TAMPA, Fla. — For Tampa Bay Buccaneers outside linebacker Shaq Barrett, the grief comes in waves and some days he feels it worse than others, especially when he's alone with his thoughts for too long — which is when football helps the most.
He misses his baby girl — his sunshine — Arrayah, his 2-year-old daughter who drowned in the family's pool April 30, as Monday would have been the first training camp practice she'd attend with her mother, Jordanna, and her three older siblings.
«This is a daily battle. Tough battle,» said Barrett, speaking for the first time Monday since the tragedy. «Today I felt it heavier today than I did the last couple days.
»Her smile — I just miss her so much. Her energy, just like putting her to bed every night, reading stories. She just brought so much brightness and wholeness and completeness to our lives. And we most definitely have a big, big, big, big, big hole in our hearts and our lives that we won't be able to fill ..."
That smile is now permanently etched on his right forearm in a tattoo, with beams of sunlight radiating down her cheeks and soulful brown eyes that look so much like her dad's. And she is surrounded by stars — her favorite. At night they'd read «Ten Little Night Stars,» written by Deb Gruelle and illustrated by Gabi Murphy. In it, baby animals go through their bedtime routines — from brushing their teeth to being tucked into bed — while counting the stars in the sky through the bedroom window.
«Every time we would read, she'd be like 'Star, star' in just the cutest voice, and she would call the moon 'stars' too,» Barrett said. «But she loved her stars. It was everything.»
He never imagined that tearing an Achilles in Week 8 of last year and undergoing surgery, which
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