Dear Dad

I hate thinking about the coming days ahead because it always means that I relive everything that happened.

When you think about major events that have happened in life, you remember where you were. I was laying in my bunk bed at Iowa State, as a freshman, when the first plane hit the WTC on 9/11. I was laying in my bunk bed at Iowa State, as a freshman, watching the T.V. when the second  plane hit the second WTC on 9/11. I was sitting on my mom and dad's bed, watching TV, in second grade, when the phone rang to tell us that my Grandpa had died. I was in my dorm room at Iowa State, as a freshman, just getting home from work when the phone rang to tell me my Grandmother had died.

I couldn't sleep the night before I got married. I remember laying on my bed, with the windows open in our bedroom, in labor with James when I screamed at Eric to call the hospital because something was definitely wrong.

It was 7:04 a.m. on March 11, 2006 when I called my parents and told them that Eric and I weren't going to get married in 5 short months. March 12, 2006, at 7:00 p.m., Eric attended his first Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. He's been sober every since.

But even as all those life events took place, I can't ever remember how I felt. I can definitely remember how I thought I felt, but not the actual feelings itself.

But I remember how I felt when I got the news you were gone. I remember how it felt when I had to walk out of the hospital, and the funeral home, and the church, and the cemetery without you.  And each year, I relive those feelings, without being able to really help it.

It's like when someone dunks you at the pool and you're truly not ready for it. Only someone is doing it with your heart. It's like the panic sets in, and then the struggle to find something steady to pull you up, and finally, relief when someone or something does.

And there is relief when reliving these feelings. There's a relief that it's over and it isn't taking over my life like it used to. There's a relief that, by God, life has gone on, even though I never thought it would. I have found happiness in James, and my marriage, and my job again. I love my friends, I am social, I am happy.

It's pretty incredible when you think of the shock that you go through when you lose someone so quickly.

I miss you every day of my life, but in missing you, I'm also happy. Thank you for giving me the strength to move on with life. It has put things in perspective.