People Will Remember Me for Who I AM, Not Who I Wish I Had Been

I used to tell my children that they would not wake up one day and be a certain kind of person on their eighteenth or twenty-first birthday if they were not working to be that person right now.

And I remind myself that I won’t suddenly be a better version of me just because I cross the threshold of senior citizenship.

Age doesn’t magically transform anyone into a better self than that which they have been practicing to become.

If I am kind and gracious and loving today, then I will most likely be so tomorrow.

If I am bitter and spiteful and petty right now, my heart won’t open wide just because of a birthday that ushers in a new decade of life.

I am crafting a legacy every. single. day.

People will remember me for who I am, not who I wish I had been.

Some Words That Help My Wounded Heart

I cling fast to words that speak aloud what I’ve only thought.

I collect sentences that eloquently express what I can only feel.

I pull them out on days when my head and heart are doing battle and I can’t find any middle ground.

Reading reminds me I’m not the first soul to travel this way.

Others have been here before and left breadcrumbs.

A friend said, “Remember, he’s in good hands.” I was deeply moved. But that reality does not put Eric back in my hands now. That’s my grief. For that grief, what consolation can there be other than having him back?

Nicholas Wolterstorff, Lament for a Son

The promise that I will one day see Dominic again makes the pain bearable. But it does nothing to treat the essential wound. He is not here and I will miss him, miss him, miss him until I draw my last breath.

The worst type of crying wasn’t the kind everyone could see–the wailing on street corners, the tearing at clothes. No, the worst kind happened when your soul wept and no matter what you did, there was no way to comfort it. A section withered and became a scar on the part of your soul that survived. For people like me and Echo, our souls contained more scar tissue than life.”
― Katie McGarry, Pushing the Limits

I never knew a person could cry every day for months. Not just a tiny overflow that falls sweetly down a cheek but gigantic gut-wrenching, ear-shattering sobs. That was what I hid from everyone-the pillow-over-my-mouth-to-muffle it-crying in my room in the dark.

Maybe we all do.

Maybe that’s why those untouched by child loss don’t really know how much it hurts and for how long.

grief is a house
where the chairs
have forgotten how to hold us
the mirrors how to reflect us
the walls how to contain us

grief is a house that disappears
each time someone knocks at the door
or rings the bell
a house that blows into the air
at the slightest gust
that buries itself deep in the ground
while everyone is sleeping

grief is a house where no one can protect you
where the younger sister
will grow older than the older one
where the doors
no longer let you in
or outJandy Nelson, The Sky is Everywhere

When Dominic ran ahead to Heaven, he was living on his own. He’d been out of the house for a couple of years.

So I was utterly unprepared to find his earthly absence echoed in the house from which he had already been absent. Everything changed, everything was slightly askew.

And it is “a house where the younger [brother] will grow older than the older one”.

For in grief nothing “stays put.” One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs. Round and round. Everything repeats. Am I going in circles, or dare I hope I am on a spiral?

But if a spiral, am I going up or down it?

How often — will it be for always? — how often will the vast emptiness astonish me like a complete novelty and make me say, “I never realized my loss till this moment”? The same leg is cut off time after time.C.S. Lewis, A Grief Observed

I remember being surprised the first time I circled back around in my grief and revisited places in my heart I thought I had subdued and conquered.

But that’s how it is.

Grief has so many layers that I honestly don’t believe we could survive it at all if forced to peel them back all at once. So I’ve resigned myself to the fact I will come back to many of the same sore spots over and over.

I do feel like I’m spiraling upward. Each time I circle around, I’m better equipped to face the fear or guilt or sorrow or despair.

The phases recur, but I’ve grown in the meantime.

I’m stronger.

I’m wiser.

I’m more resilient.

And I’m still here.

It’s Been YEARS-What is Wrong With You???

If you think that time makes a difference to a mama missing a child who ran ahead to Heaven without her, you don’t know as much as you think you know.

Time does not heal all wounds-especially the kind that shatter a heart into a million pieces.

It takes time for the wound to scar over, but it doesn’t undo the damage.

So if you are wondering why your coworker still takes the day off on his child’s birthday or the anniversary of her child’s homegoing, I’ll let you in on a little secret: Years disappear when those milestones loom large.

Read the rest here: It’s Been Years-What’s Wrong With You?

Don’t Go-Help Another Heart Hold On To Hope

When grief was fresh, the pain was raw and my heart was oh, so tender, I desperately needed a safe space to talk about the nitty-gritty of child loss.

And I found it in online bereaved parents’ groups.  

I’m so thankful that they exist, that they are maintained by people who give time and energy to keeping them safe and that-for the most part-participants are kind, compassionate and encouraging.

There is something I’ve noticed now that I’ve been here awhile.  Many parents tend to drop out of active participation when they get a little further along in their journey. 

Read the rest here: Stick Around: Help Another Heart Hold Onto Hope

He is The God Who Stays

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Child loss is not a hammer in the hand of God.

He didn’t “take” my son so He could mold me into the person He wants me to be.

But He will use this pain and sorrow if I run to Him.

Sometimes I resist but His Father heart is steadfast in its love toward me.

God doesn’t give up and decide I’m “too much trouble” or “too far gone”.

NO!

He’s the Faithful Father watching and waiting with open arms for the Prodigal to return.

He will weave even the darkest and most tangled threads into a beautiful, redeemed tapestry if I let Him.

He’s the God who stays.

Always.

Forever.

Amen.

I’m Still Human and There’s No Shame in That

I don’t know about you, but since my son ran ahead to Heaven, I’m ultra-aware that every encounter might be the LAST encounter.

That has its pluses-I’m careful when I deal with touchy subjects, I make sure to tell my people I love them, I try not to leave in a huff.

But it has its minuses too.

When things go sideways (and they do!) or someone just isn’t willing to listen to my point of view or I am offended by theirs and can’t manage to cover my feelings, regret and guilt consume me.

That’s not helpful or healthy, though.

I have to remember I’m human just like everyone else. Bereavement hasn’t changed that.

❤

Everyone struggles.

Everyone makes mistakes.

Everyone wishes, at one time or another, that he or she had done better, spoken more softly or loved more fiercely.

But we are human and can’t get it right all the time.

So if you, like me, have had a less-than-stellar recent record dealing with those you love, those you meet and those you pass on the street or in your car, accept this truth:

You are absolutely, positively NOT perfect.

And that’s OK.

Pick yourself up, dust yourself off and start over.

If apologies are in order, make them.

If hugs can set things straight, hug away.

And if only time can soften a heart then be prepared to wait.

Grief, Like Love, Lasts a Lifetime

At first grief felt only like sorrow and longing and brokenness.

Then it felt like confusion and anxiety and despair.

A little further along this journey it mostly felt like apathy.

Now it feels like love.

It’s the same love that helped me hold on when I was face first in the toilet every morning for seven months. Morning sickness with Dominic lasted nearly the whole pregnancy! With two young children already in our home, it was one of the hardest seasons of my life.

It’s the same love that demanded they bring me my baby when they whisked him away due to “concerns” after birth. Twenty-four hours later, c-section or no c-section, I told the nurse I’d be marching my butt down to the nursery if they didn’t bring him to me right away. (It was a different time-no real “rooming in”.)

It’s the same love that worked with my frustrated little boy to make his words sound clear and correct. Slow down, hit the hard consonants, be precise in how you form your lips. He grew up to give the undergraduate address when he graduated from UAB in front of thousands.

It’s the same love that listened when he told me his troubles, his fears and his dreams. So, so many nights he’d come in, flop down backwards on my bed and proceed to talk until I was just about to drift off to sleep.

It’s the same love that held his hand as people walked by expressing condolences.

It’s the same love that kissed his cold cheek before they lowered the casket lid. Told him, “Good-bye” and walked upright from the sanctuary.

I refused to dishonor his brave life by giving in to my personal fear.

Grief is really just love.

Dominic has been my son since he sat safely in my womb.

He’s still my son.

My love is not diminished because I can no longer touch him.

Love lives.

Forever.

A Few Grief Quotes That Help My Heart

When I find words for my feelings it helps.

So I collect quotes, copying them down in my journal and sometimes hanging them where I can see them throughout the day.

Here are a few that speak to my heart. I hope they speak to yours. 

I wish there WERE a secret to surviving this journey. But there isn’t. There is just one moment, one breath, one step at a time. I do the best I can each day.

Over time I’ve grown stronger and better able to carry the load. Over time I’ve learned how to shift my focus from my son’s death to his life.

Death ends so many things.

But it does not end the influence of my son’s life on my heart and it can’t steal the moments I shared with him.

As long as I hum the tune of his unique song I can still hear him.

Before I was the one in the Valley of the Shadow of Death, I didn’t realize it’s a lifelong journey. I acknowledged that loss changed a person but I didn’t know that it keeps changing you. Grief influences how I experience the present not just how I view the past.

When Dominic ran ahead to Heaven it instantly changed the landscape of my life. The future I thought I’d have was shattered and I was thrust into unfamiliar and often frightening territory with no road map. It has taken a long time to learn how to walk in this uncertain world and I still stumble.

There are no set standards for how or how long a heart grieves. Everyone brings his or her own personality and experience to the process.

It’s tempting to look for a structured guide to measure my progress.

Others can share how they are walking this road but ultimately I have to forge my own trail through the wilderness.

This is one of my very favorite quotes. Great love, great grief. How could it be any different?

When a child is born into a family, no one finds it strange that the addition changes everything. When that child leaves too soon they shouldn’t find it strange that it changes everything once again.

I didn’t just lose my son, I lost the family I used to have.

The place he should be but isn’t looms large every time we sit at the table, gather for celebrations or just line up for a group photo.

Part of the work grief requires is learning to hold onto the love and influence my son poured into my own life. I have had to redefine my relationship with Dominic-figuring out how I to mother a child I can no longer see or hold.

There’s a lot of pressure on grieving hearts to “get better” based on the medical model of illness, treatment, recovery. But grief is not a disease. It truly is the price you pay for love. I have experienced healing in the eleven years since Dominic left for Heaven but I won’t be fully healed until I join him in eternity.

Every single child is a unique gift to the world.

When death steals their presence, the light and love they shared with others lives on.

As long as we remember, as long as we speak their names, they continue to be a gift to those who love them . 

Sunday Prayer for a Grieving Heart

Father God,

I long to be enveloped in the sweet peace and safe cocoon of Your people.

But my heart feels oh, so isolated by this great grief it carries inside!

I take my place in the pew and am distracted by the intact, happy families surrounding me. Every bit of chatter about last week’s activities and this week’s plans reminds me I can no longer whisper a reminder to or share an inside joke with my missing child.

Help me come-broken as I am-and offer what’s left of me to You.

Open my heart and apply the Balm of Gilead to my wounded soul.

Speak courage and comfort to my spirit.

Lead the people You call and assemble to practice compassion and to actively reach out to the ones who struggle just to show up.

Thank You for seeing, hearing and loving me even when I feel unseen, unheard and unloved.

Amen

We Don’t Lose Them All at Once-Bit By Bit They Fade Away

I cannot speak for others but in my case, it seems that I did not lose Dominic all at once.

In fact, I’m still losing him.

Bit by bit, a little at a time, nearly molecule by molecule, his mark on my life, my walls, my world grows smaller.

Of course the space he occupies in my heart is safe-a mother’s heart grows larger with each birth and never shrinks again!

But in the physical world, the observable world, the world outside the safe sanctuary of my own soul-his presence THERE is fading.

And that’s it’s own brand of grief that must be recognized, felt, mourned and laid to rest.

fading-away

Every time Dominic SHOULD be here but ISN’T means another memory made without him, another photograph with a missing piece, another family milestone celebrated a bit more quietly because his booming laughter doesn’t join the chorus.

Every decision that would ordinarily involve consulting all four children’s schedules and desires is one more opportunity to count down two, skip one and go to my youngest.  I never can remember that there are only three phone calls or texts to make. My heart hurts each time I don’t check in with Dominic.

desimones uab family

Odd pieces of mail come in his name-leftover from mass mailing lists that have not yet been purged of deceased individuals.  Still a little shocking, always sad, I carry it up the quarter mile to the house and lay it on top of the pile of other things that prove he once walked the earth.

Digging through the toolbox in the garage for a screwdriver and there’s that funny little part he took off a car years ago and tucked inside the drawer-just in case we could use it for something.  I smell the grease and gas and feel him near.

Then my mind drags my heart back to reality and he’s gone again.

Dozens of moments make me miss him anew.

I’m not delusional.

I know he has run ahead to Heaven.

But my heart holds on to every shred of physical connection as long as it can.

any place we ever walked i miss you

And then he’s ripped from me all over again.