I’m staring at the photo of you I selected for this post and for your obituary. It’s one of  the few photos that we have of you and it’s how I always remember you.

My sweet red headed baby.

It never gives me any comfort to think of you as an adult spirit. You were my sweet, snuggly little baby and it’s how you stay in my mind.

Oddly, though…I feel the need and absolute desire to talk to you like a grown up today.

You would have been an amazing man, Matthew. Talented. Kind. Gentle. Strong. Much stronger than your mother ever could be. I wish more than anything that I could see you as a happy, fulfilled adult some day.

But it can never be because you died.

It’s been six years today since that horrible day that ripped us all to more pieces then we’ll ever find again.

I feel like I have aged centuries in these six years, Matthew.

There are so many thoughts twisting up my heart and tumbling through my mind this year about you.

I wonder if you knew your brother Aaron before he came to us. Somehow I keep thinking that you must have had a say in just what kind of spirit was going to be sent to our little family. If you knew that our family needed this particular little bundle of sweetness that is your little brother?

Aaron being here is very…complicated.

When I thought about what having a new baby in our family would be like I could easily imagine all the love and joy. I didn’t anticipate how much seeing and having a little one that is so close to your age on this day would hurt and tear at me.

Sometimes when I kiss the bridge of his nose I flash back to what it felt like to kiss yours. When he’s sleeping and I can only see the top of his head and nose I see such strong glimpses of you. It fills me with such joy to see you in some form that is alive and in motion that it takes my breath away much of the time.

While I absolutely love him for the individual that he is, seeing you in him can make me so happy my heart almost bursts.

I wish I could say that it was all good images that I remember. Too often when I snuggle or kiss or nod off rocking him I start in a cold sweat remembering your cold skin, your horrible wounds, the way your little body felt in my arms when your breath left it and you turned cold.

Do you know what that does to someone?

Sometimes I have had to look up to see hell.

If only I could give you my life to give you yours back; to make you breathe, live and grow, I would. I would trade my existence for yours without a moment of hesitation. I would fight tooth and nail and bloody my hands pulling and trying for the mere chance to make it happen. I try to live with my fury and disappointment at the inadequacies of the natural laws of this world that will never allow my to even TRY angers me, like so many other things regarding your loss. I try to put my rage at your loss on the least harmful targets as possible to spare those around me,  but it doesn’t always work.

What’s in my head escapes and hurts myself and others. I wish they would go away. There isn’t a far enough, dark enough, safe enough place that I can find to erase those images and there are many times that I have thought they would drive me insane. So insane I thought it would be impossible to survive through your loss many times, Matthew.

I often feel I will never be whole again.

But…

There is Aaron…this little baby.

A second chance.

And while it is still so very hard and I sit here struggling to get out of this very big hole I’m in?

I love him so much.

He has brought so much love and happiness to our family, Matthew.  He has made your loss more bearable in so many ways. Your father is a different man since he was born. Your brothers are proud little mother hens that adore and watch out for him.  He has saved your mother.

I wonder if you know all these things.

I hope so.

I know that you didn’t want to leave us, I KNOW IT.  I don’t blame you for ANY OF THIS.

Never.

EVER.

You are my sweet, sweet boy and you always will be.

I have to think and believe with how much we loved and treasured you that you miss us deeply and wish you were here with us as much as we long to have you back with our family.

No matter how lovely and perfect heaven is supposed to be?

I can’t imagine it being happier than being here with those that loved you so, so much.

Sometimes I feel silly writing these things to you or talking to you in the shower or in those really horrible hours of the morning with the light is blue and cold and lonely.

So many people of faith around me say that you are with me, that you are my guardian angel, that you are proud of me. I’m not sure about that. I want it to be that way. I want you to be around me, guarding me, giving me comfort, being proud of me.

If you are up there or here or wherever and you can see my life and be with me?

I’ve done the best I can, but I am not capable of a lot.

I’ve hurt so many.

I’ve lost so much.

I’m so messed up.

I have set back after setback after setback. I think that I am doing well, that things are better, that I can actually function and be free of this debilitating sorrow that is so tied to you and then BAM!

I’m proved wrong.

I’m in a pretty dark and deep hole right now, Matthew. I wish I could be different for you. For everyone. For myself. I wish I could just be…fixed.

I have so many good and wonderful things about me. Why can’t they just stay center stage and outshine the other all the time?

Why do I keep falling down SO HARD?

So MANY times.

It’s exhausting to keep going through. For me and everyone that touches my life. It’s too much sometimes. I wish I could look at this like someone I want to get away from and distance myself from it.

I don’t have that luxury.

I get to stay right here. Front and center. Yippee.

And I feel like a failure.

Over and over and over again people tell me that you are here, with me and that you will give me comfort when I feel you.

But I don’t.

I don’t feel you here with me.

What kind of horrible mother says that?

Doesn’t feel their child’s spirit around them?

So I try.

I pretend.

I hope, and wish and try to FORCE IT TO BE SO.

But I just…don’t.

It has tortured me for a very long time.

A longtime friend that knows me inside and out lost their father at a young age and I confided this horrible guilty secret to them quite some time ago. They told me that it took years and years before they could take comfort and feel their dad around them. They were just too hurt and in pain to do so before then.

Just like they knew it would, it comforted me and gave me hope that one day I might.

That it would help combat how I feel all the time.

I hurt for you. I ache for you all the time.

I cry and sob and RAGE that you didn’t get more time here.  That you didn’t make it to four months like your brother did. That you will never have a first day of school, a first kiss, fall in love or give me a beautiful redheaded grand daughter to make up for the fact that your father is the only single chromosome male IN EXISTENCE.

Not one single day goes by where there isn’t at least a twinge of pain in my heart for you and it shows.

The fall out from your death is so big and ugly I wonder if I will ever stop feeling the effects of it. I have been asked again and again and again if it gets easier.

Sometimes I am actually truthful in my answer.

No.

No, it doesn’t.

It never, ever gets easier…I just get better at dealing with it.

Until I don’t.

And the process starts all over again.

I know this has been a hard day. A difficult letter. One I hope you understand.

Even if I am not through enough of my hurt and pain to feel you here with me yet?

If you’re really here?

Please don’t leave me.

Please.

To get through life without you I will need you by me every second of the way until I see you again.

Until I do?

I think about you.

I miss you.

I love you.

ALWAYS,

Your mama.

Aaron is 4 months old.

I can hardly believe it. He is still alive at 4 months old. I am so grateful I could (and do) weep with thankfulness. Aaron has eyes on him almost every moment of the day and night. I stay up with him until around 3 to 6 in the morning (depending on the exhaustion level and schedules of us all) when my parents or Jon stay with him while I sleep until around 10am to noon-ish (again, depending on exhaustion and schedules). I know that it seems crazy. Unless you have had a baby die of SIDS. Then? It makes perfect sense.

These 4 months have been so joyous, but also so very stressful.

We all worry, worry, WORRY about and fuss over this wee bundle of sweetness.

Before he died, Matthew got sick. It started out with goopy eye discharge and grew into congestion that lasted the 1.5 weeks before he died. The medical examiner that did his autopsy (and no, I still cannot write that word without dread) said that his illness contributed to his death.

Last week, Aaron got the SAME symptoms at the exact SAME time as Matthew.

He got very sick.

I freaked out.

FREAKED OUT.

We are extra cautious and vigilant and I still have a constant knot of painful worry in my stomach, even though his symptoms are greatly improved.

Nothing can happen to this baby.

Please?

I know that everyone loves and adores their children but people, this little baby is WORSHIPED by everyone in our family. He has saved us all and makes us all so happy. I love, adore and cherish every single second I get with him. I could stare at him 24/7. I love his expressions.

He is seriously the sweetest, snuggliest, laid back, sweet tempered, awesome little love.

I love how round he is.

I would also like to point out to you a feature in this shot. See that thing next to the tooth he got in a week ago or so?

YUP. TOOTH NUMBER TWO! (Seriously, this growing has GOT to slow down a little before I start to cry. Again.)

The kid has THE hairiest eyebrows. I love them. It’s like someone went and stuck two fuzzy caterpillars on his face.

HIS EYEBROWS GET BEDHEAD, PEOPLE.

For reals.

SEE???????

Seriously, how cute can you get?

I am so thankful for him.

This month has been one of the hardest I have had since Matthew died. With Matthew’s anniversary on Wednesday, this month is always very hard. But SO many other hard things are happening and hitting me and my family. Yeah, I have a drama-filled life but honestly, this month blows my usual happenings all to hell. My husband knows the most of everything, certainly more than anyone else, and even he is not privy to everything.

I’m not in the best place.

Not at all.

But?

Aaron is my secret weapon. My big gun of defense. He is a like a shot of sunshine, joy and love, all in one.

He is just about the only thing keeping me together right now.

He is what makes being in this ugly hole so different.

He gives me the most important thing of all when you get in this kind of state: HOPE that things can and WILL get better.

I love him fiercely and forever.

I’m so grateful he’s still here.

Aaron Michael Choate
Born: May 19, 2009
Days on earth: 108

I have been waiting for this day.

Hoping for it.

Dreading it.

So many people don’t get why it even matters to me.

My answer:

It just does.

It matters a lot.

Aaron reaches 108 days on the earth today.

The same number of days his older brother lived before dying of SIDS.

108 days.

That doesn’t seem very long, does it?

It’s not.

Especially when you are talking about an entire lifetime for someone; when you consider that it has been 2,171 days that we have gone without our sweet, sweet baby boy to hold and kiss and cherish.

While 108 days doesn’t seem very long at all in comparison to 2,171 days, it was absolutely long enough for my wee baby boy to imprint his soul on my heart so deeply I will never let go.

That part didn’t take long at all-it happened the instant I saw him. He was MINE. My strong, sweet, red headed little man.

My Little Bug.

108 days of love and wonder and joy was all we were given with him.

So few blissful days with Matthew, so many dark ones without.

I look down at Aaron and feel so much happiness my heart hurts. I see his cute round eyes, his little nose, and watch all his adorable movements, coo’s and smiles and it lifts me up more than I ever thought I could be again.

I took this video, not only because I adore my baby but it is for a very pointed illustration so that you can try to understand me. It’s short (and cute) so please…watch it?

He’s adorable, no? This stage of life is so precious and sweet that I wish I could stay up 24/7 just to watch every single second of it. I cannot see this without thinking about my Matthew. How similar they are to me.

How I love them both so much.

How Aaron is still here.

How Matthew is not.

He’s not here because he died.

At 108 days.

One moment he was as alive and sweet and precious and HERE as much as Aaron is in this video; I blinked and he was dead and cold and more still and quiet than any baby should ever be.

HE DIED.

MY LITTLE SON DIED.

I still cannot comprehend it sometimes. Sometimes I will say it over and over and type it over and over and still, I cannot make myself believe that those words belong in my life, my history.

Sitting here thinking about the little one I lost squeezes my heart with a hurt so intense I can’t breathe. So sharp that I just want to run and run and RUN from it.

Holding Aaron’s tiny warm body to my chest listening to his sweet sounds I remember how I sat in a trauma bay holding my quiet and still little one and felt the heat leave his body and the terrible sound of the last bits of oxygen exiting it and I cannot fathom how I survived it.

How did I survive Matthew dying?

I get asked that question all the time.

I ask myself the same question regularly:

How did I live through burying my child?

How did I survive something that horrifying?

HOW AM I STILL BREATHING WHEN MY BABY IS NOT?

How, how, HOW?!

The truthful answer?

I have no idea.

It certainly wasn’t what I had in mind.

It certainly wasn’t my intent.

That is a story for another day, though.

But…that day is coming.

Soon.

I’m finally brave enough to talk about it.

But not today.

Today is enough of a struggle.

I didn’t want today to be about my sorrow and fear and pain.

I wanted it to be about my joy that Aaron is HERE.

HERE WITH ME.

ALIVE.

For which I am more grateful than most of you have any idea.

It’s just hard.

So hard that some days that I feel like I can’t take a breath because my grief has taken up every molecule in my body and all I want in the world is to be with my little one and rage and scream and cry that I cannot.

It is still so hard.

STILL.

Even after 2,171 days.

I have held up these 108 days so much better than I thought I would. There has been much less anxiety and fear than I anticipated.

Today was going to be a joyful day of celebration for my son and the life he is living with me and I expected it would be. However, I have learned that expectations often get the middle finger in the grieving process. You have to take what is in front of you and deal with it.

And what is in front of me on day 108 is sobbing, pain and sharper sorrow for the loss of my baby than I was prepared for.

So, I will deal with that today.

I will allow myself to be sad.

And come day 109?

I hope to have joy.