank God every day for their lives. We don't know the number of days that each of us will have, and every moment we are granted together is precious.