My Space

I tell people I'm not who I once was. I don't know if they really understand. Some do. I guess. I hope. For a long time after Erin was diagnosed with cancer I'd said that if she didn't survive, if I had to one day bury my child, then they'd have to put me in the earth right alongside her. They did.  A large part of who I once was is in that ground. Gone.   And when I visit Bronswood I often lie in the soft grass on top of her, feeling her in the breezes that blow and the wind chimes that ring and the flowers that bloom, and I wish I could stay under the protective limbs of the pine tree that towers over her; the one that withstood recent turbulent storms that felled mighty oaks just across the way.

The deaths of Skye and Dr Nachman caused eruptions of fresh pain. It's pain that's always under the surface, but pushed deep to the core by the necessity of everyday living. One has to function and smile. It's expected. And I want to do so.
Most of the time.

There are exciting events happening and challenging responsibilities to learn at new jobs and dirty clothes to be washed.  All important. Some mundane.  All part of -Well, life does go on, you know.
Yes, it does.

We host parties to celebrate the truly wonderful occasions in our lives ~

to welcome the lovely, soon-to-be member of our family

by showering her with gifts in anticipation of an August 6th wedding!

But there's an energy required to roller coaster between these joyous events and that core pain, complicated by the resurgence of my own grief in the recent experience of my friend Hope's fresh grief and my profound sadness over the shocking death of the physician that helped guide Erin to a better life in spite of the chaotic effects of her cells at war within. It's an energy few understand.  
Throw yourself into the present. Into the lives of those around you. Have fun!

I do.  We do, those of us who've buried children do so as best we can, but the gaping hole left by their absence, an unfulfillable hunger pang, constantly gnaws at our insides. Our lives become a complicated series of integrations necessitated by the jagged tear that splits us in two; fragmented pieces penetrating each side.

We grieve the one gone, and look for ways to include them

among the events of the present time.

The internal on/off emotion toggle of those of us with dead children doesn't always switch seamlessly. It occasionally shorts out and results in sparks of tears and exhaustion. Grief truly is hard work.

I'm now the editor of the newsletter for the Chapter of The Compassionate Friends, where I've attended meetings for about a year. Members of the steering committee submit articles of interest for possible inclusion in the issues, and I recently received the one below that I've pulled into the July/August publication. Due to the ever-present dichotomy of grief - joy, and the complexity of the elements that now define me/us, its theme hit home.

~
Please experience me as I am and not as you think I should be. I have
transformed and emerged out of the cocoon of ignorance and paradisiacal bliss.
I have seen the other side of life; I have visited the landscape of suffering
and know all its twists and turns and I need to tell you this story of mine. It
will require of you that you listen carefully and without prejudice. You do not
know this land, how can you; so I will teach you about it graciously.

At times, I may be angry at you for not knowing this place of desolation and suffering, and other times I will forgive you for not knowing. I will often treat you in a
way that makes you feel what I am feeling. I ask you to forgive me for this, but
it is a strange experience being me.

Often I wonder why people do not visit this place of their own accord.
I guess nobody wants to know this kind of sadness unless they have to.

My journeys there have made me wiser, stronger, more compassionate,
cynical, sad and bitter. It's strange, but all of those qualities can be
in the same person at the same time.

I have returned to your world a different person
and if you want to get to know me as I am now, then we
can meet and share with each other. If not, I will leave your space.

TCF Atlanta Online

- beneath the pine tree