Child loss is also often sibling loss.
In addition to their own heartache, bereaved parents carry the heartache of their surviving children.
The family everyone once knew is now a family no one recognizes. Hurting hearts huddle together-or run and hide-and it is so, so hard to find a way to talk about that pain.
Read the rest here: Grief is a Family Affair
It didn’t take long after Dominic’s leaving for life to ramp up and obligations to pour in. We had two graduations and a wedding within two months of his funeral.
Then there were thank-you notes to write, dishes to return and every day chores necessary to manage a home and family.
No escaping what must be done.
It took me a little while to realize that if I was going to survive this lifelong journey I had to make some changes in how and when I responded to requests to do something, be somewhere or participate in outside events. Because no matter how worthy the request, there was only so much of me to go around and I was forced to spend nearly all my energy and time and effort on figuring out how this great wound was impacting me and my family.
I cannot overemphasize how much strength and energy is needed to do the work grief requires.
At first, turning down a request or asking someone to reschedule was relatively easy-the loss was fresh in their minds and they were gracious and understanding. As the weeks and months and now YEARS have passed, it is harder…
Read the rest here: Grace and Space
Child loss rips through a life like a tornado-wild, unpredictable, viciously destructive.
It drops from the sky like a meteorite-no warning, no defense, just crushing weight.
It wrecks havoc in absolutely every corner of a bereaved parents’ heart and life.
And there is no safe space to escape from nor insurance policy to cover THAT damage.
When Dominic was killed, his sudden death instantly untethered me from the world as I knew it. I needed friends and family to anchor my heart in love and support so I didn’t float away. ❤
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!
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.
It’s a brand new feeling to watch your son with his.
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?
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.
“Death ends a life, not a relationship.” ~ Tuesdays with Morrie
A parent’s love doesn’t end simply because a child leaves this earth.
The relationship is not over as long as a bereaved parent’s heart beats.
So we face a challenge: How do we express love to and honor relationship with a child out of sight and out of reach?
We tell our stories and theirs. We start foundations or fund scholarships or do Random Acts of Kindness in honor of our son or daughter. We lobby legislators and city councils. We fight for changes in medical protocol. We post pictures on social media to keep their lights bright in friends’ and family’s memories.
And we say their names.
Because death can take a body, but it can’t steal a relationship.
I want to be everything my living children need me to be.
I try hard to celebrate them, be available, listen closely and love them well.
I never, ever want them to feel they are competing with their missing brother for my affection or my attention.
But I’d be lying if I said it was always easy.
Sometimes the happy moment so closely resembles a shared memory that includes Dominic, my heart takes my head in directions I wish it wouldn’t go. Sometimes it’s a long awaited once-in-a-lifetime occasion and Dom’s absence is a giant, gaping hole everywhere I look.
It’s really hard to be stuck at the crossroad of being happy for a child still here while mourning and missing the child that’s gone.
I’ve had to do that many, many times in the five years since Dominic ran ahead to Heaven and I’ve found a couple of things that help.
I put something in my pocket or wear a piece of jewelry that is a token of my love for Dominic.
It helps me feel as if he’s represented even if no one else knows about it. Then I lean in and take hold of the celebration as best as I can. When I feel overwhelmed, I touch my little token and/or escape to a quiet corner or bathroom for a minute or two and collect myself.
I also try to do something called “pre-grieving”.
I allow myself time early in the morning of an event to be alone and cry if I need to. If the tears won’t come, I listen to music that helps my heart reach that place of release. I journal my feelings. I walk through the day and admit where it might be especially challenging. I think through how I can deal with that and make a plan.
It makes a difference.
So much has been stolen from my surviving children.
I don’t want them robbed of their mama too.
Fathers are often overlooked grievers.
They shouldn’t be.
Dads aren’t bystanders in the shattered world of child loss-they are participants as parents of a son or daughter whom they love just as much as any mother.
So just like Mother’s Day is hard for moms, Father’s Day is hard for them.
Read the rest here: Father’s Day for Bereaved Fathers
*I wanted to get this out early enough to help friends and family of a bereaved father understand a little better how they can encourage him as Father’s Day approaches.*
Circumstances have made me thoughtful lately.
My grandson’s premature birth, my daughter’s wedding and our personal season of unwelcome milestones have reminded me that life is short.
And then a Facebook friend shared this meme:
My heart cried, “Yes!”
It’s so, so true.
What we will value most in our vulnerable moments and in our last moments won’t be anything we bought at a store (or online).
It will be relationships.
The people we love and who love us are the true treasure of a life well-lived.
They are priceless.
Child loss is also often sibling loss.
In addition to their own heartache, bereaved parents carry the heartache of their surviving children.
The family everyone once knew is now a family no one recognizes. Hurting hearts huddle together-or run and hide-and it is so, so hard to find a way to talk about that pain.
There is definitely a time and place for professional counseling. Many, many families benefit from having a trained individual, outside the immediate grief circle, guide them in exploring feelings, developing coping strategies and learning to live life this side of loss.
But there is also something to be said for arranging casual open-ended activities with surviving siblings, parents and even grandparents where space and a more relaxed atmosphere often leads to honest sharing.
This graphic has lots of excellent suggestions for how to craft such a space.
Not all will be suitable for every family, but every family should be able to find a few that fit.
I’ll add these guidelines that may help your family make the best choice for YOU:
These are just ideas.
Google is your friend and your phone is probably already in your hand or pocket-use it.
Find things that fit YOUR family.
The only way through is through.
You have to feel and deal to heal. ❤
We talk about a lot of things as if they didn’t reflect a real person and a real life.
Addiction is one of them. And let me just tell you, every single number is a life and behind every single life is a family.
Statistics are easy to toss around until one of those numbers represents YOUR child.
My son was killed in a single-vehicle motorcycle accident. One of the 76 individuals who died on a motorcycle in Alabama in 2014. If you look it up, you’ll find tables printed with clean edges and comparative data one year to the next.
But if you look at me-and hold up a photo from BEFORE-you’ll see grief etched into a mama’s face that can’t be measured, sifted or weighed.
My son was not an addict. He was a health nut. But he liked his motorcycle and never saw the contradiction between spending hours at the gym then putting that beautiful body on a fast moving, unprotected engine-on-wheels. A helmet was not enough to save him that night.
Addicts don’t start out wanting the life so many of them end up living. They take a puff or a pill or a drink and think it’s all in fun. They have no way to know that the one moment of weakness or even purposeful exploration may result in a lifetime of struggle.
Once caught in the cycle of craving and crawling out and caving again they may or may not eventually find the light. They may or may not become sober for the rest of their days. They may or may not have the inner strength, the outside support, the medical intervention and inpatient treatment they need to conquer this demon.
And it is a demon.
Addiction is never a choice even when the first indulgence into drugs or alcohol is.
Parents living with addicted children do everything they can to guide them to help. They try tough love, abundant grace, boundaries, threats and rewards. Some even move their families to try to escape habitual influences on their child-hoping against hope that a new place and new friends will create a safe space where addiction can’t flourish.
It rarely works. In the end, addiction takes too many of our children. Addiction kills.
And the wreckage left the other side of those deaths is enormous. It’s messy and ugly and hard to sort through.
The one thing NO parent of an addicted child needs is someone else’s misguided advice on how they could have “saved” his or her child. They don’t need quips about “seeing it coming”. They don’t need anyone to heap shame on them because of the choices their child made and the disease that robbed them of choice in the end.
So when we talk about addiction and numbers and treatment and responsibility and especially death, we need to remember that every single statistic is a person.
Every single person has a family.
And that family is devastated.
Speak gently. Extend grace. Offer love.
They already know shame.
thelifeididntchoose 