Ashley's Story

She will leave fingerprints all over your heart

8/29/2018

How can it be 5 years already...

I wish I knew.

It seems like just yesterday she left us, and yet seems like a lifetime ago all at the same time.  We haven't seen her...

 or held her...

 or kissed her...

 or touched her...

 in 5 long years. 

How do you survive the death of your child? How do you wake up the next day, the next week, the next month, the next year?  I have no idea.  Honestly, I don't.  You feel as though you won't survive.  Your not even sure you want to survive, and yet somehow you keep breathing.  Even though breathing hurts, you keep doing it.  I'm 5 years into this grief journey that began the day our precious Ash stopped breathing and I am still searching.  Scratching and clawing my way through it.  Determined to make her life count.  Determined to not allow her to be forgotten.  Determined to speak her name daily so that she does not disappear from this world.  Determined to use what she taught me about living to make my time here matter.  Determined to hang on to my faith even on the days when I feel as though its gone.

The loss of Ashley Kate broke my heart.  It truly did.  It broke me in a way that cannot be healed outside the gates of  Heaven.

I'm still learning how to live with the burden of grief.  Its not an easy lesson to learn.  It doesn't come naturally.  I read somewhere along the way that grief is just love that no longer has any place to go.  I'm not sure how I feel about that statement, but sometimes it makes sense to me. 

5 years past her last morning with us I can tell you this one thing...I miss her.  I miss everything about her.  I still do.  I imagine I always will. She was the most precious thing I ever held.  She was beautiful.  She was happy.  She was so full of JOY. 

Ashley Kate, you are so loved.  My sweet girl I miss you more than words could ever convey.  How I wish we had been given more time with you.  You lived the life you were given more beautifully than any other person I've ever met.  You never once worried about your tomorrows.  You taught me more about God and His Power than anything.  I learned to trust His character even when I felt that what He was doing in our lives was unfair.  I'm still learning to lean on Him as I grieve for you my precious girl.  I love you.  I miss you.  Oh how I long to see you again. Until that day I'll keep clinging to my faith in Jesus.  You are forever loved...forever missed...forever eight.
   

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