New Year's Resolution

I am not a big fan of making New Year's resolutions, although I have done it every year since I can remember.  I have never been a person with good will power and making a promise to myself in January and keeping it through December seems nearly impossible.  Despite my skepticism I find myself making a resolution every January 1st in hopes that I will be able to make positive changes in my life.  This New Year's Eve Micah asked me what my resolution for this year was.  I thought for a moment and answered that I wanted to spend more quality time with my family and friends.  At the time, it seemed like a good goal for the year.  Over the last day I have pondered a little more about what I really need to do this year and I have come up with a new resolution, to let go.
While I do wish to spend more quality time with both my family and friends, I can't really give my full self until I have done some letting go.  I have several things to let go of.  First, I want to let go of the terrible sense of guilt I have for the death of my son and daughter.  Logically I know that I did nothing wrong, but I still hold onto this motherly guilt that I was responsible for keeping them safe and I failed.  Secondly, I have to let go of my anger.  I am angry at myself, my Doctors, the hospital staff and even my husband & daughter.  I find the anger bubbling up from time to time during my search for answers as to why my babies died.  This anger has to go.  Lastly, I have to let go of jealousy.  It is an ugly emotion and it serves no purpose.  However, every time I hear about the "royal baby", or see newborn photos on facebook, or hear another friend's pregnancy announcement I am filled with jealousy.  I want to cry and shout that it should be me.  I hate that I cannot find happiness in other people's joy.
I know that letting go of these heavy emotional burdens will not be accomplished quickly.  It may not even happen this year.  I know that letting go won't happen on it's own either, it will take work.  Some days I am up to doing the work and getting past these negative feelings.  Other days it is just too much and I let them wash over me.  As the days and months go on I will press forward, keeping my goals in mind.  Until I work on letting go my previous resolution of spending more quality time with family and friends cannot be attained.  I cannot spend quality time with anyone until I am once again at peace.
One thing that I will not be letting go as part of my resolution is my sadness.  It is not that I don't want to be happy.  I do want happiness, but not if it comes a the price of forgetting my children.  I have gotten much better with time.  I spend more time smiling and laughing and less time mourning and crying.  I do hope that the sadness never completely disappears.  It is my reminder of Penelope & James.  Every time a tear rolls down my cheek it is because of them and I cherish that.  I have learned and I continue to learn to be a happy, functioning person again while still enmeshing that sadness of my son & daughter's death into my life.  I will always feel an ache for them and I never want that ache to go away.
It is only the second day of this New Year.  I feel both overwhelmed and excited by the possibilities that this year holds.  By the end of this year my beautiful daughter will have her third birthday.  Next month my husband and I will celebrate our fourth wedding anniversary.  August will be the one year anniversary of Penelope and James' birth and death.  I have a lot of things to look forward to this year and I hope that by the time I am making my resolutions for 2014 I will have made some great strides.