Miss,

This is part two of the March 20th letter, where I referenced that I heard two songs on Country Radio.  I told you about I Loved Her First, but now I need to tell you about Don’t Take the Girl.  Don’t Take the Girl is Tim McGraw’s song about a relationship between a boy and a girl that began when the boy didn’t want his dad to take the neighborhood girl with them on the guys’ fishing trip.  He asked his father to take any one of his friends, but to please not take the girl. The song continues ten years later, with the boy and the girl dating, only to be held up at gunpoint.  Bargaining with the robber that he can have his watch and his money, he begs him please not to take the girl.  

Miss, the end of the song, which is so sad and powerful and which takes your breath away in the awful meaning of the word, has the couple married and the woman in labor.  The doctor comes out to tell the man that the baby is just fine, but the wife is going to die.  He drops to his knees and begs God to take him, but to please not take the girl.  I’ve been there.

Miss, I used to pray every night for God to inflict me with Marissa’s illness.  Telling him how nobody deserved the pain less than Marissa, I bargained with him throughout every hospital stay, every flare-up, every blockage, and every surgery to have us trade places.  The agony of seeing my little beauty suffering so was gut-wrenching, and the hours waiting for her to get out of every surgery were torturous.  Mount Sinai had the names of those in surgery on a board in the waiting room, and one time, after about 7 hours, I no longer saw her name on the board.  It had said her name all along, and then her name just disappeared.  I ran as fast as I could until I found her, terrified that something had happened to her.

Miss, when Marissa’s colon was removed during her first surgery, and she woke up with an ostomy and a bag at the ripe old age of 20, it wasn’t easy for her (to say the least).  For an entire year, until she could have a reversal, she would have bowel movements in a smelly bag attached to a stoma. This gorgeous and sweet child, who had been so emotionally strong, began to melt down.  She was, understandably, horrified, and it didn’t get easier.  I don’t want any accolades, but I was her cheerleader.  I kept her going.

One of Marissa’s college roommates was celebrating her birthday down in Atlantic City about a month and a half after Marissa’s first surgery.  We encouraged Marissa to go, and she picked up a friend from Marlboro on the way down. About an hour after she picked up her friend, while driving,her bag exploded all over her.  It was a nightmare, and she didn’t have extra supplies with her.  She called me hysterical, inconsolable, telling me she couldn’t do it anymore.  I talked her through it, packed up her stuff, and, facing her father’s disapproval, raced down the parkway to meet her. She was a literal and figurative mess, but I helped her clean up (she had stopped at a local hospital), and I encouraged her to keep going.  I ALWAYS encouraged her to keep going.

God didn’t take the girl from me literally, thank Goodness, but on February 24th, 2014, he took her figuratively.  That was the day she walked out of my house for good.  I’ll tell you about it tomorrow.  

I love you,

Me