My hardest grief season begins in November and runs to the end of May. Thanksgiving through Dominic’s birthday on (or near) Memorial Day are days full of triggers, memories and stark reminders that one of us is missing.
If I could fall asleep November first and wake up in June I’d do it.
But I can’t so I have to employ all the tricks I’ve learned in the over seven years since Dominic ran ahead to heaven to survive those particularly challenging months.
It was one of the things I shared with Dominic since both of us were Political Science majors and had aspirations of a legal career.
In recent years I’ve found it healthier to eschew most newscasts and instead selectively choose printed news stories based on interest, relevance and headlines.
Yesterday I was blindsided by what seemed innocuous enough, “Gas Prices Expected to Rise in Wake of Cyber-attack on Pipeline”. Curiosity led me to click and read the article.
Everything was just fine until I read this line, “Gas prices will soon reach levels not seen since 2014.” That’s when it hit me.
So. much. life. has been lived between Dominic’s leaving and this moment.
Living on a farm I’ve buried a lot of things in this Alabama dirt, I never thought my brother would be one of them. I miss you so much Hector Dominic DeSimone! ~Julian DeSimone
Of course I’m always aware to some degree that time is passing and he is drifting further and further behind relative to my family’s everyday experience. But I’m not often required to stop, take stock and really count the days and ways he hasn’t been part of all the things that fit between his last breath and my most recent one.
2014. My goodness that’s working it’s way to a decade!
And when you consider that college degrees are (ideally!) completed in four years, babies are in the womb for nine months before making an appearance, jobs can be won and lost in a week and retirement declared in thirty days-well, seven plus years is a very, very long time.
Sweet Ryker has only been part of our lives for just over two years.
My mama joined Dominic in heaven eighteen months ago.
The pandemic has forced uncomfortable changes and choices for more than twelve months.
My husband’s official retirement date was half a year ago.
And that’s just a few of the bigger changes since Dom left for Heaven!
I am thankful (didn’t think I’d ever really mean that) to have survived and, in many ways, thrived, since burying one of my children.
It’s been hard.
But I don’t want to rush my precious family into further grief and pain.
Even so I’m prone to sit, bewildered, that time refuses to stand still in light of the giant loss we’ve all suffered.
And sometimes even headlines remind my heart of that.
The first time I shared this post was two years ago-before my mother’s death.
It had been five long years since Dominic left us and I was beginning to notice reliable, positive changes in the heaviness and quality of grief.
Our grandson was born very premature but his story has a happy, happy ending! He’s growing even more and is such a delight.
There have been other changes too-Covid19, social isolation and my husband’s retirement-all impacted daily life and how I experience Dom’s absence.
I want to offer this bit of hope for those who are just beginning the awful journey of child loss-the pain softens, I’ve grown stronger and better able to carry it, and life, in all its varied forms keeps going.
There ARE some beautiful things ahead.
Hold on.
❤ Melanie
This life is not all sadness and sorrow, death and darkness.
It was. For a very, very long time all I could see was distant flickers of light.
They were just enough to keep me going but not enough to lift the utter blackness that surrounded me.
Seven years and most days I accept that it’s real like I accept the Theory of Relativity-factually true but I don’t really understand how it fits in my life.
When I pause and focus on, ”Dominic is gone” it’s just as shocking today as the very first day.
❤
Even therapists get it wrong sometimes.
Especially therapists that only know what child loss is supposed to look like from books and lectures.
I understand how logical it seems that a parent should be able to accept his or her child is no longer alive. After all, most of us saw our child’s lifeless body and performed whatever rituals our hearts find most comforting.
When it first happened all I could think about was getting through a minute, then a day and then all the decisions and days leading up to a funeral or memorial service.
There’s no road map.
Even when others come alongside (and many, many did!) there’s just no easy way to navigate that part of the journey.
And then I realized that in addition to all the “regular” days that absolutely, positively break your heart, I had to forge a path through “special” days.
It would be easier, in a way, if it happened all at once.
If the vivid memories of his voice, his laugh, his body language, his sense of humor just disappeared-POOF!-now-you-see-it-now-you-don’t. Then I could make a single adjustment.
But that’s not how it is. Instead, the living proof of his existence recedes like a wave from the shoreline, only there’s no returning surge to remind me of the force that was Dominic.
We buried the earthly remains of my son seven years ago today.
I still have no idea how I walked away from that deep pit where his body would be lowered never to see daylight again.
But I did.
Western society doesn’t like to acknowledge the horror of death. We don’t like to be too dramatic, cry too loudly, wail and weep throwing our bodies over a casket.
But maybe we should.
Why can’t we have a dramatic outburst at the edge of death that burns an unforgettable image in the hearts and minds of those who join us to say good-bye?
thelifeididntchoose 