The dates and times of our children's deaths are forever seared into our brains. For me, it has meant when the number nine or September comes up, I pause to realize that is the month of my son, Chris' birth and death. If any number around twenty-three comes up, I calculate how many days this is is before or after Chris' last earthly birthday. If twenty-four or near there comes up, I remember Chris died on September 24th.
It is an odd mental exercise. Perhaps some of you do this without realizing it. Perhaps it is part of PTSD which the death of our children can cause. Perhaps, it is a way of accepting or transitioning into a life without our children. An internal, subconscious clock that repeatedly punctuates our lives and most certainly time. A means to accepting without ever forgetting.
How very unfair for us as parents to be reminded of our children's deaths by so many simple things. But, this is, unfortunately, how our lives are now. Just as I recall September 19, 1976, as the date of Chris' birth, I remember September 24, 1999 as the date of his death.
We cannot avoid these recollections, these calculations, these dates. They come into our hearts and heads because the dates of these significant events punctuate our lives into before and after. We did this or that when son or daughter was alive. We can no longer bear to do this same activity on a particular date since our sons or daughters died.
I can't say, "Do not do this," because somehow, punctuating is a method of coping, of handling our lives and containing our grief. And a time of year that brings fond memories, plus anger and sadness that the happy times have been cut off by another date. We all do this. We are not alone. Nor, are we crazy.
Our punctuation points will never go away, but we need to strike a balance within ourselves depending on where we are in our grief journey. Anywhere from complete absorption in grief or several days of melancholy which pass.
I suggest daily journaling to help express grief and a way to see our progress in re-integrating life without our children. Do TaiChi, pray, yoga, massage, relaxing music, gardening. Or a new hobby like painting, pottery, making beaded jewelry, sewing, a walking club. Whatever helps lift you up mentally and physically. None of this will bring back our children, but it will help us accept the facts as they are. To stay grounded in reality. Out of bed, avoiding self neglect, off the couch, even out of a dark closet or away from the TV screen 24/7.
Mourning a child is the worst of any pain. But the pain has to be confronted gradually to help us, as parents, move forward inch by inch to having a life again for ourselves, our spouses, our partners, our living children and for gainful employment. Life will go on around us for a period of time. Then bit by bit we find a new sense of "normalcy." How we get there is an individual, but necessary, process for each of us. We are not okay with what has happened. Nor should our lives be defined and destroyed by the deaths of our children. This the mysterious "acceptance" I so often mention, punctuated as it is.
"But I am in pain and despair; Lift me up, Oh God, and save me!" Psalm 69: 29
P.S. My sincerest apologies for being away for so long. I am juggling several health issues and frequently in much pain. I hope you will pray for me as I do for you.
Love, peace and strength, Rosemarie
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