Category: grief

The NFL of Marriage

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It’s the 10th again. Each one that comes adds one more month since he went to his new Heavenly home. This time it’s ten months. Our wedding anniversary is in eleven days. I feel like that may be the hardest day yet.

I’m sure a lot of people pick special dates for when they get married. We kind of got married on the sly. 😏 Our families knew but for everyone else it was a “surprise” – sort of because we’d been engaged awhile. We got married at a beautiful park in Jacksonville on a beautiful, sunshiny day with the sweetest officiant who also offered to be our photographer afterwards. We purposefully chose 3/21, even though it was a Tuesday, because we said it was like 3-2-1 blastoff! Like we were finally getting to “officially” start our life together, even though we’d know we would be married a long time before that. We thought of all of the dreams and plans we had together and talked on the drive to Jacksonville specifically about putting a roof over both our side porch and back patio and adding rocking chairs so one day we could rock our grandbabies when we were old. Little did we know we’d have two coming long before we were “old.” And that Scott would only live to meet one of them.

I’ve said this before but losing a spouse is not just the loss of the person. Oh, that alone is big enough to make your life implode, but that’s not the whole hard part. It’s losing your future. It’s like playing football since you were five, planning your entire life from then on to be an NFL player and having the God-given talent and skill to be one of the greats, then sustaining a career-ending injury during one of your first big games as a pro. You didn’t make another plan. You didn’t choose a backup plan because this was the only one you’d ever wanted, ever dreamed of. And now it’s gone.

Except losing your spouse, your partner for everything life throws your way, is so much bigger.

We knew when we got married that we were pros. The NFL of marriage? That was us. We went through some really, really tough stuff together and we smashed it every time together. Neither of us had a doubt that this was forever. I’m sure that could be said of a lot of newlyweds but we’d both been married before and this time we had learned a lot about the work it takes to stay married through thick and thin. And we truly loved each other through each of our quirks, frustrations, mood swings, bad habits, and life lessons. We knew we were 100% married til death do us part.

And we were right about that much.

I may never be able to afford to put a roof over our patios but I’m working on doing what I can to make our home what we wanted together. We used to go outside to our back patio and drink coffee together in the mornings. We’d sit in chairs by the patio table, looking out over our pool and our beautiful back yard area, listening to the church bells from down the street and trying to figure out which hymn they were playing that day.

And we’d plan fruit trees to plant so the grandkids could pick it and have healthy snacks. We’d plan other new plants around the pool to make it even more pretty out there, and plants like Jasmine and gardenia and plumeria that would make it smell beautiful, too. Little by little I will keep trying to bring the dreams we both had to fruition. Sometimes I feel selfish doing that, like, why should I have all of these things now when he can’t enjoy them with me. And then I remember where he is and that he would want me to at least have this until I can get there with him. And I think he’d smile knowing that our dreams are still important to me, the ones I’ll be able to figure out how to do.

I bought a hammock. Today I will put it outside. We laughed over wanting a hammock we could lay in together and over what could potentially happen if we both tried to lay in a hammock together. That was one of the times we laughed until we cried because the scenarios were pretty hilarious as we talked about them and pictured them in our minds. I’m going to get in that hammock today and lay there alone for a little while…assuming I can get in without of of those crazy scenarios occurring, and just think about what he would say if he came home and saw I had put it together for us to try out.

I still have all of our dreams and plans in my head. There were so many. Some may never occur. Some I wouldn’t want to do without him. Some I will do in honor of him. Any of them I complete helps me heal in some small way, so I’ll keep looking for ways to do that.

I can feel God’s peace over me today. I’m not crying as I type, as I often do. The memories, at least for today, are coming in gentle waves and not tsunami crashes. I’m thankful to have had the opportunity to dream with him. ♥️

Chasing Peace

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This is from Joyce Meyer but I think it’s my primary problem right now:

You can’t just sit back and wish for peace, wish the devil would leave you alone, or wish that people would do what you want. The Bible tells us to actively pursue peace. You have to make up your mind to crave peace.

It actually feels as if a the opposite of peace is actively chasing 𝘮𝘦, every single day lately. And I know the author of peace but I know who dishes out the other, as well. And I absolutely do 𝘤𝘳𝘢𝘷𝘦 𝘱𝘦𝘢𝘤𝘦. But the Bible says we have to actively pursue peace: ”Turn away from evil and do good. Search for peace, and work to maintain it.“
‭‭Psalms‬ ‭34‬:‭14‬ ‭NLT‬‬.

The verse makes it sound as easy as a Nike commercial: Just Do It. But, holy cow, it is NOT easy to maintain sometimes. I’m reading my Bible. I’m doing four separate devotionals every day (because they’re all very helpful – while I’m reading them but then somehow I get off track walking away from them.) I’m praying. I’m seeking it. Still, it is elusive. It’s as if it found the ultimate hiding spot in a game of hide & seek while I’m getting hot and sweaty outside looking for it, ready to throw in the towel and just go get a glass of cold Kool Aid and plop down on the couch in front of the TV until it comes to say “why’d you quit lookin’?”

Trying to muffle the chaos inside my head does not work because that just wakes me at 2:00 a.m. when my mind figures it has nothing better to do. Raging at the tornado I’m constantly facing doesn’t help because, alas, I do not control the wind and waves. Crying over it doesn’t help because I just get a headache and stopped up nose…although sometimes it feels like it helps release the pressure in the moment. The only thing that does help is reading my Bible and I’m sure that’s what I’m being called to do even more than I have been but I’m kind of stubborn sometimes (no comments from the peanut gallery, please.) My childlike mind wants to say “I’ve already done my homework and I worked hard on it! Why are you assigning me more? I’m tired already!”

And so I pray to crave it as strongly as I crave peace since sometimes I can’t seem to remember that they’re the same thing. And I pray for my stubborn, childlike mind to maintain a stubborn, childlike faith but to do a better job growing out of the attitude I tend to get when I’m tired or hungry. The I Can’t attitude.

For now, I will try to sleep. When I wake up, I will try to start again, again.

Not Me

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I’m not who I once was.

I was a “social butterfly” at one time. But my wings have gotten wet. Wet butterfly wings don’t make for easy flight. When I’m around large groups of people and noise, I feel hot pins and needles all over my body. My skin feels too tight, like after you wear tight, not-stretchy jeans to Thanksgiving and then feel like you can’t breathe after you eat until you peel them off or at least undo the button and maybe even the zipper while you pull your shirt down to cover it up. Oh, and by the way, by ”large groups of people,” I now mean something like ten where that term wouldn’t have been used for less than fifty or a hundred people before. I’ve performed on stage for over a thousand before. This person who used to enjoy being surrounded by people is much more comfortable with one or two now.

No one really knows how to deal with this other me. They keep waiting for me to get straightened out and become myself again but I really think that person died when my husband did. I really think I’m not the same me and that the person they used to know isn’t coming back again. Yet, still, no one knows how to adjust; I’m supposed to.

I’m very anxious in social situations now. It becomes difficult to breathe. Often that is because I’m trying very hard not to cry. Nothing has to even “trigger” the tears reflex and that’s another whole part of this different person I’ve become. My husband used to wonder why I never cried. I told him I thought it was learned behavior from being a single mom. I’d compartmentalize things to avoid crying so that they’d never be worried or upset. I just wasn’t someone who cried. Now I cry uncontrollably and sometimes at the most inopportune times. Inopportune, for me, means in front of people, thus why I will struggle to breathe normally while desperately attempting to hold back tears. Who 𝘪𝘴 this person???

Well, now I guess it’s me. And it doesn’t feel like it’s a me who will just go back to being that other woman. The one I barely recognize anymore. The one who laughed to the point of tears of hilarity when my husband tried to raise one eyebrow without raising the other, making ridiculous faces in the process and laughing just as much with me. The one who played the game where you try to talk with a mouthguard in and then talked even a little sillier when it made people laugh to hear it. The one who was everyone’s “mom” at work and had extra chocolate, unopened chapsticks, safety pins, pens, tampons, and Vicks VapoRub in her locker at all times in case anyone ever needed anything at all. I don’t know where that woman went because I’d really just rather be at home, even alone, doing homemade projects I devise for myself to do by myself. I don’t even know if this new person is healthy but I don’t feel sick. I feel like I’m finding some kind of peace in an otherwise untenable situation in which I have no choice but to live.

People keep telling me it’s not healthy for me to be alone so much, to stay home so much. But if it’s not healthy then why do I feel better doing it and feel torn every single time someone asks me to do anything else? I love my children and my granddaughter; I feel joy when they come through the door and when I hug them. I love sitting and just reading books to my granddaughter or listening to her laugh at the dogs. I enjoy sitting with my sister and just doing random things like cooking something and talking. I feel good sitting and having coffee with my best friend, even when we talk through the hard stuff. I enjoy spending time with my mother-in-law, just sitting in the living room and talking about the people we miss. I just don’t love the chaos of noise, and groups, and tornados of activity anymore. Maybe that’s not so bad, right? Maybe the new me is just an introvert, and if I’d always been that way then people would think it was okay. I’m not sure why it’s not okay now.

The me you knew before is not me. Can that just be okay? When the doctors walked down that hallway and said “I’m so sorry…” my heart shattered into a million razor-sharp pieces and my world went black; when I picked up the pencils to try coloring it back in, it was impossible to make everything match the original because you can’t photocopy life. What is here now is different, but I’m still in here somewhere.

Look Now From The Place Where You Are

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New beginnings sound like something exciting, something adventurous. In order to experience a new beginning, however, an ending must be acknowledged and accepted. Truly believing there is no way to alter an ending, especially when that ending was not how you wanted things to end, is outrageously difficult. It is hard for those who have not experienced it to understand, but even when that ending is death of someone you love, it’s very difficult to accept the finality of it. The acceptance comes in fits and starts. There are fits of raging against the world that it shouldn’t be this way. There are desperate cries of sorrow and pleas for an altered ending. I am becoming convinced that the only way to defy the disbelief, to nudge into the acceptance, is to focus on what God has planned for your future, even when it wasn’t the future you planned. In fact, especially when it looks like this isn’t the future you wanted, it’s important to lean into God’s new plans and have faith in them, even when it feels like there is no hope.

Several times in the last three weeks, God has brought a specific passage from Genesis into my path. Imagine that: Genesis, defined by the dictionary as “the beginning or origin of anything,” is the place I’m found studying and pondering.

Abram, eventually to be renamed by God as Abraham, has been waiting for the fulfillment of God’s promise to him. When they arrived at what Abram must have assumed was the Promised Land, his nephew, Lot, took all of the best areas of land and left Abram with the rest. Abram must have thought something like, “Your promise was for leftovers?” but:

”The Lord said to Abram, after Lot had parted from him, “Look around from where you are, to the north and south, to the east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you.”“
‭‭Genesis‬ ‭13‬:‭14‬-‭17‬ ‭NIV‬‬

In a different translation God said ‘Lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are.’ He was saying don’t look behind you because there is nothing left there for you. Don’t look ahead into what you think should happen or should have happened. Look from the place where you are and, in that, keep having faith that I will do as I promised. My promises were never contingent on whether this would happen; I already saw this coming and I have prepared.

One of the most difficult things about grief is not constantly looking back at what was and also not looking forward at how wrecked what-should-have-been now is. It’s really hard to look from the place where you are. It feels as if disaster surrounds you from behind and ahead. Everything in the now is challenging and leads you to wish for what was and worry about what will be, but we are called by God to be thankful for what was (what we were blessed with in “the before” because it was beautiful and we loved it and them) and to trust His promises for the future.

One of the things He has steadily promised me was provision. I constantly feel internal pressure to do something to make sure His promise comes to fruition. I’m in a challenging place right now and I’ve been instructed to wait on the Lord and to trust and believe in His promise. I’ve been called to be still, which is not a strong attribute of mine. In my heart I truly do believe in Him and His voice. Still my nature consistently challenges me with “what are you doing about it?” Even when I know there is very little I can personally do to alter outcomes ahead of me.

I’m also challenged by purpose. I was a wife, a mom, and a “Lolly” (grandmother) and those were my identity. I’ve lost an identity before and it hurt tremendously, causing me to question who I was as a person if it was not this. I am a nurse by licensure but I’ve known for a long time that God was redirecting that calling on my life and had new directions for me to walk. I thought that direction was wrapped around being a good wife, mama, and Lolly, but a huge part of that identity is gone now that I am a widow.

I’m faced with the question of where that leaves me because it feels as if there is a gaping hole in part of who I am. Multiple people have said things to me about “finding a new husband one day.” This leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth. While I do know that people mean well and, to them, they are offering me a new sense of hope that one day this hole will be filled, my husband cannot just be replaced. I don’t think that, when one loses a child, people would just say “well, just have another one; that’ll make you feel better.” And while I understand that I do not have any idea what God has in store for the rest of my life, that is absolutely something in which I have no interest at all right now. Honestly, if that ever was God’s intent and part of His plan for me, He would have to essentially, figuratively, drop someone in my lap for me to even consider it; even then it would be a challenge to navigate my way through the emotions that would surface as a response.

The overarching theme here is that I have to look now from the place where I am. I cannot look back toward what shouldn’t have happened (only at the joy and blessings that my husband brought to my life.) I cannot look forward as if it were a puzzle I am capable of figuring out; I say this meaning that, although we do make plans, I cannot determine the outcome of my life. I don’t know if I will die tomorrow or not for fifty years so trying to make a plan that encompasses what the rest of my life will look like is foolish. I have to look from where I am now. One step at a time, one day at a time. There are no shortcuts or crystal balls. The world works in such a way that new beginnings don’t just come the day that you are born. Learning to walk is a new beginning. Starting kindergarten is a new beginning. First love is a new beginning. Marriage is a new beginning. Having a baby is a new beginning. Divorce is a new beginning. Scott was a wonderful new beginning but now I am, once again, at a new beginning.

Becoming a mama was a new beginning for me, almost 26 years ago. When they moved out, it felt like an ending but it was really just another beginning, a different but still lovely path that has led to one beautiful granddaughter (so far.) I have to learn that my husband physically leaving this earth as another beginning. I didn’t like when my kids moved out on their own. I still miss them when I’m not with them. The same for my husband. I never wanted this particular new beginning. But I had to continue when the boys went out to spread their own wings. I had to learn to look from the place where I was then and begin to take steps toward being a mom from a distance and what that would look like.

Today, I’ve already begun my journey as a widow and I’m still figuring out what that looks like for me. I don’t know exactly where it’s going to take me. I do know that God already knows exactly what that looks like in my future and I wholeheartedly trust that he means it for good and not for failure. That’s where I’m standing right now, looking from the place where I am, knowing that I will be okay. I will have joy. I will have purpose. And I will always have a God who loves me and wants what is best for my life. I’m going to follow that lead.

Reinvention

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It might not seem like it, but what you’re looking at is me reinventing myself.

I started this project about a week ago. When my husband and I bought this piece, we wanted to paint it white but never got around to it. I’m getting around to it now, even though he’ll never be here to see that I finished it for us.

God speaks to me most often and most personally during creative processes. This is why writing is so cathartic for me, as well. I would be lying if I said that I know how every bit of information He spoke today relates to my grief process, but I’m quite sure they do. Some of them are already quite obvious; see if you can pick them out. Some I don’t really get yet but I expect Him to keep talking as I work my way toward figuring out how this is going to turn out. Below are some things that He told me today while I was working on this furniture rehab:

  1. There will always be naysayers telling you that you’re doing it wrong. There are two categories of these people: the ones who’ve never gone through doing this and the ones who are “experts” and like the way they did it better.
  2. There will always be imperfections. Some are there because of the way the wood has imperfections and some are because I missed spots or don’t like how I painted them. I’ll either be doing touch ups for the rest of my life or I’ll accept it as it is one day. I will probably vacillate between both of these choices.
  3. It needs more than one coat of paint. In every single area. Some areas will need more than that.
  4. When I feel like it’s completely done, I’ll have to gently take a razor blade to the fragile glass parts, but that’s isn’t going to stop me from getting a little paint on them now; I’m doing it anyway, even when I’m scared I might mess it up.
  5. I haven’t moved the breakables out of the curio part because I’m afraid they’ll get broken outside of it.  At some point I’ll have to remove them to paint the shelves on the inside.  That time is not now.
  6. I might sand down some of the parts I painted at some point for a different “feel” or “design.”  I can’t decide all of that right now or even until I think it’s done, so I’m not thinking about that right now.  I won’t know how I want it to look until it’s closer to being what I want it to be.  That’s okay.
  7. Sometimes I paint carefully. Sometimes I just smash and glob it on. That doesn’t really have anything to do with the part I’m painting. It has more to do with how I feel when I’m doing it. Sometimes I don’t feel like working on it at all, so I don’t. It will get finished whenever it gets finished.
  8. I don’t have any idea of what this is going to look like when it’s “done.” Sometimes, as I get further along in it, I feel like I can see a glimpse of what it might become.  Sometimes I think it’ll look okay; other times I think it may always be a disaster that I can’t fix.
  9. Some parts of the wood are darker, just by the nature of the grain. These parts are harder to cover with paint and will require more work.
  10. There are places that are hard to get to properly without taking the doors off. Despite knowing this, I still do not have the energy to take them off yet.
  11. Eventually I will need to buy new hardware for the knobs and handles, finishing touches. Since I know that, I’m not worried about getting paint on them now while I’m trying to redo the rest of it.
  12. Today it looks more complete than the last time I worked on it. That doesn’t mean that it’s finished. If I stop now because it looks better, I’ll never achieve what I wanted to before I ever started it.
  13. I didn’t create or build this piece of furniture. It’s something I acquired. That means there will always be parts of it that I wish had been built differently. The yellow wood and gold paint were parts of that. They’re a part I can change, so I am. The carved in parts are something I cannot alter so I have to just do the best I can to make it look like something I can find joy in.

All of this came just today, in a couple of hours of allowing my mind to be open to the work. For me, the work and the Word comes through creative projects but for others it comes differently. Whatever your process is, find time to let it work. And yet, if there are times you just don’t have the energy or mental bandwidth to deal with it, take a break – for however long you need. I think today’s work is going to be useful in the long run.

I’m also working on other things at home. I’ve worked on cleaning my bedroom, my bathroom, and my kitchen. I’m making my bed every day. These may seem like small things but, for me, they were big because my life felt like utter chaos. There aren’t before photos of those “projects” because I’d honestly be embarrassed for you to see the clutter that had developed. I’m having to get to a simplified place in my life so that I can even see where the pieces are supposed to go, like sorting puzzle pieces into edge pieces and various color piles before you start to assemble the entire picture. None of this is a “yay, me” statement. I’m telling you so that, whether it’s grief or depression or looking for purpose in your life, you’ll know that this is what worked for me; it’s a place to start if you don’t have a clue where to start. For me, the most important part is that you don’t have to do it all at once. Sometimes I do one small thing, like putting dishes in the dishwasher and waiting down the sink area and counters. Other times it’s cleaning off just my dresser, or emptying one clothes drawer, taking out what no longer fits, and reassembling it with what is left knowing I’ve decided that I only have to do one drawer today. Then some days I have the energy and the desire to do more than just that. I’m trying to make a point to do ONE thing each day, at least, even if it’s just one drawer. If I encounter a day when I can’t do even one, I’m giving myself for letting it go until the day when I can. This morning I also just cleaned my range hood, nothing else. For today, that may be all I am able to do. And that’s okay.

After first day of work
Today (still not even close to finished…but I’ll get there one day

Rescue Me

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I’ve been pretty sick this week – cough that sounds like a garbage disposal with a fork stuck in it, voice that sounds like a 90-year-old who smoked filterless Marlboros for 80 of them, and a trash can full of used tissues – and yet still, somehow, I’ve been on a temporary upswing. Last week I had diverticulitis and every day of that I felt as if my head was being held underwater (emotionally) because it is hard being sick alone when your spouse was a dedicated caregiver. Mine was a nurse so, even when I said I was okay, he tended to anything I needed and was extremely compassionate. Now, although I’ve lived through being sick alone before I met him, I really, really miss him being with me when I feel bad.

After getting over the diverticulitis and almost immediately being struck down with some viral nonsense, this week of sickness I’ve somehow managed to be on an emotional upswing. I got it in my head that I needed to do some simplifying of my life, purging things from my house that we never used, tidying up, organizing. It was like “spring cleaning” came early and I was on a rampage to rid this house of extraneous things (none of them things that were specifically his.) And it felt good to be “putting my life back in order.”

If you read my previous chapter then you know that I already anticipated a downswing. I’m here to tell you that when the crash comes, it hits like a head-on Mack truck. This afternoon my brain is telling me that none of this cleaning up even matters. It would matter if he were here, but he is not. He would have appreciated all of this reorganizing and spiffing up of things. He would have enjoyed it just like I have been liking the new feel of it. But he can’t. And the fact that I am “enjoying” it on my own is the opposite of numbing. At times today it has felt like walking through my home when, instead of hard wood flooring and carpet, there is grass filled with sand spurs throughout the whole house. It makes you gasp and then fear taking another step.

There is more I want to do, in various rooms of the house and even outside, to feel like I have accomplished what I have set out to do. It takes little jobs here and there because I often tire or lose the will to finish. Before I sit down to work on my novel again, I feel like I need this in order to achieve clarity of thought, and yet I don’t know whether that is just a pipe dream…a way of working to force something that cannot be forced. I’m a problem solver, by nature, and I haven’t yet discovered an effective way to fix this. I’m doing all of the things I can think of and yet I still see no way “out.” I’m going to hate the way this ended for as long as I live. I’m going to know it never should have been this way. I think I’m always going to want to go back.

I’m thankful to know that both God and my husband are ahead of me and not just behind. God is still here, in the ethereal way that He exists in every breath that I breathe. My husband, well, in a way he is part of every breath, as well, because I can’t breathe without wishing he was standing beside me, laying next to me, holding my hand, touching my face. It’s strange how someone I knew as a physical presence in the world, someone I could touch and laugh with and fall in love with and go on adventures with, could be less present than the God who always stays. Scott’s memories are always with me, the memory of him…but I don’t feel him here. And yet God, whom I have never had the honor of laying eyes on or whose skin I have never touched, Him I can feel. There are still times I can almost feel God as a physical presence wrapped around me and His peace envelopes me like warm water.

Today, as I struggle with another deep dive off the face of the cliff that is grief, the one I climb over and over but inevitably fall from again and again, God is here. He never lets me hit the rocky crags of stone that are at the bottom of the cliff face. He never lets me drown in the tossing and churning waves at the bottom. I fall and I fear the crash. And the fear, the panic of the idea of falling so far, so deeply into the chasm that I cannot climb again, feels like a crash in itself. And it’s not only the fear of hitting the bottom, of drowning in the salty waves. It’s the fear of trying to find the energy to get back up. I dread the climb because it’s exhausting to get up every day, reaching for a higher point than I’ve ever reached in this journey, and knowing that, at any moment, I could slip again. Knowing that, at some point, I will fall again and have to start over yet again. I’m only eight months in and I’m weary of the workout…with forever to go.

I do find that, most days, I don’t seem to fall as far down as I used to fall. I also find that I don’t lay there at that landing for as long before I can stand up, determined to try again. I’m noticing that I’m developing some muscle memory for how to ascend and that some days I remember where the footholds are without having to look as hard for them. The times when it feels like I’m completely starting over are a bit farther between. Today, I’m choosing to be grateful for that.

When I go to bed tonight, I’m going to tell God, again, that I trust Him. I’m going to tell Him that I know that He sees the path I need to take and ask Him to keep directing my steps. I’ve often prayed that He not let me fall back down again but I’m learning that every time He catches me sooner, I trust Him more to do it the next time. Unfortunately, it doesn’t make the fall less scary while I’m in the freefall…but it does make the idea of falling less frightening. I guess it’s like parachuting. There is trepidation but as you check your harness over and over, seeing that everything is safely as it should be, you learn each time you ready yourself to jump that you will be safe when you reach the ground, more and more so each jump that you do, indeed, land safely. And yet as you take that first step off the floor of the plane into open air and gravity, there must still be at least a few moments of terror and adrenaline before the chute actually opens. I’ve landed safely enough times to know I will survive this somehow, but that doesn’t stop the sudden panic when gravity pulls me down at breakneck speed.

Writing typically calms me and so, now, I am on level, if lower, ground. I don’t think I’ll try climbing tonight. I think I’ll go to bed resting, trusting Jesus to keep me safely in the hammock of His arms, and wake tomorrow to try again. I’ll wake, have coffee, and begin one of the projects I have planned for organizing my home and see if I can get a foothold again. Thank you, Father, for rescuing me…again.

Look At My Room!

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Remember when you were a kid and your mom or dad would tell you to go clean your room? And remember, when you were done, how you’d go say “Mom, Dad! Come look at my room!” It was tidy and you’d worked hard on it so you wanted to show someone; you wanted them to be proud of you.

Maybe that’s just me. I know that part of mine and part of my husband’s love language was words of affirmation. It’s one of my kids’ love languages, and I can already see that in my one-year-old granddaughter, too. Honestly, my husband and I could never really figure out what our primary love language was because we both had a strong affinity for all five of them. When he was alive, cleaning up the house while he was at work was an act of service for me, another love language. I knew he loved clean sheets and a made bed. I knew chaos made him stressed while organization made him feel more calm. The odd thing about this is that we both had some serious ADD going on and always had to work hard to be organized. So when we were home and wanted to relax, that’s what tended to fall by the wayside after the struggle of keeping everything detailed and organized at work.

Fast forward to now: I’m experiencing what I assume is a new part of the grief process. I make this assumption because this inclination is absolutely not ordinary for me. I’m cleaning. Everything. I’m typically kind of a pack-rat (not a hoarder, by far, but I do tend to wonder if “I might need that later”) but right now I am purging my home. Mind you, nothing of my husband’s is in the throw-away or donate piles. I’m not there yet and don’t know that I ever, ever will be. But, for example, I worked in my kitchen for about six hours today, simplifying my life. I don’t think I’ll ever be able to reach minimalist status but, to me, this is as close as I’d ever get.

Chaos…for almost eight months my mind has been pure and unadulterated chaos. I don’t like it. It makes me feel the way that being late makes me feel. I hate being late. And if I am, by chance, running late – for anything, really – then I feel a very similar sensation to panic. I don’t like to be in a hurry (although my mind and my body always act like I am, in fact, in a hurry) and having to rush just causes me undue stress and anxiety. And that is the feeling I have lived with these last eight months…constantly.

With no point in acts of service for my husband, I had let my home just run amok as far as cleaning or even keeping things in their place were concerned. My home didn’t become a hovel, but I definitely was uncomfortable when people showed up to visit. I know, I know; people understand, but I still felt disgraced. To top that off, I couldn’t really sit down to write without constantly thinking about the mess around me. I began to realize that I felt stuck. Not stuck in my home; I adore this home that we bought together. I just felt stuck in the chaos and, apparently my brain suddenly said “we can fix this!”

From a therapeutic perspective, I do somewhat anticipate getting the house back in order and then cognitively realize that none of the cleaning “fixes” it. I expect that my subconscious thinks this is going to make me feel “all better” but, when I’m done, my husband still will not be here so there is bound to be a let down. Still, for today, it feels as if I have accomplished something.

But back to the first paragraph, when you asked mom & dad to come see your sparkling clean room (and hoped they didn’t check under the bed or in the closet for the things you stashed away to create a more pristine appearance…)

When I cleaned house while my husband was at work, I would eagerly anticipate his arrival back home. Obviously, I was always happy to see him get home for lots of reasons but when I had really worked hard to make our home pleasant and comfortable, he would come in and I could just feel the sigh of peace that came from him. He didn’t have to say “you did a great job!” or “I’m so proud of you.” I just knew he felt comfortable and glad to be home. He might say “the house looks really nice, honey” or “this dinner is really delicious” but he didn’t have to; I knew how he felt about it and I wanted him to be able to relax at home without feeling there were things he needed to do right after work. Seeing him at peace gave me peace. Reading that back it sounds like some Leave It To Beaver show but it’s true; maybe I was born in the wrong era.

Today the kitchen is pretty close to tip-top shape, but he isn’t coming home to see it. I found myself feeling sad because “it’s all for nothing.” I know it’s not, but a part of me can’t help feeling that way. There’s a saying that goes: “If a tree falls in the forest but no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?“ If I clean my house and it doesn’t really matter to anyone but me, does it really make a difference? It’s dumb, I know, I know. Some of you who are super perfect at keeping everything spotless all the time are cringing at how this sounds but it’s only one of the things that grief brain does to you…one of the many.

To clean or not to clean may not be a struggle in your world. With depression, however, even taking a shower can feel like a chore not worth completing. As gross as that sounds, things that are simple, everyday tasks for most people require gargantuan effort and determination for someone fighting the minute-to-minute pitfalls of even regular depression, much less major depressive disorder and/or C-PTSD.

I don’t even know how to end this blog post. I guess I just want you to know that if you are walking through grief and you feel something like this, like you just really miss how your loved one would recognize your accomplishments and appreciate them or even celebrate them with you, you are not alone. A lot of things about grief make you feel like you’re literally “going crazy.” I talk to myself (or to him, as if he were here) more than I talk to anyone else these days. It is alarming and disarming even to me, at times, but I’m sure it certainly is when someone walks in and finds me doing it. And yet, most times when I speak to another friend who is also a widow, I find that whatever it was I experienced was, indeed, something they went through, too. Isn’t it strange how we all think we are so different but, so many times, we are actually so much the same? I don’t know if I would call all of the stages or phases of my grief journey “normal,” but they’re as normal as I get. Yours are, too.

Forgiveness & Trust

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Overcome evil and anger by praying for those who hurt and abuse you.

I’ve been like a bear with my paw caught in a trap, wanting to wound the one who could release me in my pain and anger. In this case, my release was only possible by offering grace to the captors who placed me here.

Tonight, I’ve been given the instruction from God to forgive the people who were party to my husband’s death and to offer them grace, yet with the full knowledge and trust that God has the power and omniscience to handle the outcomes. If they realize their errors, their negligence, and learn from that experience, He has the power to make them better from it, because that won’t bring Scott back but that is still a positive outcome. Or He could guide them on a path where they never make the same poor judgements again because they are unable to forget the tragedy that their actions caused. He also has the ability to enter circumstances into their lives to prevent them from ever hurting anyone else if His foresight shows that they refuse to heed the education that this situation is able to provide for their futures. God has called me, in the wee hours of the morning, to trust Him to do that. He calls me to pour out grace upon grace just as He has flooded it over me. And trust me…I’ve needed grace upon grace, too. We all do. Just different kinds.

This is not an easy task to undertake (and make no mistake, it is a chore, a job, an unearthly, overwhelmingly difficult undertaking.) Only He, however, has made it possible because the choice to follow His instruction was more of an obligatory mandate than a decision. I can see the peace on the other side of it even as I feel called, yet because of my own stubborn and hurting heart, still hesitant, to enter into it. Trusting Him is easy; trusting and forgiving them is not.

I’ve chosen whom I will serve. The Bible says that you cannot serve two masters. It’s talking about serving God or a love of money in this particular scripture but it applies, also, to the fact that you cannot serve both God and the enemy. If you choose one, you are no longer serving the other. Jesus won me over a long time ago because He loved me enough to die for me. So, when God says to forgive, I choose to obey. Forgiveness is a choice. You don’t always feel like you have forgiven when you choose to do so. You may still have anger (I do.) You may still have difficulty feeling as if you have truly forgiven them (I do.) But the obedience to God and His Word are important. The choice you make to say “I forgive them, Lord. I’m trusting You to help me do it within my heart and I believe justice comes from You” is what makes all the difference, even if you have to say it day after day after day.

So, I am saying it here, as a reminder that I did, in fact, say it and in hopes I’ll truly feel like I’ve forgiven despite the fact that I will never be able to forget. I can’t forget what they didn’t do, but should have. I can’t forget because I still have nightmares, awake and asleep, about it. But I’m choosing to forgive them.

There is a peace that eventually comes with forgiveness. I mean, I know because I’ve done it in other circumstances. That hard won peace is worth the work it takes to get to a place where you let go of what can never change and let God work in your heart over it. And listen, I’m not bragging about doing this at all. This is me writing it out in the hopes that, as I do, it becomes cemented in some way, becomes real, becomes some kind of lasting thing that takes root because it’s hard sometimes. This time.

If you’re in a place of grief that is accompanied by anger, choose this day whom you will serve. Choose with me, the only path that leads to healing. Choose to forgive and speak it out loud. God will honor your decision to make the difficult choice to follow Him in this endeavor. Judgement is mine, says the Lord. I forgive them; (I forgive them. I forgive them. I forgive them, Lord.) I also hope that one day, here or in Heaven, I get to see how that plays out in the people who were a party to the biggest loss in my life thus far.

For Auld Lang Syne

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I’m sitting here, expecting to hear fireworks any time now, and doing what people do on New Year’s Eve – thinking back over what the year has brought…and, more acutely, what it has taken away.

When the clock strikes midnight tonight, people will raise a glass, kiss, and then burst into the lyrics of the song “Auld Lang Syne” as they watch the ball drop in Times Square. Oh, what I’d give to have even one more chance, but better yet a lifetime, of this with my husband.

Roughly translated, the phrase means “old long since,” or, more understandably in English, “for old time’s sake.”

The U.S. Embassy in Italy maybe explained it best in a blog post: “The lyrics of ‘Auld Lang Syne’ pose the question: How do we best remember the memories, friends and experiences of this year and the years before? The answer, the songwriter tells us, is to ‘share a cup of kindness yet’ as we journey into the new year.”

“Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
And the days of auld lang syne?

For auld lang syne, my dear
For auld lang syne
We’ll drink a cup of kindness yet
For the sake of auld lang syne

And surely you will buy your cup
And surely I’ll buy mine!
We’ll take a cup of kindness yet
For the sake of auld lang syne

We two have paddled in the stream
From morning sun till night
The seas between us Lord and swell
Since the days of auld lang syne”

From the original Scottish, it does not mean to question whether old acquaintances should be forgotten and never again brought to mind. My interpretation (or translation) of the intention of the song is to say “let’s drink a cup of kindness for the sake of those people we cherish, for old time’s sake.”

Because, for me, they are not and will never be forgotten, although I often fear the loss of the minutiae. I fight a daily battle to continue on, and yet to also hold onto every tiny detail I can possibly remember.

If you are making new memories with someone you love tonight, recognize in that moment that that’s exactly what you’re doing; you’re creating a memory to look back upon. Relish it. Cherish it. Protect it. More than anything, take a moment to be grateful for it.

I will not be making new memories tonight, but I will be cherishing and offering up gratitude for the ones I was able to make with Scott and with sweet Judah. Time is a thief and the devil is a liar. I will not let that steal my joy or my gratitude for the time I was able to love them. ♥️

Your Process is YOUR process

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If you’ve seen my Christmas tree in the background of photos this Christmas of Lillian, my granddaughter, you may have noticed that it is bare except for lights and the angel. I decorated as much as I could for Christmas this year; I wanted to be dedicated to celebrating the birth of Jesus despite my sadness and longing for it to be different this year. The ornaments, though…

One peek inside the ornament box, beautiful hanging memories tucked away every year, safely prepared for the next, exposed ornaments that my husband had bought for me over the years we were together. I put up the tree, turned on the lights, and pulled the angel from the top of the box, which we usually put on last. All of that was challenging but I did it. And then I began to unwrap ornaments to place on the tree…and promptly fell apart, another moment of the carefully glued together pieces falling apart again, memories scattered on the floor all around me at my feet. Once again, the angel was the last thing I placed on the tree; this time she is alone.

This is a process of rebuilding and falling apart, constantly. Last night I went to see Suwannee Lights with Luke, Patrice, and Lillian. I was overjoyed to see how excited she was and how rapt her attention was on each new display. She barely stopped bouncing, babbling, and shrieking with joy all night. My kids didn’t stop smiling, ear-to-ear, at the thrill of watching her experience this newest “first.” It was beautiful. And then we reached the display for the armed forces. I was fine until we got to the Air Force tribute and the man, in full dress uniform, accepting donations for the Wounded Warrior Project. We stopped and Lillian put money in his basket while I fought back tears, yet again. Oh, how Scott would have LOVED seeing her love this and seeing our other beautiful granddaughter. (You don’t see much about Emery on my posts because I have only seen pictures of her on Facebook. I also don’t share her photos with you because I don’t feel like I should share them, out of respect for her parents, until hopefully one day I have permission to do so. Death brings hurt, loss, and separation in ways we don’t expect before it happens.)

I recovered fairly quickly to keep from putting a damper on their enjoyment but a void keeps the broken parts from jumping back together on their own. They have to be actively put back together again, each time, like a puzzle that has been scattered. To replace them as part of a whole picture, you have to take them, piece by piece, and find the spot where they belong. That is time-consuming but necessary and, eventually, worthwhile.

I’ve learned to accept the things that I just cannot do as necessary baby steps that support my own healing in slow motion instead of failures to “fix” this, like not having ornaments on my tree. I know that one day I will be able to do it but I acknowledge that, for today, it is okay not to. This is part of my process and may not be part of everyone’s. That’s okay, too. Some people cannot live in the same home they did with the person they loved because it brings pain, for me it brings comfort to be surrounded by our day-to-day life. It’s a juxtaposition to the situation with the tree and that doesn’t make sense, maybe, but that’s okay, too.

𝙉𝙤𝙩𝙝𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙢𝙖𝙠𝙚𝙨 𝙜𝙤𝙤𝙙 𝙨𝙚𝙣𝙨𝙚 𝙞𝙣 𝙜𝙧𝙞𝙚𝙛 ᴀɴᴅ ᴛʜᴀᴛ ɪs ᴏᴋᴀʏ. ♥️