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The days have been a blur of early mornings, commutes to work, pickup from daycare, and bedtime routines. I’ve had a few evenings where I’ve intended to exercise or practice mindfulness by journaling or painting, and instead found myself in bed on my phone for hours. It’s a happy blur, but exhausting too. Now I have a few minutes at work to sit with my thoughts and to reflect on how I’m doing.

Eden, I’m in a pretty good place and I sense that I’m getting better every day. There was a night where I was triggered by something I read online and I lay restlessly in bed thinking about the day you left. But the next morning I was okay again. There are more days like that–ones that have moments of sadness which are followed by many days of normalcy and happiness. I find that I’m able to pray more, and sermons and books move me in a way I haven’t felt in a long time. There’s conviction and longing that tugs on my heart and makes my spirit feel like it did before all of the heartache. There’s less anger. Less apathy. It’s not a wild fire, but it’s definitely a flame.

I tell Caleb about you sometimes. There’s freedom in talking to someone who can’t understand you. He listens and babbles and goes about his business, but I get to say your name out loud. One day it’ll be comfortable to say your name even when he does understand me. I feel a pang of guilt at my awkwardness saying your name around anyone other than Caleb. It’s a betrayal, but I can’t bring myself to verbalize “Eden”. It might be rooted in the underlying fear that there was never a baby in the sac to begin with and so I have made a fool of myself by giving a name to a baby that didn’t physically exist. I do think about you and love you, though. You know that I talk to you and that, although it’s hard to imagine myself with a daughter now that Caleb is born, I think about what having you around the house would have been like. If there’s any doubt that you have my love, you possess the name that I loved the most. No one else will have it. And one day I might be able to say it out loud.