BY BLYTH LORD

Cameron was born 18 years ago, today, May 4, 1999. She died 2 years and 5 days later, May 9, 2001.

Until last month, I had dreamt about her only two times in those 16 years. In the past 4 weeks, I have dreamt about her 3 more times. That’s a flood after a drought.

I wrote about the most vivid one that morning when I awoke, a few weeks ago. It goes as follows–

Cameron is two years old and lying in her bed. I come into her room. She looks much as she did towards the end of her life, very long and thin and wan, wispy hair, but this time she turns her head towards me and says Mama. In real life, Cameron never spoke words and eventually stopped making sounds of any real sort. In my dream, I come towards her and scoop her up. She looks at me with her big eyes and gives a small smile to indicate that something is afoot – that she is back. Back! I go get her a bottle, which, in my dream, is suddenly filled with some sort of possible elixir that may help this miraculous recovery. She sucks the bottle slowly but with a constancy she did not have at the end of her real life. She continues to look at me with her big big eyes. In my dream, I know that this is impossible, that Cameron has died but has now returned, picking up almost where she left off and this time with her symptoms reversing. Her suck and swallow are returning, her emotional affect is awakening, her gross motor skills are activating.

We finish with the bottle and I take her into another room where a good friend’s daughter is sitting. I introduce the girl to Cameron and to Cameron say, “Say Hi to Lily.” And Cameron does. “Hi Lily.” Cameron’s long body is sprawling in my arms, so I stand her on the bed assuming she can’t bear any weight; but she does and makes the beginning gestures of trying to walk.

I know I am in the middle of an astonishing event that defies understanding. I wonder what blood samples the doctors will draw to explain the reversal of the disease. I wonder how spiritual leaders will explain her return from the dead.

It is time to be practical: I put Cameron back into her bed and go to call Charlie to tell him that we are going to have to change our vacation plan with our two daughters Taylor and Eliza. We can hardly leave with Cameron now back from the dead. Besides, our car won’t comfortably fit five people. We will have to get a new car.

And then I wake up.

I lie in bed the next morning savoring the dream and also wondering how I feel about it. Am I crushed upon awakening to discover it is only a dream? Why have I even had this dream? Do I think Cameron’s spirit has visited me finally after all this time? What does this dream even mean?

Am I grieving the fact that the medical research my family funds every year for a treatment for Tay-Sachs STILL hasn’t come through to save the children affected today?

Is it because I spend time with families whose children are still living because of breakthroughs in research and medical interventions, while mine is not?

Is it because I spend time with families like mine whose child has died, for whom there was no salvation?

Is it because I spend time with families who are living in-between, hoping that the research will save their child whose physical well-being is progressively degenerating?

Or is it because I flat out miss my daughter and want to still mother her by holding her?

I will likely never know what this dreamt means or why I had it. I told Charlie about it at dinner. And wept. In its entirety, the dream was both pleasant and very upsetting. It is impossible to hold your child and parent them again once they die. Most of the time, now, these 16 years later, I’m OK with this. And then sometimes I’m not. And that, I suppose, is the sum of it.

Happy 18th Birthday Cameron. You are forever 2, and I love you always.