Dear Kai...

You are 14 today. You look way too much like a man. When you walked in to say goodnight last night, on the eve of your 14th birthday, I was shocked at the young man you have become physically. You are stunning and breathtaking to behold, so handsome and soft and beautiful.

And then there’s the man you are becoming inside. The boy who had to grow up way too fast. The boy who, at six years old, had to hear the news that his brother, his best friend in the whole world, was gone. Had died. Wouldn’t be coming home with us from Montana.

How on earth did you do that, do this? How have you become one of the most amazing humans? And I say this not because I believe it, because I do, but because everyone around me tells me that you are so amazing. It’s not just my motherly adoration. It’s anyone who knows you.

You were so little when it happened. Just six, just in first grade. I look at the first graders now and can’t even begin to understand how someone that little could hold something so big. What the universe asked of you was so much, too much. I remember we would go to family therapy with Dr. Nancy and you would sit in that big chair and hang upside down, and Dr. Nancy would say, “Yes, Kai, your whole world has been turned upside down.” It was just awful.

And yet.

And yet, here you are. You are kind and wise and loving. You ask me all the time if I need your help, around the house, with my grief, with your little brother. I think to myself sometimes, he wants something. But no, you’re just being kind. I think too that in a way you feel the need to take care of me, which I love and which I tell you is not your job. But you want to do it anyway, small gestures to convey that you love me and see me and my grief, and you want to be the one to stand next to me in that. You are bigger than the whole sky to me when you do that.

And it was more than just William’s death that you held, that you carried. It was Bodhi too. You were an only child after William died, and we just didn’t want that for you. So we tried to give you a sibling. And it worked. We got pregnant and shared that with you immediately, that you would have another brother. Not as a replacement, never a replacement, but as an addition to our family and our love. And you were over the moon. And then we found out he was sick and it was so scary, and we told you anyway because that’s what we do in our family. We tell the truth even when it’s hard. And so we waited and waited to find out if Bodhi would breathe when he was born. We waited through a pandemic and homeschooling and isolation. And thank goodness he took the biggest and most beautiful breath when he arrived, and we FaceTimed you immediately and we were all together as a family, and it was beautiful. But then he had to have two surgeries, big surgeries, which were scary too, and you held all that.

And now, Bodhi is fine, wonderful in fact. And you are teaching him how to play baseball. You say “goodnight, love you, see you tomorrow, bye” every night to each other. You fight with him and get mad at him too, of course you do, he’s your little brother. But you love him and you love us, and I could not be more in awe of the way you walk through this world. You are graceful and thoughtful and you have walked through so many hard doors, and you just continue to show up and be you. You have always been you, Kai. Unapologetically you. Not too bold, not too shy, just right in the middle where you belong. William, Kai, Bodhi. You are my middle, my safe space, in the middle of life and death, the bridge between your brothers and the bridge for me and Dad too, born on our anniversary. Kai, you are everything.

I love you so much.

Mom.

Kai on the day of his birth

Kai on the day of Bodhi’s birth