SUPPORT GROUPS

When Andy first passed I sought out a number of different online support groups mostly because I had the need to know if what I was feeling was normal.  The loss of a child is so overwhelming.  It turns one's world upside down and nothing seems real.  I just wanted to know that others were also experiencing what I was.  However at that time I did not want to talk.  Most likely because I couldn't.  To say much more than how agonizing it was would be to acknowledge what was unacceptable to my heart and brain at that time.

Over time living without my son has not got much easier, I will not lie.  But one must learn to accept what is, if one is to go on living.  We just have no other choice.  The pain is still so very real and all too often very raw but now we are much more aware of it and we have no other choice but to find ways to live with this pain.  I often compare it to having a huge hole in my heart, over time I'm learning to plant flowers around that hole to make it more peaceful to visit.  Those flowers are the wonderful memories I carry with me of my son's life.  I am planting them in such a way as to try and hide the hole as much as possible but make no mistake, that hole is still there! 

I'm coming to recognize a new purpose for support groups and possibly a more meaningful purpose .  Now I could be wrong, this stage is new to me but I suspect that new and possibly life long friendships will come to bloom from some of the support groups now as I come to depend on them for that one place where I can still go to release my feelings that will always remain with me.  Unlike any other grief, the loss of a child is one that never goes away.  It seems many of us carry with us to some degree a need to speak of our angels and "nurture" them in some way.  Support groups such as Compassionate Friends and others offer that opportunity.  We can show pictures like other mom's show pictures of their living children, we can nurture by participating in candle lighting and balloon releases and other events that allow us to still feel involved in some way in our child's "life" and we have the chance to build friendships with other parents who understand these needs and feelings because they have them too, something that only a grieving parent can understand.

I've noticed that it's fairly common for grieving mothers to join a group then need to back off for a time then many find their way back.  I suspect that this could be why.  Perhaps we back off during that painful period when we are facing the reality of acceptance? 

As I said, I'm still learning, this is always a growing new "normal" for me which I am simply sharing my thoughts along the way.  But it's just a hunch that support groups can offer a nice soft place to rest once that painful reality of acceptance has been faced.  A place where they understand.

HOLIDAYS

As holiday joyfulness
Starts to fill with cheer
My heart sinks much lower
Becoming more aware
you're not here.

While others gather together
Their families intact
Pretending I'm happy
Becomes so much harder  an act.

They just can't understand
And I pray they never do
What its like for me
To face holidays without you.

I just want to hide
"Silent Night" has a new tone
As I whisper your name
In the darkness alone.

Yet never before
Have I felt closer to God
After all HE is holding
Part of my heart close in love.

The Road Traveled Thus Far

They say we have no choice but "process" thru I believe
Five stages of grief.  Some take longer than others, some we get stuck in and continue to return to and repeat. 
I've just been reading some of my posts from the past.  I tend to put my feelings out here and try to leave them.  This is my first time reviewing my own words and I guess the social and behavioral sciences major in me is coming out because I'm surprised to recognize some of the stages in my own walk.
I also was a bit taken aback at how angry I've become.  I really don't like seeing that.  Hopefully I'm correct when I say it feels as if a change is afoot.  Although to what I don't know. 
So much has changed.  Are they permanent changes?  Were they necessary in order for me/us to cope?  I suspect so.  But how many of these will have to remain?  I honestly don't know. 
I feel as a family we've hit an all time low but we've hit it together and that's what matters most.  And this low isn't totally due to losing Andy.  I'm facing the worst illness in the worst of circumstances ever.  This is seriously kicking my butt though and I'm more or less without a doctor but waiting for an appointment with the Cleveland clinic and a specialist here in town.  Although through recent information I'm afraid she's the wrong kind of specialist and we simply don't have the money to keep grasping at straws.  Its incredibly scary having to decide what to do!  The wrong decision could cost me my life if I am correct, and a friend going through the same is correct.  But if we're wrong we can't financially afford that.  I could really use your prayers and some guidance from up there in Heaven!  As much as I love and miss everyone I'm really not ready to join you yet.  I'm not finished here!
Looking back I never would have thought I would have been saying that again.  Only by the Grace of God....

A MOTHER'S LOVE

I've felt guilty for neglecting this blog for so long.  "People will think I've forgotten you" constantly runs through my head.  First, let me assure you, that couldn't be further from the truth!  A mother's love for her children begins the moment she knows she's pregnant and carrys on til death, her death to be specific.  Nothing that child does (or doesn't) do can sever that or lessen that love.  As a mother I can can only imagine the grief mother's of people like Jeffrey Dahmer or other violent publicly hated figures must endure. 
People tend to disappear from your life during the "storms" in even the best of circumstances.  Whether they don't know what to say or do, don't like the ongoing negative vibe, or don't like feeling helpless?  I honestly don't know the reason.  I can tell people, when someone needs you even if it seems like there's nothing you can do to change their situation, your mere loving presence is helping. Anyway, to have to grieve in such solitude as those mothers would likely have to would be so horrible.  We long to hear our children's names, living or not, said with love.  Every mother wants that for her child and the grave doesn't change it, nothing changes that.  While they're alive we have the privilege of nurturing them, hugging them, kissing them, listening to them, watching them grow and ...well hopefully be loved and love life.  A grieving mother is robbed of all the "normal" privileges of motherhood with that child.  We must create a new normal. We maintain their graves, hold memorials...write blogs.  Anything that gives us that sense of still being a mom, still loving our child and if it prompts another to lovingly share a memory, say (or write) their name, light a candle... Essentially keep at least their memory alive, we're loving part of them alive. 
Since becoming a GM I've come to understand how very important this is.  I experience it and have yet to meet one single GM who doesn't.  This doesn't end in a year, not in two years, not in even twenty years.  We carry it with us til we are joined with that child again.  Come to think of it, I don't know yet if it ever ends.
So if you know a woman who has lost a child, let her know you think of her child with love.  Just as seeing our living children get love and praise fills any mothers heart with joy, your little moment of acknowledgement is one of the greatest gifts you can offer.

Nothing New

I intend for this to be short.  I'll explain later, unfortunately there's someone who might use some information if I post it to try to hurt me and right now I'm not strong enough to handle that.

Its been rough.  I've been down sick which has left me with a lot of time to just think.  You should have graduated from college, maybe got married, maybe even had a baby by now.  Instead there will be none of that.  There will be no new "happy pictures" of you on my wall.

Acceptance comes a little at a time...probably because that's the only way we can face it.  I love you Amdy-Roo!!

MAY 16, 2014

Ugh, this is what I get for not blogging for a while, so much to say I don't have a clue where to start.  That's the thing about grief. it's this rapid change process which we don't choose, don't know when it's coming, don't know where it's taking us or when if ever it will end.  Normally writing is one of my primary ways of dealing with my emotions but if I'm being honest with you, and I said I would be, with this, there are times it is so deeply personal and overwhelming that it's difficult to write about it.  Difficult to share my feelings and sometimes just plain difficult to identify exactly what it is I'm feeling.

I can say that I have never felt more alone in my life than I do these days.  It's been 27 almost 28 months since Andy passed.  I'm far from healed but I guess people in general feel that I should be by now.  Very few people speak of him anymore.  I've even been called selfish and told that I make his death all about me.  These two individuals who stated this have no clue what it is to lose a child.  My grief and speaking of it is one way that keeps me tied to him and keeps his memory alive.  When I say how much I miss him and how much I still love him I feel that he can hear me.  I want to be sure that nobody makes the mistake of thinking that he will EVER be forgotten like it seems he has been by so many.  There is not a day that goes by that his voice, his smile, his silly jokes and little nuances don't cross my mind and I don't ache for him.  HE IS PART OF ME.  One of the two who stated that I know is simply trying to be hurtful and stir up as much hurt, pain and trouble as he possibly can.  That's just how he is.  Further nobody who knew my son would ever be so hurtful and disrespectful to his family.  If they truly KNEW him they would have known how very important his family was to him and how very important he was to us.  They would know that their cruel words were disrespecting HIM.  He never would have tolerated their words/actions.  Andy was a family man and dare I say a mama's boy in a good sense of the word. a big brother who put his younger siblings first.  It gives me an idea of where many of the nasty rumors that spread thru our small town concerning his death started.  Ironically from one who is spiteful and jealous and one who was never around.  It takes balls to desert him when he's alive and needs his friends the most (especially when you lived so close) then call me selfish for grieving his passing hard.  Maybe if you were around that last year you'd understand.. 

Mother's Day

I'm not sure what to do with myself this holiday.  I'm in a hurricane of feelings but these days I don't think anyone cares.  I guess others can get over the most important people in your life during and suddenly  just being gone but mothers day reminds me that BOTH  my son and mother are gone.  Its a very difficult time and I feel like I don't dare talk about how I'm missing them or how badly I'm hurting.  I've recently been told I'm selfish and that one girl hasn't visited since my son's death "because I'm making bit all about me". I'd ask her one question- having not been to the viewing or his funeral or around me at all, how would you know how I'm handling his passing?