Botox

On Not Erasing

I don’t spend prolonged periods of time looking at my face in the mirror. As a matter of fact, I avoid it as much as possible. I’m not entirely sure why. I don’t recognize myself anymore, for one. The face that stares back at me is the face of a person permanently and forever altered and I don’t know who she is yet. And it is, after all, rude to stare at strangers. But, this weekend, my daughters and I went to an event that (in order to be presentable) required, unfortunately, some prolonged mirror-looking.

My face is different. This is true. There are new lines: Sad lines. Despair lines. Lines of resignation. I can see the permanence of my loss etched there. Pain and longing are frozen in long canyons across my forehead, the corners of my eyes sag, betraying the paradox of an empty space that is somehow the heaviest thing to hold. Between my eyebrows, anger.

I put my palms on my face. smoothing my forehead into my hairline, pulling the corners of my eyes up and back. Holding it there.

I could get rid of these lines, I think. People do it all the time. It’s called Botox.

Botox could smooth away all the evidence of all the nights I wake up in a sweat calling Amelia’s name. How long have I been scrunching my face in agony as I relive, in my dreams, her body being taken from me?

I could smooth away the mornings I return home from school drop off and climb back back into bed to cry myself to sleep again.

Remove the times when suddenly and without warning, I feel as though I have been kicked in the stomach and I bend myself over my own body in pain and wail.

I could eternal sunshine all evidence of my loss away. Every 3-6 months, for 9-12 dollars a unit, I could look as if it never happened. What a deal!

But how could I ever?

Erase the 4,177 days and 18 hours of parenting you? Loving you?

Erase the 246 days and 18 hours of holding you in your grief as we used up the 21,254,000 seconds of little nows left before they forever ran out? No refills allowed?

The 39 days, 18 hours between “Mama, I’m starting to lose my balance again” and your final breath?

The one hour of holding you as you crossed to a place I could not follow?

Arriving at zero, the numbers begin to climb again and now we are at 135 days, 6 hours and counting of living without you. Erase this?

No.

I got a tattoo of your name on my arm because I want people to ask me about it. Then I can tell them, “Her name was Amelia, she existed, she was extraordinary.”

No one will ever ask me about the lines on my face. That would be weird. But, if they did, I would be able tell them: This is the map showing where I have traveled in the land of love and grief. This is the evidence on my body of my daughter, once living, now dead and everything in between and after.

Now I am practicing looking in the mirror again. Not to pull back and smooth the lines, but to trace them slowly and kindly with my finger. And as I trace, I talk to myself about you, Amelia. Who you were. What you did. How you took up space on this planet. How kind. How solid. How curious. How you mocked death with your continued creativity. How you unflinchingly insisted on life for the remaining 246 days, 18 hours of yours. Not because you were waiting for a miracle, but because you were dying. How very brave you were . How very loved. How very missed. My face is my witness, my evidence.

“Her name was Amelia. She existed. She was extraordinary. She will forever be the greatest loss of my life.”

If my writing means something to you, please consider supporting with a paid subscription. Helps keep the lights on as I try to create space to parent my daughters through grief and grieve myself. Love to you all!