It could have been you. Anyone of us Mothers could be feeling the absolute heartbreak Melissa Graves is feeling right now.  The numbness, the regret, the blame, the devistation. 

None of us are immune to tragedy. None of us can see the future.  None of us know if the last hug or frustrated sigh over uneaten dinner will be the last. None of us know when our number is up. 

None of us are perfect parents. Not a single one of us can claim we have never taken our eyes off our child for a split second. Not a single parent alive can pretend that in a brief second, one horrible life changing second couldn’t destroy our lives and take our baby away forever. Because deep down we know it could it. Things happen. Horrible, unthinkable things…accidents happen. 

Accidents happen. Think about that for a second. Then remember why we don’t spend every second of our lives worrying about these unthinkable tragedies. We don’t because we can’t. We spend our lives trying our best to make happy, fun memories with our littles. Because we want them to live and enjoy life, even if those lives are short. We want to see their smiles and hear their giggles.

That is exactly what the Graves family was doing on a magical family trip before it all got taken away in one of those horrible life changing seconds. Please remember that before you cast doubt, point a finger of blame or claim this would never happen to your child!  Please be kind to parents who are facing horrible things, be kind to the family at the restaurant with the toddler melting down, be understanding to the Mom who can’t get her children to leave the playground without them screaming wildly. Just be kind.

Parenting is hard, it’s exhausting, it’s frustrating. Parenting is a full time job, it doesn’t stop because you’re on vacation and if it does stop you’d give your own life to bring it back.