I’ve been slowly reading through Henry’s journals and letters from his nine months away in treatment last year. I never opened them before he died because they were obviously private. After, I knew I wanted to read all of it, but I couldn’t work up the strength to do it. Finally, this week I took out the wrapped bundle of papers and messy notebooks and sketchpads from the bottom drawer of his dresser, and I took it with me on my trip to Utah to read while I was all alone in my hotel room. I knew I would cry, so I thought this would be a good time to dig into Henry’s writing.

And I did cry.

I cried because he was so funny and smart and such a good writer, and I cried to read his essay on how deeply wounded he was by his parents’ divorce. I cried when I read the letters his younger siblings sent him while he was in treatment, so hopeful and loving (and which he’d saved and carried around with him for the next seven months, and then brought home with him, carefully folded into his journal). And I cried when I saw the sketch he’d drawn of “my family,” which included an adorable rendering of his baby sister, C.

It was very hard to read all of it. His desire to get clean and stay clean and his deep fears that he wouldn’t be able to pull it off after returning home are a constant theme. His love for his family is writ large on every page; this was not a boy who had become estranged from or angry at his parents and siblings and extended family, even though he was struggling with something that very often alienates teenagers from the people who love them most. No, Henry’s struggle was never with us, really. It was completely internal for him. And reading of the pain that his addiction caused him just broke my heart. When you see an addict’s external behaviors, which seem so carelessly dangerous and thoughtless, it’s easy to believe that he or she doesn’t want to stop or isn’t bothered by what life has become. In Henry’s case, he was obviously tortured by it. This simply wasn’t the life he wanted and it wasn’t who he expected or wanted to be, but by age 17, when he wrote these journal entries, he had already begun to doubt that he was capable of beating back the drugs for good. He felt inadequate for the task.

I am going to share some bits and pieces of Henry’s journal on my blog, and the first thing I want to share is this gratitude list that he compiled while in the first three months of treatment at a wilderness-based prigram in North Carolina. Helping recovering addicts recognize what they have to be grateful for is something a lot of treatment programs emphasize, so Henry was asked by his therapist to make up a list.

The result, written pretty much exactly one year before he died is pure Henry:

Henry’s Gratitude List
Spring 2009 – Age 17


Family
Girls
Friends
Music
Laughter
Dreams
Art
Memories
Concerts
My Parents
My little brother
My sisters
My dog
Jerry Garcia
Birthdays
Oceans
Funk
Love
Rhthym
Guitars
Waterslides
Plastic
Aluminum
Titanium
Amoxicillin
Penicillin
Windows Operating System
Air Conditioning
Lars
Hovercrafts
Banjos
Caterpillars
Socks
Trampolines
Loin Cloths
Lacrosse
Monkeys
Sea Monkeys
Sea Horses

Henry and his little brother E

Three year old C has four siblings – H, J, E and now, Baby G.

H, J and E all have the last name “Granju.” This is also my last name, which I kept after my divorce from H, J and E’s father.

However, C’s father, my husband Jon has the last name “Hickman,” as do C and now, G. But C is insistent that G’s last name MUST be “Granju.” I couldn’t figure out why she was so adamant about this until I realized that to her, ALL siblings have the name “Granju.” That’s just how it is to her – if you are her sister or brother, your last name must be Granju. So she is baffled by the fact that her new baby sister has a different last name than her other siblings. She just seems to find this very, very wrong.

She’ll get it figured out eventually, I guess

A few more shots of J and some of her best friends taken last week by Hannah Sexton Davis . I really love the way this photographer uses light in her work. I’d like to get her to take some shots of my other children as well.

This has been the hardest summer of J’s young life – a season she will never, ever forget. She and Henry were exceptionally close. Her loss is profound. She has suddenly gone from being the little sister to the oldest child in our family. I am happy that even in the midst of all the hurt she’s faced recently, she has also managed to have some great fun with her friends this summer. And I’m grateful that she has such terrific friends – two of whom were with her when she did this photoshoot. I love all of these girls a lot. They and their families have really held Jane’s hand through the loss of her big brother and I can never thank them enough.

A few of my favorite pics of Henry and his little sister J together. They adored one another, always.

Happy birthday today to my beautiful C. I can’t believe it’s been three years already. Your birth was one of the most grueling experiences of my life, but also one of the most satisfying.

I am so proud of what a brilliant, bookish, articulate, quirky, creative, loving and expansively sweet person you are. You are a delight, and have brought so much joy to our entire family. I know that your third year has not been an easy one. You have already experienced change and loss that many adults have not yet faced.

But the next year will be gentler for you…for all of us. I promise.

And your big brother Henry loved you very, very much. Never, ever doubt that…or forget it.

Today Jon, J, G and I drive down to Chattanooga to watch E and his cousin J play in a middle school lacrosse tournament at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (G’s first LAX game!). C stayed in Knoxville and played with cousin NC, and also spent much of the day with Jon’s parents. J and E’s dad drove down to Chattanooga too, so we all watched E play, and we went out to lunch together at a favorite pizza spot, Lupi’s in downtown Chattanooga, just a block away from the Tennessee Aquarium.


Two of my three girls – J and Baby G with me at Lupi’s.

E on the field, wearing mouthgard (that’s why his teeth look blue)

Baby G on my shoulder at the restaurant, looking like a cross between Mr. Magoo and an angry raisin.

J and her dad at Lupi’s

I think G is up to close to 6 pounds now. Woohoo!

And although she appears to have brown eyes instead of blue, she looks pretty much exactly like big sister C as a newborn.

(And she has notably looooong fingers and toes, just like Henry)

J, C, E and G all together for the first time after G’s surprise early birth. Missing Henry. There should be five present and accounted for. We all know it.

While E was away at camp for the month of June – leaving for his big adventure only a few days after his big brother Henry’s memorial service – his baby sister G arrived five weeks early. I called him at camp with the exciting and unexpected news. Two weeks later, he came home, and this is what he had made for Baby G – his new baby sis whom he’d yet to meet – in his camp woodshop.

I love this boy.

C is a very sweet-natured, easygoing two year old in general. But she’s been through A LOT in the past 10 months – too much. As a testament to her naturally easy going temperament, she held it together through my hospitalization last fall (we hadn’t ever been separated that much – not by a longshot) and then through the nearly 4 months that I was barely functional and often in bed due to killer “morning” sickness. She was calm and patient as I next spent five solid weeks at Henry’s bedside in the hospital, meaning she was separated from me constantly and when we were together, I was distracted, worried and sad. Then, on May 31, she lived through the devastating death of her oldest brother and the grief that enveloped our household, including seeing me essentially take to my bed for two weeks.

After that, only a few weeks later, her baby sister was born at only 35 weeks . G’s early birth by c-section meant that I spent 5 days in the hospital with the new baby, once again separated from C, who is still a baby herself. It’s just been far too much for anyone to handle, much less a toddler. Now, finally, C is not holding it together so well. She’s understandably showing the strain of everything our family has been through since last October.

Don’t get me wrong, she’s exceptionally sweet directly toward her baby sister. It’s toward the REST of us that she’s is showing her frustration. For the first time ever, she’s kicking and hitting at her cousins, her older siblings and at Jon and me. She’s throwing real, honest to goodness temper tantrums for the first time. She’s whining like crazy (although that’s starting to let up some). She’s just REALLY, REALLY mad and she’s obviously finally letting off some pent-up steam – some very, very pent-up steam.

My sister pointed out the other day that I was being too snappish with her when she melts down, so I am now trying much harder to be as gentle and understanding as I can be. Jon and I are also working hard to normalize her daily routine after so much uncertainty and being shuffled around in recent months. But she just doesn’t have the words or the emotional resources to explain to us how stressed she’s been, so falling apart is all she can do. Dealing with her tantrums and anger have been trying for the rest of us in the family in the past two weeks, but I hope that finally letting it all out is giving her some relief. I am very proud of how sweet and patient E and J are being with her, even when she’s being really cranky with them.

Henry (age 3) was really furious when J came home from the hospital. He developed a weird nervous tic for several months and for a short time, he literally refused to look at me or speak to me any time I was holding his little sister. After about a month or so, he fell in love with her and after that, they were always as close as two siblings could be. Then, both Henry (age 6 at the time) and J (age 2) were just thrilled when E was born. They never showed any stress to speak of. The three of them became a tight unit for the next decade. My three babies – for many years, I never imagined there would be a fourth or a fifth!

I have to admit that I was REALLY worried when C was born in 2007 because she was a newcomer to that threesome of siblings who were now 15, 12 and 9 years old. During my pregnancy with C, Henry and J were not happy AT ALL that I was having a new baby. In fact, all three musketeers were incredibly embarrassed at the idea that their mom was having a baby NINE YEARS after the last baby joined the family. Henry was flat out angry about it – something about which I felt terribly guilty at the time. Once C arrived, however, J and E were immediately smitten with their little sister. It took Henry a while to come around. But once C could babble and reach for him, he began to melt; he totally fell for his baby sister. And she was just nuts about Henry. C loved him very much.

Now we’ve brought G home only 34 months after C joined our family (yes, she is definitely our last)… And Henry is gone – he just missed his newest baby sister in this time zone. But I know they will see one another again, and I like to think that they were together before she was born. On the day Henry died, I sat on his bed with his feet and legs in my lap and felt G kick against them, through my very pregnant belly. On that day, the two of them were connecting physically for the first and only time. As their mother, this was both beautiful and terrible for me to experience, but they touched each other. That will always be meaningful to me.

But back to poor C….she’s just completely overwhelmed at the moment.

Did your toddler melt down when a new baby came home? Tell me about it and tell me how you helped him or her through the transition. I’d love to hear from others who have dealt with their own Very Angry Toddler.