Dear Andrew,

It's been a difficult month.  One year since you passed.  A couple of weeks until your little brother arrives.  There is so much emotion in this month that I feel overwhelmed.  I feel like I'm drowning in grief and hope and terror all mixed together.

My grief has returned with more of a bite to it.  It never went away but I was able to focus on the future.  To get some hope back in my life.  This month I have only been able to focus on the way things should have been and how they could turn out again.  I've visited you a lot this month.  I feel closer to you at your grave, like a little bit of you is waiting there for me.  I feel like I let you down when you aren't getting regular visits.

Then there is the utter terror that has taken over my life.  The what ifs and what could be.  What if we lose your brother too?  How will we cope?  Will we handle it?  In my head I am already planning what we will do if we lose him.  The little things we would do differently.  Is this normal?  Isn't this a bit too morbid for what should be such a hopeful time?  We are supposed to be planning for this new life to come into our world and since you were our first the only thing I have to compare it to is death.  I can't get excited about him arriving because I'm terrified we are going to be grieving for two now instead of one.

He is 37 weeks and one day today and each day gets a little more terrifying.  The type of terror that makes you freeze where you are and not want to move.  The terror that can take over your whole body and mind and is very hard to push away.  Each day we come that much closer to the timeframe that we lost you.  We keep hearing how great everything is and how healthy he is but that doesn't provide the comfort that people think it should.  You were the same way.  There was nothing wrong with you.  There was nothing missed in your scans.  You just got caught up in your cord and died.  How does that make anything easier when people enthusiastically tell us how great your brother is doing?

It's been a hard year, never mind a hard month.  But I can't believe you've been gone for a year.  I can't believe all the little things we've already missed out on.  A life that was never lived and never will be.

We miss you so much.  You are always our first baby and now our forever baby.

Love you.