14

When contemplating this year's birthday celebration, I needed something that felt more personal. Instead of our traditional full family balloon launch and dinner as a group, I chose a permanent balloon to keep close to my heart. Ryan would be fourteen this year and the reality of that many years separating me from the short time I was able to spend with him doesn't feel possible; the memories still vivid. Whereas I have moved forward in life, it isn't without those raw moments floating just under the surface at times.

The years like this one where I am settled in the weeks leading to this date, feel intense and brutal when the calendar lands on December 20. Years where the birthdate is something I dread for weeks leading up to his day, leave me almost relieved when it finally arrives. Either way, my heart hurts in this season every year.

This year is challenging in a different way as I have fully reconnected with Ryan's birth mom. We are friends so I feel the burden to protect her as much as I can from my emotions and the bitterness some family members still hold in their hearts. I cannot direct that anger toward the broken woman who has been clean for years and struggles to find the strength to forgive herself. The anger instead is focused on the loss itself and the way she was manipulated as a young girl into the drug scene in the first place. The drugs and a lot of unhealthy people created the storm that ended with me rocking my son to sleep and assuring him it was time to let go. To this day, that moment has been the hardest of my life but he deserved peace. I loved him enough to want his suffering to end even though it meant losing a part of my heart in the process.

So on this birthday, fourteen years later I hope my friendship with his birth mom is something he would be honored by. I pray my reluctant family members find peace and ultimately also forgive fully. This remembering someone who was only allowed nine painful days on earth is difficult in the best of circumstances but in true Baughman style, we have complicated it further but I have to remain true to the promise I made Ryan and God in those grief stricken early days. My prayer is to see my son again in heaven healed, whole and reunited with ALL of us who loved him.

Rest easy sweet boy. I love you forever.