This week I’ve been plagued by unsettling, bad dreams. Several nights ago, Chris left me (only in my nightmare) and I woke up feeling absolute terror at even the thought of that prospect. I think it just stems from my fears of losing more loved ones. I’ve already lost Lucy, who’s to say that fate won’t play another bad hand and take more away? I know that Chris isn’t willingly going to leave me; we’re too solid and love each other too much for that. However, those fears of losing him by some other means are enough to make my blood turn cold. The past few nights, I’ve had several dreams of being pregnant (I think with Lucy?), going through the entire pregnancy and even into labor, and then there is absolutely no resolution. Either Lucy is simply no longer there and the pregnancy was merely a figment of my imagination, or it just stops. It’s seems pretty clear where those dreams are stemming from. I wake up in an even more intense state of sadness with these dreams. It makes my heart hurt even more. This seems to be getting infinitely more difficult as the days pass.

I keep seeing Lucy’s image in my mind’s eye… I see her every time I close my eyes, and even when I don’t. She was so beautiful, so perfectly made. I can’t believe how gorgeous she was, so angelic. I can’t help but think of what a beautiful waste her death is. She was the picture of infant health… she had every opportunity ahead of her for a wonderful life, with parents who loved her and had already made her their whole world. We really did have all of the makings for a lovely fairy tale. Talking to my mom a few days ago, she’d mentioned the idea of the ‘fairy tale’ that my life had seemed to become, and how adding Lucy to it was only going to make it even more wonderful. Then this happened. And my mom had the realization that the original fairy tales all ended in some horrifying, gruesome way. They were meant to teach the little children lessons by using genuine fear tactics and the characters’ meeting some sort of frightening demise due to their actions. Well, I guess I got my authentic fairy tale then. The thing is, deep down in my sub-consciousness, I worried all along that something would go wrong… things were simply too good to be true, or I simply wasn’t meant to have or didn’t truly deserve to have it all. Maybe I was right. But it isn’t fair that Lucy had to pay the price. She didn’t deserve this, even if for some cosmic reason I did. A beautiful waste. Logically, I know that I did nothing to deserve this, Chris did nothing to deserve this… it just happened. I’ve always been plagued with self-doubt for as long as I can remember, and now that this has happened, the self-doubt is threatening to become bigger than it’s ever been. Again, logically, I know that I can overcome those things, but I feel as though I have to learn how all over again. It’s an uphill battle.

Yesterday, while out walking, I had this image suddenly burn into my brain of carrying Lucy in her ergo carrier, her chubby, perfect baby hand and arm sticking out, bathed in sunlight, grasping the index finger of my free hand, my thumb stroking her little hand. It was beautiful. Because that’s what was supposed to be happening at that moment. These are the types of dreams I have in the moments I’m awake. All of the ‘should haves’ splinter my heart into a million pieces every day, and I know I’ll never be able to put it back together, even if I try for the rest of my life.