I read a lot. I love to consume information, and I’m always reading 10 things about this or 15 ways to do this. Well I read somewhere about the habits of miserable people, and there was one thing on the list that really stood out for me. The list stated that miserable people glorify or vilify the past. They blame their past, and they glorify a missed chance for a better life. They obsess about the would haves or the should haves rather than being present. I have played this game endlessly since Allie died. It starts with the question, “What if Allie hadn’t died from cancer?” It ends with, “Was I not supposed to have had children?” It’s a game of pure torture, and it has made me miserable.

Near the end of 2014, I had breakfast with a friend that also lives with the terrible pain of having a child die. During our conversation, she mentioned that someone told her, “I am glad to see you are moving forward, not moving on.” I have given this a lot of thought over the past month, and that is what I am striving for in 2015. I am unable to move on, and no one should expect a grieving parent to move on. It’s not something you get over. Allie is my daughter, and I will always be her mom. I refuse to move on from that and the bond that Al and I share is forever. However, I do have to move forward. If I live in the past or think about the what ifs, I am torturing myself and doing a huge disservice to Evie and everyone else that I love. I cannot be stuck.

I know a lot of people choose one word to center their year around rather than making a resolution for the new year. I decided to do this for the first time in 2015, and the word I chose was forward. I wrote it on a post-it note and stuck it to my computer monitor at work. The word was chosen to help me in respect to my past, my grief, and my pain. Here I am, three weeks in, and I can’t say that has already been accomplished. But, I have found that my word has helped me in places where I didn’t think I needed help. Work has been my sanctuary since Allie died. It’s a place where I can focus on a task and not think about my pain. But now that I see that post-it daily on my monitor at work, it has helped me to embrace new ideas in the workplace. It has also stopped me from playing my what if game of mental torture, and I haven’t made anything worse in my life.

I was having trouble figuring out how to end this post when I saw this fitting quote by Martin Luther King, Jr., today, on MLK Day.

“If you can’t fly then run, if you can’t run then walk, if you can’t walk then crawl, but whatever you do you have to keep moving forward.”

I am a long way from flying, running, or even walking. I am starting with a crawl, but at least it’s headed in the right direction. And, as I crawl forward from this dark place, I carry Allie in my heart.

You are always with me, Al, and there is nothing miserable about that.