Tag: wife

Anniversaries are Supposed to be Happy Occasions…right?

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I didn’t make a post yesterday because I needed, for my own sanity and ability to put one foot in front of the other, to essentially pretend that it was another, everyday kind of day. None of my days will ever be the kind of normal I want them to be again; yesterday was certainly anything but “normal.”

May 10th. One year. A whole year. The longest year of my life and yet…wasn’t he just here yesterday? I will continue to say that I really don’t understand how time works after all of this. Or how it can be that my brain knows he is gone but my heart…my heart still thinks he’ll walk in the door any minute. My heart still jumps when I see his location on my phone and it says he’s home. For a split second, every time, I want to get up and go find him. And then after the split second comes the sinking feeling that he cannot be at our home because he has a new one with Jesus.

Tornados hitting the county, a tree falling and crushing my new baby almond tree, my patio furniture being slung all over the place, and no power most of the day while Lillian was with me kept my thoughts busy in the early morning. We hid in the hallway and played with flashlights with all of the curtains, shutters, and doors in the house closed until the danger had passed, then walked window to window to survey what damage we could see from inside. Soon after, a sweet friend took time out of her own busy, kid-filled schedule to just come sit in our powerless house and talk with me for a couple of hours. We talked about a myriad of things but really didn’t focus on Scott. Oh, I thought about him all day long..he’s in most of my thoughts every day…but I couldn’t really talk about him yesterday. I had wanted to spend the day celebrating who he was but then realized I could not talk about him much at all on this “anniversary day” or I would lose what composure I was managing to maintain, a slim cord wrapped around the bulging chaos of grief that wanted to spill out. So I just kept pretending.

A little later my kids started showing up to hang out while we all waited for power to return at our respective homes. We all laughed at Lillian’s antics, which tend to amp up when there are so many of her favorite people there to watch, and everyone tiptoed around what day it was…or more accurately, around what this day looked like, felt like last year. With no power, no TV or music or phones for distraction, it was a blessing to be occupied by casual conversation with others the whole day.

Luke and Patrice asked me to eat supper with them but Austin and Taylor had already invited me to go out to dinner with them at the beautiful 406 restaurant. They took me with them to their anniversary dinner and then insisted on paying for my dinner and theirs. I didn’t realize last year that it happened on their anniversary. I’ve found, along the way, that there is a LOT I don’t remember at all about those days.

Our power was restored and, thankfully, I was able to get some sleep with the A/C on. Much needed sleep because, although I’ve been dreading the arrival of this date for awhile, what I didn’t anticipate was the 9th being much worse than the 10th this time around.

The 9th, throughout the day, was a replay of what we were doing this time last year. Waiting for him to be called to pre-op. Kissing him goodbye in the pre-op area before they took him back. Telling him I loved him and he was going to be fine; I’d see him when he woke up. Sitting with his parents in the waiting room while he was in surgery. Saying goodbye to them while I was waiting for him to be taken up to a room. Seeing him at 7:00 p.m. And then it got really hard. You see, I never saw him on the 10th. Well, I did. I laid in the bed with him but he was already gone. Re-living, again, the hours from 7 p.m. to 11:43 p.m. was brutal. And then remembering the time from then until 12:45 a.m., frantically pacing a waiting room I had been shuffled to and left alone in, trying to get a hold of people I needed, until doctors came to tell me it was over…life, as I knew it and loved it, was over. And the feeling of the cold wall against my back and my shoulder as I slid to the floor, unable to hold my own weight. No. No. No.

That film has played in my head many times during sleep over the last year but usually, while awake, I’ve been able to redirect myself. There are too many whys, what ifs, why didn’t I’s, why didn’t theys, and the ever present “what else could I have done; what should I have done differently to make them save him.” I don’t have a choice when I’m asleep, until I wake in sweat, but in the daytime I can usually waylay the thoughts, except for this time. It’s like when you think about the Challenger explosion, or 9/11, or the Oklahoma City bombing, and you not only remember exactly where you were and what you were doing at that moment but you can feel the shock and devastation you experienced then. This time I was unable to let go of it until I had walked through much of those hours again. The last hours. I’m sure “anniversaries” are different for everyone but I now know that the anniversary of the day before will always be harder than the day they officially called off the code and delivered news to me. By then, he was at peace…and I was desperately clinging to strands of faith that one day I’d find peace here before I go to be with him again.

Looking back, this year has been a picture of God’s hand at work after tragedy. Friends I’m blessed with rallied around and poured love over our family. Some of those same friends have been very steadfast throughout this whole year, understanding that this wasn’t a pain that would disappear after the visitors and meals stopped coming, after the funeral was done. Financially I shouldn’t have been able to maintain what I have been able to thus far. Many times I thought I may be forced to break mine and Scott’s promise to the kids that I would stay home to keep Lillian at least until her mama finished nursing school…but God. Every time I prayed I could keep the promises that Scott and I had made, every single time, God made a way. While I will have to return to work soon, it won’t be before what we committed to. I’m not sure what that work will be but God has given me a year to heal and learn how to manage my grief before needing to concentrate on whatever my new job will entail. I do not even have words to express how thankful I am for this time.

And Lillian, my beautiful, sweet granddaughter. God knew, long before we did, how much she was going to be needed in our family, the light she would bring in darkest sorrows, the joy she would spread even when sadness seemed to reign over everything, the hope she would sprinkle over grown ups, not even knowing that she was doing it.

I haven’t posted much online lately but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been writing about him. This last month, especially, has given me much to write. Now, though, for the most part, I am saving my words for print. I still have a lot to learn about publishing and a lot of choices to make about how to do this, but if everything goes well, and I believe God is in it so it will happen, I will have a book out sometime this year. I always thought my novel would be the first (and really only) book I would write but this book has written itself in my words but by God’s voice of hope intermingled with my trauma. I’ve decided to finally tell about what happened to my husband and how he died…why he died. I have also decided to add in some other very sensitive subjects about loss, widowhood, and being left behind, that I have written over the last year but decided were not social media material. They’ll be in my book. I’m saying this now because Scott really wanted me to publish my novel. He was proud of my writing, even when I felt like I couldn’t get it right, sounding like I wanted. He believed in me so much more than I ever have. He encouraged me endlessly to do this thing I never felt worthy or capable of doing with any success. I do not care, though, about success in an author’s terms. The success is in completing another thing we had planned to do together. This first book won’t be my Christian fiction novel, although I hope to one day finish the other half of it, too, but this book was born of pain and healing, of loss and still living, of devastation clinging to hope. And it is filled with him.

Today is the 11th. This year has been like a marathon (and I 𝘩𝘢𝘵𝘦 running) with those little tents throughout the race where you stop to drink or fuel up before continuing on. My stops weren’t fuel ups, though. They were days I had to get through. Instead of marking my progress by how many fueling stations I had passed (I don’t even really know what marathoners call them) my progress was marked from one day I made it through to another. Holidays, birthdays, probate dates, and tasks completed. The thing about this marathon, though, is that when I finally felt my chest hit the ribbon at the elusive finish line…it wasn’t the finish line at all. It was yet another starting line and I cannot leave until I finish. But when I finish this one, there’s still only another start again. Every marathon, every year that passes, flows into the next and the next with no end, like some ride that you cannot step off of because it never stops moving so, so fast. I’ve gotten through all of the “firsts.” Now I have to learn how live without just surviving each day. So starts a new year…and God will still be in the outcome.

A Break in the Storm Clouds

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Grief is something that attacks not only when you find yourself unaware, but also when you are fully cognizant of the fact that it is coming again. I’ve known for months that my wedding anniversary would be a day that brought deep feelings of loss. So much so that I found it difficult to remember and honor the blessing of that day.

I was blessed beyond measure to have met my husband, to have fallen in love with him and he with me. I was overwhelmingly blessed in the fact that he was such an amazing caregiver, not only to others by way of his profession but to me, as well. He took care of my heart so gently, with such kindness, compassion, and with an immeasurable love. I get so stuck sometimes in the feeling of being cheated by his death that it can be difficult to just be thankful for his presence in my life the years that we had each other, to be grateful that he was ever mine to begin with. Loss covers me so deeply that I tend to ignore the fact that if I never had him with me at all I wouldn’t be grieving now but would have missed out on so much that was worth the unbearable pain I now feel. I would not trade one for the other, not in a million years.

I’ve said it before but I truly believe that there are many who never experience the kind of relationship we had. There are women and men who search their whole lives and never find the beauty of what we were blessed to have. There are many who settle for so much less because they lose the ability to even believe something like it exists, have just given up on ever finding it, or are in so much of a rush to be with someone that they fall into the trap of believing that this is just as good as it gets. I was forty years old when I met him but we crammed a lifetime of amazing adventures, heartfelt moments, life lessons, and very special memories into that small span of time. I still want more, but I am thankful for every moment I had with him.

Because grief comes in crashing waves, though, it’s really hard sometimes not to feel lost and drowning in the undertow. Grief doesn’t come in the kind of waves that soothe you to sleep from the beach; it’s in the kind of waves that cover you in the shadow of a high arch that you already know is going to throw you into the ripping fire coral and broken seashells on the bottom. The kind of waves that hit one after another, sometimes in such quick succession that you aren’t sure if you’ll ever make it to the top to breathe again. In the tumult of those moments, it is almost impossible to reach for the peaceful moments of beautiful memories because the panic that rises within you is all-consuming.

I know the One who calms the wind and the waves. Yesterday morning I reached for him in the absence of my husband and He came quickly with the offer of a leisurely day of spending time with my children and my granddaughter at the zoo. Yesterday I experienced a day of peace. I thought of my husband often, of times we had been at that zoo together, of how his eyes would have lit up with joy over seeing our sweet grandbaby experience seeing all of these things for the first time and of toting her around on his shoulders, but I didn’t spend the day in mourning his absence. My boys are better men because of having known him. My granddaughter will never remember him but is already being taught who he was and how he lived. She will grow up knowing he loved her very much in the short time he knew her. My life is vividly vibrant in so many ways for having loved him, even in the times it seems darkness is all I can see right now some days.

Today, because of the grief-rest I enjoyed yesterday, the waves have slowed down to gently lapping the shore. I’ve been carried back to the beach by the One who walks on water. For today, the storm has calmed despite the fact that in just over a month it will have been a full year since he changed his address to a place prepared for him in Heaven. I know the weather is fickle, but I’ve weathered many storms simply because the God of all creation is intent on protecting me from the cacophony and chaos of loss, even when I am wind-tossed and overwhelmed. Abba God, remind me, in my darkest and stormiest moments, to reach for the rock that is higher than I. Lead me, Lord; I will follow.

Hear my cry, O God,
    listen to my prayer;
from the end of the earth I call to you
    when my heart is faint.
Lead me to the rock
    that is higher than I,
for you have been my refuge,
    a strong tower against the enemy.

Psalm 61:1-3

Whatever Is True…

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Yesterday is hard to explain. If you’ve been following my grief journey then you know two things: 1.) I am a Christian and know God is here for all of it. 2.) I’m very real in my writing about when it doesn’t feel like He is but knowing He hasn’t left me here alone.

Yesterday was our wedding anniversary. If I’m being honest, and I always am in my writing even when it sounds pitiful, I cried more and harder yesterday than I have since the first few weeks he was gone. More than at Thanksgiving or Christmas. More than birthdays. More than all of the everydays that have passed since he was here. Those days all belong to a lot of people. Even birthdays, many people celebrate birthdays with you. This day, it was all ours. It was the day that “til death do us part” was promised. In less than two months it will be one year since “til death do us part” became reality.

It is difficult having an anniversary without the one who created that special day with you through a shared covenant with God and each other. We should have been celebrating it together. My memories on Facebook showed posts both he and I had made over the years, declaring how thankful we were to have found each other, how in love we were, how we couldn’t wait to spend more years and years together. It was also filled with photos of prior anniversary activities. The memories yesterday, at least for this year, made me feel more bitter than sweet. I love that we made so many beautiful memories together but am angry and sad and feel cheated that there will be no more. I kept trying to remind myself to think of whatever is true, noble, right, pure, lovely, admirable, excellent and praiseworthy. I kept trying to praise and be grateful for the time we did have together. I kept trying, but it was hard to feel it. My mind fills with sorrow for what the rest of my life looks like without him. The loneliness. The lost laughter. The absence of arms wrapped around me when I’m sad, scared, frustrated, or happy, excited, and loved. I’ve made it through a lot of days without him so far, 316 as of yesterday to be exact.

316. My anniversary was 316 days after his forwarding address became Heaven. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten son, that whosoever believeth in Him shall not perish but have everlasting life.” John 3:16

It was only this morning that I was pointed to this realization, the 316 days. God watched his son die, just as I had to watch my husband. After Jesus rose again, God took him to Heaven just as He did my husband. Because God willingly made that sacrifice, like I so unwillingly did with my husband, I will have the opportunity to see him again one day and also to spend the rest of my eternity in the presence of Jesus.

I’ll still always, always wish we had longer here together, in this life. I’ll spend the rest of my life not knowing why it ended so soon and in this way. But I’m trying again, today, to be grateful that it is not over. “Til death do us part” only means in this world, not the next. And, for me, my marriage didn’t end at death. People call me a widow but I am married. My husband is just on an extended remote assignment and currently has no way of communicating with family, just like when he was in the deserts of Iraq during Operation Desert Storm. This time, though, he won’t be the one coming home…we will.

Grief Ravine

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February 13th, 2024

I’ve fallen, again, into a grief ravine.

This deep chasm is not unique, not in this place, this particular map of a city I’m passing through in my life.

This ones is not tourist trap.

Oh, I’m trapped here but no one would visit on purpose.

These un-unique, deep gaps

– too ugly and terror-inducing to be called “valleys” – that sounds magical and lush, and green…

”valley” sounds like it slopes down gently and back up again…no, this is no valley.

these deep, vertical gaps are everywhere.

It’s as if someone took a giant hair comb to the earth here,

creating deep, deep, deep slashes into the ground

and leaving very thin, very high peaks in between each one.

The walls of the ravine are steep and very hard to climb.

Sometimes it feels as if the walls are slippery – like there is no place at all to get a foothold.

Then it changes, morphs into a craggy, dirt-packed wall with tiny, broken seashells sticking out

so that when you climb and then lose your footing, the wall tears into your skin.

But your choices are to climb – to 𝘵𝘳𝘺 to climb – or to run along the bottom of the ravine

Endlessly – never gaining altitude to get out.

But the running along the bottom part…

That part just feels easier sometimes.

Or stop moving altogether, just sit here, stay in one place.

I hate it here.

It’s too deep for the sun to shine down here so it’s all shadows.

Like a treasure trove for Seasonal Affective Disorder to collect participants for its annual party, except here there is an annual pass.

You know how that goes: annual passes are never cheap.

This one is very expensive. Very.

The cost of being here is too high to pay. I didn’t choose to pay it.

Thieves.

…Somehow, some way, there is definitely a way to get to a nicer, more lovely city.

I’ve been on other terrain before. I’ve stayed in nice places for long periods of time and never wanted to leave.

So I know better views and cities exist on this voyage I call my life. I cannot seem to find the map.

Perhaps one of these days I will arrive at the peak and it won’t be between ravines that time

A long stretch of flat ground will be there and, beyond that,

No more jagged rocks and broken seashells

But lush greenery, flowers and springtime air with fresh-cut grass.

One day.

For now, if I sharpen my focus a little…or some days, a LOT,

If I remember that I can call out for help and that there is someone who always hears, even from wayyy down here,

I’ll suddenly see camouflaged ropes hanging from the top of the chasm.

I’m not much of a rope climber so it’s still a tough climb, but there are knots in it to help.

Sometimes, when I just don’t even have the strength to reach the first knot, He comes down and sits next to me in the pit.

He lets me rest and watches over me so that no other beast can overtake me down here while I’m unaware.

Then, when I’m ready, He gets on His hands and knees, even in the broken-shell ground, skin-tearing ground, and lets me climb on His back to take the first step toward reaching the rope

To try again, finding the way out which is only up.

There have been times when I have gotten to the top and He has laid down across the gap of the next chasm, letting me use Him as a bridge.

Other times I’m not paying attention and just fall into the next, somehow completely ignoring the sturdy bridge.

One day, I will find the top that extends into pretty scenery. I just don’t know how many more ravines are between here and there.

For today, I can’t decide whether to rest, or look again for the rope.

I’m going to cry out for help finding it because I want out again.

I’m not worried about whether or not He’ll come; He always does.

The Desert

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When I picture a desert landscape, I see sand – lots and lots of yellow sand – cactus upon cactus, maybe some of them with a few pink flowers on them, and perhaps a mirage. That’s about it. Probably blue, sunny, cloudless skies because deserts are very hot.

The desert has dormant seeds, though, that turn into wildflowers! And not just a few here and there; at certain times of year, parts of the desert are carpeted in wildflowers. Those seeds that lay beneath the sand, unbeknownst to anyone traveling a dusty road through the vast desert land, are waiting for the right opportunity to burst forth and bring beauty to an arid landscape.

My soul has felt like a desert for a while now. Dry. Cracked earth. Spiritual food and water are available but sometimes I don’t know what’s “safe” to eat. Some things people offer as comfort are not comforting at all. I have to turn to The Good Book to know I’m getting real nutrition.

The thing about those wildflowers, from what I read, is that they need very specific conditions to bloom and that is why it doesn’t happen often. They need at least one inch of rain to blossom.

I cannot make it rain more often in the physical desert. In my personal desert, a place most often devoid of happiness and enjoyment, I do know where my help comes from. The problem is holding onto that help long enough to get a whole inch at one time.

In the literal desert, humidity is so low that not enough vapor exists to form rain clouds. In the rain shadow desert of southern California, coastal storms from the Pacific Ocean try to blow in to reach the desert but are blocked by Mount San Jacinto and Mount San Gorgonio. It stays dry on the Eastern side of the mountains.

I find my desert often blocked by mountains built by the enemy. Rain is produced but is sometimes stopped from reaching me due to shouting from the enemy inside my weary head. Weary of fighting for strength and joy and “normalcy.” There is no more normal. People say there will be a “new normal” but I’m learning it will never feel “normal”again. It will just always be different in a way it was never supposed to feel. (You can argue “supposed to” and “it was part of God’s plan” with me but I have an entire discourse to kindly but fervently release upon you should you care to discuss it. God knew my husband would die, yes. He, however, did not cause or plan it. He is only capable of GOOD.)

The goal is to keep trying to create the right conditions for enough rain to meet my desert without being blocked by the mountains. There is an entire ocean of water to evaporate from and bring to my desert but I have to keep chipping away at these mountains. They are called despair, hopelessness, depression, fear, to name a few. Oh, I have a hope. I have complete faith about where my husband is now and that I will join him one day. But the hope has not managed to soak my earthly soul yet, for what the rest of my life will look like here.

If my imagery hasn’t hit you fully yet, God is the ocean, Satan and his gnarly minions are the mountains, I am the desert. And I still have these dormant seeds lying within a parched ground. The Bible tells me that I can say to this mountain to be lifted up and cast into the sea…and it will. I believe it…for me, though, it seems to be moving one pebble at a time.

The fact that the mountain is veeeerrry slow moving causes some degree of a crisis of faith for me sometimes. The enemy tries to tell me “if you’re such a strong Christian, a true believer, and God is who you think He is, why is your mountain so hard to lift, huh? Why am I still here, able to hold onto your rain?” And then I remember, over and over again, that God did not ever say I wouldn’t have trouble in this life; much the opposite, in fact. John 16:33 says “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (emphasis mine)

Jesus had trouble. He had so much that he cried and asked God to change what was happening…but the plan for his future was necessary. It was immovable, unchangable, if God intended to create a path to salvation for all of His children. Jesus wept. Jesus prayed. Jesus still died. Jesus rose again.

“I have told you these things so that, in me, you may have peace…” Yes, in Him I have peace at the very core of my spirit even as battle rages within me. I have the peace that I will see my husband again one day. I have peace that I will not always live in a place where there is worry, loss, despair. That does not change what I feel now, just like it didn’t make even Jesus feel carefree that it would soon be over; he still had to live through what physically hurt more than I can imagine.

I’m not a failed Christian because my flowers aren’t blooming yet in this desert where I now reside. (Neither are you if this post aligns with what you are feeling in your own grief.) It’s my desert; I know where the seeds lay planted. I also know they will only be dormant for a time. I know God is brewing up a rain cloud of epic proportions to pour over me because when the enemy fights the hardest it is because God is about to do something big in the Kingdom. I may be down, but I am not out.

Today I will keep seeking sources of living water. Tired as I am, I will continue to search for that which can make my dormant seeds bloom. I have been planted in this season to one day give testimony to what He does in tremendous loss. He stays. He protects my heart. He fights for me when I have no fight left. He is here. Faith means I don’t have to feel it to know that it is still true.

”Even the wilderness and desert will be glad in those days. The wasteland will rejoice and blossom with spring crocuses. Yes, there will be an abundance of flowers and singing and joy! The deserts will become as green as the mountains of Lebanon, as lovely as Mount Carmel or the plain of Sharon. There the Lord will display his glory, the splendor of our God.“
‭‭Isaiah‬ ‭35‬:‭1‬-‭2‬ ‭NLT‬‬

Rod & Staff

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Grief is a UFC championship level scuffle except there are not only two contenders; anger, despair, thankfulness, pain, grace, loss, panic, praise, fear, disbelief, worship, and longing are only a handful of the emotions fighting to be the one on top, the one you can’t shake.

When loss happens and you’re knocked off your feet, life still keeps going on, unbidden, around you. You still get sick. So do your kids. You still have mishaps that cause the need for home repairs. You still get flat tires. If you’re in Florida, hurricanes still come and go. Nothing just stops while you feel like your heart has. You don’t get to just grieve “in peace” because the world just keeps turning and everyone else goes along with it. One thing I have learned in this process is that grief feels like unmitigated emotional chaos.

In a maypole dance, the pole stands still at the middle but children holding ribbons dance around it, over and under, which leaves the pole completely wrapped in ribbons. Braided ones that you can’t just let go of and have them fall off; nope, they have to be untangled. This is how it feels when you’re just standing still trying to catch your breath, but the emotions and the daily occurrences of “normal” life are still swirling around you, over, under, and around. It all gets tangled up and twisted around until just the normalcy in itself makes it hard to breathe. HOW can the world be normal without that person here who was so very much a part of what your world IS…was…

And so a daily (and sometimes nightly,) battle ensues. The battle to try to keep the positive things on top and wrestling the negative ones to the bottom, underneath…but underneath means they’re still there – maybe even closer to the core than they were before.

Since January, for reasons I cannot even identify, my core has been strangled by emotions that I have great difficulty controlling. I’m doing the things that I know to do: taking medicine for major depressive disorder (not my first tangle with this beast,) staying in the Word daily, trying to stay busy on the days I can force the energy to do that, taking vitamins, trying to eat food that is nutritious (sometimes) and drinking water, journaling to get the thoughts in my head to the outside so I can sort them. Nothing is making the scales tip in my favor lately, however.

It. Just. Hurts.

I’m not a stranger to pain. I’ve had kidney stones several times. I have given birth to three children. Each of those children has been hospitalized at one time or another – actually, each has been more than once. Each of these things has a time when the pain will cease. You pass the stone (and/or have surgery to be able to pass it.) The baby is born and the contractions stop. Each of my children, thankfully and by the grace of God, have come back home with me from various hospitalizations. But this…this has no end date as long as I am on this earth. When people say “Honey, you’ll be alright; this too shall pass” I want to say “Yeah…like a kidney stone.” It will never go away. It hurts as it passes and there are more up in the renal pelvis just waiting to get stuck. Last count I had five on one side and four on the other. So there is really no end; there is just wondering when the next attack will begin.

I’ve lost people I loved and cared very much about before. It sucks. I have a pretty good vocabulary but any way you shake it, that phrase just feels right. It just sucks. And yet even still, this is different. The cut is so deep that sutures won’t fix it; it has to be left open to heal from the inside out. And being open leaves it accessible and vulnerable to every single organism. In the case of grief, the visceral pain leaves you open to spiritual attacks on every side.

I don’t war against God. I war with Him. Even when I already feel defeated, I’ll be on the winning side of this one day. In the meantime, He’s got a plan for what He wants to do with me during the rest of the time I’m here. It’s my job to figure that out. Even while I’m sick. Even in the middle of a hurricane. Even with a flat tire. I have to figure it out. No pressure.

My purpose right now is my granddaughter and doing what I can to help and keep “raising” my already grown up kids. Turns out they do still need their mama after they turn 18. (Don’t tell them that when they’re 16 or you’re going to get a fight.)

I guess it’s not that I don’t have a purpose. It’s that God promises to give beauty for ashes. I think it’s that this tragedy needs a purpose. I did not find solace in the purpose of trying to make it right for other people who would tread the same path my husband trod in the hospital system. Giant corporations are going to keep doing things the way they do them because the laws are written to protect them and because they have enough money to fight against having to change the way they do things just because it’s the right thing to do for the people they are supposed to serve. The way they do things saves money and they have zero reasons to stop doing that when our laws don’t hold them appropriately accountable. That is what it is. Period.

So what purpose can come from him being gone? Nothing is ever going to make this right. It cannot be “fixed.” That is what I’m waiting for God to tell me. Please, take the ashes and show me the beautiful part.

My granddaughter is beautiful. The ashes are that her PopPop doesn’t get to see her grow up. My children are amazing. The ashes are that they don’t have the benefit of his example and his help learning things anymore. My home is beautiful. The ashes are that we bought it together and now I own it alone. There has to be more than ashes in all of this. Of all of these ashes, something good must be made by shaping them into some kind of art. Some mosaic of the broken pieces of our lives.

Since January I have been tossed in waves of despair and feelings of desolation. I survived the holidays! That alone should have been cause for some feeling of accomplishment but instead the road began a downward spiral on an escarpment of epic, steep curves and I cannot seem to stop the trajectory right now.

What I do now is know that God is riding it out with me and will catch me before I hit the bottom. He’ll either lift me back to the top or He will walk back up the steep path, carrying me when necessary. What I do know is that, although in so many ways I feel alone, I am not alone at all. His rod and His staff, they comfort me. His rod wards off enemy predators when I feel them approaching. His staff guides my direction. As long as I don’t wander away from Him, He can reach me with those. That’s what shepherds do; stay close and tend the sheep.

I don’t know how long I will remain in the valley I am wandering through. I do know that I don’t do it alone.

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.

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.

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. ♥️