Friday, December 14, 2012

Sandy Hook Shootings and Holding Your Kids a Little Tighter

On December 14, 2012, 20 year old Adam Lanza fatally shot twenty children and six adult staff members at Sandy Hook Elementary School in the town of Newtown, Connecticut. Before driving to the school, Lanza had shot and killed his mother. After killing students and staff members, Lanza committed suicide by shooting himself as first responders arrived. The masscare was the second-deadliest school shooting in United States history, after the 2007 Virginia Tech Massacre.

No mass shooting has every effected me quite like this one did. These were children. I know that in some sense, all shooting victims may be someones children, but, these were innocent 6-7 year old's that were just spending their day at school. After watching the news religiously that day and evening of the shooting, I couldn't help but hold Aiden and Allison extra tight that night. It's truly events like this that can make you realize how precious life truly is. How quickly it can be taken away. So, as they both went to bed that night, we held them both a little longer, gave them both extra hugs and kisses, and held each other a little tighter as well.

The morning came around a little too early, around 5:30am... Alli was crying out for us. Instead of being frustrated, tired, annoyed, etc... I ran to her. She gave me the biggest hug, and I proceeded to try and tell her it wasn't quite time to wake up yet. She wasn't having it, and wouldn't let go. I then did something we haven't yet done, but we hope to have a tradition every Sunday morning. I brought her down to our bed, and she cuddled up with us, and fell asleep. For another hour and a half! I never thought that would happen... but I couldn't have been more comfortable, happy, or at peace. (I had also gotten up around 6am to breastfeed Aiden and then put him straight back to sleep, so I had my share of both my babies, and truly couldn't have been happier to get up and do it.)

I feel like I always need to keep this is mind whenever we wake up with them in the middle of the night or at the crack of dawn, whether they are having a bad dream, hungry, etc... just being so appreciative of life and how fast they grow up. I will never get enough of the cuddling... I hope they don't grow out of that anytime soon.

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