Every Day.

Usually around this time of the year as the weather warms up and the cicada's start chirping outside I'd get this warm, fuzzy feeling and I would say to myself "Christmas is here!"

My whole life Christmas has been my most favorite part of the year.

I loved shopping for presents and decorations, I loved standing back to admire the Christmas tree after we had put it up, I loved wrapping presents, organizing the table settings months in advance and doing a super expensive food shop, but most of all I loved our family all together. That is after all, what Christmas is all about.

I will now simply participate in Christmas. I will put on a fake smile for my remaining daughter, who will still be feeling joy on Christmas morning and won't feel her brother’s absence quite as much as we will.

Originally, I had planned on boycotting Christmas all together. Maybe jumping on a plane to a country that doesn't even celebrate Christmas or simply staying at home and forgetting Christmas ever existed. A friend soon reminded me that I couldn't do that to my daughter and I reluctantly agreed that it probably wasn't the right thing to do.

Archer would be 19 months old on Christmas this year, he would have really understood it this time. He would have been attacking the Christmas tree with his chunky little hands, in fact, we probably would have had to put the it up somewhere high because there's no way he would have been able to resist.

He would have easily been able to rip into his Christmas presents and understand that there was something awesome waiting for him inside. I'm sure by then he would have had his favourite TV character or Favourite kind of toys.

He would have been running, jumping and dancing around the back yard with his cousins and sister and he definitely would have been old enough this year to climb on the bouncy castle and slide down the water slide.

I have been trying to avoid Christmas, but then I thought to myself, why are you dreading it? How is Christmas any different to any other day? I have read that Holidays and special events will all be harder to deal with and I can sort of see why I guess, they're supposed to be here for those holidays, they're supposed to be doing all the special things we do on those holidays - but they're also supposed to be here every other day too.

I miss him, every day.

I cry for him, every day.

I beg for him back, every day.

I wonder who he would have been, every day.

I look back at the spot in my car where his car-seat used to be, every day.

I get sad when I see the pea and ham soup in the freezer, everyday (he loved that soup)

I see the scratch in the wooden floor where he dragged his toy piano across it, every day.

I touch his bedroom door every time I walk past it, every day.

So, I will approach Christmas this year with the thought that Christmas pain is nothing compared to the "every single day" pain, because Christmas pain comes once a year... "Every single day" pain - is every day.