Be True to Yourself

When David died I became powerless, and was stripped of my self worth. I was left hollow, and my sense of identity crumbled as well. These feelings were confirmed by the fact that people avoided me because of my loss.

The death of my son has thrown me into the darkest days of my life. It is so difficult to write about my feelings as words cannot begin to describe the pain. People avoid me and therefore I try to mask my inner self and pretend to be normal. Yet by doing so I know that I am not true to myself and that makes me sad and unhappy. I cannot live a lie because by doing so I will destroy my soul, and my self worth. Therefore I decided to be me. I will no longer pretend to be the person that I am not. 

Losing a Child Distinguishes Me from Every Parent Who has not Lost a Child

Having lost David distinguishes me from every parent who has not lost a child. These parents are fortunate and do lack my perspective on life. They do not know how I feel. They mean well, but they just do not know. They tell me to be strong. They tell me that they feel for me. They tell me that the pain will dull. They tell me that my son had gone to a better place. They don’t know that I want David here and not somewhere else even though it may be a better place. I don’t want to hear that. I don’t want people to give me any advice. They cannot unless they have had a similar experience.

There is an absence and a horrible silence in the house. There is a longing for David beyond description. There will never be the same happiness in my life as before until I hold David again someday. People ask me if I am still going to therapy. As if therapy is going to work like magic, which is going to take my pain away. I realize now that nothing works. How could it? How could anything work when my life blood is taken? How could I become whole again? I might reach a stage where I will get better, but I will never be the same complete person as before. I know it. I feel it in my soul.

God and God Alone

Shortly after David died, fear gripped my soul that people will forget him. As time passes I am realizing that he cannot be forgotten as the mere presence of my person seems to remind them of the loss. However, they choose not to remember him as they refuse to even mention his name.

I am at a turning point in my life where I try not to talk about David to close friends and relatives to the level that I used to.  I want them to think that I am over my loss, yet by doing so I hurt more and feel so alone. I feel more comfortable with strangers and with other parents who share a similar loss.  I have a great sense of sadness and overwhelming sorrow because I feel that they are burying my son over and over again. When someone dies, his spirit and life remain alive in our hearts and memories. Why should we therefore act as if they never existed? There is a healing effect in bringing them up and mentioning their names. Yet I feel intimidated or maybe that I am doing the wrong thing when I mention his name, or his age or his birthday or his anniversary, or the number of years that he has been gone.  I am realizing that God and God alone understands my thoughts and I can communicate with Him at any moment.  “Behold I know your thoughts”.  Job 21:27

Cape Cod Flowers

Advice to the Recently Bereaved Parent

When your child's candle burned out, you were left  in the dark grouping to find your way again. You have to go through the pain and there is no pain like this pain. Even though you will feel like you want to die, somehow you will survive. However you will struggle every day to make it. You will be dissatisfied with life because the one you love is gone and you will forever long for him/her. Any occasion or celebration that you are involved in will be a mixture of sorrow and joy. You will ask many questions, but there are no answers. People will offer you solutions, but there are no solutions. You will worry that in time people will forget your child. Trust me your child will never be forgotten. Just take it day by day. Do not worry about tomorrow. Try to live in the moment. Everything that you thought was important is no longer important. You will see life in a different way. Be good to yourself. Nothing that you do will change anything. Remember that you did the best that you could. You should not feel guilty about anything. Your child knew that you loved him and you were loved  in return. You can keep your child safe in your heart. As long as you are in the flesh, you will hurt. Your heart is bleeding and healing will take a lifetime. You will see so many things that will remind you of your child. You will hear your child's music and cry. You will watch your child's favorite TV programs and cry. You will see young people who resemble your child and cry. Yet you will be thankful that your child was a part of your life even though for just a short time. The value of life is not to be measured by the number of years, but by the impact that your child's life had on others. Your child will be missed terribly.

I cannot tell you how to do it. Each one of you has to find your own way. I know that keeping busy helped me as well as walking. Sometimes when I was about to bust I just walked. It is as if I was walking my grief away. I found that the car was the safest place for me to cry and scream. I think that tears are helpful. At times I could not function unless I cried first. I sat a lot and did nothing. I was fatigued. They say that grieving is the hardest work that one can do. You are going to feel that life has no meaning anymore and that you have no purpose. It is OK to feel that way. I used to say to the Lord while crying “Lord anything, but not my son”. I had a hard time going to church as every hymn brought tears to my eyes. I remember when I heard “Rock of Ages” I just could not stop crying. My eyes still drain as if they leak. When I hear the hymn “Be still my soul” I tell the Lord how can I be still when my soul is raging. I experienced anxiety and my legs shook. At times I could hardly breathe. When I was desperate, somehow the Lord sent someone or something happened that allowed me to survive. It is a daily battle. I was told that I needed counseling and I went for a year. It did not solve anything. You need to find someone who is willing to listen to you. I must admit that time does not take the sting away, but it lessens the frequency of tears and will give you some relief. If I did not have the Lord and nature I would not have survived. I thank the Lord for the beauty of his creation which has become more pronounced after the loss. The people that I thought would be there for me were not. I was amazed at the strangers who were more helpful than the so called friends. Everyone is going to tell you to be strong. You don’t have to be strong. You have earned the right to be whatever you want to be.

See Beauty in Life

God created a world full of wonder and glory. He created it for us to enjoy. I was always attracted to the beauty of nature even as a child. I grow up in a very poor home and did not have toys to distract me and therefore I played outside most of the time. There was a meadow by our house and I enjoyed the wild flowers as they bloomed, especially the white daisies and the poppies. I learned to distinguish edible plants from those that were not edible.

When I lost my son David, I wanted to die. I could not tolerate the pain. I felt that I could not go on. I would only sit and do nothing. I would wake up crying and go to bed crying and I cried many times in between. I would scream. I would wail. I would throw fits of despair. I would get in the car and drive to nowhere yelling and screaming. I would follow cars when the drivers appeared to look like David, chasing them in order to get one more glimpse of him. I kept myself so busy in order to avoid the pain and sorrow. Sorrow came back at great frequency and I had to figure out how to survive. Sometimes when I could no longer tolerate the pain I would sprint out of the house and go for a walk. Walking seemed to help quite a bit. I would walk until I got exhausted and then I would sit and sit doing nothing. Then one day I decided to create a garden for David and named it “David’s garden”. Now I have many gardens and many meadows and they are all David’s gardens. As I gardened I became more in tune with nature. Its wonder and beauty made me alive and distracted me from the pain, worries and problems that occupied me. I was able to face these problems because I saw beauty in everything and my son is becoming more beautiful to me with the passage of time.

My advice to you is to see beauty in life. Teach your children to be responsive to the beauty of nature and the wonder of every aspect of life. I believe that this will tend to make them more enthusiastic and to live their lives with full zest and zeal. They need to learn that they live in a beautiful world. They need to learn to see the beauty in everything and to make the most out of every moment of their lives.

December 15, 2004 Diary

December 15, 2004, it is bitter cold but sunny. My emotions ebb and flow. One day I wake up fine and as the day progresses, my sorrow builds up and then I go crazy, yell, scream and cry my heart out. Other days I wake up in tears and cry before I can get anything done. Yesterday I was a mess. I cried all the way to school and then I happened to park by David’s car, which I gave to our secretary, and that made me go crazy. I got out and touched the car as if I was touching David. Later in the day I saw a small jet going up and up into the sky so far that it could reach the crescent moon that was still visible in the daytime. I longed to be on that jet and imagined myself going up to see David. I never realized how deep the bond is between us. I keep questioning the loss and why God allowed David to leave us at such a young age. At the same time I do not understand why God takes other young people who would have impacted the world in a great positive way as well. Who can understand the mind of the Lord? My thoughts are not your thoughts and my ways are not your ways says the Lord. “Every man dies” keeps ringing in my ears. I cannot forget that the Lord id faithful even though my anger blinds me at times. A student left me a sweet note after the final “I am deeply sorry for your loss; I can only imagine what you are going through. Just know that he is with God, a better place”. That caused the tears to flow again. Tears for David will never dry.