Stillborn brother poems

Update

Hello, 

     It has been a very long time since I have uploaded anything on here. Last time I wrote I was 19 and almost done my fall semester of my sophomore year of college.  I am now almost 23 and almost done with my first term of medical school! I graduated from college may 2021 with a bachelor's of science degree in cellular, molecular, and physiological biology and I was so excited to be accepted to medical school. Looking back on some of my earlier posts (also the more recent ones if I am honest) it is a little cringy but I was 14 when I started this.  My first post was 9 years ago! Of course those earlier posts are/notes are cringy because I was a young teen when I wrote them. I am sure in 9 years if I look back on this I will think that this note is something I would never post. So if you made it to this update then I am thankful you could stick it out through all the weirdness of 14 year old me. 

     I remember something I wrote a few parts back about Kaleb's birthday. I was navigating the first time I had no family around me on one of their birthdays. I made a big deal about college being 5 hours from home. Well my medical school is in a whole different country and is a 5 hour flight from home. I have now spent quite a few of their birthday's not with my family and while that is unfortunate is also kind of nice to just have the space to grieve on my own terms each time. 

     That being said, you may be wondering why the sudden post after 3.5 years of nothing. Well a few days ago was another really big birthday and it tore me up the whole week leading up to it. I have spent every milestone birthday (for both boys), since Kaleb turned 13, away from home. With the timing of school that is just how it has  worked out. I navigated each of their 16th birthdays while away college and working a night shift job (and being scheduled to work the night leading into or coming out of their birthdays). That was a little rough. But no birthday has made me feel how I felt leading up to Ethan's 18th birthday. 

     There are several factors that have played a role in making this birthday especially painful. First, I was not at home and therefore was not surrounded by my other siblings. As I mentioned before, seeing them on Ethan and Kaleb's birthday helps because the intense sadness is satiated slightly by how grateful I am to be able to have a relationship with Kaiden and Ella. Second, it was his golden birthday. He turned 18 and on the 18th day of the month. Third, I had a really big test 2 days later and therefore was stressed about it, sad about Ethan, and just didn't have time to grieve the way I usually do. I have had to shove those emotions down and will be allowing myself the time to feel them this weekend. I just couldn't devote the mental energy to acknowledging this immense sadness when I had to be focused on my test. Lastly, and most importantly, this birthday feels like waking up to cold water being thrown on your bed in the morning. I live each day missing him and wishing I knew him. I recognize that I have gotten older and so has he, but I cannot picture anything older than the baby I held (sometimes maybe a 3 or 4 year old little boy). But a big birthday like this just throws it all in front of you. It is a harsh reminder of just how old he is and how much I have missed out on. Ethan has spent every moment of his life in Heaven and he has missed out on absolutely nothing in this world. Every milestone for us is just his everyday life and nothing he had to wait for.  But, we have missed out on everything. In the US, 18 is a legal adult. We missed out on an entire childhood. We missed all the firsts, we didn't get to see him grow, we didn't get watch him play sports, we didn't get to send him to his first dance, meet his first crush, or see him learn to drive a car. We didn't help him apply to colleges last year and we won't see him graduate high school in a couple months. We won't move him into college at the end of summer and we will never know what he would have chosen to do with his life. We don't know anything about him. This birthday just feels so much bigger because it lays it all out for us. Reminds us of just how many big things (and the everyday little things) we didn't get to experience with him and it also reminds us of all the things that we won't get to experience in the future. I am so incredibly happy for him, but I am heartbroken for us.