one week ago...

...i was just getting relief from the pain of labor...

i didn't think at the start of this day that i would be posting here. i also didn't think i would be able to stop crying. but i am. and i did.

so yeah it's been a week. i woke up this morning and felt as if i hadn't slept at all. i slept for at least 10 hours. my subconscious musta been working over time, i was sad from the inside out before i even had a chance to think about "last week at this time". (btw - at the time I wrote this sentence last week, the dr was telling me it was time to push and i was requesting a 20 minute power nap first).

i made the decision to shower right away and get out of the house. dave has gone to work for a bit each of the last couple days so it's been me and my mama chilling. i technically did get "out" of the house yesterday...some jehovah's witness knocked on the gate and i went out before realizing who they were...kinda doesn't count, didn't even open the gate...

so we made it out of the house for real. we went to get some photo brag books for my family members that don't have the internet and haven't seen pictures of Sammy. i really can't wait to get started on the books, we got some cute paper and alligator stickers to decorate the little pages. i don't have the patience for a whole scrapbook so a mini-fake one will have to do and most likely will not outlast my attention span. (and i can't lie, chicken stickers did catch my eye but i *will not*, i repeat *will not* start collecting chickens).

it was good to get out but not easy. as we were talking about which book she would want and how it would have room for my niece (who's due in 5 weeks!) i realized we'll never get to update the pictures of Sammy. so we cried in the middle of the isle for a minute. and then we got in line behind a daddy, big sister, auntie, and a mama wearing her very young baby in a carrier. in the moment it was just hard to see. the first baby item i ever bought was a moby wrap, i debated about bringing it to the hospital even. (i didn't). the baby had lots of dark hair, was a girl, and probably weighed half of what Sammy did but it still hurt. i was never so glad to see a baby leave as i was when the dad took her out of the carrier and out to the car.

somehow that felt like a test and i felt like i passed and then i was ok. we went to print out pictures to fill the brag books and stopped at the mall for a pretzel. looking through the pictures and planning which ones to display and thinking about how much each the people receiving them would love them helped i'm sure. at the mall i got excited to be a personal shopper for my mom...she will really rock some of the latest fall fashions she just needs a little nudge to do it. lucky for her i'm a nudger.

so overall, not a horrible day but not a great one. i'm really just watching the clock and thinking about last week at this time. thanks for the prayers, before i even spent much time thinking about it people were texting and emailing that they were praying for us today. Preemptive reminders that Jesus is always looking out for me.