6 months

So with everything going on with Baby C, I didn't post anything about Conner and Benjamin's six month birthday (yesterday, July 10th).  It has been the longest and the shortest six months of my life.  It has been six months since I last held my babies.  It has been six months of knowing my life will never be the same. At the same time, I am six months closer to seeing my babies again.

Their ashes sit on my nightstand, surrounded by Conner's giraffe and Benjamin's puppy.  Their urn has their blanket wrapped around it, decorated with construction symbols like helmets and hammers.  The nurses picked it out, and it was unknowingly perfect.  It was the blanket that was draped over them when they were walked out of the hospital to the funeral home.

Every morning, when I kiss their urn, I think of one of our last moments together in the hospital.

It is January 8th.  Or maybe it is the 9th.  The events in the hospital are all jumbled together. I am still pregnant. It is the middle of the night and Tim has been sleeping on the couch next to me, or at least he is trying to. The room is only illuminated with the light from the machines that are pumping various drugs and fluids into me, which seem to be beeping every 5 minutes.  I am laying on my back with a monitor strapped to my belly, which records my contractions that have slowed to every 3-5 minutes.  The nurse comes in, and I'm not sure why.  Maybe it is because the monitor needs to be moved.  Tim is now sitting on the edge of my bed.  I tell him that he should talk to the boys, because they can hear him.  I am desperate for him to get his time in with his boys.  I know he doesn't have much longer with them. He's trying not to cry as he tells the boys hello.  Then *boom* - one of the boys tries kicking the monitor off of my stomach.  I mean, this thing jumps up in the air.  They've never kicked so hard before. Tim sees it.  The nurse sees it.  My mouth is hanging open slightly.  We adjust the monitor to go back in place.  We are laughing quietly through our tears.

Happy six month birthday to the strongest little boys I know.  Mommy loves you both so much.