Tag: grief

Decorations – Where?

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas! Trees, lights, tinsel…decorations galore. Boxes out of storage, sifting through wondering, thinking…how will we decorate this year? However, the place to decorate is not the happiest place on earth. It is not a choice one willingly makes. It is the – – – – cemetery✝️

Angie loved Christmas. Remember the movie “Elf”? Well, she would get as excited as that character played by Will Ferrell. Last year, in my attempt to keep things “normal”, I decorated her grave site quite extensively. I even put up a Christmas Tree. I remember people coming with their boxes, busily decorating their loved ones graves. Even in the numbness of the pain, I wondered, “what makes one do this?” Oh, there was a time I probably would have thought “this” was a waste or of no value. My goodness, how time and circumstances can change ones mind.

Angie’s grave site was decked out with decorations while my home was dark and somber, no sign of Christmas there. What a contrast!

Last year, by this time her decorations were up in all it’s splendor. This year it’s just not happening. Not sure what I will do, yet.

It’s not even December, I still have time. And, if it’s different or the same, well…it is what it is. It will come and go before we know it.

~Grace to accept what can’t be changed~

🎄💔🎄💔🎄💔

~Grace to take one step forward, no matter the pain~

A Year Plus

One year and six months…547 days…lots and lots of hours, minutes, seconds. Each second your absence is felt acutely, deeply. Life continues, even when I want it to…STOP! Your room is still the same. Your bed has the same sheets, unwashed, to preserve your essence. Remember Cam (a stuffed animal)? You held that thing, close to your face. Now, I hold it to my face. I miss YOU!

I saw some of your friends on Sunday, they miss you too. It was difficult to be around them, but it was good. Someone said to me, “We are glad you are here. We miss Angie so much. By you being here, we feel like we have a piece of her.” Angie, I hadn’t thought of that. You are missed by so many.

The holidays are coming. Goodness, how you loved the holidays. Not sure how it’s going to be, but hey, today is here. I’ll just do “today”. We will see about “tomorrow”.

I long to hold you, to hear you, to simply be with you. Time makes it feel like you are further and further away. Pictures and videos are just not cutting it. However, I am so thankful for technology, and that I have those videos with your voice and beautiful face. I view them often.

I LOVE YOU so very much and MISS YOU to no end ❤

Valuable Dirt

What draws me here? What do I expect to find? Is it that I am sorely aware that your shell is beneath this manicured lawn? No amount of decorations, beautiful though they are, can remove the agony of reality. Every bug, every worm a horrible reminder of ones end. From dust we came, to dust (dirt) we will return.

As the reel of my mind plays and replays those horrid images, which threaten to undo what little sanity remains, I have to purposefully make the choice to think and meditate on images of heaven – you are whole, complete, full of joy! There is no other way for this Momma’s heart to find comfort and solace.

Almost a year and a half of your departure, AND it still feels surreal. I’m learning to accept that this “feeling” will be part of me until the day I take that same journey and we are united again. Oh, how that day drags on…endlessly painful…my eyes blurred to the horizon.

Do you think of me? Do you miss me? Of course NOT, that would be torture! I know…I live it! No, this isn’t living…I’m barely enduring it!

Death, the ultimate separation. The gut wrenching reality we will all have to face. No one escapes it!

“Grief has a way of lodging itself in the body…There is a substance to sorrow, a gritty reality and physicality that, if left untended, has the power to choke out one’s hope.” ~ Annie Parsons

That Day

That long corridor…step by step. Feet as led, heavy, stuck, yet needing to move forward. That closed door…don’t open it! But, it needs to be opened…gasp! Into a cold, morbid room…knotted stomach, stuck to the spine. Was I even breathing?

Barely standing, gasping…wondering, how is this even possible? My legs felt like they would give way…a hand, loving and strong touched me – my son by my side!

There you were…no smile, no rolling of eyes, no “Hi Mom”…no movement, no sound. Your butterfly t-shirt, comfy pants and comfy socks, such normalness…yet, it didn’t seem right. The teddy bear named Gabriel was in your arms. I remember when it was given to you. I remember when you clutched to it, now it seemed, well, not right. I hear, “take as much time as you’d like.” Time…really, “as much as I would like?” Can I freeze time? Can I stop time? If I could, this is NOT the place I would choose.

“Time” ended…the choice was made. My husband, my son and I put our hands on that door, none of us wants to close. That door that will mark the “end” as we know it here on this earth. It closes, it snaps…my heart shatters, again.💔

Just Grief

Doctors try to medicate it.

Gurus try to meditate it.

PAIN…raw, searing pain.

Let me sit in it; let me feel it to the full.

It’s better than not feeling at all.

If I run from it; if I hide…it won’t make it better.

The depth of my love is greater than the pain.

It’s normal! It’s needed!

No masks!

No games!

JUST GRIEF…

Last Breath…

The dawn of another sleepless night. Your breathing shallow, sporadic…every interval, more and more distant. “It” was lurking at every corner, making “it’s” presence known, felt…making my body stand on edge. “It” had been announced months ago, AND, maybe we had “accepted it”, but the thought that “it” was…almost here was just so unnerving.

Your little frail body, almost a shell of what you had been, finally at peace; finally the screams, “Help, me Mom!” had been quieted. The horrible flow of you vomiting your insides had stopped. Finally, you lay oh so peaceful, not writhing in pain. BUT what was the cost?

At times begging The Father to take you already. At times clinging to every last second of life…wishing for one last

…Hug, smile, giggle, even a grouchy face, anything…one last MOMMIE…

I’m playing one of your favorite songs, trying to sing to you…YOU breathed in ANDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD it was over!!!

My heart pulverized into a gazillion pieces…

I know You are at peace in the very safest place you can ever be. I know I will see You again. I know…I know…I know…

BUT

How do I convince my aching arms that they will hold You, again? How do I tell my ears that they will hear Your voice, again? How do I tell my eyes that they will see You, again? How do I tell the fragments of my heart to beat, again?

I miss YOU, my beautiful girl ❤

Raw Thoughts

Today no rhyme nor reason…no poems or stories…just raw thoughts and pondering.

A heaviness. A feeling of being in a suffocating bubble. The thought that this bubble is protecting you, somehow shielding you, yet so suffocating…not having the strength to burst out of it, or really not even having the desire to come out.

The feeling that “life” is happening all around you. Like an out of body experience, I’m looking “in” thinking “everyone is so happy”…not feeling left out or wanting to engage…the desire to disappear…it would be better.

Hearing people make plans for the future, while your mind wants to turn off or just make it through this moment. Seeing people look at themselves as they work on that perfect body, while all you want is to get your heart rate up so your body can produce that proverbial natural “happy pill” (endorphins).

The feeling that you dampen everyone’s happy moments, like a wet rag flopping on everyone’s happiness. Dragging everyone down, why not disappear?

Sinking, sinking, yet knowing that you are already at the bottom of this bottomless pit.

Noises, people, laughter, life…can it all just SHUT IT!

The masquerade is sickening…I don’t want to play along…where’s the “shut-off button”, can someone, please, turn “it” off………………………….