In our modern age of light switches and street lights it’s hard to imagine a world where the tiniest candle flame could lead a body to safety.
But for most of human history that was how people lived.
It’s how some still live.
So when John described Jesus as the “Light that bursts through gloom-the Light that darkness could not diminish” (John 1: 5 TPT) he’s really saying something.
This isn’t a tiny candle or smoky oil lamp barely pushing back the edges of inky night.
When I used to drive by an unkempt yard, a run down house or bumped into an untidy person, I would think, “Goodness! Don’t they care about their yard, home or appearance? They need to do better! I would NEVER let my (fill in the blank) look like that.”
I don’t do that anymore.
Because I’ve learned that there are all kinds of reasons a body may not be busy mowing a lawn, painting a porch or even putting on matching socks.
It makes it harder to absorb the blows life continues to throw.
My husband, myself and our earthbound children have learned to expect the worse and be delightfully surprised when it doesn’t come to pass.
❤ Melanie
2016: The Forgotten Ones: Grieving Siblings
I am always afraid that Dominic will be forgotten.
I’m afraid that as time passes, things change and lives move forward, his place in hearts will be squeezed smaller and smaller until only a speck remains.
Not in my heart, of course.
Or in the hearts of those closest to him, but in general-he will become less relevant.
But he is not the only one who can be forgotten. I am just as fearful that my living children will be forgotten.
I’m driving down the highway listening to the morning news brief. A quick mention that Paris is likely to get the bid for the 2024 Summer Olympics draws my attention.
I begin to do the math-when are the next Olympics? Oh, yes-2020. Three years away.
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 realize not every parent enters child loss with the same reverence for Scripture and trust in the promises of God that I had when Dominic left us.
So it may be hard for your heart to believe the words we’ve been reading and studying this month. It may be near impossible for you to feel that God is a good Father, that He has not abandoned you and that He has a purpose and plan for your life, even here in this awful Valley.
If you’ve read this blog for any length of time, you know that while I still have faith, it’s a tested faith. I have dragged every single thing I believed before Dominic ran ahead to Heaven, held it up and scrutinized it in the cold light of loss.
I’ve tried to find a theme in each of these collected posts but today defies a single description.
The posts range from deep thoughts on eternity to God’s faithfulness to my personal insecurities.
That’s one way our grief journeys parallel anyone’s life journey: there’s so, so very much packed into each and every day. So, so much we need to think about and consider if we are going to live a life that matters.
Maybe the difference is that if death seems far off and unlikely, we are free to ignore the larger questions.
I can’t do that anymore.
❤ Melanie
2016: Road Work
Eternal perspective is hard to hold onto. Especially when missing Dominic is so much harder than rearranging my schedule or waiting behind a dump truck for my turn to pass down the road.
But the principle stands: when I focus my heart and mind and soul’s eyes on forever, even this awful pain of burying my child is a little easier to bear.
If I can lift my head-or let Jesus do it for me-I can cast my gaze to the horizon of His promise.
This may come as a shock to my city-dwelling readers, but there is not a UPS store on every corner in rural Alabama.
In fact, there isn’t one in the whole county where I live.
So when I had to return something with a prepaid label, the nearest place to do it was up the highway and off an exit that I probably haven’t taken in a decade. After dropping the package, on a whim, I scooted across the street to the Winn Dixie store for just a minute.
As soon as I entered, I knew I’d made a dreadful mistake.
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.”
Siblings are often forgotten grievers. But they shouldn’t be.
They have not only lost a brother or sister but also the family they once knew and relied upon. They (if young) may not have the capacity to express or process these losses in ways adults comprehend or recognize. And if older, they may work hard at hiding grief so as not to add to their parents’ burden.
It’s so, so important for those who love and serve bereaved siblings to pay attention, to offer support, to grant space and grace and freedom of expression. They are grieving too.
❤ Melanie
I am always afraid that Dominic will be forgotten.
I’m afraid that as time passes, things change and lives move forward, his place in hearts will be squeezed smaller and smaller until only a speck remains.
Not in my heart, of course.
Or in the hearts of those closest to him, but in general-he will become less relevant.
But he is not the only one who can be forgotten. I am just as fearful that my living children will be forgotten.
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 seven years ago when I was only just beginning to comprehend what a world without him would look like.
Today is Dominic’s birthday. He would have been thirty-three if he lived.
I find as the years roll by it becomes increasingly difficult to “age” the person I last saw into the person he might have become. Oh, I can guess-but that’s hardly worth doing since we all know life rarely follows a straight path.
And that’s what defies language and steals my breath. On milestone days especially, I’m not only mourning what I have lost but also what I will never know.
❤
It would surprise my mama most of all that on this day I’m at a loss for words.
I regularly embarrassed her with my non-stop commentary as a child. I told stories about what I heard and saw (and what my young mind THOUGHT it heard or saw) to anyone who would listen.
But I realize now there are moments too sacred, wounds too deep, experiences too precious for words.
Either you are there and share it-or you’re not-and can’t imagine.
This is one of those times.
Dominic would be thirty-three years old today if he had lived.
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 eight years later-that there is STILL absolutely, positively NOTHING “normal” about my beautiful boy being here one moment and gone the next.
❤ 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.
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