I remember very well the morning I woke on April 12, 2015-it was one year since I’d gotten the awful news; one year since the life I thought I was going to have turned into the life I didn’t choose.
I was horrified that my heart had continued to beat for 365 days when I was sure it wouldn’t make it through the first 24 hours.
And I was terrified.
Read the rest here: Why is the Second Year SO Hard?
After the flurry of activity surrounding the funeral, our house was so, so quiet.
Even with the five of us still here, it felt empty.
Because Dominic was gone, gone, gone and he was not coming back.
And the silence pounded into my head and heart until it became a scream:
How do I DO this?
Read the rest here: How Do I DO This? The Question Every Bereaved Parent Longs to Ask
I was one of those people years ago who set her sights on starting and maintaining a blog.
I thought I would post a few times a week and share anecdotes about my family and critters, insight into daily living and inspiration from Scripture and interesting quotes.
No, not THIS blog-the other two I started and quickly abandoned to who-knows-where in cyberspace.
Trouble was that the subject matter, while near and dear to my heart, wasn’t personally compelling enough to keep me disciplined and actively writing.
If someone had said, “Pick any topic to write about”, child loss wouldn’t have been in the first million choices.
No one CHOOSES child loss (Thus the name of the blog: The Life I Didn’t Choose).
But untold numbers of parents EXPERIENCE it every year. This very day, parents somewhere got a knock on the door or a phone call or sat next to a hospital bed as life slipped slowly from their child’s tired body.
Since I was already journaling and had walked this Valley for nearly a year and a half, it dawned on me that the ramblings I’d put down might be helpful to another heart. So I started THIS blog in September, 2015.
And I’ve been here ever since.
I’m not in the raw, breathless place I once was. But grief and loss are part of every breath I take, part of every moment I experience.
I miss Dominic. I still consider death an enemy. Every day I hate what was stolen and long for what was. I mourn the changes grief has wrought in my family. I wish things were different. I discover new ways loss impacts my life and new ways of coping with it.
So I keep writing.
I don’t want anyone to feel alone in this journey. I don’t want anyone to think there’s no way to survive. I don’t want a single broken heart to doubt that God is here and that He will help you hold onto hope.
I’ll spill my heart out in words until the words are exhausted.
It helps me.
I pray it helps others too.
I think it was somewhere around two months from Dominic’s departure when my heart realized life was moving forward whether I granted permission or not.
Not only folks on the fringes and the “bigger world out there” but close by-in my own family, my own circle of intimate friends-people were making plans, having birthdays, going places and doing things.
I wanted to scream.
Could the world not take more notice that it was absolutely NOT business as usual? Was I the only one whose heart was so shattered that the thought of another sunrise was painful? How could I walk into a future that didn’t include Dominic?
By the grace of God, I did it.
No one can keep the world from turning, the sun from rising, time from ticking by.
But it took a great deal of strength and courage.
First it was a “grin and bear it” kind of courage. I strapped on my armor and tucked a hankie in my pocket. I could show up and smile (a bit), talk (awhile) and muddle through.
Sometimes it didn’t go so well. I had to apologize and leave early. And I was always exhausted.
Then it was an “I’m going to be present for my family” kind of courage. The last thing I wanted to do was shortchange my earthbound children. I worked to get a better handle on my thoughts and emotions. I learned how to pre-grieve major events and milestones. I found I could bring Dom with me by wearing a meaningful piece of jewelry or tucking a keepsake away where I could touch it if I needed to.
I was able to laugh (most of the time), make small talk and write dates on the calendar again.
Now the courage that helps me hold on as I’m pulled forward into the future is informed by the fact that every passing day is one day closer to the reunion my heart longs for. What first seemed impossible is now habitual. Sorrow and joy can coexist. I don’t have to be empty of one to feel the other. The future is not my enemy-it’s where I can and will love ALL my children, husband, family and friends well until the day we are in eternity together forever.
My love for Dominic is Background Music to everything I do. But it doesn’t always demand my full attention. Sorrow is no longer all I feel and Dominic’s absence no longer all I see.
Sunrise is still hard to face some days.
My heart will always long for the time things were as they should be instead of how they are.
But I’m thankful for the courage to step into the future even when I’m afraid.
Some people say they’d love to know what life has around the corner.
Not me.
At least not much past tomorrow morning.
If my husband and I had known thirty-five years ago what our lives would be like along the way, we may very well have turned tail and run in the other direction!
There have been many, many good things in those years.
We have four beautiful children whom we love so much. Two are married and their spouses are a blessing to our family.
It’s a brand new feeling to watch your son with his.
There have been a fair number of not-so-good things too.
Job layoffs, illness, the death of Hector’s parents one right after the other and the stress and strain of life’s details when it seemed we couldn’t get a break.
But nothing compares to burying Dominic.
How does a heart learn to live with a giant piece missing?
We have, though.
We’ve muddled through.
The commitment we made all those years ago has stood firm.
It’s battered, crumpled, muddied and torn, but it remains the guiding promise of our lives together.
The morning Dominic ran ahead to Heaven, after I made the awful phone calls I reached for my journal.
I knew if I didn’t start spilling the grief onto paper my heart would explode with sorrow.
Since I learned to hold a pencil I’ve been writing.
It’s how I sort my thoughts, figure out my feelings and express my heart.
A few months after and I found several online support groups.
There I learned a whole other Language of Grief and Loss. The more I read what others shared, the better I understood my own experience and understood how to communicate that truth to others.
You might not keep a journal or write poetry or craft lengthy essays about your pain and that’s just fine. There’s no magic in written words.
Find a safe space or person and speak it aloud.
Sorrow unspoken swells.
It can’t be contained.
It will absolutely consume you.
I got a new kitten the other day.
For those of you following along, it’s not like I needed another animal in my personal zoo.
But my precious companion, Roosevelt , died in April.
Which was just in time to make the anniversary of Dominic going to Heaven, his funeral and his birthday harder since I didn’t have my favorite cat’s calming presence in my lap when grief overwhelmed me.
Once all the family festivities died down (seeing our grandson, celebrating our daughter’s wedding) I realized I really needed another cuddle bug.
My two other indoor cats are giants-great at hanging close to me but lousy at sitting in my lap.
So, meet Miss Tilly the Kitty.
Isn’t she the cutest?
I’m trying to do on purpose what I did by accident with Roosevelt.
I’m working on orienting her to me, getting her comfortable being held and training her as a good traveler on the cart and in the car. I need her to sleep next to me in the bed at least until I fall asleep.
So far, so good.
After one day going around with me to feed in the morning, she’s no longer afraid of anything except the donkeys’ loud greeting. (Which could make a grown man jump if he didn’t expect it!)
She makes me laugh. She runs like a bat out of you-know-where between the living room, kitchen and dining room. She’s entertains me and herself for nearly an hour at a time by rolling a jingle bell ball around on the floor.
And she’s been really good company.
As I’m typing this, she climbed in my lap which is exactly what I want her to do. She lies down with me at night and sleeps so hard I can reposition her like a limp dishrag. That’s what Roosevelt used to do,so I’m hopeful. I’ve slept better the past few nights than I have since he died.
Today Tilly finally convinced one of the big cats to play with her a little. The other one just shakes his head and walks away. I’m calling them the “bachelor uncles” because all they really want out of life is a routine that includes plenty of food and peace and quiet. I think they are not pleased I’ve brought this young whipper snapper into their previously predictable home.
They’ll adapt.
Eventually.
As for me, I’m enjoying the animal therapy.
❤
I want to be everything my living children need me to be.
I try hard to celebrate them, be available, listen closely and love them well.
I never, ever want them to feel they are competing with their missing brother for my affection or my attention.
But I’d be lying if I said it was always easy.
Sometimes the happy moment so closely resembles a shared memory that includes Dominic, my heart takes my head in directions I wish it wouldn’t go. Sometimes it’s a long awaited once-in-a-lifetime occasion and Dom’s absence is a giant, gaping hole everywhere I look.
It’s really hard to be stuck at the crossroad of being happy for a child still here while mourning and missing the child that’s gone.
I’ve had to do that many, many times in the five years since Dominic ran ahead to Heaven and I’ve found a couple of things that help.
I put something in my pocket or wear a piece of jewelry that is a token of my love for Dominic.
It helps me feel as if he’s represented even if no one else knows about it. Then I lean in and take hold of the celebration as best as I can. When I feel overwhelmed, I touch my little token and/or escape to a quiet corner or bathroom for a minute or two and collect myself.
I also try to do something called “pre-grieving”.
I allow myself time early in the morning of an event to be alone and cry if I need to. If the tears won’t come, I listen to music that helps my heart reach that place of release. I journal my feelings. I walk through the day and admit where it might be especially challenging. I think through how I can deal with that and make a plan.
It makes a difference.
So much has been stolen from my surviving children.
I don’t want them robbed of their mama too.
I miss a lot of things since Dominic ran ahead to Heaven.
I miss HIM-his deep voice, his perspective and his thump-thump-thumping down the stairs and the rhythm of who he is.
And I miss how his absence has reshaped the family I thought I’d have.
Raising four children, investing my time, heart and energy into who they were turning out to be, I naturally projected into the years ahead. All that love poured into them would create a legacy we’d all enjoy. Marriages, careers, grandchildren and experience would blend together into a (if not perfectly harmonious) at least a shared future.
I never imagined turning a calendar page without one of my children to turn it with me.
Dominic’s death has touched each one of us. His missing is as powerful a force as his presence. We are absolutely NOT THE SAME as we would have been if he were still here nor as we were when he was still here.
When Dom first left us, I was primarily mourning HIM. I still miss him like crazy.
But a lot of my mourning during the past twelve months has been for the family I thought I would have. I see each of my surviving children are processing Dominic’s absence in ways that influence their decisions.
In some ways it’s beautiful-I see twenty-somethings and thirty-somethings making choices with wisdom way beyond their years. In some ways it’s brutal-they set up safeguards because they know by experience that leaving the house doesn’t always mean you return.
They have back up plans for everything.
Which wasn’t something I even thought about when I was their age.
My husband and I expected to drift into retirement years full of energy and vigor. Much of that has been stolen from us by child loss too. Oh, how we long to be the fun grandparents, the traveling duo, the footloose crazy pair but it’s much more effort than we anticipated.
Sometimes we can’t muster that energy at all.
I know some changes were inevitable.
Dominic’s death coincided with a natural progression toward an empty nest. I’m not a helicopter mama and I’ve always said my goal was to raise children who could function well without me so I think that as much as possible, I prepared my heart for them to grow up and grow apart.
But in addition to normal changes, there’s an utterly unnatural and unwelcome transformation from nuclear family to brokenhearted family.
I am so, so thankful that we have chosen the hard path of running toward one another instead of running away.
I’m grateful that we have grown from five left behind to a table for seven-a new spouse and a precious grandchild.
I do not take a single second for granted because I know that seconds are not guaranteed.
But I sure wish Dominic were here to share it with us.
Some days there are just no words for this journey.
Sometimes I can only feel what I feel
and do what I do
and cry when I cry.
Today is like that.
I cannot wrap my mind around the FACT that my son is dead.
Read the rest here: No Words
thelifeididntchoose 