Category: grief work

STILL Dismantling the Past

It must be something about this time of year that prompts me to clean out corners and long neglected spaces in our home of more than a quarter century.

The extreme heat makes even the unsavory certainty I’ll run across painful memories more tolerable.

So here I am again-digging through boxes, papers and bits and pieces of “before”. Reminded that life requires work and grief makes it both more unavoidable and more difficult.

❤

I’ve spent the last two days rearranging our family room.

Since my husband has retired, we no longer use it as we once did and I realized a few weeks ago that it was ridiculous to have it set up the way it’s been for decades when our needs have drastically changed.

So we decided to tackle the job of sorting/moving/dismantling books, videos (yes, we still have a few!), DVDs, CDs and random other bits and pieces of a life long lived in the same place.

Read the rest here: Dismantling The Past

Stepping Out in Trust: Heartache and Hope

It’s still dark here.

The days are getting perceptibly shorter for those of us tuned in to the turning of the earth and the passing of the seasons.

But the light is coming. It always does.

And that is what I have clung to in these more-than-ten years since Dominic ran ahead to Heaven. That’s what compels me to write.

I want every hurting heart to know that the night doesn’t last forever.

It’s also why today I have something exciting (and scary, if I’m honest!) to tell you: I’ve created an official ministry for the work I do here and on Facebook through Heartache and Hope (https://www.facebook.com/heartacheandhope/).

The Lord planted a vision in my heart awhile ago to expand into new territory.

I am a quiet person who longs only to stay (mostly) in my home and surrounding area. I once loved traveling but now only really enjoy it in the company of family to low-key destinations that afford plenty of space and natural beauty.

But I am stepping out into uncomfortable places and trusting my Shepherd King to provide the means and direction to journey on.

I’m not one to appropriate Old Testament verses to justify current choices but I do absolutely believe that He nudges us to spread out and to reach further than we might choose to do in our flesh.

So, like Jabez, I pray:

Oh that You would bless me indeed and enlarge my territory! Let Your hand be with me, and keep me from the evil one.”

And God granted his request.

I Chronicles 4: 9, 10

The ministry is called “Heartache and Hope” and is a federally recognized 501(c)3 non profit so donations are fully tax deductible to the extent allowed by law.

This is my hope and heart for this new endeavor:

  • I am committing to monthly local bereaved parent gatherings (check out my personal Facebook page for details if you live close);
  • to make myself available to share with and speak to others if invited to do so;
  • to speak to and gather with pastors and others (such as healthcare providers and social workers) who are positioned to come alongside grievers in critical moments;
  • to provide printed resources to bereaved parents;
  • to host small retreats to encourage and refresh bereaved parents; and
  • to be a voice for grief education in the larger community.

If you host a local group and are interested in my coming to share with you in person, please feel free to DM me. I can’t promise to accept every invitation, but I am going to accept as many as I can.

Along with the blog, public page and private bereaved parents’ group, I am working on a website with resources, links to other excellent ministries and graphics for sharing. There will also be a way to donate and to contact the ministry online. (Look for that in the next week or so!)

Until then, I am including a QR code at the end of this post and will also share it on my personal and public Facebook pages if you feel led to join me in this endeavor.

I won’t be making appeals or sending emails or selling products because I trust that what the Lord births in a heart, He brings to fruition. Other than periodic updates on where He is leading and how He is providing, nothing will change in this space.

I am, and will always be, devoted to sharing honestly about my journey and encouraging other hearts along the way.

*If you would like to donate, you may scan this QR code or click on the following link:https://square.link/u/cNen14Q1

Bereaved Parents Month 2024: How Do You Breathe?

I’m ending Bereaved Parents Month by sharing this post because I still have moments when I marvel that I’ve survived.

❤

It was the question I asked the bereaved mother that came to my son’s funeral.

It was the question a mother asked me as we stood by her granddaughter’s casket, surrounded by family and flowers.

And it is the right question.

Because when the breath leaves the body of your child, and you look down at the shell that used to be the home of a vibrant, living soul, you simply can. not. breathe.

Read the rest here: How Do You Breathe?

Bereaved Parents Month 2024: Life Grows Around Grief

When days become months and months become years it’s hard to explain to others how grief is both always present but not always in focus.

I’ve struggled to help those outside the loss community understand that the absolute weight of the burden is precisely the same as when it fell on me without warning that dark morning.

Dominic’s absence, if anything, has seeped into more places, changed more relationships and influences more choices than it did ten years ago when I was only just beginning to comprehend what a world without him would look like.

Read the rest here: Life Grows Around Grief

Bereaved Parents Month 2024: I AM Defined [In Part] By Grief

I’m not at all fond of the saying, “Don’t let your grief define you”.

I understand that I shouldn’t let my grief CONSTRAIN me, shouldn’t let it circumscribe my life, making it smaller and smaller until all I think about, speak about or experience is sadness, sorrow and missing.

And I don’t.

But I cannot ignore that losing a child DOES define me.  It defines me in exactly the same way other momentous events-good and bad-shape, mold and make me into who I am.

Read the rest here: I AM Defined [In Part] By Grief

Bereaved Parents Month 2024: Ten Ways to Survive Hard Grief Days

My hardest grief season begins in November and runs to the end of May.  Thanksgiving through Dominic’s birthday on (or near) Memorial Day are days full of triggers, memories and stark reminders that one of us is missing.

If I could fall asleep November first and wake up in June I’d do it.

But I can’t so I have to employ all the tricks I’ve learned in the over eight years since Dominic ran ahead to heaven to survive those particularly challenging months.

Here are ten ways I survive hard grief days:

Read the rest here: Taking Care: Ten Ways to Survive Hard Grief Days

Bereaved Parents Month 2024: Background Music

Another bereaved mom wrote that she was better able to cope now than she had been a year ago.

And thanks to Facebook memories she had proof.

Several comments down a second mom wrote something that got me thinking-when, exactly, did Dominic’s loss move from the forefront to the background?

I’m not sure I can pinpoint a day or moment when I realized that sorrow was no longer ALL I feel and Dominic’s absence no longer ALL I see.

Read the rest here: Background Music

Bereaved Parents Month 2024: Ten Things I’ve Learned About Child Loss

The first time I shared this I was trying to distill years of walking the broken road of child loss into a relatively few, easy to think about, “lessons”.

Since then I could add a dozen more but today I’ll only add one: Being a bereaved parent is not my IDENTITY but it impacts who I am in ways I’m still figuring out.

Just as being married or being female or being from the southern United States informs how I walk in the world and interact with others so, too, does having buried a child.

There’s a lot of pressure to pretend that’s not true.

But I won’t do that.

❤ Melanie

I’ve had awhile to think about this.  Nine years is a long time to live with loss, to live without the child I carried, raised and sent off in the world.

So I’ve considered carefully what my “top ten” might be.

Here’s MY list (yours might be very different):

Read the rest here: Ten Things I’ve Learned About Child Loss

Bereaved Parents Month 2024: I Keep On Keeping On

I think I counted months for nearly three years after Dominic ran ahead to Heaven.

Just like when he was an infant and toddler.

When he was living and growing I celebrated each milestone. But after he left, I cringed when the twelfth rolled around again.

Every time I folded the calendar back to reveal another four weeks had passed, I felt my heart flip flop in response to time’s unstoppable progression.

❤ Melanie

The months roll by, the calendar pages turn, soon school will be back in session and you are still not here.

Sometimes I think I have figured out how to do these days that remain between now and when we will be together again.  

And sometimes I realize that I haven’t.

Read the rest here: Keep On Keeping On

Grief and Faith: The Problem of [Un]Answered Prayer

I’m really thankful that more and more Christians are willing to shed false positivity and embrace lament.

Because the truth is lots of stories this side of eternity end in tragedy or at least unmet expectations and sorrow instead of glorious, victorious sunshine and roses.

Crops and marriages fail. Dreams come and go.

We hope for healing but don’t receive it.

Loved ones die.

Let’s just be honest about it-about ALL of it.

❤ Melanie

In the wake of burying Dominic, the most difficult spiritual discipline for me to recover has been prayer.

In part because my heart just doesn’t know what to ask for or how to talk to a God Who has allowed this pain in my life.  

In part because I don’t really have a framework for placing the prayers I want to pray inside my ongoing struggle to commit my future and the future of my family to the hands of a Father Who didn’t step in to prevent Dominic’s death.

I still struggle with this.  

Read the rest of this post here: The Problem of [Un]Answered Prayer