It is just so hard to accept that remaining silent is often better than saying the wrong thing.
It seems like every quiet space MUST be filled with chatter-especially in our overstimulated world of screens and noise boxes.
But, I promise-if you and I are speaking, and I choose to expose my heart-I would rather you take my hand or hug my neck and say nothing than tell me, “I understand exactly how you feel.”
Unless, of course, you do.
Read the rest here: No Comparison
It’s tough leading in a dance you never wanted to learn, isn’t it?
Yet that’s what bereaved parents do every single day.
We carry our own burdens and also shoulder the burden of others in social encounters, working hard not to step on toes.
Sometimes, it’s just too much.
If I don’t mention Dominic, no one else does and that disappoints me.
If I do mention Dominic, the response is often sympathy or rushing to another topic.
Which is also disappointing.
If I smile, then I’m “so much better’.
If I tear up, then I’m “not over it yet”.
Read the rest here: Can I Just Be Me?
You know that scene in Forrest Gump where he starts running and just can’t stop?
I thought that was a funny way to deal with grief when I first saw the movie.
But now I understand it perfectly.
If I could have started running, walking or even crawling away from the heartache in those first days and weeks I would have.
Truth is, though, you can’t.
No matter how far or how fast you run, it all comes with you. I have to live in the black and white reality of a world that includes my dead son. I don’t have a choice if I’m going to keep my sanity.
And I think that’s another kind of invisible wall that separates those of us who walk this Valley from those that don’t: we know-deep down, surefire, gut-wrenchingly-KNOW there are things you cannot escape.
You can’t outrun them.
You can’t wish them away.
You can’t ignore them.
You have to embrace them no matter how prickly, heartbreaking or impossible that seems.
And then learn to live with them.
I’m pretty good at pushing away uncomfortable or sad or downright horrifying thoughts in the daytime.
Sunlight means there’s plenty to do and plenty to keep my mind from dwelling too long on anything that will make be cry or bring me to my knees.
But there is a dangerous space just between wake and sleep, when the house is quiet and my mind is free to explore random corners that guarantees unpleasant thoughts will pour in and overwhelm me.
I can’t tell you how many times the last moment before sleep claims my consciousness is filled with thoughts of Dominic.
Not sweet memories of his smiling face.
Oh, no.
Instead they are graphic images of what he looked like, crumpled on the ground, perhaps gasping one last time trying to fill his lungs before his soul flew to Jesus, leaving his body behind.
It’s impossible to describe the electric current that shoots through my midsection like a lightning bolt. I cannot help a heart that doesn’t carry this awful burden understand how such flashes disrupt any hope of peaceful sleep.
I used to be afraid of ghosts in the dark.
I never slept without aid of a nightlight until well into my adult years.
I’m not afraid of specters anymore.
They are small potatoes next to a mother’s own heart screaming, “Where WERE you????” when your baby breathed his last.
Nights are just plain hard.
No distractions.
Only sorrow and a broken heart in bed together.
❤
We’ve all been at the family dinner table when an elder launches into THAT story-the one that gets dragged out every holiday and several times in between.
Often our eyes roll and we exchange knowing glances with the younger set as if to say, “Here we go again!”
But we point our faces toward the speaker, lean in and lap it up.
Because we know this story is important to her or else she wouldn’t be sharing it again.
You learn a lot about your parents and grandparents, older aunts and uncles by listening carefully to the stories that have stuck around in a head that finds it hard to remember what the body had for breakfast.
Some of the stories are wonderful. Sweet, sweet memories of special times and special friends; of younger years and youthful dreams.
Some of the stories are tragic. The baby brother or sister who only lived a few days or months. The mother that died too soon because there were no drugs to treat a common condition. The friend that never came home from the war.
The stories are windows into souls.
Some of us have stories that need telling NOW. We can’t wait until our age guarantees us a captive audience.
Because telling the stories helps our hearts.
A fellow bereaved mom who has a gift for finding exquisite quotes found this one:
Sometimes I think that if it were possible to tell a story often enough to make the hurt ease up, to make the words slide down my arms and away from me like water, I would tell that story a thousand times.
~Anita Shreve, The Weight of Water
Every time I tell the story of Dominic, it helps to keep him real.
It reminds my heart that he lived, that he mattered, that he matters still.
And in the telling, I am giving away a little bit of him for another heart to carry. His light is passed to another soul that can pass it to another and another.
It doesn’t really take away the hurt and sorrow, but it does help me bear it.
So if I launch into the same old rendition of my favorite memories of my missing son, bear with me.
Be a witness.
Help me carry the burden.
Here they come.
It’s time for the First Day of School photo contests on social media. Shot after shot of little ones and not-so-little ones posing with new book bags and new clothes holding a chalkboard sign that indicates their grade.
And then the pictures of college freshmen toting boxes into dorm rooms, waving good-bye to mom and dad, beginning their adult lives unfettered by curfews and parental oversight.
Then the laments, “I can’t believe they are growing up!”
I hear you, mama. It IS a challenge to watch them grow up. But you aren’t really saying, “good-bye”.
I see it from an entirely different perspective.
Read the rest here: It Ain’t Over Til It’s Over
One of the greatest challenges I faced this side of child loss was finding a space where I could speak honestly and openly about my feelings toward God and about my faith.
So many times I was shut down at the point of transparency by someone shooting off a Bible verse or hymn chorus or just a chipper, “God’s in control!”
They had NO IDEA how believing that (and I do!) God is in control was both comforting and utterly devastating at the very same time.
It took me awhile to revisit the basic tenets of my faith and tease out what was truly scriptural and what was simply churchy folklore.
It was worth it.
Because while my faith looks different today than it did the day before the deputy knocked on my door, it is still faith. And it is rock-solid, founded squarely on the truth of the Bible, the words of Jesus and the unalterable promises of God Almighty.
I spoke on this topic last October and developed a series of posts to make what I shared available here.
So as a follow-up to yesterday’s post (if I didn’t scare you off!), I’m putting the links to all the posts in my series “Trust After Loss” in one place.
Here they are, with a brief description of each:
God is sovereign-He rules.
God is good-He loves.
How do those two truths live together in a universe that includes child loss? How can I trust the rest of my life and my eternal future to a God who lets this happen?
Read the rest here: Trust After Loss: Admit the Pain
“Faith does not eliminate questions but faith knows where to take them”
~Elisabeth Elliot
Read the rest here: Trust After Loss: Acknowledge Doubt and Ask Questions
The same God Who keeps the earth in orbit around the sun has ordained that death will not have the last word.
Light will triumph.
Darkness will have to flee.
Read the rest here: Trust After Loss: Access the Truth
This is what it means to appropriate God’s strength:
I have to exhale my doubts, inhale His truth and then allow His Spirit to weave that truth into armor so that I am strong for battle.
Read the rest here: Trust After Loss: Appropriate God’s Strength
God is no respecter of persons.
What He did for me, He will do for you.
Ask Him to guide your heart and He will do it
❤
I told the two children with me that morning that we were going to survive this awful blow.
And we have.
It has been hard and ugly and more painful than anything else we’ve ever had to do.
But we’re still standing.
And I want to encourage the hearts that are just starting down this broken road: You really CAN make it.
Some of you reading this are saying, “But I don’t want to make it. I want to lie down and give up and be out of this pain.”
I don’t blame you.
That’s precisely how my heart felt for months and months. The only thing that kept me holding onto hope was a strong desire that my precious family not have to bury another person they loved. It was enough to force my lungs to draw one more breath, and then another, and then another.
The breaths turned into minutes turned into hours turned into days-then weeks, months and finally, years.
Here I am, six plus years into this Valley and I can tell you this:
Sorrow is no longer all I feel and my son’s absence no longer all I see.
Yes, every single minute grief runs like background noise in my brain. I can go from OK to devastated in a heartbeat.
Yes, I miss Dominic like crazy.
I miss the family we used to have.
I miss the me I used to be.
But I am also living, loving and even laughing my way through many days.
I can go from tearful to joyful in a heartbeat too. I am even more grateful for the children that walk the earth with me. I try harder to be present, to listen, to lean in and love more fully.
The broken me is a more compassionate woman who knows the value of a minute spent with someone you love.
I’ve learned to shift the weight of grief to one hip and make room for other things.
It’s hard.
It’s going to stay hard.
But with God’s help, I’m strong enough to make it.
It was a long time before I wanted to believe that I received any gifts worth keeping from this life I didn’t choose.
I knew I had tears, pain, agonizing sorrow, loss, heartache, dashed hopes, empty arms.
If I could give those back and regain my son, I would do it in less than a heartbeat.
I can’t, so I’m left here to ponder what else I’ve received from burying a child.
Read the rest here: Grace Gifts of Grief
Shame is a shackle as sure as any chains forged from iron.
And it often finds its home in the hearts of those who bury a child.
Bereaved parents may feel shame for lots of reasons…Shake Off the Shame
thelifeididntchoose 