Halloween for Elle and her Would-be 8th

These cute cats invited Cam to decorate pumpkins and visit Elle's grave with them. (Cam looks so much older in these pics!) 

Love the microphone Griff painted for Elle. I remember her singing Justin Bieber Christmas songs into her pink portable CD player w/ mic.

"Dear Elle, Hey it's your big bro! Just know that I think of you every day. and Happy Halloween!!!"

Wearing pink on Elle's would-be 8th birthday

That white framed picture above was taken just a few weeks before Elle's accident. They were having a good ol' time playing "Nerds."

Getty made this floral arrangement and vase for Elle in Floral Design (he and Ashdon told the school counselor they would take any class to coordinate with each other's schedules. They also took Ceramics :)

Griff made sure he got a pink bow on his backpack for Elle's birthday. 
Heart-melter.

I try not to dwell on Elle's death, but her birthdays seem to bring things to the surface, like it or not. I was irritable for a couple weeks as her 8th approached, and Rob caught that bug, too. 

Strangely, I kept flashing back to the day it happened. How I had put her in time-out behind the bleachers at Cy's basketball game, because she was throwing a tantrum over Rob's iPhone. That was the last conversation I had with her before the accident. Grandma and Grandpa whisked her off to Walmart to buy treats.

I remembered how at the time of the accident I ran from doctor's house to doctor's house up our street instead of being with her. 

I thought about how I paced the hospital hall just outside of the helicopter's receiving room. They had shut the doors when someone told them "the mom is here." I remember worrying I was going to throw up on the floor and sitting on a bench with a social worker with my knee bouncing uncontrollably. I remember the paramedics emerging from the room and asking them if they had seen this a lot, hoping to normalize it and reassure myself she would be okay like most of the other kids in this kind of situation. One just looked at the floor, and the other just said, "No."

I wondered at the massive denial I was in. How I left her bedside to shower and eat and sleep and talk to our friends and family. It is unthinkable to me now. At the time I did not understand that days and even hours were not guaranteed.  

I remember watching the nurses wash her large surgical wound stretching across her body in an oval from her chest to her pubic bone. Why didn't I ask to wash her? They rolled her onto her side, and I commented how cute her bum was. 

The nurses told me to not overstimulate her so she could heal, so I barely touched or talked to her. The nurses combed her hair and braided it. They changed her bandages. They moved her arms and legs.  

It should have been me.

She's my little girl. I had only days and hours left with her. I took care of her for 4 years, and then, at the end of her life, strangers took over. Strangers took her body into surgery after her death to remove her kidney. Strangers took her to the morgue. Strangers prepared her body for burial. Strangers drove her to the viewing, the funeral, and the cemetery. Strangers buried her casket.

I resent that I was so shell-shocked that I couldn't think or act like the mother she knew. 

So, these have been my thoughts. Anniversaries and birthdays are still very hard to approach, and I still believe I will long for her for the rest of my life. But, I prayed for help in moving forward without feeling I'm leaving her behind and felt inspired to understand that she is not just a part of my past. She is my future. I'm not leaving her behind; I'm moving towards her and towards our reunion.

Elle, I love you forever