Goodbye my friend

Tonight there were a few tears in our house. Tony had to "retire" a very dear friend of his - Cena Bear.

About three and a half years ago, just prior to when I had surgery, I knew my boys ( then almost 1 and 3) were going to need to spend a great deal of time away from me. To help them cope with this, I took them both to Build-a-Bear to 'make' a bear of their own. Tony chose a little white bear and dressed him in boxer shorts, a gardening apron, and thongs. There were about a hundred different outfits ranging from cheerleaders and fireman to sporting outfits and tuxedos, BUT underwear and an apron was what seemed right to Tony.

When it came to providing a name on the birth certificate, 2 year old Tony suggested "Mummy", then "Daddy", and then "Cena Bear" which was good enough for me.

Cena Bear has rarely left Tonys side, particularly at bed time. He has been washed many times, re-sewn over and over, brushed, and redressed. He wears a Santa outfit all year round. He has been to hospital with Tony and always travels on overnight trips with him. He is Tony's buddy.

Last week as I was switching off all the lights for the night at 11pm, Tony was stirring. Thinking I must have woken him, I went and checked on him and found he had thrown up everywhere and by the looks of it he had fallen back asleep IN IT!

Unfortunately Cena Bear did not come out it unscathed. I tried my best to clean him and wash him, but I could tell it might be time for him to "retire".

So today while we were out I saw some Teddy bears and I asked Tony if he wanted to pick one. After choosing a bear with a green blanket, he was all excited and I suggested to him that perhaps we 'retire' Cena Bear and this could be his new Teddy bear.

He immediately looked at me with little tears in his eyes and said;

"I don't want to 'retire' Cena Bear, I love him."

I explained to him that if he doesn't get to 'rest' from his Bear-ly duties, he is going to fall apart and I won't be able to fix him.

So tonight as bed time rolled around, I told Tony its time to take Cena Bear to meet Big Ted (Anthonys Teddy bear from when he was little). We said Big Ted had been retired for a VERY long time and had been waiting for a friend.
This took some of the sting out of it all, but as we put them in the storage box together, Tony's face crumpled and it brought tears to my eyes. I could suddenly remember how much I loved my Teddy bears and how real they were to me. I of course knew they weren't real bears or anything, but they were real friends in my eyes and I couldn't stand the idea of one of them spending the night on the floor. I realized for Tony, he is packing away a friend and replacing him with another. It was genuinely heart breaking to watch

I heard Tony introducing his new bear, Mayfield, to his new room. The instructions were very detailed;

"This is our bed. You will sleep near the wall so you don't fall under the rail. Don't touch the light bulb, it's hot. You don't need to be scared of that picture on the wall - that's just the Wiggles. Oh, and we are vey lucky, there are no daddy-long-legs up here. You will just love it!"

I'm sure Mayfield will be very happy here.