My Heart Aches

*********Warning, Children Mentioned, not IF related***********



My heart is aching today. As I have talked about before on my blog, my DH and I used to be a huge part of his nieces' lives. The oldest's dad died when she was young and DH and I always tried to fill that space in her life. The younger one's dad (who was my SIL's dealer) was in prison for the a few years and even after he got out, he has not been a part of her life. Up until last summer, we were a part of everything they did, saw them almost every day and even had our older niece at our house at least one weekend a month. Last summer, we discovered that my SIL was using drugs again (after six years sober) and found out that it was pretty bad. We decided that, rather than call CPS, we would take the girls for a few days, in an attempt to get my SIL to see that she needed to get clean again. The girls were grateful. My SIL was not. Although she told me she understood why we did it, she stopped all communication with us (once she was clean and we returned the girls to her) and has not allowed us to see the girls. It has been very hard on me, especially during bad IF times. Prior to losing them, I always told myself that at least I had them. Now that I don't, bad IF days meld together with missing them and it makes it especially difficult.

Although we missed our younger niece's birthday last year due to this whole debacle, we assumed that my SIL would get over it soon and it wouldn't be long before we got the chance to see the girls again. Now that it's been over a year, I am taking especially hard that I won't even be able to wish her a Happy Birthday on Friday. I miss both girls so much it makes me tear up and my throat starts to feel like it is closing up, whenever I think about them. I am sending her a birthday present, that I have been shopping for all day, but I'm having a hard time even picking something out, because I don't even know what she likes anymore and I am afraid that my SIL will intercept it and not tell our niece the present is from us.

At this point, I feel like at least if I send something, *I'll* know we sent her something and maybe one day I will be able to tell her (if her mom does indeed intercept it). My heart just hurts today. :(