They Want to Talk About Death So We'll Talk About Death

The past few days the girls have been asking me about death.

Yikes. 

We’ve talked about it before but no one they are close to has died, which isn’t a surprise since they are 5 & 3.  They understand that when your heart stops beating you die (hey they asked and that is all I could say on the spot!).  They also know that the people you love are sad.  From what they’ve seen in Disney movies it looks like you’re sleeping and they know you don’t come back. 

They know my dad is dead and in heaven.  They know good people go to heaven with Jesus.  We haven’t talked about what happens to bad people.  They know we can’t go visit heaven, they asked.  That one almost broke my heart – they wanted me to see my dad. 

Addie declared yesterday that she is afraid to die and she doesn’t want to.  TC would like to know exactly when she is going to die.  I was not at all prepared for this.  I told them that death is a part of life and everyone who has ever been alive will someday die but we don’t have any idea when that will be and hopefully we won’t have to worry about it for a long long time.

I made sure not to make any promises.  We have no idea what the future will bring.  I can’t promise that I will be here tomorrow.  As much as I wish I had the power to keep them both alive and well for the next century there is only so much I can do.  I didn’t promise that we will all be alive for any certain amount of time.  Big Hero Six seems to be the movie that has really brought this topic up, I think it’s an important conversation to have with young kids as life is unpredictable but it’s not easy.

I talked about it before but I have a very real fear that I will die young leaving my girls motherless.  I wish I could push these thoughts away but they linger.  It’s not that I live my life in fear, I will drive on the highway, visit big cities, swim in the ocean…but I fear that something will take me from them.  Some days the fear is so great that it literally takes my breath away.  Obviously I don’t share this fear with the girls, we talk about death when necessary (when they have questions, when they ask about someone who died and such) but we don’t go out of our way. 

I didn’t think 20 years of my life was a short time when my dad died.  I was lucky to have him for 20 years but now as I am getting older I am realizing that 20 years was nothing, hell he’s already been gone for 14 years.  He didn’t know my husband, my kids, me as a grown up…I want way more than 20 years with my girls.  I have big plans!  I don’t know why I have these fears but I do.  I sincerely hope that when I talk about death with the girls they don’t hear my fear.  I hope I can be as honest with them as they need.  I hope that they can go many more years without truly knowing the pain that comes with losing someone they love.

What do you say when your kids start asking questions about death that you just can’t answer?

Ghost of Christmas Past

Don’t you hate when happy memories turn into painful reminders?  I know I am not alone in struggling through the holidays, there are ghosts everywhere.  

Christmas 1986

It seemed like everything changed in one year, the last “normal” Christmas my family had was 1999.  By 2000 my dad was sick and while no one wanted to say it, the prospect of it being his last Christmas (it was) found its way into everything

Growing up Christmas was always the same, the 23^rd would be full of cleaning and baking, that night the beans would be set out to soak for the homemade baked beans and last minute preparations would be made.  The 24^th would be cooking, cooking, cooking!  Chicken wings, a lasagna, a ham, a turkey…everything.  We would head to church for the early service then it would be back to our house for our annual party.  Having 4 brothers and sisters made for a packed house to begin with but by the time it was time to head back to All Saint’s Episcopal for the 11PM service it seemed that half of the town had passed through our doors. 

Church was always great too, something about the smell of the candles blending with the smell of the wooden pews…I don’t think I will ever smell that again.  The choir would sing all the same songs, the organ the loudest it has been all year and one voice in the choir a little louder than the others (Amanda, you know who I am talking about!) and we would head home with “Joy To The World” still ringing in our ears. 

Well, my dad is long gone, that house is long gone, and as it often happens, the church has gone through so many changes that while I may remember the building the faces inside would be foreign.  I know this is all part of growing up but I feel like other people got to space these things out.  My dad died, we sold the house and a leadership change in the church one right after the other.  There wasn’t much time to recover from one change before the next one happened.

Every Christmas I think about a big bellied man with a distinctive beard.  Someone who embodied everything that Christmas was about: faith, love, family.  My dad was better than Santa.  Even when we had nothing we had everything.  Each Christmas Eve he would put the star on the advent Christmas tree and read “The Night Before Christmas”.  My dad was Christmas.  While I really love celebrating with the girls and each year it gets more and more exciting with them there is still a hole in my heart that will never be filled. 

Yesterday we had the new annual family Christmas at my stepmother’s (and her husband’s) house.  It was great to see everyone and watch the kids open gifts and pig out on cookies but I left with such a heavy heart.  My dad would have loved this (well not my stepmother’s husband, that would have been awkward) but he never got the chance.  My kids will never know him; they will have a totally different relationship with Christmas.  All I can do is tell them about how great of a man he was, keep him alive in that way, but man, it’s hard.

This will be the 14^th Christmas without my dad and to someone who has never lost a parent or someone close it may seem a bit extreme for me to still be so heartbroken after all this time but one never truly gets over something like that and special days just magnify the pain you carry with your daily.  If you do know someone who has suffered such a loss, especially in the time since last Christmas, please make it a point to reach out.  Let them know that you are there for them and that you are keeping them and their loved one in your thoughts.  Be sure they know that their pain doesn’t make you uncomfortable, they don’t have to hide.  Speak their loved ones name freely, there is nothing worse than feeling like everyone has forgotten.

Christmas is still a happy time for me, as it is for most people who are still grieving, but there are moments of tears and pain but that’s OK.  I am not ruining my holidays by being sad,  I am honoring my father by remembering.

That Could Have Been...

When we hear that someone dies, someone we don't know, we still get sad.  We feel for their family and friends.  When a celebrity dies we may feel that they had some small impact on our lives, we may even miss that impact in the future.  We are still sad and feel for their friends and family.  Yesterday, when we all learned about the death of Robin Williams many of the people I know felt something greater than the passing sadness for someone we will never know.  We felt a profound loss, a gut punch.  Not only that he was gone but that he was gone by his own doing.

Someone who brought us laughter for much if not all of our lives was fighting such depression that he felt he could fight no more.  My personal go to funny guy when I needed a funny guy did all of that all while hiding his true feelings.  I am sure others could see the sadness in his eyes at times, we all knew about his struggles with substance abuse in the past but we are talking about a magical genie here!  If anyone could "get over it" he could, right?

I think what had many of us in disbelief was the name that popped into our heads after everything sunk it.  I can't be alone in saying that after I caught my breath from the initial shock I thought, "wow that could have been _____".  The person in our lives who may do their best to be the life of the party, who may just ooze love and warmth, and the person who always seems to have that twinge of sadness in their eye.  This could have easily been them.

Many of us know people who are struggling.  We don't quite know what to say to them - we are afraid to trigger something or even to just sound stupid.  We worry but not think there is anything we can really do - beside, they always seem happy...

This was a 63 year old man, a husband and a father.  A genie, an alien, a teacher, a cross dresser...this was Peter Pan, Peter fucking Pan! And now he's gone.  If all of these people who brought laughter and hope into our lives could do this that anyone could.

I think that is why it hits so close to home.  If you're like me and a name or two popped into your head  when you heard the news and you haven't already done so, pick up the phone.  Just to say "hi, I care" it could make all the difference.

And as you go about your life remember these important words:

Thanks you R.W. your work helped shape me into the person I am today.

sometimes there are no reasons

When I was younger I was all about "everything happens for a reason" then things started happening.

I don't believe that everything has a reason.  Some things just happen and it sucks.  I am not saying they don't happen according to God's master plan for us and maybe that in itself can be called the reason but that is a different story for a different day.

After Will was hurt I tried for the longest time to think of a reason, perhaps had the accident not have happened they would have been ambushed or hit an IED...but maybe they would have made it safely to the target and killed the bad guys as planned.  Some nights grasping at straws helps but not most.

Just a few days after we moved home we went to his church, it is his childhood church where his grandparents go and where everyone knows him.  One woman, I've met her a few times before years ago, came up to me and looked right into my eyes and said, "we pray for Billy every week, just know that everything happens for a reason - it is so good to have you all back home".  It was like a punch in the gut.  It took everything I had to stand there and smile and mutter "yup" before I flipped my shit.

Someone please tell me the reason - the real reason that some idiot rolled over a vehicle and in the processed ruined my husband.  The moment that butt of a weapon hit him in the face he was forever changed.  Please tell me the reason that he can't remember our kids being born or his way home from work.  There has to be a reason that so jerk can't drive and my marriage fell apart.  Why I am afraid of him when I know he's in a mood and I have pissed him off.  Everything happens for a reason?  I don't know the man I married and many days I don't want to.  Please - please - tell me the reason, I am just dieing to know.

Yesterday an amazing man, a loving husband and father of three, was taken from his family in a horrific accident.  What is the reason for this?  Tell me a reason why three young boys had to stand there an watch as their father crashed into the ground doing something that he has done thousands of times never to say he loves them again?  This man would take the shirt off of his back for you and, from what I hear, was one hell of a Ranger when it came time to fight.  He bent over backwards for Will and me when we needed help getting out of the Yuma quicksand and just like that he's gone.  Gone.  There is no reason for this, there is no lesson to be learned, no other life to be saved...there is nothing but hurt and sorrow.  A reason, fuck you a reason.

Next time something horrible happens to someone you know and you find yourself searching for comforting words and all you can come up with is "well everything happens for a reason" please stop yourself, a simple "I'm so sorry" will do.

Please keep this young family in your thoughts, his widow is asking for prayers for her, prayers that she can raise her boys in a way that would make him proud, so if you can please say a prayer for her.