I need a broom

October 27 2017

i woke up around 530 this morning to the sound of the intrusive wind rattling the wind chimes and teasing the heavy branches of our apple tree into believing they can fly.

There are snow flurries.

I had been dreading this change in the season where fall gives way to winter weather far too soon in this part of the country.

Mali and I would rejoice when the snow would start. Always hoping our weather man (who is usually wrong) miscalculated the amount of snowfall. Like praying for great surf in my former life, we prayed for endless feet of snow. This usually came to no fruition. It was always fun to dream.

With her abscence all that is left is cold, howling wind and flurries.

Today is a reflection day for me. I’m on a vacation day. I have become adept at filling in my time.  So much time now. So much quiet.

The usual chaos from having children in our home has given way to premature empty nest.

That empty nest that a couple of months ago was sheer anguish has changed. It’s like the aftermath of a great tsunami now. Finally able to take in the weight and breadth of the damages. We have hit the clean up stage of our grief. Not sure where to start but well aware of the mess laid out before us.

I still cry and wail in anguish. Just not like I used to. It’s more of a quiet despair. Her name is always on the tip of my tongue and she is always on my mind. Every now and then someone asks a question about her.  I burst into tears.

Open enrollement at work has stressed me out.  Her name all over the health insurance, dental, vision, life. Her status as a beneficiary on insurance policies. College funds. HR asking for a death certificate, her date of death. I become mute and barely manage 4/8. It’s a whisper I shove out mouth. Then tears.

I takes a lot of energy to live in this state  I try to put on a good face at work but my eyes are a testimony to the lie.

I hope it snows feet today.

 

 

Guilt

I learned a long time ago guilt was such a useless emotion. Don’t get me wrong, I still experienced it but merely acknowledged it and moved on.

Since Mali left this world I have been consumed by guilt. A lot of it misplaced.  I should have seen the signs, I shouldn’t have been softer when she was so anguished. I should have taken that day off to be with her. I shouldn’t have taken that job that had me traveling so much. I should have home schooled her.

I feel like I let her down and caused her suicide. That is an awfully heavy load to bear. I try to remember she chose to end her life. To no avail, I own that choice even if I know in my head the silliness of that statement, my broken heart directs me differently.

The lonliness that has ensued since has been a vast chasm of emptiness and sorrow. She was my dearest friend and her absence is duly noted.

I spend my time with only her on my mind. I ache to hold my child. Smell her, hold her hand. Laugh with her. She used to sing this crazy little song from the Lion King. I can’t remember it now.

I put many pieces of her favorite clothing in ziploc bags to preserve her smell. It’s all I have. I spend my lunchtime with her at the masoleum.  She always has fresh flowers.  As the days go by I am losing what is left bit by bit.  It is pure torture.

The guilt is so consuming. I ride it out daily.  I miss you duck.  I miss you ducky princess.

 

What is hope?

Fall has set in. I see it as the leaves in the trees turn, the wind becomes cooler. The taste of Autumn air with its subtleties, the garden passing into sleep, apples heavy on the trees, daylight growing shorter and night longer.
Your room is as you left it. Entering your space is hard. Where once I would sleep in your bed wrapped in your blankets and pillows trying to hang on to the essence of you, that as I write is fading slowly.
Boxes of your clothing stacked in your room, not to remove you but an effort to preserve what little of you I have left, except in memory.
Oh how I long for you. The smell of your hair, your laugh, that big smile.
As I try to understand the meaning of death, my search has led me down our Catholic faith. God in his mercy and intercession of his Mother that you reside in heaven.
I am unable to comprehend Heaven or hell. I read books, blogs, and listen to the stories of others that have lost a child.

C.S. Lewis once said grief was so similar to fear. Maybe he meant fear of our own Mortality.
All I know since you left is a vast emptiness. Spring and Summer came and went and I barely noticed it. I find comfort in nothing.
Some say it will get better. I want so badly to believe. If I pray enough an answer will come. Perhaps I ask the wrong question.
Service to others provides some meaning. It is not a replacement to being your Mama.
Pain is my companion. My therapist thinks I’m getting better. Maybe it’s the medication that dulls my brain.
I obsessively long to be with you.
I want to leave this place of sadness and go as far away from it as I can get.
Your Felicia holds me here. His pain is as palpable as mine. We’re like two people clinging to each other and trying not to drown. Self preservation is the life jackets that keep us above the water and all I want to do is take mine off and sink to the bottom.
The realization you are never coming back is real now. There is nothing I can do about it.

Half a Year, One Day At a Time.

Today marks 6 months since Mali left us. It has been a hard path to walk. Our family has stumbled, crawled, cried and suffered pain. Unbelievable pain. The ocean of tears we have cried could raise the sea level. We have bargained, begged and pleaded.
Throughout this darkness and the immense sadness that dropped on us like a house, we have found love.

Love in our family and friends, strangers, new friends.  People who have been right where we are and those that have supported us through this fog, not having gone through losing a child but, are stilling willing to hold our hand and guide us in the dark, getting us to safer ground.  I have nothing but love and gratitude for these people.

Thank you for being kind to me when I can’t be kind to myself.  Thank you for listening to me cry and rant.  Thank you for not judging me when I took everything too far and you still loved me.

God has to sometimes shake my soul so I can be aware of all the love around me. Including his love. God has never left me through any of this.

6 months ago I didn’t t just lose my daughter, I lost my dearest friend.  I’m a matter of minutes she was gone.

Im still trying to make sense of something I will never be able to make sense of.  My life is a mess.  Every day though, I get up, pull myself up by my bootstraps, pick up where I left off the previous day and start again.

Experience: that most brutal of teachers. But you learn, my God do you learn.  C.S Lewis