Dear Livvy

How can it be 10 years since that fateful morning?

How can it be that the years have now turned into decades?

How have I survived without you?

How am I surviving?

When you first left us Livvy I was sure I would die from my brokenness. I couldn’t understand why or how my heart continued to beat without you. I cried myself to sleep with guilt for surviving, for living when you didn’t.

But as the days turned into months I learned that my journey wasn’t over yet. That my job was to make your legacy known.

To share with the world your legacy.

Your legacy of love!

Livvy George you loved life with every breath, you tried to cram so much into your day.

Making your moments, loving on others and laughing hard.

Losing you only reinforced the lessons you had been trying to teach me in your lifetime.

Make the moments matter and love hard.

You didn’t care for fancy food or designer clothes all you wanted was that one last hug, that one last chocolate biscuit.

You were strength baby girl, fighting every day with sheer audacity to pack every second with love and laughter.

You were hope, seeing you defy doctors encouraged, challenged and celebrated everything.

You were love, unconditional , open honest true love. You came as you were and accepted others just the same.

In the past ten years I have lived life by one rule, What would Livvy say? Have I given enough, have I helped enough, have I loved enough?

When I have struggled and felt like giving up, I remember and rely on your strength, you never gave up even when others around you had.

When I have cried and felt like withdrawing from the world, I remember your smile and your mischievous ways and stay present.

Your legacy is in all of us that had the gift of knowing you and now thanks to the book written about you with those that didn’t.

As I watch your sisters grow I wonder what you would have been like now. Yet I also see you in them too, in their smiles, in their laughter, in their strength. I know you would be so proud of them as I am. How they refused you let losing you close off their hearts, they have and they still do hurt but they do not ever give up.

Livvy I wonder if you see what we have done since we lost you, the children we have called family through fostering and the baby brother I know you would have cherished. I often look at Daniel and see you, he is so cheeky at times and has us wrapped around his little finger that the feeling is so familiar.

I pray you are as proud of us as we are and always will be of you.

Ten years my baby girl, how the heck has it been so long? I still wonder why the world continued to turn without you. Yet I know that’s exactly what you would have wanted. You would have kicked my bum if I had given up.

I miss you, these three words don’t seem to hold all that I want to say but they are my heart. I MISS YOU. There isn’t a day, a minute a moment that goes by when I don’t.

Forever my baby girl.

I love you to the moon, stars and back

Mommy xxx