Live for the Lessons..

It has felt like the past few weeks have been a little rough.  I have been having flashbacks, much like I would imagine someone with PTSD would have.  Only I am flashing back to the last few weeks with Tatum, and what could have been different to keep her here with us a little longer.  My brain cannot stop sending these flash backs and I feel like it is making me a little crazy.  I am nervous sometimes that my filter might slip off and I may say something that I regret.  I don't every want to be offensive to people, but right now I feel like i can't make any promises.  You've all been forewarned.
So tonight Lance and I were going to a dinner for our surrounding neighborhoods (our stake).  I love these kind of things, or at least I used to.  Right now I have sever anxiety about meeting new people, and at this there was a good chance that we would have to talk to people that we don't know.   When we walked in we spotted a few tables with people that we know.  We stopped and talked for a minute.  One of our neighbors were sitting at a table by themselves so Lance walked over to sit by them.  All I saw was a potential for 2 other couples that we didn't know to sit by us.  Guess what happened, exactly that!  The couple next to us introduced themselves and we talked for a second then we all went and got our food.  It wasn't long before the lady next to me was commanding the conversation, or maybe monopolizing it.  That was fine with me, less chance to have to answer questions.  Before I knew it she was talking directly to me, then the dreaded question came, "What ages are your kids?"  I decided to tell it all to see if it even stopped her for a second from talking.  I told her our oldest would be 20, but he died when he was 18 months old, then we have a 17 year old, a 16 year old a 13 year old a 10 year old a 3 year old and we would have a one year old but she died about 4 months ago.  She paused for a minute, didn't ask how they died or consider that our youngest had just barely died before she started vomiting her miracle story of her youngest all over me.  She was born at 36 weeks and it is a miracle that she is alive.  Then I got the ENTIRE life story of this 10 year old girl.  Honestly, what a moron!  Just a heads up, it kind of hurts to hear the "miracle" stories when your daughter is the one that just barely died.  Just saying.   It wouldn't have been so bad had I known this lady from Adam.  I am not sure she took a breath the entire night.  I was exhausted by the end of the night.  I was grateful that I was able to keep my PTSD remarks in check, cause I was sure thinking them.

On a nicer note, I wanted to share the cutest story about Holden.  Holden is always so quiet.  Because of this I don't always write about him.  He really is such a sweet boy.  When we were in California and he and Hayden were fighting, they both got grounded because they  would. not. stop.  Later, Holden came up and asked me if Hayden was going to loose his Birthday party because he was grounded.  That sounded like a good idea to me, but I told him no, that they would only be grounded until Friday, so we could celebrate his birthday on Saturday.  Holden said, "Ok, because I was going to say I could take his grounding if he was going to loose his party "  It was a proud moment to think that he had that much love and respect for his older brother even though he often treats him like junk.  Holden certainly has the forgiving heart.

This afternoon Halea was practicing her face painting skills on Hilary because she was volunteering at one of the school carnivals and she was the face painter.

Holden and Hilary were good sports.  I think that Hilary enjoyed it a little more than Holden did.

 This was a kids meal toy  It came with a hat that has donkey ears on it and she was running around hee hawing.  It was too funny.

Sporting her new Dora jammies from her cousin in California

 It is dreaded Friday so one of my friends brought me flowers.  I will never be able to adequately thank everyone that has held my hand through this really hard journey.   I can't even put into words how much I have been missing Tatum.  I read a few of my blog posts that I wrote before she died and I just want to zap myself back there.  I feel like I am in a bad dream and I can't escape it.  I am freaking out because I feel myself forgetting what she felt like to hold.  Yesterday Hilary wanted me to paint her fingernails and I had flashbacks of painting Tate's.  What I wouldn't give to bring her back.  I miss taking care of her so much.   I miss seeing the interactions with her and the other kids.  I miss kissing her and smelling her.  I just can't even explain the emptiness.
I have been thinking a lot about how I have made it this far.  How has my heart continued to beat in my chest despite it's complete brokenness?  How have I continued to breath?  How have I continued to get out of bed every morning even though I do not ever want to start yet another day without her here?  The only explanation I have is that the Savior has filled in where I could not.  I do my best and He does the rest.  I have put my whole faith in Him and I have been carried these past few months.  There is no other explanation.  What I feel like I have tried to do for my part of the whole deal is to try and stay close to the spirit.  I try to invite the spirit into my life.  I know, now, more than I ever did how vital this is to the survival of our spirit.  I think that when we stop searching to feel the spirit, is when the door is opened for Satan to put fear and doubt in our minds about what we know is true.  If I allow myself to go for long periods of time without feeling the spirit or recognizing the Savior in my life, that is when the pervasive evilness of the world can creep into my thoughts and I forget my purpose.  We are at a time when we can not be too careful in protecting ourselves.  I am sure this is one of the great lessons that Tatum came to specifically teach me.  She left me yearning for the feeling that I had around her.  I felt it with Trevin too, but I had become so busy that I had forgotten how much I needed that feeling always in my life.  I am not  perfect at creating the environment to have those feelings close all of the time, what with the crazy thoughts I was having while the lady was vomiting her life story all over me tonight.  But I am trying my darnedest to stay focused.  I want to always honor the lessons that I have learned from being their mom.  I am lucky in so many ways.