Last year

My dear friend Amy coined a phrase that I find myself using a lot lately.

The ghosts of autumns past.

Normally the change in the temperature, the emergence of fall decor, and the too-early-emergence of Christmas decor/music/etc would be a welcome shift from summer. But now it just conjures up painful memories.

We're getting to the point in the year that, one year ago, our lives changed forever. So the next month is full of dates that were just normal days one year ago, but that will now forever be significant.

One year ago today was my 20-week ultrasound. We got to see our precious baby (choosing to keep the gender a surprise) and marveled at God's handiwork of tiny fingers and toes. Halfway to March 1! We ate a celebratory brunch at IHOP. :)

I remember a scrapbooking retreat, a girls' night out, a parent-teacher conference. And I was pregnant. Blissfully unaware that just weeks later, I no longer would be.

Halloween is probably the hardest day to think about at this point. That was the last time I really felt Hannah move. It was the last big event before the rest of that awful week unfolded.

And then my mind moves beyond November 5th. To the first surreal days of this new journey. To fitting into regular jeans way too soon. To picking up my daughter's ashes. To a trip to Duluth as a newly bereaved family. To surviving Thanksgiving. To dreading December and the happiness of Christmas. Because I wasn't happy. I was broken. And mad. And not pregnant anymore.

So what do these ghosts of autumns past do? They make me want to crawl in a hole. To put on my yoga pants and take a nap for about a month. To hide. To wallow. To despair. But really? That would just be giving in to these ghosts. These ghosts that have no authority to touch me in the slightest way.

So here's to not giving these ghosts power. Because I truly believe in the One who wants more for me than to dwell on how hard things were last year. One who encourages us to have hope in the future and believe there are bright days ahead.