Category: grief journey

Christmas 2023: Why, Oh Why, Is Christmas So Hard???

I first shared this a few years ago when I really thought I should have reached a place in my grief journey where holidays weren’t as difficult as they were at first.

But what I realized then and what has been confirmed since is that every year has new and unique situations that make Christmas a fresh challenge each time.

❤

As the tenth Christmas without Dominic rapidly approaches, I am pondering the question:  “Why, oh why, is Christmas so hard?” 

I think I’ve figured out at least a few reasons why.

Read the rest here: Why, Oh Why, is Christmas So Hard???

Christmas 2023: Surviving Siblings and Christmas

I first shared this post in 2016 when we had muddled through the first two holiday seasons after Dominic left us and were headed for a third.

Now facing our tenth, there are some things that have changed a lot (adding grandchildren and losing my mama) and some things that remain the same (the ongoing struggle to balance everyone’s needs and expectations with the reality of sorrow).

I still find the principles I outlined years ago to be the best way to approach the season. We certainly don’t always get it right but we continue to strive to honor one another, to honor the true meaning of Christmas and to honor Dominic.

❤ Melanie

How do I honor the child for whom memories are all I have and love well the children with whom I am still making memories?

That’s a question I ask myself often.

And it is especially difficult to answer for celebrations and holidays, special events and birthdays.

Read the rest here: Surviving Siblings and Christmas

Christmas 2023: How To Survive December With a Broken Heart

It comes up again and again-and not just for the parents facing their year of “firsts”:  How do I survive December with a broken heart?

There’s no single answer or list of things to do that will suit every family.

But there are some general principles that can make even this awful reality a little easier…

Read the rest here: How To Survive December With a Broken Heart

Christmas 2023: Ten Years. Sigh…

I’m a little better today. Thank you so much for all the prayers, well wishes and love.

I just couldn’t let December break forth on hurting hearts without extending some understanding and encouragement.

So I’m sharing this post from last year.

To be honest, not much has changed but I AM better at pacing myself and recognizing that what may be molehills to others (probably were to me Before) are mountains NOW.

So I will content myself with showing up-even if I can only offer reruns.

❤ Melanie

When I was a little girl I never thought about how the holidays impacted the adults around me. I figured it was all about ME. Or at most, me plus my brother and Santa Claus.

I was blissfully unaware of budgets and baggage.

Now I know better.

The holidays require us to wrap more than presents. They force us to wrap all the pain and expectation and hope and heartache in a giant package and serve it up hot and ripe for dissension and disappointment.

Read the rest here: Christmas 2022: Nine Years. Sigh…

A Beautiful Moment When the Light Gets Through…

A few years ago, I had a grace-filled, heartwarming visit with another bereaved mama who came all the way from Maine just to hang out with me. And that was so, so good.

As she and I shared over coffee and tea, shopping and meals, lounging and walking we found so many ways in which our journeys have been similar even though the details are really very different.

One is this: There was a distinct moment along the way when each of us began to see light and color again in the midst of our darkness and pain and it was a turning point.

Read the rest here: There’s A Moment When The Light Makes It Through Again

Thanksgiving 2023: Post Holiday Blues

It’s a paradox really-that grieving hearts can be more anxious and more sorrowful BEFORE and AFTER a milestone day, birthday or holiday than on the day itself.

That’s not true for everyone, but it’s a frequent comment in our closed bereaved parent groups.

Read the rest here: Post Holiday Blues: When The Grief Comes Crashing Down

Birthdays Can Be Tricky…

Tomorrow I will be sixty years old.

When I celebrated my fiftieth, I had so many dreams and plans! I couldn’t have imagined that the next ten years would be filled with the heartache of child loss, along with all the hope and joy of an expanding family.

But here I am.

Definitely older and, I would like to think, a little wiser.

Wiser to the truth that no one escapes pain in this life. Wiser to the fact that joy and sorrow can coexist. Wise enough to know by experience that sometimes the very best thing you can do is shut your mouth and open your arms to a hurting heart. Wise enough to realize that birthdays for bereaved parents are often complicated.

I wrote this post several years ago but share it annually because unless you’ve sent a child ahead to Heaven, you might not realize how very tricky birthdays can be for the parents left behind.

❤ Melanie

Tomorrow is my birthday.

And while I am truly grateful for another trip around the sun, since Dominic left us it’s not a simple celebration of life lived and the hope of years to come.

The last birthday I had with an unbroken family circle was a lovely surprise party for my fiftieth held in Dom’s apartment.

Ten years later and it seems a lifetime ago.

Read the rest here: Birthdays Are…Complicated

I Need to Know You Remember

As families gather around tables and in backyards to celebrate fall birthdays, Thanksgiving and (soon!) Christmas, my heart longs even harder to hear Dominic’s name.  

Of course I remember him-he’s my son-and of course others do too. 

But it is especially helpful this time of year to have friends and family speak of him aloud. 

Read the rest here: Let Me Know You Remember

Child Loss: Don’t Let the Outside Fool You

From the outside-very soon after all the formal visiting, meal bringing and memorial service or funeral-most bereaved parents look “fine”.

We have to.

The world doesn’t stop turning because our world imploded.

Work, life, family duties, household chores, and all the ordinary things determined by hours and calendars keep rolling along.

But on the inside, every bit of who we are, how we feel, what we think has been devastatingly poked, prodded, ripped apart and rearranged.

Read the rest here: Don’t Let The Outside Fool You

STILL Nothing “Normal” About It

I first shared this post in 2016 when I deeply resented anyone trying to tell me there would eventually be a “new normal” to this long road of sorrow and missing.

Since then I would say that I can concede there is a kind of “normal” that eventually takes over a life-even a life shattered by loss.

No matter how tempting it might be to climb under the covers and hide away in my room, biding time until it’s MY time, I can’t.

And little by little, the ordinary (and extraordinary) habits, pressures and circumstances of walking in the world require more and more of my attention forcing me to sequester Dominic’s absence to a part (instead of the whole) of my waking existence.

But I will tell you today-over nine years later-that there is STILL absolutely, positively NOTHING “normal” about my beautiful boy being here one moment and gone the next.

❤ Melanie

❤ Melanie

Something you hear early on in this grief journey is that one day you will find a “new normal”.

I hate that phrase.

Because while I have certainly developed new routines, new ways of dealing with life, new methods for quelling the tears and the longing and the sorrow and the pain-it is NOT normal.

Read the rest here: Nothing “Normal” About It