A Shattering

It is so very hard to describe the pain of losing your child. There is no “moving on” “getting over it” or complete healing. It is the absolute shattering of your heart in a way that the pieces cannot be glued back together. Much like the shattering of a tea cup. You can attempt to glue it back together all you want but the end result will be missing gaps and cracks; it will never be the same. I think that God picks up all the pieces of our hearts and helps us to carry them forward in our lives, just as they are. I believe that He holds those pieces as sacred and belonging to Him so He will protect them and also use the pieces of our hearts to help others as we continue on in this life fully trusting Him.

Laughter

Over the past few months, whenever I find myself laughing at something, I am a little surprised inside. And also relieved. Surprised, I guess, that I am able to laugh and relieved that I am still able to feel joy and humour. I suppose that when others hear me laughing it may cause them to think that I must be doing better and “moving on”. This, of course, is not the case. My heart is still broken but grief doesn’t preclude laughter or joy. Thank the Lord for that. Although there are days certainly where I feel completely wooden, there are also days where I feel the full breadth of my emotions, laughter included.

What We Keep Doing

Not long ago, I was talking with a friend about how we will never get over the death of our children. And that is most certainly so; we will not ever stop feeling the pain of their absence. This we will never do. But what we will do is:

Continue moving forward every day, even on the days we are crawling.

Look for all the joy in life God provides for us.

Keep reaching our hands out to help others.

Show God's love to everyone we can.

Let God direct us to find our purpose each day. 

We will keep breathing, living, loving.

We will keep on.

The After

We have moved from the Before into the After. The After; there is no returning from it. In the before, there were plans. Plans for a trip, plans for retirement, plans for work, plans for dinner, plans. In the After, those plans seem fleeting, uncertain, not to be trusted.

We find our way through the After and learn how to live in it. It is the never-ending nightmare that each morning when we wake up, we have to realize again that it is our reality. It is another earthly realm that no one but God can help us traverse.

When We think We Can’t

I can’t do it! There are circumstances for each of us where this is our immediate thought process. Recently I was in a position where I had to do a number of things I thought I couldn’t. I was left with no choice; counting on God to help me complete tasks that seemed insurmountable. It has brought me to the place of deeper contemplation about what I legitimately can and cannot do. Without a doubt, before Mikael died, I thought I could never survive losing one of my children. Isn’t that what every parent thinks? We are unable to survive this loss. We simply can’t! And yet, here we are. Still living. Still breathing. Still feeling. Our hearts relentlessly keep on beating. We are left with a choice. How will we continue? How will we keep marching forward? What will we fill our endlessly beating hearts with? I can only find God as my answer; to fill my heart and my soul and to provide meaning to my life as I take one step after the other. Every step with God’s help and every step to do what he has before me to do for this one day where my heart keeps beating. In the aftermath of every impossible situation, every horrific tragedy, every soul crushing experience, when we can’t, God can.

Relentless

Today was Mikael’s birthday. I will not pretend it was an easy day but it was a day that I got through, with the help and distraction of my granddaughters and the grace of God. The thing is that although today was hard, the past year and a half have been just as hard. Lately I have felt this heaviness, like a slab of granite embedded in my body dragging me down. This constant weight that I can’t shed. There is no measure of tears that can dislodge it, no slamming of fists, no shattering of glass; it is permanently present. Grief. I have known from the beginning that I would have to allow it to take up residence and develop a relationship with it, and yet there are days, or weeks, or months, where it just seems like this unwanted guest that just won’t leave. I keep packing it’s suitcase but it won’t latch shut and the contents keep spilling out. If I had to describe grief with one word, I think that would be RELENTLESS! It is many other things at many different times but it is always relentless. It will never go away.

You may wonder, “What happened to her faith?” I can assure you that it is still there and that I know without question that God continues to carry me and love me. But that doesn’t make the weight less, it just makes it carriable. Having faith in God’s salvation and grace doesn’t mean that I won’t have bad days or weeks or months. I will have them. It doesn’t mean that there won’t be times where I feel so overwhelmed that I simply don’t know how I will continue to function. God will be there in those times. It’s the thing about him that I’m counting on the most; his presence during every moment that I cannot move. You see, grief is most definitely relentless, but God is everlasting and eternal. I will count on that!

Meandering

It’s difficult sometimes, many times, to put into words what is happening in our thoughts on this journey. It’s a journey like none other. There are days where we feel like we are managing and days where we just can’t absorb what has happened.

On those days, it feels like everything is so elusive. The thought of them not being here  can’t be grasped as a concrete thing. Our brains can’t settle around that reality. Like trying to catch bubbles in the air; they just pop if we even manage to touch them. On those days, we just hang on and wait. Sometimes that is all we can do and that is okay.