Tag: anniversary

Thirty-Five Years and Counting

Some people say they’d love to know what life has around the corner.

Not me.

At least not much past tomorrow morning.

If my husband and I had known thirty-five years ago what our lives would be like along the way, we may very well have turned tail and run in the other direction!

hector and me 29 anniversary

There have been many, many good things in those years.

We have four beautiful children whom we love so much.  Two are married and their spouses are a blessing to our family.

And this year our first grandchild made his dramatic appearance at only twenty-eight weeks!  We are oh, so thankful he’s doing well.

It’s a brand new feeling to watch your son with his.

ryker and jm june 19

There have been a fair number of not-so-good things too. 

Job layoffs, illness, the death of Hector’s parents one right after the other and the stress and strain of life’s details when it seemed we couldn’t get a break.

But nothing compares to burying Dominic.  

How does a heart learn to live with a giant piece missing?

IMG_1813 (1)

We have, though. 

We’ve muddled through.

The commitment we made all those years ago has stood firm.

It’s battered, crumpled, muddied and torn, but it remains the guiding promise of our lives together.

traditional wedding vows

Repost: Dispelling Marriage Myths Surrounding Child loss

I wrote this last year for our anniversary.  It is still true.

We are battered and torn but hanging in and hanging on to one another.

Don’t believe the myth that a marriage cannot survive child loss.  It can and many do.

Today my husband and I celebrate 33 years of marriage.  

Our thirtieth anniversary wars a mere two months after we buried our son.

Here’s the last “before” anniversary photo (2013)-unfeigned smiles, genuine joy, excitement to have made it that far…

Read the rest here:  Dispelling Marriage Myths Surrounding Child Loss

Countdown

This week marks the beginning of a countdown no mama wants to observe.  

It’s not the happy “days left ’til delivery” of a newborn bundle of joy.  It’s not “days left ’til school’s out” or prom or a wedding or a college graduation.

Instead it’s a heart-wrenching countdown to all the “lasts” before the final “last time I saw his face”.

Today is the third anniversary of the last time I saw Dominic alive.

The last time I spoke to him in person, the last time I hugged his neck, the last time I hollered, “Be safe!” as he pulled down the long driveway on his way back to his apartment.

I wish I had said more,

hugged more,

studied his face more closely,

breathed in his scent more deeply,

done ANYTHING that would have made that moment more memorable.

But it was just one more ordinary moment in what I was certain would be many more ordinary moments.

Except it wasn’t.

I don’t know how many years it might take for my heart and mind and body and soul to stop marking these dates.  I doubt I’ll live long enough for that to happen.

I’m thankful I will see him again.  But I want to see him NOW.

My heart cries, “I want it back!  Oh, how I want it back!”

My heart hurts.

And it is going to hurt-the countdown is only beginning.  

as long as I live