Any Given Moment

Grief is such a difficult thing to talk about.  Eight years ago today I lost someone I loved very unexpectedly and it rocked my world to the core.  Initially when grief hit it felt like I had forgotten how to breathe.  The things that used to happen so naturally like sleeping, smiling, laughing, and getting dressed now felt foreign and uncomfortable.  Feeling unable to breathe is painful but it feels appropriate since how can you go on as if everything is normal when you know some things will never be the same again.  The pain is almost comforting at first because it makes you feel connected to that person.  You feel like if you hurt enough it will keep you tied to them and them to this earth.  That somehow if your pain is enough somehow you’ll wake up and will have been nothing but a terrible dream. 

The first time I laughed after the accident I felt guilty but also relieved.  That’s why grief is so tricky is because there are no hard and fast rules about how to recover from the sadness.  The journey with grief is different for everyone.   How do you maintain a reverence for the person who you lost while still moving on with your life?  What is the right amount of time to be sad and the right amount of time to rejoice in memories of your loved one?  After the pain subsided I went through a phase of numbness.  I was so tired of hurting and over thinking everything that I just stopped feeling much at all.  It felt easier to disengage.  This didn't hurt as much but it also wasn't helping me heal.  I found out that by disconnecting from my sadness I was also disconnecting from other people. 

After a while I realized neither of those first responses was working for me.  I slowly started to accept that it was ok to feel normal most of the time but that sometimes something would trigger me and I would burst into tears and that it was simply going to be that way for a while.  I even realized that those triggers may happen periodically for the rest of my life although they continue to decrease in frequency and duration as time passes. 

In the past eight years I have learned to never take the people I love for granted.  I have learned to never stay mad for long, it simply isn't worth it.  I have become a stickler for people wearing seat belts and have yelled at people more than once for being careless and not wearing one.  I have learned that through great tragedy some wonderful things happened in the lives of people who knew him.  I have been delighted by stories of his life and how full it was even though it was way too short. I have been touched that people still remember him so vividly and that he meant so much to the people around him.  I have been humbled by the acknowledgement that God gives and God takes away.  I have been reminded that it is sin in the world that causes such awful tragedies and God simply helps make beautiful things out of the ashes.    I have been comforted by the knowledge that Mike is in heaven and that we will see him again one day.  I have been heart broken by realizing our future kids won’t get to meet and grow up with their amazing uncle.  But mostly I am thankful that I knew him and that we can continue to tell his story!

At any given moment your life can change.