A conspiracy of silence forces those who are suffering to hide. It creates huge gaps between what goes on behind closed doors and public image.
And it causes those who are wounded to question the authenticity of their own experience.
I will tell my story because even though it is hard, it matters. And even though it hurts, it can help heal another. And even though it isn’t finished, it can blaze a trail for others to follow.
Read the rest here: Courage is a Heart Word
My husband was sued for discrimination by a disgruntled employee. The whole thing started heating up just after Dominic ran ahead to Heaven in 2014. The suit was filed just before Christmas 2015.
We’ve been living with this awful thing hanging over our heads for nearly 3 years. Thankfully, the truth prevailed and my husband was exonerated.
But it took a huge toll on both of us and on our whole family.
I sat in a courtroom a few days ago feeling nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
I was waiting for a verdict that had the potential to change the rest of my life but I could not muster a single feeling.
Because when you’ve watched your child’s body lowered beneath the ground, there’s really not much else the world can do to you.
I stared straight ahead as the jury walked in. I didn’t dare hope that they had found in our favor. I’ve learned that hoping for the best sometimes only hurts a heart worse in the end. Better to expect absolutely nothing and then if you get a tiny something, it feels huge.
In agonizing slow motion, the long verdict form was read.
The first question offered a sliver of hope.
But we had to wait thirty more minutes for the hope to be confirmed.
It was oh, so slow and very frustrating as the jury was polled, mistakes in counting were made, recounts were required but finally the numbers were recorded and everything was squared away.
Now on to the individual verdict form. Was my husband going to be held accountable for something he simply did not do? Was there still a shred of justice in this world? Could 12 strangers sift through three weeks of complex and often conflicting testimony and get down to the truth?
Yes!
They could and they did!
We both let out the breath we’d been holding and managed a tiny smile.
Twenty-one days in court, nearly three years with this lawsuit dangling like Damocles’ sword over our heads-over in the short minutes it took to read the verdict.
This trial has cost me more tears than I thought I had left.
Every legal pad pulled out of leather brief cases was a reminder that Dominic should be here with us, guiding us, reassuring us that he was on our side and no matter how things turned out there would be ways to make it right.
I cannot adequately express the toll this season has taken on my soul.
But I am overjoyed that the Lord saw fit to reach down and assure the victory.
If you see me on the street I might look a little dazed. It’s hard to accept something good has happened when all you’ve come to expect is something bad. So it may take me a few days to grow into an expression that reflects the beauty of the gift.
Bear with me.
I am so, so thankful.
Thankful for every prayer raised, for every encouraging text, message, email and card.
And thankful most of all for the absolute assurance that no matter what I may face in this life, not only is God with me, but you are with me as well.
It’s easy to be courageous when there are so many faithful friends standing behind you.
Thank you. ❤
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.
I’ve always been a bit of a cheerleader.
Not THAT kind of cheerleader!
But the kind that stands alongside the road handing cups of water to the struggling stragglers in the far back of a marathon.
Because I believe in doing your best and finishing the race, even if it’s hard and even if it’s not pretty.
I also think that often the difference between giving up and giving in or going on and getting done is courage.
Not the “in your face I’m gonna fight you” courage of action movies but the quiet, everyday courage of simply carrying on when you’re tired, worn down and empty of hope.
And the thing about courage is this: I can lend you some of mine.
That’s really what cheer leading is all about-calling courage to another heart, lending courage from the sidelines.
So many wounded hearts are walking around, barely holding onto hope, and all it takes is a few minutes, a few words, an outstretched hand, a smile, an open door or a pat on the back to strengthen their grip.
So when you see that downcast face, that defeated stooping shoulder, that exasperated mama toting three kids into the grocery store-don’t turn away.
Reach out.
Hand a cup of kind words in the name of Jesus.
Help a heart hold onto hope.
When I started writing, Dominic had been gone nearly 18 months.
Before I went public with my thoughts, I had filled six journals with page after page of ramblings, Scripture, quotes from books, questions and tears.
Those are some of my most precious possessions because when I look back I can see how even in the very first hours (yes, I started writing that morning) God was already bringing truth and healing to my shattered soul and broken heart.
In a couple months it will be three years since I started sharing here. And while I rarely look back on the posts in any orderly way, I can see that God has continued His faithfulness when I do.
But just like I promised when I wrote the introduction to my site, I will always be as honest as possible when I share.
So let me just tell you: It’s STILL hard.
Not in the same first, breath-robbing, soul-crushing, can’t-lift-my-head sort of way that makes a heart certain it can. not. survive.
But in a slow-leak, not-enough-air-in-my-tires sort of way that makes every road less comfortable to travel and necessitates lots of stops to make sure I can keep going.
I’ve just endured two weeks of one bad thing after another.
All of them have a solution which (on my scale) makes them hardly worth noting.
But each disrupted my life and will require significant time, energy and resources to address.
And for a heart that has learned how to make it by going slow, choosing predictable paths and incorporating lots of stops along the way, those kinds of disruptions create stress and strain on an already taxed system.
I will absolutely survive.
I’ve already survived the cruelest and most difficult days of my life.
But it’s no cake walk.
It’s still hard.
You know what breaks my heart all over again?
The fact that so many bereaved parents tell me they don’t feel they can share their experience on their own FaceBook or other social media pages.
That’s just WRONG!
They have been shushed to silent suffering because when they break open the vault of emotions and let others see what’s inside, most people turn away-or worse, they condemn that wounded heart for sharing.
SHAME on you if you are one of those people.
I’ve written about this before here:
In recent years we have dragged many topics into the light. We’ve made space in the public square for discussion of things we used to pretend didn’t exist.
But life after child loss is still a hushed topic.
The long road to healing after burying a child is rarely acknowledged outside the community of bereaved parents.
We have splashed all kinds of garbage across the Internet because in one way or another it makes us feel good (yep, admit it-it feeds some place in your soul) but we will not tolerate someone being utterly honest about how impossibly hard some things are to bear in this life.
Because THAT makes us uncomfortable.
Not every hurting heart is brave enough to risk negative public opinion. I understand that completely. This post is not for THEM, it’s for the hundreds and thousands who want to shut them down and shut them out.
This may be for you, if you have ever scrolled past a plaintive post or made some glib comment like, “God has a purpose in this for you” or worse, written a private message scolding someone and telling them they are begging for attention, refusing to “move on” or hanging on to hurt.
Think for one minute-literally 60 full seconds-how it would feel to hold the cold hand of your dead child, bury your child, go home to his empty room and then live the rest. of. your. life. without the earthly companionship of the child of your heart.
Then think again about censoring your friend who’s grieving.
Instead, speak courage to his or her heart.
Strengthen their hold on hope don’t destroy it.
Courage is a heart word. The root of the word courage is cor – the Latin word for heart. In one of its earliest forms, the word courage meant “To speak one’s mind by telling all one’s heart.” Over time, this definition has changed, and today, we typically associate courage with heroic and brave deeds. But in my opinion, this definition fails to recognize the inner strength and level of commitment required for us to actually speak honestly and openly about who we are and about our experiences — good and bad.
~Brene Brown
I call my parents pretty much every morning.
It was a habit started years ago after my mother had a bad spell and ended up in the hospital. I like to start my day knowing how she and my dad are doing.
The other day Papa and I were talking about the movie, “Unbroken” we saw a couple years ago.
There’s a scene where the main character was forced to hold a heavy beam over his head in a Japanese POW camp for hours. If he let it fall, he would be shot and his torture over. Malnourished, mistreated and disheartened, he somehow found the strength to do it.
He endured.
His courageous example lent courage to the others in that camp. His victory was in not giving up or giving in, though he bore the scars for the rest of his life.
These past months have been difficult ones for both of my parents. Mama’s fall, heart attack and multiple hospital stays have left her very different than she was last summer. Someone needs to be with her all the time.
That means my dad-who has no physical limitations-is as housebound as she.
Papa is absolutely committed to caring for Mama and he’s doing a great job.
But it’s hard on a heart to be confined when you are surrounded by so many chores that need doing and so much wide open space that begs you to get out in the sunshine.
He is enduring.
And I am thankful for his example.
So few of us will have an opportunity to do really grand things that make headlines. But most of us will have a chance to be faithful in hundreds of small things that make up meaningful lives.
Quiet, everyday commitment to not giving up when life is hard and rest seems so very far away is victory even when it doesn’t feel like it.
It speaks courage to other hearts to hold on.
Truly.
Always.
It’s a funny thing.
If you’ve never faced anything very frightening, it’s easy to think that those who do and march on through are somehow immune to fear.
But nothing could be further from the truth.
Courage is not the absence of fear but the mastery of it.
Yet you cannot master something you deny. You cannot resist that which you claim doesn’t exist.
Child loss is frightening.
So frightening that those not forced to walk this road usually choose to pretend (in practice if not in words) that it simply isn’t part of the world they live in.
It’s so frightening that most bereaved parents experience a period of time we would describe as “being numb” and “shock”.
It was probably six months until my heart truly understood the fact that Dominic was not coming back.
Ever.
It was frightening on so many levels-I had to face the fact I was not in control, had to face the fact my life was never going to be what I had envisioned it to be, face the fact that my surviving children would be shaped by grief in ways neither I nor they could anticipate, face the fact that I would live out my years carrying this heavy burden, and face the fact that no matter how hard I wished things were different, they were never going to be different-my child was dead.
And when the numbness began to wear off and fear creep into my heart, I had to choose: Was I going to embrace and experience this awful, devastating fear or was I going to try to deny it, distract myself from it or try to dismiss it as inconsequential?
Facing fear requires facing my own weakness.
Facing fear means becoming vulnerable-admitting that I am hurting, admitting that I cannot do this on my own, admitting that maybe, just maybe, I can’t climb this mountain without help.
Choosing vulnerability was its own challenge.
What if others mocked me? What if no one helped me? What if I just wasn’t up to the task?
I decided that NOT facing fear was not an option. As long as it lurked in the shadows I would be its prisoner.
So I turned and looked it square in the eyes. And I found, with God’s enabling help, I could master that fear.
Two verses became my touchstone:
When struck by fear,
I let go, depending securely upon You alone.
In God—whose word I praise—
in God I place my trust. I shall not let fear come in,
for what can measly men do to me?Psalm 56:3-4 VOICE
When I admitted my weakness, His strength was sufficient.
Choosing vulnerability and facing fear opens the door for God to show His power in and through me.
Child loss is still scary.
I’m still afraid.
But the Lord gives me strength to master the fear.
This weekend another family joined the ranks of the bereaved.
A beloved son left for heaven in a car accident.
The mama’s best friend messaged to ask what she could do to help this newly broken heart.
It made me dig deep in my memories for who did what in those first hours, first days and how it made a difference in our family’s ability to hold onto hope and to stumble forward in the heavy fog of grief, pain and sorrow that enveloped our hearts.
My friend was already committed to showing up and sitting silently and lovingly with this child’s mother. I didn’t have to remind her of the power of compassionate companionship.
She was going.
She was staying as long as it was helpful and necessary.
She was coming back as many times as needed.
And that is a gift!
I remember the morning I got the news and as the sun was coming up, a truck pulled down our lane. It was Robbie-our “adopted” son. As soon as my oldest son (who was in WV at the time) got the call, he called Robbie. Because he knew I would be able to bear Robbie’s presence and accept Robbie’s help. I cannot describe the relief I felt when he came to the door-another shoulder to help carry this burden until we could gather all our family together to lift it in unison.
And after him came a couple we had known since the kids were little.
Both rushed to our doorstep to offer companionship, practical aid, listening ears and simple reassurance that though this was NOT a dream-oh, how I wanted it to be a dream!–I was not going to walk this Valley alone. They stayed until my husband, son and parents had made it here. I will never, ever, ever forget that gift of unconditional love and time offered just when I needed it most.
Others came. Some did practical things, brought necessary items, helped me begin to think through next steps. But many just sat with me and my children as we waited for my husband to fly in and my parents to drive up.
I cannot overstate how important SIMPLY BEING THERE was!
Thinking back on that time, I dug up some other very practical “first few days” things friends and family can do:
Compassionate companionship makes the difference between a heart holding onto hope or letting go and falling into the abyss.
Trust me.
I know.
Trigger warning: I discuss my loss in terms of falling. If you have lost a loved one to that kind of accident, you might want to skip this post. ❤
I really don’t know how to explain it to anyone who has not had to repeatedly face their greatest fear.
It takes exactly as much courage.
Every. Single. Time.
I have had a dozen major surgeries in my life. I am always just as anxious when they start the countdown to anesthesia. Doesn’t matter what they push in my IV line-that moment when I realize I am relinquishing all control to the hands of others frightens me.
I feel like I am falling over the edge of a cliff-nothing to hold onto, no way to stop what’s coming, no way to clamber back up and change my mind or change what’s about to happen.
It’s the same every spring since Dominic ran ahead to heaven.
From the middle of March to the middle of April my body responds to cues my mind barely registers. Sights, smells, change in the length of the day, the direction of the prevailing wind-a hundred tiny stimuli make my nerves fire in chorus declaring, “It’s almost THAT day!”
There is another underlying dissonance that begs the question, “Why didn’t you see it coming?” Or, at least, “Why didn’t you spend a little more time with him on those last two visits home?”
Dominic was busy that spring-an internship with a local judge, papers and responsibilities as a journal editor along with the demanding reading load of second year Law School meant he didn’t make the 30 miles home all that often.
But there were a couple days he came our way in the month before he died.
One was to bring a friend’s car and do a bunch of work on it. That day was chilly and I popped out a few times to chit chat as they labored under the shed in the yard. I made lunch and visited with them then.
Still, I kind of felt like I shouldn’t hover over my grown son even though I really missed him and wanted badly to talk to him about something other than car parts.
The jacket he wore and dirtied that day with oil and grease and dirt and gravel grit is still hanging in what we use as a mud room.
Unwashed.
Because they were coming back to do more repairs in a few weeks.
It is only now finally free of the last scent of him.
The next visit was on a day when I was busy, he was busy and we were all frustrated over equipment that wasn’t working properly. He brought me some medicine from the vet in town for a sick horse and spoke briefly about whether or not we’d cut some fallen limbs in a bit. Then he went to help his brother try to get the backhoe cranked. I was suffering from a severe flare in my ankle so was only able to hobble out to the spot the stupid thing had stopped for just a minute before needing to hobble back inside to put my foot up and allow it to rest.
He left early because I wasn’t up to cutting logs and neither he nor his brother could crank the infernal machine.
I remember that before he left, I made a point of turning him to face me and hugging him tight while telling him how very proud I was of him and everything he was doing and becoming. A little unusual because Dominic was the least huggable of all my children. He was no cuddler.
It was not a premonition-I was prompted by the knowledge he was going into finals and had been stressed lately.
But I am so glad I did it.
And then-poof!-time flies like time does and he and his brother were off on a Spring Break trip. They texted me faithfully to let me know they made it safely to their destination, safely to my parents’ home in Florida for a few days after that and then safely back home.
I never saw him alive again.
Spring is not my favorite season anymore.
While my heart can appreciate the promise of new life declared in every budding flower, every unfurling leaf, every newborn bird and calf and lamb, it is also aware that every living thing dies.
I’m on the edge and falling off.
I can’t stop it.
And it’s just as frightening this time as last time.
thelifeididntchoose 