Those words are hard to hear. 

For Cayse’s second anniversary, we received a beautiful bouquet of flowers from my in-laws. When I received the flowers, my eyes caught the beautiful butterfly in the bouquet. 

Anytime we gather as a family, there is always a BIG butterfly around. We never noticed butterflies until Cayse passed.  Now, whenever that giant butterfly comes around, someone always recognizes it and says, “It’s Baby Cayse!” 

My mother-in-law told me that a giant butterfly came to visit once when she was under her patio with my father-in-law. She stuck her hand out, and the butterfly came close to landing on her finger. Another time, my mother-in-law was at a birthday party, and the butterfly showed up. She said that the butterfly stayed through the WHOLE party. 

Twenty-five days after Cayse’s anniversary, I had to throw the flowers away.  Days before, the flower petals were starting to fall. I kept saying it was time to throw them out, but I just couldn't bring myself to do it. Last year, I made mementos from the flowers we received for the first anniversary of Cayse’s death. This year, I never even thought about making anything with flowers. 

When I picked up the flowers to throw them out, I started shaking and tearing up. My son, Coen, said, “Mom, what are you doing with Baby Cayse’s flowers?” I told him it was time to throw them away since they were dying. He replied, “But how are you going to remember him?” I told him I would take the butterfly out of the bouquet and keep it. He said, “Mom, I do not have anything to remind me of baby Cayse," but then he said, "Oh wait, I have his picture in his room.” 

Throwing away the flowers was very hard. It felt like I was throwing something away that represented my love for Cayse. When I threw the flower in the trash, I started to cry. Coen said, “Mom, it will be okay; you can always go into my room and look at Cayse's picture.” Coen always seems to know the right words to make me feel better.