Lovely week...

Next Thursday is All Saints' Day and the day after that is All Souls' day. Today (Saturday), our Priest asked for help to gotong-royong (loosely translated to group cleaning-up) at the parish cemetery. So we carted the older 2 boys and my 4 year old princess to the cemetery to help out. It was a sunny morning and there was quite a good turn-out. We picked rubbish by hand into garbage bags under the hot morning sun and managed to gather quite a lot of rubbish! I am proud that my kids worked just as hard as their parents and between us 5, we picked 4 bags of them.

Sometimes, I feel slightly guilty and even a little hypocritical that we only come to help in the cemetery after we have a loved-one buried there. But I won't beat myself over this. It never occurred to me to participate in such activities before. Time was always the factor, or rather the lack of it. Actually, it was more an excuse. We have one hour to spend in front of the TV or on Facebook and we have none to spare for something more significant? I want to say I will never make this an excuse anymore but I know I am 'weak' and sometimes lazy, so I will say this: I will try and try to make time for anything and anyone in need.

At the cemetery, we saw some men building tombstone on a grave and I asked my hubby to get their contact. We will be putting up one for Emily's grave soon. I did some searching online for nice designs but hubby would like something simple. We'll see what the tombstone maker has to offer.

As a matter of coincidence, I read a Facebook post by my aunt a minute ago. It was a video about Pearl Joy Brown, a miracle baby. Of course, being the mushy type, I cried seeing the video. I also found her blog. But get some tissues because you will be moved to tears. What great courage and what a beautiful life that they are holding in their arms.

I miss you, Emily.

Oh yeah, I have nice news. We have been asked to be godparents to a beautiful baby boy named Alexander Tan who is almost 3 months old. We met him and his parents for the first time last week during our Rosary prayers at their house. His mother, an Indonesian (his dad is a Sarawakian Chinese), was busy being the host so I offered to hold the baby and ended up holding him the whole evening, GLADLY. He was such a happy baby and I was able to make him smile a lot. After awhile, I even made him sleep in my arms. He never wimped or cried one bit! It was such a joy to hold him, it does help ease a little of my pining for Emily. Alexander has yet to be baptised, so some of the BEC members suggested for us to be his godparents. I immediately said yes and I am very very happy, :). I think Alexander will be baptised in November, I can't wait to see him again.

Oh yes, we will be praying for baby Pearl Joy and her family. We have also been praying for a lady reader of my blog and her son who will be undergoing heart surgery in November. I am sold about prayers and I hope all of you are too. Pray lots and pray hard. GOD loves us all! Amen.

Emptiness

Yeah, I am getting on with life. Things are as they should be. I am busy getting the kids to school/daycare in the mornings. Work also is pretty busy, and lunchtime with my lunch buddies are usually the highlight of the day. I will be busy picking the kids up in the evenings.

When we get home after having dinner at MIL's place, we will watch some TV before the kids go off to bed. Hubby always sleeps early too because he wakes up early to go to work. I usually have difficulty to sleep early, so I spend a few hours before bed watching Korean dramas online in our room. As much as I like watching them, I have to admit the real reason I do this is to wear myself out so that I can drop into bed and sleep straight away. But that doesn't always work. Last night, after watching 3 consecutive episodes, I felt tired but when I was on my bed trying to sleep, I started sobbing again. I miss my baby, Emily.

While driving to work too, I will think of her. When I am shopping and I see baby stuff or if I see someone's cute baby, I will think of her. When I am not occupied with something to do, thoughts of her come to me. And it still hurts in my heart and tear floods my eyes. I try looking for books form people with similar experience but they are not readily available. I looked for people who share their stories online and came to this site:

http://community.babycenter.com/groups/a6716015/down_syndrome_loss

I guess this should be normal for grieving mothers. I read that this could go on for 1 year. Yeah, I think time will make it easier but I will never feel the same. It feels like there is an emptiness inside you that cannot be filled. With time the emptiness may grow smaller but it will never fully heal and I supposed this is how it will be.

After all these happenings, I am still thankful to Our Father in Heaven. It is better to have and to lose than never to have at all. It was better that I had 5 months and 9 days of her alive with me than lesser. It was better that I had experienced all the emotions and trails, all the doubts and hardship than not having seen the kindness that exist amongst family and friends. It was better that we learn that money really didn't mean more to us than precious human life. I have a lot to be thankful for. Even for the current suffering I am going through (nice writeup on Finding God in suffering). I know it is better that I am going through it than to live life in spiritual complacency. Lord God, help me and guide me to experience Your love in every circumstance and to fully surrender to Your will.

Getting On...

Pretty flowers...

I bought some pretty purple and pink flowers for Emily's grave on the morning of the 40th day of her passing, on Wednesday.  Took half day off to prepare food for our BEC members who came to our house for rosary prayers for the day too. The days are getting on fine for all of us. I have a lot more free time now. I even started piano lessons, something which I have been meaning to do for awhile. We have plenty of things to do in the house which we will be doing little by little every weekend.

I still miss her often but it's not too hard now. Sometimes I wonder why God gave Emily to us only to take her away so quickly. But that's how God works, we can never really understand it with our limited capacity. Someone said to me, I still have 3 kids that need my attention. That may be true, but I still miss having a young baby. Even before Emily's passing, I had this thought of adopting a baby and my husband agreed too. So if the opportunity comes and a baby is in need of a family, we are opened to it.

I want to change because I had Emily in my life, I want to get more involved in anything that I can help out. Whether it's for charity or for Church. Next time, when there is a call for volunteers for a cause that I feel strongly about, I will take a step forward and offer my help. So I pray to our Heavenly Father, take me and guide me to do Your work. Amen.