Dear Andrew,

It's been an emotional few weeks.  Christmas wasn't celebrated last year and now with your brother this year I feel like we have to celebrate.  It feels like a lot of people have expected us to move on and be happy all the time.  But this isn't the case.  I love your brother dearly and having him has brought so much unexpected joy into our lives but I still miss you.  I still have and probably always will long for you to  be here.

Your brother was 5 months on the 8th of December and you should have been 18 months on that date.  It was a date that really hit home as Christmas would be so different with an 18 month old and a 5 month old.  Hectic but I imagine happy as well.  So in your memory we went and bought toys to donate for an 18 month old this Christmas.  It was the only way I could think of honoring your memory while helping someone else.  Buying those toys was difficult.  I didn't know what an 18 month old would want and it hurt me that I should know.  I should be well versed in what you would want for Christmas.  Instead I stood in the toy store with your sleeping brother trying to figure out what to buy.  In that moment life seemed wholly unfair. 

Why did we have to go through losing you? It's probably a question that will always play on my mind.  Along with what would life be like now with the two of you?  What would your personality be like?  Your little brother changes every day and looks completely different from when he was born.  What would you have been like?

A part of me died when I lost you.  It's a part of me that I will never get back.  An innocence and joy that disappeared with those dreaded words.  And I suppose Christmas magnifies your loss as it is a holiday about children and joy.

So today and every other day I think of you and miss you and day dream as to what my life would be like with both of my little men here.  I love you baby boy.