Dear Jakey,
I am really not sure where this letter is going. Usually, I have a good idea of exactly I want to tell you. But the last few days I have been struggling a bit with my thoughts. Everything feels a little disconnected lately – sort of like I am on the outside looking in. It is weird. Yesterday I was in your bathroom with Ethan and I was looking at the two pictures we have hanging in there. They are the big close-ups of you and Ethan after your very first baths. You both look so identical that if it wasn’t for the different towels I couldn’t tell you apart. But I looked at it and I tried so very hard to remember that day. And I couldn’t – I mean I remembered it in a sort of distant way, but in reality it was just looking at a picture. I didn’t remember it like I was there. And then today I was walking up the stairs and there was that picture of you and me at the park in Buenos Aires. I remember it being such a happy day, maybe my happiest ever but it still seems so distant and almost like it wasn’t part of my life. Or not a part of this life. And then that makes me sad. How can you – the most important part of my life feel so separate? I don’t like it. But it is like I am grasping at straws sometimes because I know things will never be what they once were. And I can’t go back no matter how hard I try.
Paulie’s mom asked me today if I felt sad when I was around younger kids. We were at tae kwon do and she always brings Alexandra to class. I told her no – that I was used to it and really okay with it. Which is true – I got so used to our life as it was and really loved you for you – so it didn’t bother me that other kids were healthier and doing different things – at least not mostly. But I told her something that I have found to be true over the last 5 1/2 months. I don’t get sad for younger siblings, I get sad when I see older kids – teenagers or adults in wheelchairs with some of the same problems you had. And I feel bad – like I stare, but stare because I am so sad that it isn’t us anymore. It is really the thing that does me in – I was getting so mentally prepared to take care of you for my whole life and keep you in our home and safe and happy. I had talked about getting an elevator put in and making the adjustments we would need to make. In the airport earlier this week I saw a boy – probably in his late teens – in a wheelchair. Not just a wheelchair but one like yours. That is the part that breaks my heart because we never got to get there together. I was getting so ready buddy. I wasn’t feeling so scared about it. And know it doesn’t matter.
This one isn’t coming out easy Jakey. I am just so lost without you. I keep thinking of life with you and how it is now. It is just different. Today after school Ethan and walked to G. Williker’s to get a birthday present for Ollie and little things for Fiona and Gracie. We just walked over and back and it was easy. No big deal. But tit was something we couldn’t do before. So it just feels weird to be so easy now. Today, Daddy was golfing and was home a little later than we thought. And I couldn’t help but think about how that would have been harder and I would have been more stressed out because it would have been tae kwon do, feeding you, meds and dinner. But this time it wasn’t a big deal. And that too feels wrong. It shouldn’t be this easy.
I miss you. I want you back. I want to be a family of four again. It just felt better.
Love,
Mommy