Ted looked at me last night and said "you're quiet the past few days"...I've not much to respond back, I have a hard time around the Holiday...with Easter approaching.  My days are spent around ladies mostly, who talk much of their families...in many ways, I have become the oddity, at least in my own mind, because since Adam's gone, not much normal stuff is comparable to their tales...I listen and smile...but I know there's always an empty chair at my table...I know that if Adam might have had a second chance, he at 27 might have a wife here with us...and perhaps a child of his own...swallowing hard, we know that will never be....and I know I am forever altered....again, a smile is a mask we the bereaved parents wear to let others know we are "okay".... I read a great article recently, about a parent's grief...it was compared to a stone in your pocket...it's always there, as a bereaved mom, I can still feel it's heaviness...I know it's always there although no one else does...it's an annoying discomfort at times and sometimes it pokes and hurts you....reminding you all over again of how much you suffer this loss...sometimes you lose thought of the stone and you laugh....smile....live life a bit, then out of nowhere you feel it...the pain from that rock you're carrying that no one else knows about....and in all honestly, they don't know....I was a mom who had an "intact family" for a bit, and at the time, I would never have imagined how an event like this could affect a person or how long the pain would follow....I'm also very proud of where I am...and the challenges I have faced have actually made me into a stronger woman and a better person...I took credit before into living a pretty decent life, before Adam's life ended.....I thought I did the best I could...and I probably did....but there isn't a thing I couldn't relate to or understand now...my empathy has grown and grown...and so has my love...my love of Adam's memory....my love to help Jordan as he too deals with the same heaviness from the rocks in his own pockets...and my deep deep love for Ted...who is my "rock" here on earth....without him, I am incomplete....when he walks aside me, the burden of that stone is somehow lifted, I am thankful for his love....each and every moment of each and every day.....