Well, We Did It

It is so incredibly hard to believe that five months have already passed since we said goodbye to my husband, my best friend, the kids' daddy. Five long months.

Five months ago I never thought I would get through these five months. I was prepared for it to be the worst five months of my life, and it most certainly was. You see, from October through till March, we have most of the important dates for our family. I desperately wish I could include E's birthday in this timeline, but unfortunately her actual birthday was two days before he died, so we have to overcome that hurdle yet.

The day he died was E's birthday party. After that we had Halloween, which is a FAVORITE family holiday. Then we had Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving in itself has not always had a big emphasis in our family, but this past thanksgiving was exceptionally hard. My very good friend Rebecca invited us over to her home, and while I love and appreciate her, it was so hard to see all the married ladies there. It was just us girls, but I was the only official "single" one, and all their husbands were deployed. So it was a very hard day for me. Then came Christmas, which I don't even want to talk about. Our Anniversary was December 29th, and that day was OK. It was sad most definitely, but not as bad as I thought it would be. The next hardest day, probably one of the hardest days for me, was New Years Eve. I remember how hard it was for me, leaving him behind in 2009 and starting 2010 without him, and I desperately did NOT want the new year to start. On the other hand, I wanted New Years Eve to pass as quickly as possible because I was just tired of the day...it dragged on and on and on.

After that, we had a bit of a reprieve in January, thankfully, and that was when I really started scheduling myself and making sure I was busy all the time. I actually burnt myself out. And though we had a reprieve from bad days in January, I had a really rough month emotionally, physically and mentally. I've heard mixed opinions on how rough the 3d month is, and it really was for me. February 7th brought us the twins' birthdays, thankfully the only day that month that we had a sort of "anniversary.

And now we have March. March, like October and December, will always be one of our hardest months. March 2nd was the day we lost my Opa in 1997, and I think of him often. How much i have wished that he could have met Barry and the kids. March 6th is Barry's birthday, and March 7th is my sister and our youngest daughter's birthday. Thankfully after tomorrow, we will have passed through the first five months of agony.

I have come so far in five months, further than I thought I ever would. I have become so much more independent than I thought, so much so that I have trouble asking for help now. But I am still desperately grieving, and desperately missing Barry every day. My mom sent me a letter and I read it today and cried. She wrote about the day that A was born and how gentle he was the first night, and first few days, and I cried and cried and cried. Memories are so hard, I try so hard not to remember sometimes because its so hard.

I am glad that I can proudly say that I DID IT! I made it through the first 5 months, and accomplished that which I never thought I would. And right now we have so much to look forward to in the next couple months with our new house and house warming party. I am so excited for this new house, new things. New memories, new beginnings and a new start.

I still miss you Barry, and I will see you in my dreams. I'll love you forever and always.