Tommy

Taryn had a very special connection to Tommy.  When he was born I think she knew in some way he was hers too.  My nephew Patricke never had any siblings.  He loved her like the sister he always wanted so she was more than a cousin to him.  His children were special to her too.  Tommy is his first son.  Tommy made her want a baby of her own even more than she did before he came along and she wanted one a LOT.  She spent as much time with him as she could.  

After she died, Patricke was sitting in his kitchen after coming home from the hospital that day and he was crying.  Tommy came up to him and asked him what was wrong.  Patricke said "My heart is broken."  Tommy reached over and put his hand on Patricke's and said "You can have mine daddy."  Only the sweet innocence of a baby would know just what to say at a time like that.  

Tommy had a very hard time after we lost her.  He would talk to her and hear her talk to him.  Heather, Patricke's wife, would come in the room and Tommy would be flipping through the channels on the TV and she'd ask him what he was doing and he said to her, "Taryn is trying to figure out what to watch."  He once started singing "It's My Party and I'll Cry if I want to" he had not been taught that song by his mom.  He knew all the words and she watched him sing it and asked how he learned it and he told her Taryn taught it to me.  He was three years old.  He talked about her so much that his Kindergarten teacher asked if they could put her on his pick up list at school because she was obviously someone in  his life who meant a lot to him.  Heather had to explain what happened to his teacher.  

Tommy started first grade today.  I looked at the pictures of him all grown up and confident with his back pack and new clothes and thought that Taryn would have been there too.  She is.  I'd like to think that there are really guardian angels.  I do.  I know that if it's possible in any way Taryn will be his.  She will watch over him and whisper to him and be with him throughout his life.  When you fall in love with a baby it's like that.  They never leave you.  I know because I fell in love with her.  

Every mother does that.  They weave that intricate web between their baby and their heart that is unbreakable.  It starts from the moment they breathe and never ends.  Every smile, every silly frown and ever time they say your name as a toddler is etched on your heart.  

It's so hard to imagine life without them.  You don't know how you ever lived a day before they were part of you.  I could see that Taryn had that kind of love for Tommy.  She was finally pregnant with Kayan but her first baby was Tommy.  He loved her too.  He still does.  He talks about her sometimes.  He misses her all the time.  He struggles to understand why she isn't here anymore but knows she's with him.  

When a baby feels that love from someone they know it's something they need and want.  I'm sure Tommy will love Taryn for the rest of his life.