Survivor: Ryan's First Birthday

There are certain things you are just not supposed to say. Like, “Ooh, that haircut pretty much turned you into a sheepdog.” Or, “Yes, you do look fat in that.” And, “I don’t like my baby.” The first two, I have never actually felt towards anyone, I promise (so you can stop feeling self-conscious right now), but that last confession… this is me, raising a quiet, sheepish hand.

Don’t get me wrong, I LOVE my baby with the innate reflexive response of a mama bear who will throw her own body in front of a wayward bullet or scratch out the eyes of anyone who even thinks harm on him. But liking him has taken some time. Unlike what seems like most of the moms around me, I did not forge a bond with Ryan right away. Plagued with fatigue, the grief and guilt over ending Lucy’s life, and the loss of the tiny bit of temporarily regained freedom I had experienced just before Ryan was born—when Caedmon was 5 and Addie was at the much more independent age of almost-2—I just didn’t have it in me to appreciate this gift that God had given to us. While others were #soinlove with their babies (and rightly so!), I felt like a monster as I mechanically nursed him, changed his diapers, held him to me when he cried, and then checked my watch to see if he had turned 18 yet. Reading up on postpartum depression now, I recognize that I shared some of the symptoms, including bouts of explosive frustration and thoughts of “Ryan—all of them—are better off with a more competent mom”, though I’m not sure which are legitimate signs of a deeper illness and which are simply a result of a poor attitude. Because Ryan was not a particularly difficult baby; I just had a particularly sour heart. Thankfully, even the worst storms subside, and babies grow (and become easier as a result). It was 8 months before we had what I wrote in my journal as a “budding camaraderie”. 10 months before I could honestly say that I enjoyed him. And now, at 13 months? I no longer feel like I got roped into the worst babysitting gig ever. In fact, you could even say that I like him (most of the time), which considering our journey, is quite a development. But even more significant, I’m learning to be thankful for him.

Recently, I met up with two old friends who, after I shared (and complained) about my difficult year, related their journeys this past year with their babies—the ones with special needs and the ones they’ve lost due to multiple miscarriages—and all of a sudden, I felt like the biggest jerk in the world. But also the luckiest mama to have three beautiful, healthy babies who could have been dropped in our laps by storks, given the relative ease in their arrivals. Talk about a shift in perspective and gratitude. And so I’m thankful for Ryan, our pleasant, smiley, quiet baby who likes to hug us and his stuffed animals, can get past any obstacle to scurry up the stairs, and loves to wake before 5am to hang out with Mommy.

Ryan turned one earlier last month, and it was a day Wayne and I had looked forward to for a long time. We had joked that we should throw an Independence Day party, celebrating our freedom from the most challenging of the little years, but we thought that might be somewhat offensive to our children. So instead, we went with a Survivor theme, because that is exactly how we felt about RyRy’s first year—that we survived… by God’s grace and the skin of our teeth, we survived. Now for another 17 more years...

With little steam left after a whirlwind May, RyRy almost didn't have a party. The thought of putting together a huge celebration was just not in my bandwidth, but I also didn't want him to be that child who grows up and asks, "Where are the pictures from my first birthday party?"... only to be met with our guilty stares. And so less than a week before his birthday, I scrambled together an intimate and simple get-together of friends and family who know and love Ry and who were so essential in helping us survive this past year.

Truth be told, I have been aching to throw a Survivor-themed first birthday since Caedmon turned one, but for one reason or another, I never got to. Here, though, was my chance!

It was partially because I was tasked to cut out leaves for our upcoming VBS anyway, to make vines just like these, that I decided to go ahead with a party, Survivor-style. I figured I might as well put in the work once and get rewarded twice! And then thanks to my friend, Winnie, who pretty much runs a party supply warehouse disguised as a well-appointed home, I had access to this awesome grass skirt and other Survivor-y decorations, like faux tropical leaves and coconut tumblers (because that's exactly what survivors drink from on deserted islands).

Our menu for the day: kalua pig (that was SO easy to make in the slow cooker), sesame chicken strips from Teriyaki Time, a vinaigrette slaw, white rice, Hawaiian rolls, fruit skewers, and chocolate chip cookies with coconut and macadamia nuts. Ry's birthday cake was the chocolate cake I always make; this time, the toasted coconut not only tasted good, but it fit the theme perfectly! (In actuality, Survivors from the show usually starve or "feast" on plain rice porridge... We were pretty kind to our guests, in my opinion.)

What does one wear to a Survivor party? If we were sticklers to the theme, we would all wear close to nothing, but camo pants with a onesie works pretty well, too!

Our one activity for the day—what I called our "immunity challange"—was the same one we played at Addie's first birthday, in which we instructed guests to bring a non-food, non-toy item that would entice RyRy's attention. They were pitted against one another in heats, shaking their objects and trying to get Ry to crawl towards them and choose their object, thus advancing them to the next round until we had one winner, the "Ultimate Survivor"!

Though Auntie Fay didn't win the title of Ultimate Survivor, she gets points for Most Creative "Item"—Uncle Ed!

Here, Caedmon stands in for Aunt Sam with her item, the empty bubble bottle. 

And here Ry goes...

He questions the bubble bottle. Looks at Uncle Ed...

And he goes for the bubble bottle!

Caedmon celebrates with a victory dance!

Aunt Sam is our Ultimate Survivor! That immunity necklace looks good on her.

(Though, it was brought up to us later—by Steven, Sam's husband—that Sam's item, the bubble bottle, was technically a toy originally, so she should actually have been disqualified from the competition. I suppose she outwitted us...)

RyRy with my side of the family. (You can't fully tell, but Wayne and I are purposely dressed like Jeff Probst, the host of the show Survivor.)

Favors: more chocolate chip cookies, but wrapped in whatever tropical island paraphernalia I could find in my closet. Raffia works!

And because we were so busy (and because he's our third??), I forgot to take his one-year photo until a whole month later! But RyRy, know that you are loved and liked, and we are so, so thankful for you! Happy birthday, little boy!

Crying Over Spilt Milk

My first Mother’s Day six years ago was spent doused in vomit and tears (Caedmon’s and mine, respectively), which sounds about right for a new mom of a one-month-old. We were on our way to church—our first attendance after the arrival of the baby—which was significant because while we had ventured into the world a few tentative times before, this was our first attempt at returning to an old routine, paving the way to what I hoped would be some semblance of structure in our topsy-turvy lives. The fact that it was Mother’s Day only added to the salience of the occasion.

It’s not that we hadn’t WANTED to go back to church (or anywhere with a more defined framework) prior to this point, it was more a matter that we COULDN’T. Still learning to handle this creature whose sole purpose seemed to be to ruin our lives, we just physically couldn’t get our acts together enough to leave the house to arrive anywhere on time. We were running frantically on this endless hamster wheel of feeding, burping—and because Caedmon had moderate reflux—near-projectile vomiting, which then meant cleaning up, changing, and then repeating from the beginning. And while I so appreciate the imagery of “herding cats”—plural—I can’t even use it to accurately describe our desperation as new parents. Though the sentiment of harried rushing and running about, trying to corral a number of feral beasts who are simultaneously scampering away and scratching out your eyes is spot-on, we only had one cat, and one who—as a newborn—didn’t even move! But still, herding that one, immobile cat took everything out of us. (Anyone who has cared for a newborn for any prolonged amount of time will attest that those unmoving baby cats are the worst.)

So it really was a near-miracle when on the morning of that first Mother’s Day, Wayne and I had managed to get ourselves up and dressed early, and had even enjoyed a peaceful breakfast while Caedmon still slept soundly. And as if he understood my carefully detailed timetable and lofty expectations for the day, Caedmon stirred at the perfect hour that would begin our perfect day. I nursed him, we changed his diaper and put him in his special outfit, and then strapped him into his car seat. Even though the drive was across town, we had plenty of time to spare and would even be early—something I rarely was, even before I had children to blame. I was just patting myself on the back for such a job well done, when Wayne hoisted the car seat, and Caedmon, with his sensitive tummy, suddenly and violently spit up his entire meal, dousing me, himself, and our carefully laid-out plans in a thick layer of baby vomit. So much for going to church this Mother’s Day, or anywhere, it seemed, for the foreseeable future. Time to break out the emergency survival kit; we were hunkering down for the long-haul.

There was little to do at that point but to clean up the mess—which is what Wayne did, because I just sat there and cried pathetically on the couch. I cried for our plans, so painstakingly synced with Caedmon’s schedule, that had just folded like a house of cards. I cried for this complete loss of control over our lives and the ineptitude I felt over accomplishing the simplest tasks. I cried for my body that still hurt from birthing a tiny human and from keeping this tiny human alive; my toes still curled at the onset of each nursing session. I cried that that same body, once in marathon and triathlon form, could now be a stand-in for Jabba the Hutt. I cried and cried and cried. There was nothing happy about this day or being a mother!

But thank goodness for dads who know to take the baton when Mom has fallen flat on her face and refuses to budge from her pity party. I was useless as Wayne quietly extricated Caedmon from his soggy car seat, changed him into a new set of clothes, and then washed all the soiled seat covers. And because the seat was all wet, which I thought dictated our sequestration at home, Wayne resourcefully lined Caedmon’s chair in a thick layer of towels, even padding the undersides of the wet straps. And while I was still ugly-crying on the couch, Wayne came over to give me a hug and a quick pep talk along the lines of “this is hard, but we can do it” (which rings truer each and every day), and then presented me with our newly clean and highly absorbent baby: “Okay, Mom, we’re ready!”

We did make it to church that day, even if it was literally for the last two seconds of service. And we even held it together long enough to make a trip out to Costco afterwards for supplies and lunch. (Look at us, surviving!) It was clearly nothing fancy, but that first Mother’s Day was monumental. To me, it symbolized an inauguration into this league of undercover super heroes who had been making and sustaining lives all around me. I had been Lois Lane, blind as a bat to all these phenomenal women, most notably my own mother, disguised loosely—not in glasses—but in kid-friendly cottons and synthetics. How amazing and awesome and all-sacrificing a mother is—whether she even wholly embraces it or not.

Since then, I have become a mother two more times over, which has left my body worn and damaged beyond easy repair (blistering eczema all over my hands and a herniated umbilical just to name a couple of gripes). I have been doused countless more times in vomit and all other bodily fluids. (In fact, I was puked on all over just yesterday evening, and today, it was baby jelly poo.) And I have had my plans spoiled… what, every day? But still my heart beats so completely for these little beings who have ruined EVERYTHING. They try me and test me and stretch me, but you know, they also rebuild me. That first Mother’s Day—just one month into the fray—I cried for the loss of my self, and understandably so; that forced self-denial is brutal. But what I didn’t yet have the perspective to see is that once the milk has been cleaned up, our schedules sufficiently reshuffled, and those extra pounds—well, may or may not have been lost—I still have this entourage of mini people who, through all my vacillating emotions and self-centered regrets and soul-searching identity crises, have remained my biggest fans. They’re just waiting for me, wrapped in absorbent towels, to finish MY tantrum so they (at least for now in these little years) can continue loving on me with their simple, uncomplicated, yet fierce adoration.

And that’s nothing to cry about.

Our absorbent baby

Introducing Caedmon to one of our favorite places.

Enjoying my first hot dog after following all the pregnancy rules, like a conscientious mamma should. (This happened not at all with pregnancies #2 and #3.)

Family Photos: January 2018

The first thought I had when I saw these amazing photos by our friend Susan of En Pointe Photography was, "Wow, we are so deceptively charming and put together!" Because the truth behind these photos taken earlier in January is that RyRy was unusually fussy, Addie clung to me and refused to set foot on the wet grass (until a timely game of Red Light, Green Light), and Caedmon was being such a menace, climbing all over and jumping in front of shots. I was still feeling high strung from frantically picking up the house just minutes before Susan arrived, as well as every single extra postpartum pound. And of course—of course—I was sporting this raging zit, smack dab in the middle of my face (thank goodness for Photoshop). "Well, that was stressful", I said to Wayne after Susan left. I truly did not expect any good photos to emerge from that morning. 

But Susan is brilliant and works wonders (as can a loose, slightly structured shirt to hide an unflattering midsection), and I am so, so happy with how these photos actually turned out. Which leads me to my second thought when I saw these photos: Though these polished pictures don't tell the complete story of who we are, they still are Us. One day, I'll look back at these images and that feeling of desperate drowning, that often keeps me from appreciating this current stage of life, will fade (as it already has some), and what I'll have are these distilled memories of our children at blissful play (unless you're RyRy, who is doing all he can to hold it together). 

Our life right now is both crazy and mundane, but I'm thankful for Susan for highlighting the beauty that is clearly there as well. So the lesson is this: don't fret so much, because there is something good even on the most desperate of days... and hire a really good photographer!

playing Red Light, Green Light

(Caedmon 5, Addie 2, Ry 7 months)

Oh, Addie...so unhappy that she has to touch the grass. 4 out of 5 smiles is a passing rate, I suppose.

I love that Susan captured Addie's simple delight over a snapping twig.

This just about captures our kids that morning.

That winning smile...

Why, yes, we always huddle together and read while the sunlight pours down on us just so.

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds

The day Lucy died, we should have been celebrating instead. It was July 2, a Sunday, Ryan’s one-month birthday—a day that, were we more true to the traditions of our heritage, would have been marked with feasting and red envelopes stuffed with money, portending a future filled with fullness and good fortune. But instead we were putting our dog down, and there clearly was no such merriment.

Just two days before, on the heels of an all-night trip to the ER with our feverish newborn, we received the devastating news that Lucy’s bladder was filled—FILLED—with stones. On the x-ray, it was clear that these fist-sized rocks were not going anywhere on their own. The doctor recommended surgery—on Monday at the latest—and just like that, we were slammed with the immense decision of going through with the costly procedure or euthanizing Lucy.

Lucy was our Pennysaver pup and had been with us from nearly the beginning of our marriage nine years ago, essentially growing with us as we became real adults. “Thirteen adorable puppies” was what the ad had read. That night in early January, because we were unprepared for the sudden addition to our family, Lucy slept in a Crate and Barrel box salvaged from the stack of wedding gift debris still waiting its turn for the recycling bin. She was my companion during that first winter of our marriage, when the frost nipped extra hard. I was a recent transplant from sunny San Diego where winter means (possibly) putting away the flip-flops for a month or two, and with no friends or job of my own, I had spent day after aimless day in our dingy once-bachelor pad going stir-crazy from loneliness and cabin fever. Lucy was my bright spot then and gave some purpose and structure to my day. After all, I was a pup-mom now! All day we played rope and “drag” (a game that is exactly as it sounds: I dragged Lucy around the house by the end of her rope, an activity Lucy especially loved); at night, I dutifully got her up from her cardboard box and took her out for multiple potty breaks. “I’m so tired!” I remember wailing to Wayne, as I collapsed on our bed in exhaustion. Oh, how I chuckle at my “exhaustion” then (though I suppose it’s telling that I was never a baby person even at that point). It was good training, though, for the real deal, a practice in selflessness and expanding our hearts, in patience when she chewed up my designer flats, and disciplining when she did it once more (and wisdom never to buy designer flats again!).

As that winter warmed into spring, we started running. Around and around the levee and green belt and Sacramento’s Pocket area and all the way to marathon shape; together we trained for multiple races. Though I eventually made friends and found a job, there was always time for rope and drag (until she grew too heavy—a day, I’m sure, Lucy regarded with dismay). She was there when, as newlyweds, we worked to make our house a home—me, blithely (and unevenly) coating our living room with Barn Door Red, because I loved the name even more than the paint shade. With each subsequent home we grew into, the tips of Lucy’s fur reflected all my varying color choices and ever-evolving tastes.

When we had Caedmon, and then Addie, the dynamics of our family changed dramatically. I’m sure she felt this tangible shift in the social order: these new varmints that Wayne and I had brought home one day were suddenly taking all of our time and attentions. They let out funny sounds and smelled even worse, but for some reason we insisted on keeping them, so she scooted over and made room for them. But she was just as loyal to us even then. She was up with me at all hours of the night, and she would sit by me in the glider as I nursed the babies, and she would follow me when I changed their diapers, then plod behind me as we both collapsed into our respective beds, waiting for the next midnight feeding.

And when she and I matured into middle-age together, me with the remnants of baby bulge, we both hit the pavement once again, and though she regarded with suspicion the strange contraption with very scary wheels that I now pushed the babies in, she never flaked once on our running dates. Though the fur around her muzzle was showing just a touch of gray, her quick gait revealed a youth that remained from our levee days. She could still run like the wind—especially when she spotted a squirrel on the horizon.

It was on the day we brought Ryan home from the hospital that we first noticed something was wrong with Lucy. Never one to make accidents inside, Lucy had left small puddles of urine in various corners of the house. In our absence, she hadn’t been let out frequently enough, we had reasoned. It was almost another month—a crazy month of transitioning to life with a newborn, family drama, and sick kids all around—before we realized that something more serious was going on with Lucy.

In that last month of Lucy’s life—that first of Ryan’s—I hadn’t realized how relatively happy we were. Sure, we were collapsing with exhaustion, drowning in the needs of our tiny children, struggling, elbow-deep in parenthood, but our family—for that one month—was wholly complete.

The weekend we lost Lucy will forever be ingrained in my memory as one fraught not just with grief, but of ill-timed events and great physical strain. The all-night trip to the ER with Ryan, where I had helplessly and heart-wrenchingly watched him get poked and prodded, had left me emotionally and physically drained and totally unprepared for the news of Lucy’s diagnosis. I left the vet’s office—sobbing and shaking as much from the news as from sheer exhaustion—with a major decision to make about Lucy’s future, but with a weekend agenda that was wholly unyielding to calm, unhurried, thoughtful deliberation. We had kids to shuttle back and forth to VBS, a baby shower to finish planning and then attend, and Ryan’s follow-up appointment with the pediatrician, on top of our usual duties in caring for three kids, the last still feverish and fussy and who demanded so much extra care (as if newborns didn’t demand enough care as is). Our lives were going at a million miles a minute, and we were so, SO tired. It had been nearly 36 hours since I had slept, a whole month since I had slept well. Our brains were barely functioning, and it was in this run-down state that we had to make a decision about Lucy—and quickly. Lucy was deteriorating before our eyes. By Saturday night, she was already completely incontinent, and her urine was tinged with blood. She was sequestered in the kitchen, which for her, being apart from us, was the misery we would be putting her out of. In the months that followed, I’ve replayed the events of that decisive weekend over and over, scrutinizing every move and detail that led us to our final decision, and I ask bitterly, why did Lucy’s fate have to hinge on that crazy, beleaguered, hell of a weekend?

Lucy was 8 ½ when we ended her life. When we decided, based solely on numbers, that she—technically a senior dog—was too old for the surgery the vet had recommended, that the bill would be too high, that her odds for complete recovery without possible relapse were low. In our pragmatism, we weighed the options against the pressing reality of our growing family. And in our pragmatism, we opted to terminate her existence. The morning of Lucy’s last day, we took the whole family for a walk to the park, where we had a picnic with Lucy on the grass, though at that point, she was refusing even the tidbits of sandwich meat we were offering to her. It was the return home that was hardest, that final stretch of sidewalk that lay between us and the car that we would coax her into and drive her to her final goodbye. I sobbed then and all the way to the moment the vet injected her veins with the numbing cocktail and then the one that stopped her heart. And I sobbed as I watched the life, the sunshine drain out of her eyes until what remained of her was just a glassy stare. Oh, how suddenly and quickly our Lucy was here and then gone.

For the next few months, in a mix of postpartum hormones, baby blues, and exhaustion, I felt the full weight of our unalterable decision. It was a reluctant pragmatism that drove our hand, but now, on this side of regret, I say to hell with pragmatism, because pragmatism does nothing to assuage a broken, bleeding heart. I cried several times a week, sometimes a day. Though life’s busyness and keeping up with three kids offered ample distraction—something I was both thankful for and indignant over—always, there was an undercurrent of grief and regret running just below the surface of my composure. It was upon those rare moments to myself, though, when the kids were asleep or after a midnight nursing session that left me awake in bed, when I now made the trek to and from the crib alone, that I most felt the absence of Lucy. And the floodgates would rupture, and Wayne would wake to find me huddled in a ball, sobbing uncontrollably next to him in bed.

But it wasn’t just the grief. It was the unsurmountable guilt that crushed my being. Guilt that we could have saved her (because she still had so much life in her!) but didn’t, that we literally led her to the slaughter. Guilt that I didn’t give her as much attention after the kids were born. Guilt that I resented so much her fur and dirt she tracked in, that I would hiss at her to stop barking during naptimes, or grumble when she got underfoot. And guilt that I was feeling so much grief over a dog, when I have friends who have recently lost parents and other (human) loved ones. But grief is still grief. She was still a life that we had cared for, a life who responded to and reciprocated our love. And when a life like that is taken away, though she was “just a dog”, it still leaves a void that is palpable.

About a month ago, my grief and guilt boiled to a tipping point. In one of those arguments that isn’t really about what originally sparked the argument in the first place (a home security system, in our case), I blurted out to Wayne in thinly veiled accusations that it was his pragmatism that killed Lucy and had he not been so concerned about saving money, we could have saved her instead. Yeah, I went there... I was sobbing and shouting and so out of control. I wanted Lucy back so badly, and when blaming myself wasn’t enough, I needed to blame someone else. In a most desperate and selfish act of self-preservation, I needed to cast off my guilt to bring some order and control back into my world that had become so dark and full of irreparable regret.

And you know what Wayne did? He took it. My husband, who loved Lucy just as much as I did, who grieved her as well—though more quietly, who had also been dead-tired that fateful weekend when we made our decision together amidst a million engagements and a sick newborn, who was and is always doing his absolute best to look out for the overall well-being of our family… that husband took the blame that I was passively (yet so aggressively) hurling at him. Not in a spineless, groveling-at-my-feet-for-forgiveness kind of way, but a strong, “okay, lay it on me; I can take it” kind of acceptance. Because he could see my brokenness. Because he loved me that much. Because he saw that I needed him to be there more than I was pushing him away.

The next day, he wrote me a card: “I can’t bring Lucy back, but I do want you to know that it was one of the hardest decisions that I’ve had to make in our marriage. I don’t blame you if you blame me for her loss, but I did care for her as much as you did. I also don’t desire you to change how you feel or how strongly you feel about Lucy… I know that it has been a devastatingly difficult last half year for you, so take what time you need to process… I will bear what I need to bear and be as kind and patient as I can… and give grace when it is needed.” And then he quoted a song that we had both just seen so beautifully performed on So You Think You Can Dance. “The song that I’ve had stuck in my head all week goes like this:

When the rain is blowing in your face,

And the whole world is on your case,

I could offer you a warm embrace,

To make you feel my love.”

And something near-miraculous happened: I stopped randomly bursting into tears and mourning in the middle of the night. Wayne willingly shouldered my guilt and became my scapegoat, which I don’t even know is healthy from a psychological standpoint, but his sacrifice did allow me the space I needed to heal. And that—his selfless, loving act—is a beautiful thing. (I know Someone else who did that for me, and I’m grateful for a husband who emulates that kind of love and grace for me every day.)

                                   

When Lucy first died four months ago, I had wanted to write the best tribute to her. I wanted to share what an amazing dog she was, to follow the expected story arc of delightful stories from her life, tragic end, then tearful but inspiring goodbye. But I didn’t have the words. I was so filled with grief and remorse and guilt—I was all bitter, without a trace of sweet. I am still sad, and could I do it all over, I would save her life in an instant. Most days I still want to go to sleep and, upon waking, thank the Ghost of Christmas Future for showing us our folly, but I am no longer consumed and controlled by the bottomless grief and guilt that had so overtaken me before. With my newfound healing, I started writing the story I wanted to tell about Lucy, and in doing so, I realized that Lucy’s story is also a story of us.  

Who would have known, 8 ½ years ago when we were pulling out that Crate and Barrel box for Lucy, laughing at the spontaneity of it all, so carefree as we camped out on the ground next to her, that we would return to those same positions the night before her death, this time watching and crying over her failing health. We would have two kids asleep upstairs and one sick and fussy newborn in our arms with us on the ground. Our minds and bodies would be spent, but our relationship, solid. Solid enough that when I lashed out at Wayne, he not only took the blows but shrouded me with his embrace. 8 ½ years ago, who could have predicted that. Who could have foreseen the joys and heartaches, the exhaustion, the wrinkles, the extra pounds, the stupid fights, the side-splitting laughter, the comforting silence, the growing up and the growing love that these 8 ½ years would afford.

They say that “dogs know”. And while all of Lucy’s life, I took pride in her beauty, I highly questioned her brains. Even so, I’d like to think that Lucy knew, and that even as we led her by the leash to her end, that when I looked into her eyes and lied and told her it was okay, that she was looking back and telling me that, yes, it is okay. Or, at least, it will be okay. And since we’re talking make-believe, if there truly was a dog heaven, Lucy would be there high in the sky, with her chin tilted up in her beguiling grin and waving her curly tail. Lucy was our primer for all of life’s major milestones—starting a family, purchasing a house and building a home together, and finally, death. The tearing down that is grief has been devastating; its repercussions, toxic. 8 ½ years ago, just six months into a marriage so new and fragile, I wonder how this strain would have driven us apart. But now—literally a lifetime later—we are experiencing this rebuilding and healing and togetherness that is made possible by those 8 ½ years of us. And Lucy—she was there for that, too.

Our "gotcha" moment when we chose her to be ours

(photo by Emily To)

(photo by Emily To)

drag!

Lucy, meet Caedmon. Caedmon, Lucy.

Our last photo of Lucy and the only one of our entire family