I confess.
When I used to drive by an unkempt yard, a run down house or bumped into an untidy person, I would think, “Goodness! Don’t they care about their yard, home or appearance? They need to do better! I would NEVER let my (fill in the blank) look like that.”
I don’t do that anymore.
Because I’ve learned that there are all kinds of reasons a body may not be busy mowing a lawn, painting a porch or even putting on matching socks.
Read the rest here: Life Happens
Grief is the price we pay for love.
Grief is an appropriate and proportionate response to the death (the end of earthly companionship) of someone we love.
If grief is small, what does that say about love?
It can’t be both ways.
Read the rest here: Can’t Have it Both Ways…
See, here’s the thing: to the outside world, my son’s death happened at a single point in time.
But to me, his death is a continuous event.
I must lift the cup of sorrow every day to parched lips. I must choose to take it to the One Who can help me lift it.
Jesus knows this cup.
He knows my pain: My Cup Overflows
It cannot be overstated: holidays are extremely hard after loss. Every family gathering highlights the hole where my son SHOULD be, but ISN’T.
There is no “right way” or “wrong way” to handle the holidays after losing a child.
For many, there is only survival-especially the very first year.
These days also stir great internal conflict: I want to enjoy and celebrate my living children and my family still here while missing my son that isn’t. Emotions run high and are, oh so difficult to manage.
So I’m including some ideas from other bereaved parents on how they’ve handled the holidays. Many of these suggestions could be adapted for any “special” day of the year.
Not all will appeal to everyone nor will they be appropriate for every family. But they are a place to start.
Read the rest here: Practical Ideas for Dealing with the Holidays after Child Loss
I know it is hard. I know you don’t truly understand how I feel. You can’t. It wasn’t your child.
I know I may look and act like I’m “better”. I know that you would love for things to be like they were: BEFORE. But they aren’t.
I know my grief interferes with your plans. I know it is uncomfortable to make changes in traditions we have observed for years. But I can’t help it. I didn’t ask for this to be my life.
I know that every year I seem to need something different. I know that’s confusing and may be frustrating. But I’m working this out as I go. I didn’t get a “how to” manual when I buried my son. It’s new for me every year too.
Read the rest here: Grief and Holidays:What the Bereaved Need From Friends and Family
You don’t have to bury a child to know that changing long-standing family traditions around holidays is a hard, hard thing.
Just ask a parent trying to work out Thanksgiving and Christmas for the first time after an adult child marries. Suddenly the way things have “always been” are no longer the way things are.
Holidays typically involve so many more people and family members than everyday get-togethers and each person brings expectations, emotions and personal history to the table.
So, that is why I decided to run this series of posts NOW. Because one of the things I have learned over the years is that giving people time to adjust to change is a good thing.
Read the rest here: Grief, Holidays and Hard Conversations
The first set of holidays after Dominic ran ahead to Heaven I was both numb and absolutely devastated.
Our family’s loss was fresh enough that folks understood if we just couldn’t do ALL the things or even anything. And that’s pretty much how we blundered through.
The next year, which was more than eighteen months post-loss, it was harder to explain to others how my heart was still oh, so raw and how the thought of “celebrating” still felt overwhelming.
I didn’t want Dominic’s absence to dominate the holidays but I couldn’t pretend it didn’t make a difference.
So I realized I was going to have to speak up and plan ahead because no one else was going to do it for me.
Here is the first in a series of posts I wrote that year-for myself, for my own family to read and to share with the bereaved parent community in the hope they could share with THEIR families and friends.
Our own holiday observations have changed in the years since I wrote them but the principles remain the same.
❤ Melanie
I live in Alabama where we are still sweating buckets under the late summer sun, so I understand if thinking about the holidays is the furthest thing from your mind.
School just starting, new routines in place-am I crazy?
Well, yes (you can find plenty of folks to back you up on that) and no-the days keep coming, one after the other, and these big days will be here sooner than we think.
And for grieving parents, it takes some thinking, some planning and some preparation to meet both extended family’s expectations and extra responsibilities at Thanksgiving and Christmas while carrying a load of sorrow and pain.
One thing I am learning in this journey is that even though I wish someone else would blaze the trail for me, I’m going to have to do it myself. And because every major milestone is overflowing with emotional booby-traps, I have to plan ahead.
Read the rest here: Grief and Holiday Plans: Working Out the Details
Child loss for the believer in Jesus is a life of contradictions.
On the one hand I acknowledge, embrace and proclaim the awful truth of physical death. Every funeral declares that the world is not as God intended, every burial reminds me that sin demands payment and separates us from the perfect Presence of our Creator and guarantees that those who are sensitive to the Spirit walk in a Valley of Tears.
On the other hand, it draws my heart to the hope I have in Christ. It helps me hold onto my Shepherd King and creates longing for a Home I’ve never seen but am fully convinced is real.
Some days I lean one way and others I lean another.
It’s OK.
Because one day my faith will be made sight and there will no longer be any tension between the two.
Hallelujah! Amen.
❤ Melanie
In my neck of the woods, if you look close you can see tell-tale signs of old home places as you ride down country roads.
A few daffodils in rows emerge each spring to show where some housewife marked her path from front porch to mailbox. A crepe myrtle looks out of place in the woods but often has a twin if you know where to direct your gaze.
People always leave a trace…
Read the rest here: Overgrown
If I touch a hot stove my hand jerks away almost before my mind registers the searing pain. It’s reflex. Our bodies were designed to react to and protect us from things that cause pain.
Run away. Don’t go back. Set up barricades and warning signs so that others can be protected.
Most of the time, this reaction serves us well.
But sometimes those reflexes keep us from healing.
Read the rest here: Feel and Deal to Heal
As a people-pleasing first born who hates conflict, giving in has always been easy for me. It’s only later that I wish I hadn’t.
So for most of my life, setting personal boundaries has been challenging.
But in the aftermath of child loss, healthy boundaries are no longer optional, they are necessary for survival.
So what are healthy boundaries?
Read the rest here: Healthy Boundaries in Grief
If yesterday’s verses were Paul’s closing arguments, these verses are his hallelujah!
When I am weak and weary and overwhelmed by the daily trudging uphill along the path of grief, my heart comes here.
Because truth is, over and over and over God has said in His Word, demonstrated by His actions and proved by His promises that love endures.
Read the rest here: Scripture Journal Challenge: NOTHING Can Separate Us From the Love of Christ
When Jesus claimed me as His child, I was liberated from darkness and made a prisoner of hope.
No matter how black the night, there is a pinhole of light. No matter how crushing the despair, there is a sliver of strength. When I want to stay under the covers, He beckons me to come out and I cannot resist.
I am a slave to the promise of Heaven.
Read the rest here: Prisoner Of Hope
I’ve had some struggles this past week.
Family is messy.
There’s tension between who I am as an individual and who I am as part of the unit.
I want, above all, to be light, love and life to the people I love and even beyond-to the people I interact with online and in person in more casual spaces.
But it’s hard.
I’ve been reminded that the only way I can remain grounded in this world is to help my heart remember that this world is not all there is.
Heaven is my true home.
And when my flesh is exhausted, frustrated and overwhelmed with sadness I speak truth to my heart until it is ready to hear it.
❤ Melanie
It comes up often in bereavement groups:
What about signs from loved ones who have gone on to Heaven?
What about books that tell stories of people who have been to Heaven yet “allowed to return”?
What about cardinals and butterflies and feathers and dreams?
It would be so very easy to allow my feelings to rule my heart and to reject the truth of Scripture. It would be less of a struggle to walk this Valley of the Shadow of Death if I could “talk” to Dominic while waiting to join him.
But the Bible is plain: I cannot trust in anything or anyone but Jesus Christ. Every thing and every one else is fallible and will eventually lead me astray.
I wrote this a few months ago and hope it’s helpful to other grieving parents:
Read the rest here: Signs
This is very true.
I found that when I received the news of my son’s accident-it was Scripture I had hidden in my heart that helped me stand.
My Bible was available, but I could not open it. My heart was too broken to read.
But the Spirit brought to mind exactly what I needed from the storehouse of Scripture hidden in my heart.
I am still fighting for joy.
Read the rest here: The Fight For Joy is Not for the Unarmed
One year ago today I came in from Wednesday night church to a message on my answering machine:
“Melanie, when you get this, call me on my cell phone. I’m on my way to Dothan. Your mama was lifeflighted and I’m headed to the hospital”
I have no idea what else my dad said because that was as far as I got before shutting down the message and dialing his number with shaky fingers.
Because when you’ve endured the worst possible news-the news that is utterly final-it only takes half a second for your brain and body to jump from alright to utterly terrified.
Read the rest here: A Challenging Year: For Better or Worse
I was a debater and raised my kids as debaters.
There’s unique beauty in crafting an argument so it crescendos to an irrefutable conclusion.
For the the master orator, nothing is more satisfying than watching her audience lean in and anticipate the glorious finale.
Paul has been leading us to these verses since he began laying the foundation in chapter one of Romans.
Read the rest here: Scripture Journal Challenge: Closing Argument
I’ve often been the person who refused to go along with some group’s plan to ignore a real issue and try to talk around it.
I usually begin like this, “I know it’s hard to talk about, but let’s be honest and…”
I’m even more inclined in that direction now. If my son’s instant and untimely death has taught me anything, it’s taught me that there’s no use pretending.
So I’m not going to pretend: Western society doesn’t do grief well.
Read the rest here: The Elephant in the Room
Experiencing deep loss has a way of winnowing the frivolous from your life.
That doesn’t mean for one moment that (after those first years of heart wrenching, breath robbing pain) I don’t have fun.
I love to laugh!
But it does mean that I cut to the chase with daily decisions that aren’t going to make one whit of difference in five hours, much less five years.
Don’t have time for that nonsense!
I try hard to maintain relationships. I try hard to speak courage to the hearts around me. I try hard to be gracious (not always successful!) when others upset or disappoint me.
And I absolutely, positively insist that Scripture be taught in context.
Jesus is a gentle Shepherd. I want to be one too.
❤ Melanie
When I had a child, suddenly I cared about everything. When I lost a child, suddenly I cared about nothing.
~ a bereaved mother
When I read this comment, I thought about it for a moment to see if it was true for me.
And I realized that, yes, it WAS true at the very beginning.
Mind-numbing pain and soul-crushing agony pressed down so heavily that I couldn’t care about anything other than reminding myself to
Read the rest here: A Few of My Favorite Things
I’m a kinder, gentler person than I was before Dominic ran ahead to Heaven.
It’s a high price to pay to learn to walk more grace-filled through this life.
I’ve come to find out that every heart has a story. Every heart is carrying a burden.-perhaps not the same as mine, but a burden nonetheless.
And what causes the most pain in this life (next to the burden itself) is when another person runs over my heart without thinking about the burden it may hold inside.
So I have purposed not to do that to other people.
Read the rest here: Refuse to Cause Pain
Romans is a dense book full of quotable verses often taken out of context.
Today’s verses include some of the most hopeful and, frankly, hurtful verses tossed at broken hearts.
“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose. ” (Romans 8: 28 NIV)
Often this verse is shared by well-meaning friends who want us to “look on the bright side”. They can’t comprehend that the darkness of child loss is so complete our hearts can’t imagine light still exists.
But when you see that verse and the ones that follow in context, a heart can find a foothold.
Read the rest here: Scripture Journal Challenge: Not Everything IS Good
I don’t know about you but my face and my body tell the tale.
It’s a story of stress and strife and it’s not pretty.
I look at photos before and after and see grief written all over the pictures taken since Dominic ran ahead to Heaven.
Read the rest here: Grief’s Physical Toll
thelifeididntchoose 