Reminiscing

'Tis the season.  The Christmas Tree with her ornament on it.  The weather that reminds me that we were nearing the end of our time with her.  I look back on that time with my "other daughter", and the reality of her loss with an understanding today I did not have at the time.  I know that if we had been able to keep her, we would never have the daughters we have today.  I don't know how to fully come to terms with that reality, but I do know that is what it is. 

There is no choice to make.  It's not a matter of who is more loved or who is more valuable, it simply is the reality of loss.  I loved her fully, and I love my daughters fully today.  Without the first, we would have never considered being willing to parent more children again. Because of her, we knew we could and because of her presence, and then her absence, we were willing.

But it certainly isn't as simple as the two replaced the one and life went on.  It's isn't an equation of sum totals of love.  It's apples and oranges or broccoli and spinach or Holland and France.  Equal yet fundamentally different.  Similar yet opposite.  It is truly the unexplainable.

I couldn't share last year's picture with you then, but I sure can now.  And I can share my daughters and how they grow.  Life is truly amazing.

In case you can't tell from the pictures, they are rambunctious, busy, totally adored handfuls of perfection.