Underground Aging

It's not often I cry at Rachel's grave anymore... I more or less just make sure everything is pretty and then leave.  Today on the way over there, things seemed to be falling into place too nicely...  the stops we made were all 'in and out' with well behaved children and nice service.  Desirae even commented on how nice one guy was. 

I should have known it was the calm before the storm.

Or maybe it's more along the lines of the fact that I wasn't preoccupied mentally and emotionally with all my little troubles when I got there.

Either way, after standing at her grave for a few minutes, a little girl on a bike and her dad rode by.  I heard her voice and her giggles from a distance as they talked while they rode around.  I looked back to the ground where my little girl is....  I used to struggle with the visions in my mind of what the underground aging process looks like, but that hasn't happened in a while either.  I've slowly learned how to snap back from those thoughts and not allow them.  Somehow today, I couldn't stop it.  And in a unexplainable kind of way, I wanted to know.  So I went there.

I pictured her blanket (identical to the one I sleep with) and her little sheep (identical to the one on her hope chest) and my imagination tried to do a 'this is what she would look like after two years underground' photo edit.  And as I saw her little face in my mind, no longer looking perfect, a feeling that I have yet to feel standing on that ground hit me.

A relentless anger.

A real physical reaction to how little control I have over this. 

Total devastation that my baby is in a casket disintegrating in the cold ground.

Instantly tears starting to fall, but they weren't soft.  They felt heavy and cold.  I angrily wiped them away.  But I couldn't keep up with them.  My jaw got tight and, like a little child infuriated by the injustice of the world, I clenched my fists and firmed my stance and growled in frustration.

If you've ever seen a mother give birth, you know the involuntary noises her great pain brings.... yep, I sounded similar in the cemetery.  And I didn't even care if any of the many people there to walk, bike and walk dogs heard me.

For 3 minutes I felt an anger that could have taken down Goliath with my bare hands.

And then I wiped my face and went home. 

It's all part of my journey through anencephaly.... and the aftermath it leaves after taking my child away.  I know I'm not the only one who has these feelings or thoughts - but somehow that doesn't make it any easier.  She's still my girl, in the ground - no matter how many times I have heard or thought "she's not really there."   She is.  Her toes, her nose, her fingers (does she still have dimples on her knuckles?), her eyes, her long dark hair..... it's all there.

And I'm still here. 

Standing alone on the ground that separates us. 

Waiting for an eternity that won't.

And no matter how thankful I am for that promise - it still hurts like hell on earth.  It still burns like a lake of fire in my soul.  I feel the effects of sin and I hate it.  I hate it with every inch of my being.  I hate that it took my daughter from me.  And I wish God would have stopped it.  He could have.  Why didn't He?

Tonight, as we drove home, I was again so disheartened by the halloween gore all around.  There is a yard around the corner from us that has a fake tomb stone that says "RIP Miss N Cranium".  It's all I can do to not go there, tell them that my daughter was missin' her cranium and DIED and it's not a freakin' joke and ask if they would put a tomb stone in their yard that says "RIP cancer patient".  I mean seriously, is this what we call 'festive decoration'??  And the caskets and fake skeletons coming out of the ground everywhere ..... ugh.... really bad timing for my day.  As I write this, I'm wondering if that actually initiated the scary thoughts in my mind.   But that's a whole other story... and a very sensitive subject so I'll stay away from it.  But I just don't see how all the evil things that are idolized on this 'holiday' can be considered harmless.... they certainly 'harm' me year after year.   But I guess if 'it' doesn't happen to you, then none of that would seem important - just something else I need to get over...  and besides, with all those cute ladybugs and candy how could it be a bad thing?  Maybe if people put cute ladybugs and superheros all over their yards, I'd feel differently... ok, I'm getting off the subject, no hate mail please.... I'm so not in the mood. 

Today was hard.  End of story.