I'll never be okay with this.

If you are looking for a positive or uplifting post, you have come to the wrong place.

Four years ago today, Peyton's suffering ended and my suffering began. 

I would like to say that loving and losing Peyton made me a better or stronger person. I would love to bask in gratitude for all of the lessons she taught me, or feel joy that she is with Jesus. There are a lot of beautiful ways I would love to be able to spin this in my mind, but the reality is that four years ago today my child struggled for her final breaths in my arms.

I will likely never be okay with that. 

I am angry and hurt. I am sad and bitter. I walk a line between feeling incredibly blessed and grateful for the joys in my everyday life, joys that I know Peyton worked hard to bring me, and feeling an immense amount of sorrow over how incredibly robbed she was. Of life. Of joy. Of growing up. Of everything.

Peyton never even felt the sun on her face. She never breathed fresh air. 

She was born into a world where she gave only love, and knew only pain.

I guess four years is not long enough to blunt my anger at that.

Disgusted!!

I am disgusted.
Absolutely disgusted!

And dismayed.

Disturbed.
Angered.

Today I came across this article.

It told me that despite my best efforts to protect my children from carcinogens, I have failed them.

We eat only organic foods.

I won't let my children within ten feet of a cellphone.
Don't allow wireless internet in my home.

Don't use chemicals on my lawn or in our house.

We play primarily with wood toys PROVEN to be free of lead paint. Any plastic toys are BPA, lead, and phlalate free.

I spent $130 on a bamboo playmat to keep them from breathing in the toxins known to off-gas from the much cheaper (and easier to come by) foam mats.

My kids do not, and WILL NOT, eat anything containing Red Dye #40, Blue #2, Yellow #5.

I am vigilant.
Informed.

So imagine my disgust - my absolute disgust, to read that not one, not two, but THREE products that my children use or used regularly have been found to contain frighteningly high levels of the fire retardent TDCPP - a chemical that was banned in the 1970's from pajamas, because they knew back then that it caused cancer.

A chemical that is also a known hormone disruptor.

Imagine my disgust when I read that the My Brest Friend breastfeeding pillow was coated in it.

A fucking breastfeeding pillow!
Are you kidding me?!

Are there THAT MANY irresponsible and moronic mothers smoking a cigarette WHILE breastfeeding their child that it needs to be sprayed in fire retardent chemicals?

Imagine how I felt to learn that the Arm's Reach mini co-sleeper that my twins spent their first six months of life sleeping at least part of the night in was coated in it.

My Graco Snugride carseats.

I want to scream.

More than that, I want to march into Arm's Reach, Graco, and My Brest Friend, grab their CEO's by the collar and yell "SHAME ON YOU!"

I want to sit them down and force them to hear every horrific detail of what cancer does to a baby. To walk them through every painful moment of Peyton's life. Shove the REALITY of what these chemicals could possibly do in their irresponsible faces.

I am sick to death of carcinogens being taken lightly. Sick to death of hearing, "everything causes cancer."

And what?
That's somehow okay?!

We are supposed to just accept that even though natural alternatives are available, it is somehow acceptable practice to use carcinogens on these products just because "everything causes cancer"?

How dare a company that makes it's bread and butter on infant products, INFANT PRODUCTS! knowingly be exposing these children to these chemicals?

California statutes set the standard for the whole country. They require that products meet certain flammability thresholds, yet irresponsibly do NOTHING when the retardants being used to meet these thresholds are dangerous, and carcinogenic.

I have contacted these companies by twitter.
@cosleep
@mybrestfriend
@gracobaby

I have written to my Senator.

Something needs to change.

We need to stop putting dollar signs before child safety. Period!

I hate grief.

I hate grief.

I hate the way it leaves me feeling vulnerable and exposed.

I can't go into what happened today, but I got the sense that someone used the sadness of my story for their own benefit and it just makes my stomach turn.

Maybe they did.

Maybe they didn't.

Either way that's the feeling I was left with.

The feeling of being used.

I hate grief.

I hate that I have never mastered the art of sugar coating my feelings about what happened to Peyton.

My daughter was born very, very sick.

My daughter suffered a tremendous amount in her short life.

My daughter died, struggling for breath, in my arms.

How the hell do you sugar coat that?

How do you sugar coat that for the rest of your life you are going to miss this little being who could have and should have been somebody?

Who could have and should have been given the same shot at life as the rest of us?

Yes my life is full of many joys.

Yes I am grateful for the blessings that each day brings.

Yes I am looking to the future with a renewed sense of hope.

No that does not erase what happened to Peyton, or the fact that her absence is permanent.

I hate grief.

I hate that I can't hide my grief, even when I want to.

I hate that if a stranger learns of what happened, and asks me about my daughter, I am going to cry.

Why do I do that?

A stranger is not worthy of my tears.

I have earned my tears.

In every hope I had for her, and fear I felt for her while she was here.

In every terrible decision that had to be made.

In every moment of this life that I should be sharing with my daughter but can't because she now lives in the cold earth.

I have earned my right to my tears.

A stranger has not.

I hate grief.

I hate the judgement that sometimes comes in that moment.

I hate when they say, "I am sorry," 

but their eyes say "You still cry over this?", 

or their tone says, "What is wrong with you?"

I hate grief. 

I hate that the only thing I have had to cling to through this journey is my honesty, and today I felt like someone twisted that honesty into something else, something perverse.

I hate that my tongue got tied in that moment, and what I wanted to do was scream and tell them how inappropriate they were, or that it must be nice to live in a world where the worst day of my life is just another bonus to something they were trying to accomplish, but I couldn't. 

I froze.

I hate grief.

All of it.

I hate that people can't get that grief IS what it is.

The definition is "a reaction to a major loss." 

That's what grief is.

I hate that people always want to put some damn title on it.

They want to summarize it so they can feel more comfortable about it and separate themselves from it.

Depression.

Weakness.

The inability to move on.

"Oh I don't have that," they can tell themselves,

 or,

"I've never been in your shoes, but if I were, I am sure I would handle it better."

I hate grief.

I hate the stigma that surrounds grieving a baby.

I want to know what exactly society considers a "normal" and acceptable response to losing your child?

Pretending she never existed?

Would that be a more "normal" response?

Or just more convenient?

Either way, if you see the devaluing of the life of a child as "normal," and grieving their absence as "abnormal," then you are the one with the problem, not me.

I hate grief.

I hate it more than anyone watching me go through it ever could.

Grief is messy. 

It is tiring. 

It is forever.

Not the darkest days of course. 

Nothing compares to those early darkest days.

But if you somehow think that a year or two years or ten years or fifty years later, my daughter's life should no longer matter to me anymore, than I don't want to associate with you.

I do not see her as any less deserving of my love because her life was brief.

If you do, than I consider that your shortness of character, not mine.

I hate grief.

I hate feeling like I have done something wrong for experiencing it.

My child died.

I didn't seek that out.

It happened to me.

Nothing about this is a choice.

If I could, I would go back to September 3, 2008.

I was 42 weeks pregnant.

I was excited for her arrival.

I had no idea what was to come.

My life was so good.

The implication that any part of grief is a choice frustrates me.

I hate grief.

Most of all, for making me defend it.

Thank You Facebook...

Thank you for your many stories, statuses, and updates about people's pregnancies, children, and the joys (and complaints) of parenthood, that time and time again remind me just how left out to feel in this world. Thank you Facebook, because honestly my dead child and lack of a successful subsequent pregnancy really wasn't enough to drive that message home. 

What can I say???

BFN.

Greetings From Inside My Cocoon

Last Thursday, I attended my second monthly grieving mother's group, and just as I had at the close of the first meeting, I felt grateful for having found it. As many of you know, this group isn't the first that I have tried to attend - I went to one early on that was an epic fail of tears and anger - but this group gives me a sense of hope, and so I continue going back. It is also a faith based group, and my faith is totally rocked right now, so I think that it is good for me to be around other women who have had their faith shaken to the core and gotten through it.

Sometimes it feels like the universe takes me by the hand, and leads me to certain people from whom I can learn. As I was preparing to leave the house Thursday, I suddenly felt compelled to wear the sea glass necklace that Hubs had bought me last year. I thought this odd, since I hadn't worn it in months, and when I got there, was floored by the irony of this action - the theme of the group was reinvention after loss, and to illustrate these changes, the group leaders held up marbles and sea glass.

Their interpretation of sea glass was different than mine, but I couldn't help but think about how fitting it was that the universe had brought me to sit among this group of women, talking about how I had left my life of medical sales after Peyton's death, and reinvented myself as a writer - and even more oddly, how one of the first pieces that I had written about grief, was a piece comparing my journey to that of sea glass.

As the night progressed, I thought a lot about reinvention, and grief, and this journey, and my mind kept returning to the old Chinese proverb: "Just when the caterpillar thought the world was over, it became a butterfly."

I started wondering where I was in that chain, was I a caterpillar, or a butterfly, and decided that I am neither, but instead somewhere in the middle. One of the women came over to share with me the story of her loss - a son who had passed some 8 or 10 years ago, and asked how I was doing. I told her that I have my good days, but for the most part am still quite angry and bitter, and she said, "like the butterfly in the cocoon, your stage of thrashing about can't be rushed."

Have you ever been to a butterfly museum and seen big glorious butterflies sitting on the floor lame, unable to fly? Those beautiful creatures are destined to failure, because they have been let out of their cocoon too early. To become strong enough to fly, butterflies must be left alone to beat their wings against the inside of their cocoon to draw the strength they need for survival, and just like these butterflies, so do I.

I need to throw myself against the inside of my cocoon for as long as it takes. I need to beat my hands at its walls, and scream and be angry. I was wronged! My child was born with cancer - I was wronged! I watched her suffer - I was wronged! She died in my arms - I was wronged! I will never see her grow - I was wronged! I mother a grave -I was wronged!

I was wronged!
I was wronged!
I was wronged!

But I embrace it.

People have asked me time and time again, if I am "feeling better yet," or "have gotten over it." and the answer is "no", and that is okay. Someday I will get to that place, where I shed my cocoon and fly free of the pain of all that happened to her. Someday I will flutter through the air, and others in passing will only see my beautiful colors, and comment on my grace, without knowing of the struggle it took to get me there. Someday I will be that butterfly, who as a caterpillar thought her world was over without believing that a beautiful life still lay ahead of her.

Someday I will be all those things, but first the hard work must be done. First I need to be left to thrash about. First I need to build strength in my wings against the walls grief has built around me. First I must work through the pain of child loss and infertility. First I must do all these things. These are the steps that will help me survive this journey.

I don't mind being stuck in my cocoon. I am used to it now, and know that coming out too quickly would put to waste all of the growing I have done this last year and a half. Coming out too quickly, for the benefit of others, would destine me to a life of looking pretty on the outside, but feeling too weak inside to ever truly lift myself off the floor.

I don't mind my time in the cocoon. It is what is owed to me.



**An IVF update.**
No news is good news right? I have been going back and forth with my symptoms, some days worse than others with OHSS. I find that if I can lay on the couch like a lump and guzzle Gatorade, they get better. When I venture out, they get worse. Sometimes I hate when they get better, because OHSS is so closely tied with HCG. The doctor has lifted some of my restrictions. I am now allowed a "short stroll" each day, and I am grateful for it because the weather is beautiful, and I was getting so bored.

I have been having a lot of pregnancy symptoms - extremely heightened sense of smell, exhaustion, tender gums, mild cramps, did I mention EXHAUSTION?- but I don't know which of these symptoms are due to the progesterone, and which are real. Two more days, and all this wondering will be put to rest, I just pray that the wondering becomes celebrating and planning... until then... I wait.

My nightmare...

Last night I went to sleep feeling very optimistic. Our appointment yesterday with the RE went very well, and he told us that my estrogen levels are rising, but remaining under control, and that my follicles are maturing nicely, many of them in the 11, 12, and 13 range (whatever that means.) He anticipates retrieval for the end of this week. After our appointment, I spent a peaceful day with hubs, and we even took in a movie (Bounty Hunter- don't bother). All of these things should have contributed to a restful sleep for me last night, but rest was not in the cards.

I found myself caught in a dream. A very vivid and cruel dream that, though I tried to break free of it, held its grip on me, making waking very difficult. You ever have those dreams, where you know you are sleeping, you know it is a dream, but still you stay stuck?

In my dream I was a nurse. After Peyton died I had felt this deep desire to go to nursing school and help other sick little babies. This lasted about five minutes until I realized that the prospect of seeing another child turn blue and die before me was one I couldn't live with.

I dreamt that it was my first day out of nursing school and I had been assigned to work on the floor of the hospital where Peyton spent her life. I walked from room to room, recognizing the familiar faces of the staff, and as I observed them caring for other patients, I grew more and more anxious. Things, blatant things that I had learned in nursing school about caring for patients, were being completely overlooked.

I became like a crazy person, flailing my arms wildly, and pointing out these missing and crucial steps in care to the doctors and nurses. I was saying things like, "You did this with Peyton too, I know you did. How could you have overlooked this with my child? She was just a little baby! Couldn't you see that? She wasn't a normal kid battling Leukemia. She needed special care!"

The staff just stared back at me blankly, or rolled their eyes, or waved me off with their hands in disgust. They told me I didn't know what I was talking about, and called my accusations "ludicrous." The more they dismissed me, the louder I got, desperate to be heard, and the louder I screamed, the less attention they paid to me.

When my energy was spent, and I could scream no more, I fell over against the wall and onto the floor exhausted. "Can't you see?" I was begging, grabbing at the staff's legs as they passed. "Can't you see that your neglect killed her?"

The staff ignored me, shuffling by as if I wasn't even there. It was clear that my words had fallen on deaf ears as they continued going about business as usual, ignoring me as I laid, manic, in a sobbing heap at their feet.

"You needed to do more..." I kept repeating, "I should have known that... I should have made you do a better job. She came here to get well. I should have made you do more."

Today marks 543 days since Peyton left this world. 543 days, and this dream has me wondering, if not at 543 days, then when?


When will the second guessing end?

He's Baaaaaack!

I don't even know what to say except that I am furious.

The asshat that I talked about here, and here, is back.

Yesterday I went up to see Peyton with my cousin and discovered little souvenirs that his dog had left around her grave. I didn't have anything on me to clean it up with, so I headed back up there early this morning with bags in tow. What I found broke my heart. There was enough dog waste around Peyton's little grave to fill three plastic doggie pickup bags.

I looked around at the other graves and found nothing. It's like he walked it over to her spot and placed it himself.

What kind of a person can do something like that to a little baby's grave? As you all know, I have already gone to the police. I don't know where else to turn because they can't have someone stationed there 24/7.

I really don't need this...

Regrouping... again

Or at least attempting to. I feel like that is what my life has become, setback after setback requiring us to regroup based on the universe's rules. Well you know what. I am pretty tired of it really. The utter irony of learning this week that my tubes are shot to crap as a direct result of a c-section that I had to bring a dying baby into the world. Oh, that's just hilarious universe isn't it? You really got me on that one.

If Peyton had been born healthy, if she was here, a laughing fifteen month old, of course I would feel this was all worth it. But she isn't is she? She was born to suffer through chemo, procedures, and surgeries that would make a grown man cry, and for what? For an infection to take hold of her after one month!

This latest development has me thinking alot about Peyton's birth. Alot about why the c-section was proposed, and if it would have been kinder to let her pass in childbirth. That would have been kinder to her, no doubt. She wouldn't have had to learn just how cruel life can be for a baby born with cancer. I am so glad to have held my baby girl, to have loved her and nursed her and known her. But at the end of the day she is gone. Just as she would have been had I birthed her. The only difference is, I wouldn't have known all that I am missing. I wouldn't have known how much I need to see her smiley face again, or how beautiful an experience it is to breastfeed her. In that way, perhaps it would have been kinder to me, too.

The truly crappy thing is that they had no idea about Peyton's cancer, so the recommendation to have the c-section, that was based on something else. What exactly? I couldn't tell you. They wait until you are in the throws of labor and then say, "it's time to get that baby out, she is in distress." What does distress mean? Her heart was healthy, her lungs. What distress brought on this surgery? A surgery that birthed a dying baby, and then wrecked my tubes through infection, and my chances at other children? I will never lay down with the man I love, and make a baby again. This is a devastating reality for me. DEVASTATING.

I am sure there are those who will read this post and judge my thoughts. I am sure there are others who will think I am callous or cruel. I can't apologize. I am not sorry that I feel this way. I am 29 years old and feel like my book is closed, like I am the punchline to some ridiculous universal joke. I married the right man. We had a safe, secure home to welcome a child into. Where did I go so wrong?

This time it is different because I recognize the stages that I am going through, I have been through them before. They have been unwelcome companions on this fifteen month ride through grief.

Shock & Denial.
Pain & Guilt.
Anger & Bargaining.
Depression.

These four have become like second nature to me, it's the last three that I have never quite been able to master.

The Upward Turn (I thought I was getting here, really I did. When we decided we were ready to try again.)
Reconstruction and Working Through.
Acceptance & Hope.

Where is the hope in something like this? How can I accept this irony? It is too cruel.

I hear Shakespeare's words, "I am fortune's fool!" ringing over and over in my mind, and believe they were written for me.

These last two days have been like those early after losing Peyton. Eyes swollen with tears. Head pounding. Not answering the phone. Not getting dressed. Not going out into the world. I have not even been able to bring myself to go see Peyton's grave. My sweet little girl who I love so much. I feel awful for this. For feeling the way I am feeling. It hurts to look at your child's grave under any circumstances, these make it especially difficult.

Most people get pregnant and know that changes are going to come. They are supposed to be happy changes... not this. Pregnancy, child loss, infertility. Where does the shit storm end?

I wrote the title of this post, "regrouping... again" with every intention to write something that says, "Listen up world, I will get through this, I will overcome this." The problem is, I don't believe it. And if I don't believe it, I can't write it.

Devastated...

There are no other words. Just devastated.
Both tubes are shot. Both f*cking tubes! The best they could offer me for answers was that "there is no justice in this world," and that it's "most likely from an infection after the c-section." The c-section I had to bring a child condemned to death into this world. I carried a child with cancer and no one caught that. I have seen an OB/GYN monthly since, and no one caught this infection.
Angry.
Hopeless.
Devastated.

Bah Humbug.

Last Christmas came right after losing Peyton, in those first fresh months where I wore only pajama pants, and didn't run a brush through my hair. To be honest, it was about ten months till I cared at all about my appearance, and even now, it doesn't fall high on my list. I was angry last Christmas, that it had to come at all, that I had to watch my nieces (who despite this loss, I love dearly) open their little girl packages, while my little girl laid frozen, or worse, beneath the earth. I had worked so hard to be healthy while I carried her. I had held her. Loved her. Nursed her. Where were my little girl's presents beneath the Christmas Tree?

Two years ago on Christmas (Eve to be exact) I found out I was pregnant, and that night we broke the news to my family. The house was filled with celebration, and all felt right in the world. We were having a baby. That was going to be our last Christmas without a child. I hate myself now for assuming so much, and having taken the promise of her existence for granted.

This Christmas, two full years after first learning of Peyton's existence, I feel myself going through the motions, but really not "feeling" the holiday spirit. I don't even want to write out the cards. What is there to say?

"My child died. I fell apart. Your lives are all better than mine. Bah-Humbug!"

I try to remind myself of all the things I have to be thankful for. My husband. My family. My friends. My good health, and that of those I love. My new rescue puppy Charlotte. The generosity of those who have donated to Doing Good In Her Name. My writing. The friends I have met in this blog world. And yet, even among these many things that I list, there is a huge, empty, void. She is gone. She is still gone. Was she ever really here?

I would like to say that with the passage of time I have come to accept this loss, but it is not true. Instead I sort of cope, like an old man with a wooden leg, I limp along, but never truly find my way back to a comfortable stride. Something is off. Permanently.

Yesterday we set up our "Peyton Tree" which in reality is not a tree at all, but a plant. I wanted something living, something that I could try (crosses fingers) to keep alive in this house to always remember my sweet girl. I thought I would feel better after finishing the tree, but I didn't. Instead I was sort of pissed off. I shouldn't have to have a Peyton Tree. I should have a Peyton. A smiling, laughing, dancing, little 15 month old to thank the Lord and Heaven for having blessed me with. This is our second Christmas since Peyton was born, and this is our second Christmas without her.

I hate posts like this. Ones where I have no wisdom to offer, or comfort or inspiration to give others on this journey. I read some women's blogs and feel somehow "less than". They have unconditional faith. They find joy in the season. I read them and wonder what is wrong with me, why I can't see the forest through the trees, and then I remember it is because my branches are empty. There is no baby on this tree top. Little hope of fresh buds in spring. There is loss, and infertility, and a looming sense of failure and inadequacy, and that is the reality of mothering a dead child during the holidays.

This year I have a new nephew, he was born just after Thanksgiving, and his healthy arrival is another thing I recite on my Thankful list. I didn't blog about my sister's pregnancy, and how it felt for me, because I didn't know how to do those feelings justice. I would like to say I had been a better sister as she carried this year, but I didn't have it in me. She said she understood, but I feel bad for it nonetheless. It is not her fault that my attempts at having a family have been so tragic, and it is not my little nephew's fault that his older cousin, the one he will have outlived by the time we gather around that tree, is not here with us. He deserves to be surrounded in joy and celebration, regardless of my own personal crap, because his healthy arrival on this earth is a little miracle, and not one to be taken for granted, as we all know too well.

This year I will sit around the family tree and watch all the baby items be opened, and smile as my nieces, too, open their gifts. I will survive this Christmas, as I somehow managed to last year (thanks in large part to alcohol and some really bad Karaoke) because the world just doesn't stop for me. It continues to turn, even as ours has come crashing down.

I will go through the motions, and fight back the tears with a smile on my face, because that is what you do in babyloss land, and I will hope, that even if just for a moment, my smile will feel good, and genuine, and real. As I do, I will be praying that wherever you are, those moments of joy, no matter how brief, come calling for you, too.

No Respect

To the man who has twice in the last week allowed his dogs to roam free and treat the cemetery like their personal bathroom... what is wrong with you? Where is your respect? Can't you see the love and care that people have put into these grave sites? Don't you feel the holiness of this ground?

I yelled at your dog. I called after you. You coward, you kept walking in the distance. You pretended that you didn't even hear me.

This isn't a dog park. It's not open space for your personal use. It deserves to be honored for what it is.

This is where you will find the woman whose husband brings flowers after mass every week. Did you know about her, before you let your dog ruin this week's bouquet? It is where the young mother, barely thirty, tragically lays. And home to infant triplets, to veterans, to a female Marine from WWII. This is a sacred place to come and just be, and most importantly to me, it is my daughter's home.

I know you saw me sitting there before you let your dogs loose. I know you saw me talking to her, and even that, the image of a grieving mother over her child's grave wasn't enough to instill understanding in your heart.

Can't you see that your actions have violated the only place in this world, where I can sit near my child? A place whose space allows me to feel her close. Nature that has inspired my thoughts. Ground that has absorbed my countless tears.

Do you even care about the pain that your carelessness has caused me?

Swirling, Unforgiving, Nauseating, Heart Pounding Questioning

My baby died of Cancer.

Sometimes this very sentence sends me reeling. How could this happen? How could my child, formed of immense love and carried within me, enter this world with the chips so severely stacked against her? A one in fifty million chance, was that some kind of a joke? When you worry about what can go wrong in a pregnancy, you never picture this. It is simply unimaginable. How could her body have betrayed her so cruelly? How could her blood have been riddled with Cancer at its creation? Why were there no warnings? I was her Mother, how could I have not known? Sometimes I lose days on end, lost in the swirling, unforgiving, nauseating, heart pounding questioning.

Since losing Peyton, I feel unable to escape stories of sick children fighting for their lives. Each blog, it seems, has a button with another story of a sick child needing prayers. Click after click, I read these stories and pray that God will show these children a level of mercy and healing that he did not bestow upon my child. And with each story, I wonder how many more Mothers need to leave hospitals with empty blankets, aching arms, and broken hearts?

It is as if I am seeing the unforgiving nature of this world for the first time. How can this be? Was it always this way; a world filled with the suffering of children? How could there have been so many Mothers with broken hearts out there, without me knowing? How could I have been so naive to believe that terminal illness was for the old? How could I have thought that those that I loved were immune to the evils of Cancer? Was I that proud? Was I that self centered?

Last night I stumbled upon a story about a beautiful little girl named Abigail, who is fighting Leukemia, the same vicious disease that took my Peyton. Abigail's chances are much better than Peyton's. She is older, three or so, and has already made it through several months of chemo. She falls into an age range with a 90% plus cure rate, my poor Peyton was looking at a percent of a percent at best.

While reading her story, scrolling through her page, and admiring the strength of faith displayed by her parents, I found myself sucker-punched and unable to breathe. The right side of her blog had a picture of Abigail with her parents, it read "us with our sweet Abigail who was diagnosed with Leukemia on Oct. 2nd, 2008." Reading that, my heart broke at the realization that on the very day that my sweet Peyton drew her last breath in the battle against Leukemia, this little girl was just beginning the fight. I sat there, staring at the date in awe, knowing that our lives, and that of Abigail's parents, came crashing down on the very same day... and I prayed to God to grant this child the miracle that we had so wanted for Peyton, the miracle of a cure.