truth – thelifeididntchoose

This Is What Grief Looks Like

Today I was backing out of the driveway when my eyes landed on the tag of one of our other cars.

Suddenly I realized that I hadn’t renewed our tags this year.

They are due in January and, like other important dates graven in my over- organized brain, I literally NEVER forget.

But I did.

And I hadn’t even thought about it these three months until just now.

My sweet granddaughter, Holly, went to Heaven at Dallas Children’s Hospital January 4th. My elderly dad had eye surgery in Florida January 19th. I was home for exactly four days the whole month.

This is what grief looks like in real time twelve years later.

I still have six half grown kittens born a week before Holly entered the world . I brought their poor mama 700 miles because I didn’t want her to deliver while I was away welcoming my precious girl.

I just can’t let them go.

They are connected to her life, a source of joy, a reminder that death doesn’t claim every beautiful thing.

I’m probably going to keep them all because I can and because a farm can always use more barn cats.

This is what grief looks like twelve years later.

I recently had a nuclear stress test and an echocardiogram. My EKG in January was just a little “off” so my cardiologist sent me for testing.

The results were good. No real issues other than that I need to get back to walking every day and should lose weight.

I finally activated a Fitbit tracker I bought months ago to track my heart rate, activity and steps.

This is what grief looks like even after over a decade.

I’m rapidly approaching another unwelcome milestone marking twelve long years since I heard Dominic’s voice, saw his face, hugged his neck.

I’m stronger.

I feel joy.

I don’t cry every day.

But if anyone thinks the absence of my son or my granddaughter doesn’t change EVERYTHING, they are wrong.

Holy Week: Resurrection-Reality and Reassurance

“The worst conceivable thing has happened, and it has been mended…All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.”

~Julian of Norwich

I’m not sure when I first read this quote, but it came to my mind that awful morning. And I played it over and over in my head, reassuring my broken heart that indeed, the worst had already happened, and been mended.

Death had died.

Christ was risen-the firstfruits of many brethren.

Read the rest here: Resurrection: Reality and Reassurance

Holy Week 2026: Living Between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection

It is tempting to forget that there were three long days and nights between the crucifixion and the resurrection beause the way we observe this season rushes us past the pain to embrace the promise.

But it’s not hard for me to imagine how the disciples felt when they saw Jesus was dead. It was neither what they expected nor what they prayed for.

There were many points in the story when things could have gone a different way:

When taken by the religious leaders-surely, they thought, He will explain Himself, they will let Him go.
When taken before Pilate-Rome will refuse to get involved with our spiritual squabbles, Pilate won’t authorize His death.
When presented to the crowd-no Jew would rather have a wicked murderer released instead of a humble, healing Rabbi.

At every turn, every expectation they had for a “happy ending” was dashed to the ground.

Read the rest here: Living Between the Crucifixion and the Resurrection

Holy Week 2026: Why Good Friday Matters as Much as Resurrection Sunday

On the one hand Death is the triumph of Satan, the punishment of the Fall, and the last enemy. Christ shed tears at the grave of Lazarus and sweated blood in Gethsemane: the Life of Lives that was in Him detested this penal obscenity not less than we do, but more. On the other hand, only he who loses his life will save it. We are baptized into the death of Christ, and it is the remedy for the Fall.

Death is, in fact, what some modern people call “ambivalent.” It is Satan’s great weapon and also God’s great weapon: it is holy and unholy; our supreme disgrace and our only hope; the thing Christ came to conquer and the means by which He conquered.

~C.S. Lewis, Miracles

Bury a child and suddenly the death of Christ becomes oh, so personal.

The image of Mary at the foot of the cross is too hard to bear.

Read the rest here: Remember: Why Good Friday Matters as Much as Resurrection Sunday

Holy Week 2026: Sorrow Lifted as Sacrifice

In some liturgical Christian traditions, today is the day the church remembers and honors Mary anointing the feet of Jesus with expensive and rare perfume.

It was a beautiful act of great sacrifice as the perfume would ordinarily be a family treasure broken and used only at death for anointing a beloved body.

It’s also an expression of deep sorrow because somehow Mary knew.

Mary. Knew.

So she poured out her precious gift on the One Who loves her most.

Tears are my sacrifice.

Holy Week Reflections: Sorrow Lifted as Sacrifice

Navigating Grief: How Terrible it is To Love Something Death Can Touch

I know as a believer in Jesus I’m supposed to be able to look beyond “this mortal veil” and treat death as a mere “address change”.

Well, I can’t.

Death is the enemy and I do not experience it as simply a transition from one state to another.

The last enemy to be abolished and put to an end is death.

~I Corinthians 15:26 AMP

Death is a reminder of all that is wrong with this earth. It’s a reminder that sin is costly. It’s a reminder that this world is not my true home.

It’s just plain wrong!

I hated death long before I counted my own son among the casualties.

Living on a farm, we have buried everything from domestic livestock to random wildlife that wandered up, wounded and we tried to save. I have hatched eggs found in disturbed nests, loved on baby rabbits, squirrels, deer and woodchucks, nursed abandoned kittens, lambs and goat kids. Many of them didn’t survive and every one took a bit of my heart when they breathed their last.

how terrible it is to love somthing that death can touch memorial stone

I have said “good-bye” to my 99 year old aunt, my grandmothers, my grandfathers and my own son.

There is nothing pretty about death. It wasn’t in God’s original plan and I hate it.

Lately, I’ve been worrying about my “therapy” cat-Roosevelt. He’s aging. And all things being equal, he won’t last much longer.

He sat in my lap as I recovered from numerous surgeries and hospitalizations.

And he stayed with me as I received concerned family and friends when Dominic ran ahead to Heaven. I don’t know what I would have done without his warm weight holding me in the chair when all I wanted to do was run away and hide.

He has been a compassionate companion in many sad and lonely moments-never asking for a thing and giving so much with his presence and unconditional love.

Every night he sleeps beside me, snuggled down tight against my neck, purring peacefully.

But he’s getting old and I am becoming fearful that I don’t have too many more years left with him. I hate that most nights I drift off to sleep thinking he won’t be here much longer.

And then I feel guilty.

Because the death of my cat (when it happens) can’t begin to touch the depth of pain of the death of my son. It seems, though, that every death taps that wounded spot in my soul.

But every death-whether a person or an animal I love-opens the floodgate of sadness I work so very hard to keep behind the dam.

I know I’m not supposed to borrow trouble from tomorrow and I work hard not to do that.

I’m working hard to cherish each moment with everyone I love without worrying that it may be one of the last.

It’s a fine line I walk every day.

Navigating Grief: On The Edge

I wrote this nine years ago.

Even writing that makes my heart skip a beat! How can I be heading toward surviving twelve years after that fateful morning? It hardly seems possible and yet it’s true.

And some days I still find myself on the edge of despair, of anxiety attacks, of deep sorrow and darkness.

But not nearly as often.

For that, I’m thankful.

Almost [twelve] years and here I am-

still on the edge.

On the edge of an anxiety attack.

On the edge of the cliff of deep sorrow and darkness that threatens to swallow every thing bright in my life.

On the edge of giving up and giving in.

On the edge of turning my back on every one and every thing.

On the edge of losing hope.

On the edge of deciding that this fight is really not worth it,

that there is nothing left to give,

that I will absolutely never survive this pain and loss.

Some days I manage to take a few steps back.

I might go a week or more and almost forget the edge is there.

And then one conversation will catapult me forward to the brink again.

Shaking, crying, ragged gasping breaths.

Tears.

So. many. tears.

I thought I had run out of tears.

Sometimes sadness is sanity. Tears are the reasonable response. Quickness to shush, shame, or fix them, can reveal a resistance to wisdom.

~Zack Eswine

Navigating Grief: Trauma Rewires Our Brains

No matter how a child leaves this earth, it’s traumatic.

And trauma rewires our brains.

The “fight or flight” response that had previously been reserved for truly life-threatening situations gets woven in with memories and feelings and our bodies remain on high alert.

So before we know it, all kinds of ordinary, daily, and definitely not life-threatening situations evoke rapid heartbeat, shortness of breath, anxiety and fear. And the absolutely reasonable response is to get away from those things that make us feel that way.

So we do (or try to!).

We find ourselves running away from people who love us, who want to help us but who just might not understand why we’re running. We cocoon in our homes, in our own bodies and try to find that one safe space where fear and anxiety can’t find us.

But there is no such absolutely safe space.

Trauma rewires our brains, it’s true.

They can be rewired again.

So many good therapies are available for those of us who suffer in silence. Many are based on using physical cues to help a brain learn to distinguish between truly dangerous and only the memory of dangerous.

It is possible to venture out in the world again, to reach for and sustain connection, to lean into company instead of shying away.

Don’t stay hidden, afraid and alone.

Find a trained trauma counselor

Ask for help.

Navigating Grief: Knocked Down but Not Destroyed

Eternity is impossible for the human mind to grasp.

We talk about it even though we can’t really understand what it means because it’s so far outside our experience and imagination.

But it’s a fact and it matters.

The life I live on earth, made up of days, years and decades is but a blip on the screen of God’s eternal timeline.

Yet what I do here and now will ripple throughout forever.

Taking hold of that fact, clinging tightly to that truth can help me make choices that will make a real difference.

To win the contest you must deny yourselves many things that would keep you from doing your best. An athlete goes to all this trouble just to win a blue ribbon or a silver cup, but we do it for a heavenly reward that never disappears.

I Corinthians 9:25 TL

I remember one particularly grueling semester in college. I had foolishly stacked five upper level political science classes on top of one another thinking that taking them together would be easier.

That was a dumb idea.

The end of semester assignments included 200 pages of written term papers along with essay tests and other random bits. For two weeks I fell asleep on my bedroom floor, pen in hand, legal pad underneath my head and surrounded by dozens of open books I used for reference.

After composing the papers, I had to type them, add footnotes and bibliography and deliver them. All back before computers and word processing programs made it easy and electronic!

Oh, how I wanted to give up and give in! I was certain that I was not going to make it. I just knew that my body or mind or both would give out before I completed the task.

But they didn’t and I did manage to make it through.

I was willing to put forth the effort and pay the price for a letter grade!

No one cares what I made on those essays. No one asks me about my college classes or grades. At 62 I can’t even remember what I wrote about.

Now I face a much more challenging task: Living without the companionship of one of my precious children. The “grade” I make on this effort has eternal impact.

This is the Valley of Weeping, yet Christ promises it will become a place of refreshing.

“When they walk through the Valley of Weeping, it will become a place of springs where pools of blessing and refreshment collect after rains!”

Psalm 84:6 TLB

I can’t see an end for this grueling work. There’s no “semester break” circled on my calendar.

But there will be an end to this toil and pain-just as surely as there was an end those many years ago.

As for us, we have this large crowd of witnesses around us. So then, let us rid ourselves of everything that gets in the way, and of the sin which holds on to us so tightly, and let us run with determination the race that lies before us. ²Let us keep our eyes fixed on Jesus, on whom our faith depends from beginning to end. He did not give up because of the cross! On the contrary, because of the joy that was waiting for him, he thought nothing of the disgrace of dying on the cross, and he is now seated at the right side of God’s throne.Hebrews 12:1-2

And the reward for faithfully completing this assignment is so much more valuable than a good grade.

Yet, my brothers, I do not consider myself to have “arrived”, spiritually, nor do I consider myself already perfect. But I keep going on, grasping ever more firmly that purpose for which Christ grasped me. My brothers, I do not consider myself to have fully grasped it even now. But I do concentrate on this: I leave the past behind and with hands outstretched to whatever lies ahead I go straight for the goal—my reward the honour of being called by God in Christ.Phillipians 3:12-16

This reward is eternal-a never-ending supply of God’s grace and love and joy that will overwhelm the toil and pain I’ve endured.

Reunion.

Redemption.

Restoration.

So while I wait, I encourage my heart with this truth:

We are cracked and chipped from our afflictions on all sides, but we are not crushed by them. We are bewildered at times, but we do not give in to despair. ⁹We are persecuted, but we have not been abandoned. We have been knocked down, but we are not destroyed. ¹⁰We always carry around in our bodies the reality of the brutal death and suffering of Jesus. As a result, His resurrection life rises and reveals its wondrous power in our bodies as well. ¹¹For while we live, we are constantly handed over to death on account ]f Jesus so that His life may be revealed even in our mortal bodies of flesh.2 Corinthians 4:8 VOICE

God invites me to join Him in the work He is doing.

Isn’t that mind-blowing?

He could announce the Gospel from the mountaintops or have angels declare it from the heavens, but He doesn’t.

He has ordained that these fragile bodies of ours, these fickle hearts, these often disobedient hands carry the Good News to the ends of the earth.

Image result for how beautiful the feet of those

The God of Heaven entrusts me with His love, empowers me with His strength and commissions me as an ambassador of reconciliation to reach a world longing for reconciliation-with Him and with one another.

So when I look up and say, “I don’t have time”. He says, “Get your priorities straight.”

When I whine, “I don’t know what to do”. He says, “I’ve got that covered. Just look around and do what’s at hand.”

When I groan, “It won’t make a difference anyway”. He says, “Do you doubt the power of obedience to the Gospel to change the world?”

My life makes a difference.

Your life makes a difference.

Eternity is shaped, in part, by how we spend it.

Navigating Grief: Life Has Limits

Not every soul lives to be “full of years”.

Some are snatched away when life has barely begun while others live a bit but not long enough. Even those whose lives span decades seem gone too soon for those left behind.

Dominic died just six weeks short of his twenty-fourth birthday.

My mother lived four days past her eighty-first.

My beautiful granddaughter Holly had only two weeks on this earth.

We didn’t expect any of them to leave us when they did. Yet, here we are.

A day dawned that did not include them and there will be a sunrise that does not include me.

There is a limit to my opportunity to leave a legacy of love, of influence and of purpose to those who come behind. I want it to be one that lasts, that matters and that has eternal impact.

That’s why it matters how I spend my days.

Because days make up weeks which make up months, years and decades and then it’s over.

That doesn’t make me sad-because what comes next is more wonderful than what I have here-no matter how wonderful I think it is.

But it makes me thoughtful.

Paul reminds the Ephesians:

^“Look carefully then how you walk!

“Live purposefully and worthily and accurately, not as the unwise and witless, but as wise (sensible, intelligent people), Making the very most of the time [buying up each opportunity], because the days are evil. Therefore do not be vague and thoughtless and foolish, but understanding and firmly grasping what the will of the Lord is.”

~Ephesians 5:15-17 Amplified Bible, Classic Edition (AMPC)

While the days are often long, the years are short.

I don’t get a “do over” but I can do better.

Image result for you can't go back and change the beginning

God has prepared good works for me to do. My responsibility is to look for them and to do them.

I LOVE these verses in Ephesians:

Now God has us where he wants us, with all the time in this world and the next to shower grace and kindness upon us in Christ Jesus. Saving is all his idea, and all his work. All we do is trust him enough to let him do it. It’s God’s gift from start to finish! We don’t play the major role. If we did, we’d probably go around bragging that we’d done the whole thing! No, we neither make nor save ourselves. God does both the making and saving. He creates each of us by Christ Jesus to join him in the work he does, the good work he has gotten ready for us to do, work we had better be doing.

Ephesians 2:7-10 MSG

Do you hear what Paul is saying?

God saved us from sin and death. But that’s not all!

He saved us TO a life of loving service. And He’s already set the opportunities in place for us to simply take advantage of as we walk on in our lives!

I don’t have to go out of my way to find them. I simply have to offer up myself as a living sacrifice and trade my will for His.

God never wastes anything.

Not even suffering.

I’ve served in some capacity within my local Body for my entire adult life. But when Dominic died, I found I was so broken I couldn’t do it anymore. I had to step back, nurse my shattered heart and try to heal.

But about a year and a half after he left for Heaven, I felt God nudging me to try again.

So I did.

I started sharing my struggle, my faith and my experience in daily blog posts.

What began as kind of grudging obedience to God’s prompting has become a lifeline for me and for other bereaved parents.

It takes time. It takes effort. It takes commitment.

And there are days when I don’t want to do it.

But I’m convinced it’s one of the works God prepared beforehand that I should do.

There will be a day when my work will cease and the book will be closed on my earthly life.

Until then, I will strive to remember what Jesus told His disciples: “While it is daytime, we must do the works of the One who sent Me. But when the sun sets and night falls, this work is impossible.” (John 9:4 VOICE)

What has God equipped and called YOU to do?

What experiences in your life, gifts and talents, opportunities is God weaving together so You can do the good works He’s placing in your path?

Someone needs you to share YOUR story.

Someone needs you to help them connect THEIR story to God’s story.

Look around, they’re right in front of you. ❤

Category: truth