These past few weeks have been both quiet and chaotic in our
household. We’ve been hustling and
bustling around the holidays, we’ve had lazy snow days at home. We’ve been taking down our Christmas
decorations and sprucing the place up to look fresh for the New Year. We’ve been going through old things and
getting rid of what we could – and overall, just enjoying this time we’ve had
together as a family.
We also spent a few days in the hospital after Buggy had
some unexpected illnesses. We joke that
Ellie knew it was a new year and wanted to make sure we met that deductible on
day one. Little monkey. Our rush to the ER last Monday was a scary
drive, mostly because we’d been shaken to our core recently when a little
friend of Ellie's and Kaleb’s passed away.
I don’t want to compare our experiences to theirs at all, but when another
little kiddo with medical complexities seems to be so healthy (for her) and
then is swept into the arms of Jesus so suddenly, it’s hard not to think about
how damn fragile life is. Not just for
kiddos like Victoria and Ellie… but for all of us. It’s hard to swallow the lump in your throat
when you can’t see through your tears of mourning as you’re trying to keep it
together. I waited until after Christmas
to let Kaleb know that his sweet friend passed away. We both sat and cried it out together. Then he asked me for a blank paper and
grabbed his crayons and headed to the table.
He drew a picture of him building a block tower with Victoria and showed
me. I put it on the fridge and let him
know I’d give it to her parents. A few
days later, I came out of the bathroom ready to go to her viewing. Kaleb saw me (not in yoga pants) and asked
where I was going. I told him. He jumped up saying, “I want to go with you”. I encouraged him not to. I told him that it was not a fun thing… it
was a very sad time and I didn’t think he wanted to go through that. I was trying to shield him from the realness
of it all.
See, when I had just graduated high school, a close friend
of mine died during our class trip. The
days that followed were impossible. We’d
been there… we’d seen things as they transpired. We got the call from friends who went with
the ambulance to the hospital. We made
the calls home and parents cried on the phone with us and booked us emergency
flights home. When we went to his house
to talk with his parents, I can’t begin to describe how awful I felt. How unfair it was that we were home… and he
was not. The guilt in the midst of that
grief was unbearable. I took my own
experience and tried to impart a bit of that wisdom on Kaleb. I told him that he didn’t want to see
Victoria this way and that it was better for him to remember all the fun things
they’d done together. Through tears he
said, “Mom, she’s my friend. I’m going
with you.” I called Brandon to get his
take on it. If Kaleb really wanted to
go, he could go. So I sent him upstairs
to get some nice clothes on. He came
down with a new button down and asked me to put his tie on him. He had slacks on and brought down tennis
shoes. We swapped the shoes for dressier
shoes and combed his hair. All the way
there, he talked about Victoria and the things they’d done together. He talked about how funny she was and about
all of the things they’d done together in the two years that they were in the
same classroom. I was so proud of him,
but still unsure of how he’d react at the funeral home.
In October 2016, my grandma passed away. This was the first funeral that my kids had
gone to that they’d remember. They
mostly played in a back room during the viewing. They had a TV there to watch and games to
play. Not until the end of the day did
they come into the room to be with the rest of the family. It was then that my boys realized that
grandma was in the front of the room, laying in a casket. Lance stood back and looked over her, then
sheepishly came back and sat by me.
Kaleb went up to the casket and stared at her. He stood there for a long time taking in the
whole situation, then came back to me and said, “Mom, isn’t that your grandma
that got dead?” in a voice way too loud for comfort. He went back up to the casket and took
another long look, then came back and joined me. He was pretty awkward. I was sure this time would be no different.
When we walked into the funeral home, Kaleb immediately
noticed the screen in the lobby cycling through pictures of Victoria. He carried his artwork with him as we went
into the viewing. I went up and hugged
her parents and spent some time talking with her momma. Tears poured down. Kaleb followed suit and hugged her dad, then
handed him his drawing. He hugged her
momma, then took a long look at Victoria and told me how pretty she
looked. She did look pretty. He went up closer to her casket and showed me
all the things he recognized in there – her special backpack that he said held
her feeding pump (he knows all about these, he said) – her doll – and other
sweet drawings. Victoria’s mom thanked
me for bringing Kaleb and we proceeded to spend the rest of our time looking at
the hundreds of photos throughout the room.
Kaleb was excited to look at the pictures and show me how cute Victoria
was as a baby and was really excited to see a picture with him and Victoria
together. Overall – he was everything I
needed him to be that day and more. He
showed strength and peace through the viewing that was admirable for a
five-year-old. I know that he likely
doesn’t understand the whole impact of the situation, and that is okay. I was afraid to bring him with me… I was
afraid that seeing classmates would be too hard on her parents. I was wrong.
Looking back on my own experience at 18, I was probably wrong then,
too. I’m sure Jason’s parents had a very
hard time seeing us come home when their son couldn’t, but I also think that
maybe it was helpful to have his friends in their home again. I guess I don’t know.
I’ve had far too many friends and family members lose their
children. I’ve thought about this
scenario too much. I know that if one of
our children were close to going home to heaven, I’d want the rest of our
children there, too. I don’t want to shield
them from the pain of that experience.
While it’s tragic and it’s awful and it’s a pain that never goes away,
it’s always seemed like a necessary pain to me.
As most of you already know, I lost a nephew 13 years ago. The pain of his passing is still so very
sharp. It’s sad and it’s unfair and it’s
overwhelming, but it’s real. And the
pain we feel today is a testament to the impact his little life had on our
hearts. When a friend of mine posted
this video last week, I had to watch it several times. If you watch to the very end, you’ll hear her
say, “You can trust a human being with grief. Grief is just love squaring up to its oldest
enemy. And after all these mortal human
years, love is up to the challenge.” In
that story and in my own, children have found ways to teach us adults that love
is certainly up to the challenge. Allow
grief to well up in you and burn in streams down your face. Let that love you have square up against
death and let it be real – however that manifests for you – because we are
capable of handling it. Our love is great
enough. Take in your day today – and tomorrow
– knowing that love sustains us all. Take some time to be thankful for all of the sweet memories you've made with the loved ones you've lost. Let grief happen. Let the scars be known because they are, indeed, signs of love... deep, ridiculously beautiful love.
No comments:
Post a Comment