I thought it would hit me as we crested the path, and I saw the sunlight sparkle across the water for the first time in four years. But it didn’t.

Maybe it would happen when I entered the bedroom we had shared, and I saw where her mattress had laid on the floor next to our bed. But it didn’t.

Maybe when I sat on the deck, when we walked on the beach, or when it was time to go. But it didn’t.

I prepared myself to feel it as our eleven-hour road trip came to a close and the interstate road signs once again became familiar.

But it didn’t. 

I have been visiting Lake Michigan since I was a baby. Not every summer, but a lot of them. I brought Jackson during my maternity leave; he was only 4 weeks old. Adelaide was a year and a half the first time she sat with me on the deck, wearing a sunhat and enjoying the breeze coming off the lake.

In Michigan she seemed to relax right along with the rest of us. Maybe it was that she wasn’t being carried in and out of the car to doctors or therapy appointments, that life was slower there, that she was surrounded by family. I almost want to say she even had fewer seizures when we were there, but I’m not sure that’s actually true. What’s more likely is that the sound of the waves on the beach dulled the sharp edges of the trauma that came with her seizures.

We stayed for a week in 2020, our first visit without Adelaide. My grief, at the point, was all-encompassing. I rode each wave with the gracefulness of a waterlogged buoy. Yet, while there, I found the strength to begin writing the story of her life.

Last week, after four years away, we visited again. It would be Anessa’s first time visiting my favorite place in the world. I was so excited to share this piece of me with her, but prepared myself for the complicated emotions that would likely await me.

But they never came.

Instead, I was overwhelmed with feelings of peace, gratitude, and beauty. I felt and saw Adelaide everywhere we went. From the dozens of ladybugs on the shoreline, to the breeze off the lake, to the striking sunsets dipping below the horizon. I never had to seek her out because she was always there.

And then our week was up, and we had to go home.  

When I woke up our first morning back home, I tried to keep my eyes closed for as long as possible. I knew that on the other side of my eyelids was my pale blue bedroom wall, not a window looking out onto the dark blue hues of the lake. Reentry after vacations have always been hard for me so I decided to take the day slowly. By late morning though, with nothing in the fridge for lunch, a grocery run was imperative.

Perhaps it was my vulnerability in grocery stores, or the mundane routine of it all, but by the time I pulled back into our driveway the tears I’d been expecting a week earlier were fighting for release.

I spent the rest of the afternoon in bed, crying and reading and waiting for the grief wave to pass. But this storm was unrelenting. I tried to transition from my bed to a reading chair in my office, but all Miguel had to do was ask if I was ok for my hurricane of emotions to cycle back around.

Just before dinner, I finally tried to emerge. Anessa was playing in our living room: reunited with all of her toys after a week away, she was making sure that each one had it’s turn.

“Mommy, will you play with me?” Anessa asked.

“I don’t feel very well…” Was all I could get out before my voice betrayed me.

“Why are you crying?” She asked.

“I miss Adelaide.” I told her. Giving in to my emotions, I sat on the floor and pulled Anessa onto my lap.

“Oh, because she’s not here anymore?”

“That’s right. When were in Michigan I felt her all the time, but I don’t feel her the same way when we are home.” I tried to explain.

“And that makes you sad?”

“Very sad.” I said.

“What if we pretend that I’m Adelaide?” Anessa offered.

My breath caught; the ground felt weak beneath me.

“Oh, honey, I never want you to be anyone other than who you are. Adelaide is Adelaide and you are Anessa and I love you both very much.” I hugged her tightly until she wriggled free.

“Ok, then how about we play restaurant,” She said leading me to a toy table and chairs she had pulled from her playroom to the living room. “It’s ok if you cry, you can bring your tissue.”

I sat down at the chair she pointed toward.

“Ok, so, what do you want to eat?”

Plastic chocolate ice cream has never tasted sweeter.

ID: A ladybug sits on a child’s thumb, her hand, palm forward faces the camera. Blurred behind the hand is a child in a green and pink swimsuit on a beach with a blue lake and sky behind her.