Mama Said They’ll Be Days Like This

I can’t even get the sentence out without trying to start rationalizing it. But today has been a really hard day.

Hard Day’s Night

It started just past midnight when Scout woke up. She and I were home while Tyler was being a supermom, pumping and loving on Avett. Scout, who is nursing a cold (so we were being extra careful by not being at the hospital), woke up sad. She is good at expressing her emotions and what makes her feel bad. Last night, in an attempt to comfort her, I told her that Mama was taking care of Baby Brother. She replied “I want her to take care of me.” And, on the inside, I fucking lost it.

Sorry for cussing. Well, kinda.

A girl who has been SO big and SO grown up is, after all, just a kid. Having sisters who are 18 and 10, who don’t live with us, Scout has been raised like an only child. She hasn’t had to divide attention and time with anyone. It was something Tyler and I both mourned as we checked into the hospital. We didn’t really get our last few weeks with her… we had plans to have some last hurrahs, just the three of us.

Wave of Mutilation

I have an uncanny ability to build damns that break. I can block out negativity with the best of them. People send a hurtful text, brush it off. Things not working out as planned, brush it off. Looming gigantic NICU bills, we’ll figure it out. Side note: the bad thing about owning your own business is that when you take off work, the income stops. Anyway, to the back of my mind it all goes.

But once I let a single negative thought settle in, the rest pour in like an ocean wave. I grab a bucket to scoop water overboard, but y’all… I’m in a funk. Is this normal day 6 stuff?

Next Right Thing

I can’t believe I’m about to quote Frozen 2, but have you seen it? Some mature emotions are happening in the sequel that Scout sings every day. While I’m not as morose as Anna is at this moment, she questions what she can do during bleak circumstances. She decides that even those she is lost and hope is gone, she just has to concentrate on doing the next right thing. For me today, that’s picking up Cece from school, cleaning the house, taking care of a sneezing Scout, and making dinner for Tyler.

I’ve seen dark before
But not like this
This is cold
This is empty
This is numb
The life I knew is over
The lights are out
Hello, darkness
I’m ready to succumb
I follow you around
I always have
But you’ve gone to a place I cannot find
This grief has a gravity
It pulls me down
But a tiny voice whispers in my mind
“You are lost, hope is gone
But you must go on
And do the next right thing”
Can there be a day beyond this night?
I don’t know anymore what is true
I can’t find my direction, I’m all alone
The only star that guided me was you
How to rise from the floor
When it’s not you I’m rising for?
Just do the next right thing
Take a step, step again
It is all that I came to do
The next right thing
I won’t look too far ahead
It’s too much for me to take
But break it down to this next breath
This next step
This next choice is one that I can make
So I’ll walk through this night
Stumbling blindly toward the light
And do the next right thing
And with the dawn, what comes then
When it’s clear that everything will never be the same again?
Then I’ll make the choice
To hear that voice
And do the next right thing
Anna, Frozen 2