Project Heal Capture Your Grief: Wish List

In an effort to ease my hurting heart this Fall, I am participating in Project Heal: Capture Your Grief. It is a storytelling/photography project to honor the babies we've lost.

Day 8: Wish List

This  picture is from the first time that we celebrated both girls on their birthday. They are exactly a year and two minutes apart, and for the longest time, I thought it was an ironic, cruel twist of fate. I would spend every May 17 since Ella was born celebrating her birthday during the day, and then crying myself to sleep that night. In the days leading up to Ella's 4th birthday, she would say things like "Mom, why do I get a cake and Riley doesn't?" and "It's not JUST my birthday, Mom. That's not fair."
So, even though it ripped my heart to do it, I baked and decorated two little cakes and we celebrated both girls. After Ella blew out her candles she said, "Mom! My wish came true! We BOTH had a birthday today!"
We've done this every year since.
My wish every year has been to make baby loss less of a stigma. If we are to EVER begin healing, we have to talk about it. It cannot be something shut away in a dark corner of our heart, never to come out. It doesn't work that way. I tried that, and it nearly destroyed me, my marriage, and my entire life. We need to tell our children's stories, write their names, and unite together, to help one another heal.