Here we are, in the midst of another holiday season. This will be our second without Adelaide. I woke up on Thanksgiving morning feeling remarkably stable and looking forward to cooking our meal together. Which is bizarre on its own because I rarely enjoy cooking but I was enjoying the quiet ease of the day. It was just the three of us and there was comfort in that simplicity. Then the grief hit me out of nowhere while I was setting the table. The event planner in me loves a beautifully set table so even though it was just us I went all out with linens and candles and serving dishes. I stood back to appreciate my work and the sight of the three place settings hit me hard. Which is silly, really, Adelaide hadn’t eaten with us at the table since she was nine months old before infantile spasms first struck. Sometimes we would roll her chair up to the table but, more often than not, if she was resting peacefully we would just leave her wherever she was. Regardless, she never had her own place setting so why was this visual at our Thanksgiving table hitting me so hard? Grief sucks like that, there is nothing rational about it, it just happens. 

I have no idea what to expect at Christmas this year. We’ll be driving to my parents in North Carolina and am looking forward to seeing family. However, it will be my first time back to their home since we spent Adelaide’s last Christmas there. In the one week we spent with them I had to resuscitate her three times with an ambu bag, once on Christmas Eve. As I sat next to her at 2am on Christmas morning trying to get her vitals stable, debating whether it was even worth it to call an ambulance, I desperately wished that she would make it so that we wouldn’t have to tell Jackson that his sister had died before he opened gifts. That Christmas was memorable for all the wrong reasons but we were together, she survived, and that morning that was all that mattered. 

Look, the holidays are hard for a lot of us, there’s no way around it, but this year we’re trying, as a family, to find ways to make them a little less painful. I’ve tasked Jackson with picking out a new ornament for our tree every year that reminds him of Adelaide. It’s simple but will keep her a part of our celebrations. I’m also keeping my self-expectations pretty low: head down, stay busy, push through but take breaks when I need them. I’m also easing off the forced gratitude this year. This concept came up among my child-loss mom friends and it struck such a strong chord with me. Here’s the thing, I have a lot to be grateful for, I know this. But I don’t need to list them off for the world to hear because while, yes, I’m fortunate in so many ways, it can be pretty difficult to marry that with the loss we’ve experienced. I was relieved we could all be together that Christmas morning but grateful wasn’t exactly the right world to describe how I felt about ‘bagging’ her for eight minutes so that we could be. 

Having gratitude forced upon us when all we feel is grief can feel like our loss is being diminished. If it’s ok to not be ok, then I say it’s ok to not always be grateful too. Or maybe it’s more complicated than that. I can be grateful for Jackson’s well-being and hold space for the grief and anger for my children that were not. But it’s taken me time to get a place where I can process and hold such contradictory emotions. For those that the pain is too fresh or deep to acknowledge the expected gratitude of the season, I see you. Shitty things happen and you don't have to pretend that they don’t just because a Hallmark movie says you should. Right now, survive. The gratitude can wait until you’re ready.