Category Archives: Grief

cancer, Family, Grief

Be in the Beginning Stage of Grief

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I am self-assessing that I am in the beginning stage of working through my grief.

The fog.

The midbrain.

The haze.

The denial.

I grieve my mom, our move, our old neighbours, our best friend’s move, our loss of friends. Grief is a pervasive theme right now, layer over layer.

I’m in a place where I’m constantly late. This mama, who was “teacher trained” to be on time and to follow a schedule, can’t get her child to school before the bell rings.

I can’t read. This ferocious reader can barely read a paragraph. I haven’t picked up a book in months.

Form filling has now been passed over to Sexy Neck. I used to get a rush from filling out forms. The completion. The finality. The knowing of all the answers. Now, I could care less.

I used to love to organize: people, events and thinking about special gifts to buy. Now I have no energy or need or want to organize anything or anyone or to buy a single thing.

We are living with the bare necessities and having great conversations talking about needs and wants.

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Every day I wake up and wonder, What the hell happened?

It’s like a tsunami has ravaged my expectations, the sense of control and my relationship with my mom. There is debris everywhere containing everything she did with us, for us and just the huge ways she was a part of our everyday life. There are also huge chunks of debris involving my dad’s life, his retirement and their plans together. We get to see, move, feel and touch these pieces of debris every day.

It is exhausting.

Mind blowing.

Devastating.

I know that I am in denial as I can’t even talk with my mom, ponder where she is or even contemplate that I, Steve nor my children will have my mom in our lives again.

I sit in this beginning stage rowing through the waves of grief. I am going to give myself this time to do my ‘work’! As my counsellor tells me, I can do my work now or later, but I will have to go through it one day.

I am choosing each day to sit.

To ponder.

To wonder.

To cry.

To be.

Just enough, each day!

cancer, Family, Grief, Parenting

Be Having A Significantly ‘New’ Normal Day

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I have had an incredibly encouraging and heartfelt day with many new ‘God’ moments. I am full of gratitude. I feel ready to come back to the blogging world to reach out and share this journey once again.

God has been revealin Himself to me through lying down, rest, coincidences, nature (especially sunsets), His word, music, memories and now through simple everyday living.

He is alive.

I am back!

Renewed and new.

Hurting and humble.

Grateful.

🌀 Last night, I had my first dream about my mom. She told me she was going to travel around the world with her friend Sherry and my dad’s friend Oscar. (No idea why these two friends came up… but I have incomplete understanding of many things these days.)

🌀 A friend, A, sent me this book:

20140203-150103.jpg(Note the butterfly on the cover. A gift from God just for our family?)

🌀 I saw a friend’s daughter walking down the road. Another great gift as I am mourning never seeing my people from Vtown on a daily basis.

🌀 CC decided to take his Nana toque out if the bag that I gave out on December 21st.

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🌀 A new friend shared that her close friend’s two year old son died in his sleep. I cried with her and was able to recommend some good grief books.

🌀 For the first time, I noticed that a card that my friends sent from Vtown had butterflies all over it. Butterflies have become very significant for our family around my mom’s death.

20140203-191523.jpgThe card has been sitting above my sink but I hadn’t even noticed the butterflies.

🌀 God gave me this word from a bible study I have been doing:

“Forget about what’s happened. Don’t keep going over old history. Be alert, be present. I’m about to do something brand new. It’s bursting out, don’t you see it?”(Isaiah 43:18-19)

🌀 I have finally decided to open the Christmas gift my mom bought for me, wrapped for me and wrote a tag on all while enduring cancer. I am full of gratitude.

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I feel newness in my journey. I sense God has given me new eyes to see with my heart. I feel a deepening. I wonder what all of this newness will entail.

Wallpaper.

Words.

Helping cancer patients.

Holidays.

A new policy for doctors.

My people.

Christianity, Grief, Jesus Christ

Be Going Underground

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I declare, I am not dead.

I am not gone from your life forever.

I have merely gone underground.

Spiritually, God has me close.

I am in a Holy Space.

Emotionally, I am fragile, weak and have the gift to cry easily.

I am tender-hearted.

Physically, I take care of my body with intention, allowing myself to heal and feel.

I am hurting all over.

Give me your grace for my indecision, my confusion.

My mind is numb.

A fog hovers around me.

I can’t ‘work it out’.

I must just be.

Underground.

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“Despite all appearances…nature is not dead in winter-it has gone underground to renew itself and prepare for spring. Winter is a time when we are admonished, and even inclined, to do the same for ourselves.”

– Parker Palmer, Let Your Life Speak

Grief, Jesus Christ, writing

Be Sharing Poems

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It is not coincidence for me, as you know, that I receive multiple things from different people on the same day.

Yesterday it was poetry.

First, a friend sent me a poem she had read at her grandmother’s celebration of life on the weekend. Then I received a poem from Steve’s amazing Aunt M.

Here’s the first one:

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Here’s the second one:

The Watcher
by Margaret Widdemer (1884-1978)
She always leaned to watch for us,
Anxious if we were late,
In winter by the window,
In summer by the gate.

And though we mocked her tenderly,
Who had such foolish care,
The long way home would seem more safe
Because she waited there.

Her thoughts were all so full of us,
She never could forget!
And so I think that where she is
She must be watching yet.

Waiting till we come home to her,
Anxious if we are late,
Watching from Heaven’s window,
Leaning on Heaven’s gate.

Thanks you two for thinking of me and for loving me with words. Xoxo

cancer, Grief

Be Wanting To Call Papa and Nana

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Here’s the conversation we had when two year old OC told me he wanted to call Papa and then Nana on the telephone. Papa was up cross country skiing, so I knew he was out of cell range. My dear, ever-present mom died on Boxing Day.

OC, who do you want to talk to on the phone? (YouTube video link!)

Sweet child working out his sadness of why he can’t call his Nana. These are his very own words.

I was Surprised!

I was humbled!

I am amazed!

Christianity, Family, Grief, Jesus Christ, writing

Be Asking Why You Blog

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Why do I blog?

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I don’t blog to earn money or to succeed at a job.

I don’t blog to get on Oprah’s network or to become ‘known’.

I don’t blog because I want people to like me or have people get to know me.

I don’t blog so that I can achieve any type of recognition or medal.

Ah ha, this is why I blog.

I blog to be completely present with my family, to be with my boys, physically and mentally, as they are growing.

I blog to watch in awe as my Sexy Neck father’s our boys.

I blog because I have a teacher’s heart. I love teaching by showing others what I am learning.

I blog because I love to write. I love playing with words, thinking about synonyms and metaphors and oh I love editing. Getting rid of words, making new ideas, rewriting whole paragraphs.

I blog because sometimes the topics I think of can’t be said. And I think about a vast array of subjects. Blogging gives me the privilege of sharing what’s in my head.

I blog because I am head over heels in love with God/Jesus/Holy Spirit. His presence in my life in unexpected ways is something that I want to share. I want to see His light shine in this often dark world.

Recently, I blogged to support my mom’s cancer journey and reach out to those around the world who love us. (How much love did we receive? My views went from twenty– which I was very happy with– to over 800 views per day!)

Now, I blog to stay afloat in grief.
To stay real.
To do my painful work.
To see God at work and to stay connected to my people

I blog to just be where I am and to Be Enough to my family and friends.

Why do you blog or why would you like to blog? I am curious.