Last week, I lost someone dear to me. It brought up all the old losses, the newer losses, the unfinished and finished grief still lingering in me. I told a friend that I was reading a book on grief (Elisabeth Kubler-Ross's On Grief and Grieving). He said, "Why don't you write a book yourself?" After all, I have suffered what some consider the 'ultimate loss' - the loss of a child. My firstborn, to be precise. And now, 15 years later, the story is there, perhaps waiting to come out. Would it help others if I were to tell Yarden's story? Or my story? I have survived such a terrible loss, and yet have grown stronger, more resilient. I have discovered coping skills in me that I never knew I had. I learned so much from my young boy, merely 4 when he died. And like I said, each new loss of someone else I knew and loved, again awakens the feelings. Sadness, love, a bottomless pit, an emptiness... and then gratefulness for having known them, and for the lessons learned. Perhaps indeed the story needs to be told...
The thing is, I don't know how to begin... With his death? Birth? My wanting to have a child, but the difficulty in parenting once he was born? The temporary relief I felt after Yarden slipped away with little pain, and the guilt that relief brought? All the things I'm writing down seem the wrong thing to say, and I know that is my critical self. All the feelings I had and have are legitimate. The more honest I am, the more others might be able to connect with this, and with their own feelings. And that is my aim. To say, 'it's ok to feel what you are feeling. It's all ok, it's all normal.'
Today, driving back from shopping, I began to think about the dear woman who died last Thursday, the one who I loved like a mother many years ago. And thinking of her brought up tears which I blinked back, thinking how unwise it would be to drive and cry. And how sad I am that I am far from her family and cannot go there to sit with them, and grieve together. Minutes later I passed the garden center and thought about planting flowers in my garden to welcome the spring which I hope will be coming soon to Holland... It's ok to be distracted. And fine to cry too.
Grief is good. It reminds me to value the here and now. To enjoy the neon orange colors of the footballers I see in the field across from my office window, and how their shirts stand out in the darkening grey of dusk.
The thing is, I don't know how to begin... With his death? Birth? My wanting to have a child, but the difficulty in parenting once he was born? The temporary relief I felt after Yarden slipped away with little pain, and the guilt that relief brought? All the things I'm writing down seem the wrong thing to say, and I know that is my critical self. All the feelings I had and have are legitimate. The more honest I am, the more others might be able to connect with this, and with their own feelings. And that is my aim. To say, 'it's ok to feel what you are feeling. It's all ok, it's all normal.'
Today, driving back from shopping, I began to think about the dear woman who died last Thursday, the one who I loved like a mother many years ago. And thinking of her brought up tears which I blinked back, thinking how unwise it would be to drive and cry. And how sad I am that I am far from her family and cannot go there to sit with them, and grieve together. Minutes later I passed the garden center and thought about planting flowers in my garden to welcome the spring which I hope will be coming soon to Holland... It's ok to be distracted. And fine to cry too.
Grief is good. It reminds me to value the here and now. To enjoy the neon orange colors of the footballers I see in the field across from my office window, and how their shirts stand out in the darkening grey of dusk.
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