If Only...

If only... Do you ever say those words?  A rhetorical question, I know.  We all say that.  If only I could lose 10 lbs...  If only my kids would listen...  If only I had more money... 

In the moments that followed Mike's death, I cannot tell you how many times I asked that question.  If only I had taken Mike's symtoms more seriously, if only the dr. had told him to go to the emergency room, if only money hadn't been so tight then Mike would have gone to the dr earlier, if only he had been given an echo cardiogram they would have seen the defect, if only I had gone into the room at 11:30 instead of noon.  I was eaten up with guilt.  I thought if I had done something different I would have been able to change it all.  Then there are these  if only questions... if only I had been a better wife, if only I had told him I loved him one more time, if only he really knew how I felt, if only I had one more moment back.  I was consumed for weeks about the if onlys... I so wanted what happened to change.  I wanted him back so badly I created ideas in my head of what I could have, or more importantly, should have done that would have saved his life.  It was all I thought of every moment. 

Finally one day I just said...I didn't, so now what?  Mike wasn't coming back and I couldn't change that with my if onlys.  And if I continued to ask if only, I would never get over my guilt. I started to remember all that I did do.  I comforted Mike.  I told him I loved him the night before he died.  I layed with him in the bed that morning and rubbed his head.  I did love him enough and he knew it.  I have to hold onto all the wonders that we had.  And learn from what I didn't do.  

So anyone who is reading this and is asking if only, go back and think of the things you did right and hold onto them.  Don't let the guilt eat you up.  Regrets are hard to live with.  Use today to tell your family and friends you love them, to say thank you to someone special, to laugh a little louder or just smile at a stranger.  Because you have the power to change the if onlys to right now.