Grief is unlike anything else I’ve experienced.
There’s no pattern, no clear path, no steps a heart can follow to get from broken to healed.
And that adds to the burden. Because there is so much pressure on bereaved parents to “get better” (whatever that means!).
I wonder sometimes who imagines that if there was a way to be free of this sorrow I wouldn’t jump on it?
All I can do is go where the grief takes me.
No shortcuts.
No detours.
After the flurry of activity surrounding the funeral, our house was so, so quiet.
Even with the five of us still here, it felt empty.
Because Dominic was gone, gone, gone and he was not coming back.
And the silence pounded into my head and heart until it became a scream:
How do I DO this?
How do I keep on living when all I want to do is give up and give in? How does a body carry this pain-is it even possible?
When I dared look past the moment to the days, weeks, months, DECADES that stretched before me, I was undone.
Even now, if I look too far ahead, my heart pounds and my head explodes.
So I don’t.
Honestly, THAT’S how you do it.
One day at a time.
One moment at a time.
One breath at a time.
I keep reminding my heart that the only thing I have to do is right now. I hold my attention to this very moment and refuse to let my thoughts wander.
Sure I mark dates on the calendar and am even able to plan ahead a bit now. But it was nearly three years until I could do that without shaking as I wrote them down.
So dear mama, dear daddy, give yourself permission not to try to figure out what a parent’s heart was never meant to calculate-how to live without the earthly companionship of the child you love-and just breathe.
One day at a time.
One moment at a time.
One breath at a time.
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
I repost this every so often because nearly every bereaved parent I know wonders, at some point, if they are going crazy.
Things that used to be second nature escape us. We can’t remember words, names, dates, how to write a check or address an envelope. Sometimes we get lost in our own neighborhood.
It’s not early-onset dementia (for the majority of us, anyway)-it’s grief brain.
Read the rest here: Grief Brain: It’s a Real Thing!
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.
Marriage, divorce, receiving Christ as Savior, growing up in a small town or big city-all those things matter to me and in my relationships with other people.
Becoming a mother changed everything.
I was no longer free to think only of myself, consider only my wishes and schedule, eat, sleep and go places without making arrangements for this new little person.
Burying a child changed everything again.
I was no longer free to believe that I would be spared great heartache in this life. I couldn’t ignore the hard question of why does a good God let bad things happen? My heart was shattered and though the pieces are coming back together again, it will never be the same heart it was before.
We routinely ask one another, “What kind of work do you do?”
Why?
Because learning about a person’s work usually gives you insight into many aspects of a person’s life, character, preferences and inclinations.
In the same way, you can’t really understand me unless you know that one of my children lives in Heaven.
Am I ONLY a bereaved mother?
Absolutely not!
I am many other things besides- a wife, mother, follower of Jesus, shepherd, daughter, rural resident, bookworm, writer, lover of all things living.
But I AM a bereaved mother.
And that colors my perceptions of the world just as surely as any of those other aspects of my identity.
I can’t ignore it.
To do so would be to dishonor my child.
I refuse to do that.
This is a question that comes up all the time in bereaved parents’ groups: Did God take my child?
Trust me, I’ve asked it myself.
How you answer this question can mean the difference between giving up or going on, between turning away or trusting.
So this is MY answer. The one I’ve worked out through study, prayer and many, many tears. You may disagree. That’s just fine. I only offer it because it might be helpful to some struggling and sorrowful soul.
I believe that God is the Author of life and the arbiter of death. What that means (to me) is that He is ultimately in control of everything and could (if He chose) intervene and stop the death of any person if He wanted to.
Nothing and no one is stronger nor more powerful than God.
However, we live in a fallen world where sin has tainted the original creation God declared “good”. So there are natural disease processes, genetic malformations, undetected birth defects (that may go unknown until well into adulthood like heart defects) that lead to death.
God does not intervene each time-but He could.
People make sinful and foolish choices that have natural consequences. My son was going way too fast in a curve on his motorcycle. God did not override my son’s free will (just as He does not override our free will all day every day) and my son ran off the road.
There are universal physical and biological laws that most of us are thankful for each day that then took over in my son’s case and doomed his motorcycle to certain paths and his body to certain death when it impacted the ground.
God didn’t intervene but He could have.
Job was ultimately protected by the fences God placed around his person. I believe each of us are too.
Yet God is weaving a bigger tapestry, writing a bigger story than only the part that includes me and my family. So my son’s death and the changes it has wrought in me, in others that knew and loved him and even further out into the world are part of God’s big story.
I have made peace with the fact that I do not understand nor like what God has done in my life by allowing my son to die, but I will trust His loving character and wait to see how it will be redeemed in eternity.
No, God did not TAKE my son. But He allowed his death.
I gain more comfort in a God Who could have saved my son but chose not to, than a God Who does not have that power.
His word declares that He keeps my tears in His bottle.
I believe it.
And I believe that one day He will redeem every one and restore what my heart has lost.
Died.
It is a harsh word.
I understand completely that some parents don’t want to use it to describe their child and I respect that.
I have chosen to use it often (not always-sometimes I say “left” or “ran ahead to heaven”) because what happened IS harsh. I don’t want to soften it because there was nothing soft about it for me or my family.
It is heartbreaking, lonely, heavy, hard and utterly devastating.
As a believer in the promises of Scripture, I use it because I want to paint a stark contrast between hopelessness without Christ and the hope I have because of the blood of Jesus applied to my heart and the heart of my son.
Without that assurance, the hopelessness would continue for eternity.
But because of Jesus, while this reality is harsh, hard and heartbreaking, I have an eternity of rest, renewal and redemption to look forward to.
I think each of us finds our own path through this Valley and should say or use whatever word is best for our own heart.
This is simply one choice among many.
I’m so sorry that we need ANY words to describe our child’s physical absence in this earthly journey. 
It’s different for every heart.
But each of us who know child loss have a season of grief.
It’s so much more than “just” the day our child left for Heaven.
For me, it starts in November and runs through the end of May-fully half of
every.
single.
year.
November 2013 was my 50th birthday and the kids arranged a surprise party for me at Dominic’s apartment. My husband was home from California and we were all together for my birthday, Thanksgiving and the Iron Bowl. So many memories, so many moments.
As the leaves begin to turn in Alabama, my heart begins the countdown.
Then that Christmas-it would be the last one where the table was full and all I have are a few fuzzy photos because we anticipated a spring season of graduations and a wedding. Plenty of time for better pictures when we were dressed for the camera.
As we hang the lights and the nights get longer, my heart gets sadder.
January was back to routine. Everyone busy. James Michael and Julian would be graduating soon. We had normal back and forth texts and messages, never knowing how precious these few recorded words would become.
As we move toward warmer weather, my heart grows cold.
February 14, 2014 was Julian’s birthday and for a couple of hours all the kids were home. We sat outside on an old trailer laughing and cutting up. Someone suggested a photo. Everyone demurred because we were in ragged work clothes and thought it was a waste of time. Oh, how I wish I had that picture now!
But there’s no going back.
I saw Dominic in March a few times. Since he lived just 25 miles away I would meet him to go to Sam’s Club and stock up on basic food stuffs. He came out to our place to work on a friend’s car. He and Julian met up and made a road trip for Spring Break.
It was the last time I’d see him alive. My heart hates turning the calendar to April.
April. What can I say about this awful, awful month?
I will never be able to recapture any sense of hopeful anticipation as flowers bloom and leaves bud. I don’t care when the last frost might be because try as I might, I can’t plant a garden. When the first really beautiful day arrives, whether or not it corresponds to Dom’s death date, it only makes me fearful other young men will take their bikes out for a ride after a long, cold winter. I wonder how many mamas wake to a knock or phone call.
The smell of cut grass reminds me of the people that came to help us clean up before the funeral. The sun streaming in the living room window conjures the mornings I woke and dared it to shine in the face of such tragedy.
My heart barely holds on.
And then May. Mother’s Day-what kind of mother lets her son die? Even though logic tells me otherwise, my heart still accuses.
Graduations, weddings–reminders that Dominic never got to finish his law degree, will never marry and that every single molecule of him is gone, gone, gone-no children, no likeness ever looking back at me again in this life.
Finally, there’s his birthday-the one he missed by only a few short weeks. Forever 23. Never any older. May 28th comes and goes. Sometimes it’s on Memorial Day like the year he was born but often not. So I gird my loins to face the date AND the day.
My heart hurts but breathes a sigh of relief.
This season is over. But it will come again.
So I try, try, try to cram as much into the intervening months as possible.
The calendar is relentless.
There’s a kind of relational magic that happens when people who have experienced the same or similar struggle get together.
In an instant, their hearts are bound in mutual understanding as they look one to another and say, “Me too. I thought I was the only one.”
It was well into the second year after Dominic ran ahead to heaven that I found an online bereaved parent support group. After bearing this burden alone for so many months, it took awhile before I could open my heart to strangers and share more than the outline of my story.
But, oh, when I did! What relief! What beautiful support and affirmation that every. single. thing. that was happening to me and that I was feeling was normal!
I have learned so much from these precious people.
Here’s a few of the nuggets of wisdom I carry like treasure in my heart:
Everyone has a story. No one comes to tragedy a blank slate. They have a life that informs how or if they are able to cope with this new and terrible burden. Not everyone has the same resources I do-emotional, spiritual or otherwise. Don’t put expectations on someone based on my own background. Be gracious-always.
Everyone deserves to be heard. Some folks really only have one or two things that they insist on saying over and over and over again. That’s OK. If they are saying them, it’s because they need to be heard. Lots of folks do not have a safe space to speak their heart. But it’s only in speaking aloud the things inside that we can begin to deal with them.
Everyone (or almost everyone) is worried that they aren’t doing this “right”. Society brings so much pressure to bear on the grieving. “Get better”, “Get over it”, “Move on”. And when we can’t, we think there is something dreadfully wrong with us. But there isn’t. Grief is hard and takes time no matter what the source. But it is harder and takes a lifetime when it’s your child. Out of order death is devastating. “Normal” is anything that keeps a body going and a mind engaged in reality without being destructive to oneself or others.
Everyone can be nicer than they think they can. Here’s the deal: I THINK a lot of things. I don’t have to SAY (or write!) them. I’ll be honest, sometimes my first response to what someone shares is not very nice. But when I take a breath and consider what might help a heart instead of hurt one, I can usually find a way to speak truth but also courage. Snark is never helpful. If I can’t say anything nice, then I just scroll on by.
Everyone has something to give. I’ve learned that even the most broken, the most unlovely, the least well-spoken persons have something to offer. It may take a little dusting off to find the beauty underneath, but my heart is stretched when I take time and put forth effort to truly listen to what’s being said instead of just ignoring it because of how it’s said.
Everyone deserves grace. Because I am the recipient of grace, it is mine to give-without fear of running out-to every other heart I meet. Sometimes I forget this. I want to apply a different measure to others than I want applied to me. But grace is the oil that greases human relationships. Freely given and freely received, it provides a safe space for hearts to experience healing.
Everyone is standing on level ground when we gather at the foot of the cross. There’s no hierarchy in God’s kingdom. We are all servants. I am responsible to my Master for walking in love and doing the good works He has prepared beforehand for me to do. My works are not your works and your works are not my works. I need to keep my eyes on Jesus, not on others always trying to see if I(or they!) “measure up”. The standard is our Shepherd and only grace and mercy can help me strive for that goal.
Everyone needs courage. When Jesus gave His charge to the disciples He told them it was “better for you that I go”. What??? How could that be better? But it WAS. Because when Jesus returned to the Father, He sent the Holy Spirit as the personal, indwelt connection to Himself. He knew they would need courage to make it through. The Spirit calls courage to our hearts. And we are given the privilege of calling courage to one another. The bravest among us quivers sometimes. You’d be surprised how often one word is the difference between letting go and holding on.
There are dozens more things I could share.
I have met some of the kindest, wisest and most grace-filled people this side of child loss.
They have been the purest example of the Body of Christ I’ve ever known.
I am thankful for what they are teaching me.
❤
I am still utterly amazed that since November 2015 I have managed a blog post every day.
At first, I was writing because I wanted to make public the things I was learning in this Valley and to honor my missing son.
He had been in Heaven a year and a half by then and it was clear to this mama’s heart that (1) people (including ME before it WAS me!) had absolutely NO IDEA what life after child loss was like once the funeral was over; (2) one way to redeem this pain was to share how God had been faithful even as I struggled; and (3) I just didn’t see too many honest portrayals of life after loss for Christ followers (which is not to say they didn’t/don’t exist but I hadn’t found them).
So I wrote.
Then I realized (much to my surprise!) that there were mamas (and a few daddies) hanging on by such a tenuous thread to hope that my meager attempt at redeeming this pain was strengthening their grasp.
Then it became a ministry.
Shepherding is in my blood.
I’ve been a shepherd my whole adult life-first to my own children and then to other children through various home school groups and activities. Then God granted a desire of my heart when He allowed me to become a “real” shepherd 20 years ago to a flock/herd of sheep and goats.
I’ve learned so, so much.
I’ve learned that consistency is key.
My herd depends on my faithful feeding and my peaceful presence. They love routine and hate change. They respond immediately to my voice and run straight to me when they are afraid.
They will endure nearly anything as long as they are assured it is from my loving hand.
I am not able to shepherd every heart that reads this blog.
But I hope that a bit of my shepherd’s love and care and compassion is present in each post.
My desire is that consistency helps the hearts that congregate here every morning. I long for my words to feed hope to you from time to time. I pray that routine gives you something to look forward to even on the hard day. I pray that I faithfully point you to the Shepherd of your soul who can provide shelter no matter where you are or what is chasing you.
I pray that together we can endure and persevere and finish strong and well.
I continue to write because I love you.
I continue to write because if a single post reaches a single heart on the verge of giving up and helps that heart hold onto hope, then it is worth every minute I spend thinking about, composing and producing these posts.
And, frankly, many of you have ministered hope to MY heart.
Dom left for Heaven about when my nest became empty. Thirty years of raising children and twenty-plus years of homeschooling came to an end right when my heart was dealt this grievous blow.
All the energy and time I had poured into shepherding my children was suddenly available for a new adventure at the very moment when adventure was the last thing on my mind.
Sharing has turned survival into something beautiful.
I am so thankful for that.
And I am oh, so grateful for each of you.
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