The Baby Shower

A few days ago I went to the first baby shower I have attended since Eva died. A baby shower for a baby girl, no less. I hardly knew anyone at the shower and most had no idea about Eva. I'm not quite sure what I was thinking when I decided to go. But I do love this baby girl, so that helps.

It was a strange shower, to say the least. From questions as to how many children I had to which I answered 'altogether, six' (and there was no follow-up so I guess whoever asked me that thinks I have six) to comments about a screaming baby there sounding like she was dying. Eva died so silently, I would have done anything that day to hear her scream like that child did. The silence of death is deafening. My dark sunglasses came in handy again that day.

I never had a shower for Eva but she did receive many gifts, as the first girl after three boys. As the gifts and clothes were passed around it felt like a little piece of my heart chipped off with each exclamation of how cute everything was. I had so many cute clothes for Eva. Clothes she never wore. I hope this little baby girl lives to grow into all the stuff she received that day.  But there is always the green eyed monster in me who jealously wishes wishes wishes that Eva would have lived to wear all the clothes she never did. I touched nothing at the shower. I ate snack food. I chatted meaninglessly with random people. I held it together, but I was crumbling within.

Thank God I had Nathan with me who I was able to cuddle and hold close when the missing of Eva got so intense. Thank you God for Nathan.

It continues to astound me how I can converse with people. How I can ask about their children. How I can listen to their replies. How I can function daily and that no one can see my broken heart. It screams within me but is silent to the world. And I know this. I don't let it loose to the world anymore. I don't sit sobbing on random park benches. And when my broken heart is acknowledged then sometimes I am embarrassed and hurry the conversation on or sometimes I cry and hate myself for giving strangers that power over me. And yet I crave her name be mentioned. I crave people to acknowledge her. I crave that others miss her too.

This life, sometimes it just feels like a joke. A cruel joke.



**Tracy I know you read my blog. I just want to thank you here for commenting about how you thought Nathan looked more like Eva than the other kids that day in the insurance office. I didn't really know what to say then, but it meant a lot to me. That you were not embarrassed to say her name. And, especially, that you brought her up first. Thanks.