He is not him

Every day I look at this little person in my arms and my mind tries and tries to see Corbyn. My mind desperately wants to see that the baby I am holding in my arms is the last baby I held that was mine. The one that I am nursing is the last baby I nursed. I have to remind myself constantly that Ledgyr is not Corbyn. He is his own little person and never will be Corbyn. I so bad want to look for similarities in him that Corby had because in a way it feels like I can still have him here. Our minds play weird tricks on us. My grieving, broken mind tries so hard to heal me and my broken soul. I have to remember that Ledgyr is here to help heal me not to bring Corbyn back to me. He is NOT Corbyn. He never will be. Yes they are brothers and they will have some similarities, and yes even if Corbyn was still here I would be looking at both of them and finding similarities of them both. There isn't anything wrong with me trying to compare their looks and mannerisms to each other. We all do that. I just happen to do it with my living children and pictures of my child that is no longer living. That part is the hard part for me. I ache as I look at him in the pictures or videos. Wonder what he would look like now. I look back at pictures of Addy at a year ago and see how much she has changed from then to now. It's amazing the change. I would love more than anything to see that amazing change in Corbyn. I can't. I am slowly coming to grips with that. So as I slowly come to grips with it in the mean time my mind still wants him in my arms. The last baby I held in my arms that was mine. The last child I nursed and nourished from my own body. The last little body that I pumped my milk for was Corbyn. It all got ripped away from me in an instant. So much so that even when I was in shock doing CPR on him that night I had my milk let down. You may think that doesn't seem that weird since I was still breast feeding him, but with me I stop getting the milk let down sensations after the baby is about 6 months old. So this sensation hadn't happened to me in months. To me, I think it was a way for my mind and body to help in anyway that it could. That it was doing what it already knew what it could do. I'm sure that a lot of other factors came into play with the abundance of hormones that were released in that instant of time, but it seemed odd to me that one of the responses was my milk let down. I'm sure there is some scientific explanation for it, but for me I like to think of it the way I do.
The days and weeks after he passed I yearned to have that sensation again. Knowing that the last time I had that sensation was when he was still in my arms. Lifeless, but still in my arms. I yearned to have my baby back to nurse. I wasn't ready to be done and I had no time to cope with the fact that I HAD to be done in an instant. The whole time I was pregnant with Ledgyr that was the biggest thing that I couldn't wait for. I remember the first time that he latched on after I had him and the overwhelming joy that I felt to feel that sensation of a baby at my breast again. I even remember saying to Brock that it was such a good feeling to feel again and how much I missed that.
Now my mind and body has to realize that this is a new baby. Not the last one that suddenly wasn't there anymore to feed and nourish and grow.
It's weird to think about my mind and body as separate, but I know that I have felt that my mind can think something completely different from what my body is feeling. I never thought of them as separate entities until that night Corbyn passed. At one point as my mind was pleading with the Lord to save my baby my body was so calm and I almost felt detached from it. Then at another point after the ER physician told me that he was gone and there was nothing else they could do my mind was oddly at ease knowing that this was supposed to be this way while my body was feeling the most pain and anguish I have ever felt. I couldn't breath. It felt like my heart couldn't even take a full beat. Like it was beating barely half a beat just to keep some blood flowing through my body. Yes, I do know that isn't possible, but that is what it felt like. My heart physically hurt beyond any pain I could describe and was doing the bare minimum just to keep me alive.
I feel like this will be a struggle for a while of having to remind myself that Ledgyr is a different baby. I don't know if it will take until he grows past 411 days for my mind to come to terms that he is not and never will be Corbyn. I do know that I have an overwhelming love for this baby. I do know that I would have had the same love even if Corbyn was still here. Would I have taken it for granted more? Possibly. Do I now? Nope. I know that Corbyn leaving has made me cherish my children and husband more. I didn't know that was possible, but it certainly is. I wake up every day with such joy to have each of them with me. I go to bed every night in fear that I won't have all of them when I wake up. It's a fear I will always have because that fear as already been realized once for me.
And so the grief journey continues for me. A never ending journey that is an unmarked, but sadly very well traveled path.