This past saturday, Mitch, Travis and I were able to attend the wedding of some friends of ours from church. *sidebar: it was travis' first wedding and he did a pretty good job. The fact that it was our home church made things easier on him/us, i think. Anyways, I was a basket case. I started out good. I was just happy to be in a dress and fancy shoes. It had been a while. Mitch called it "another pregnancy dress." To which i responded with "WHAT???" grabbing my belly and thinking he meant "you look pregnant" or "you can wear that when you're pregnant." But what he meant was the last two times we went to a wedding, we got pregnant. I guess that's a compliment. :)
Ahem,...as i was saying, i started out good. But as soon as i saw that beautiful bride walk down the aisle, i lost it. And it was again..the most overused descriptive word of my year, "bittersweet."
A flood of emotions filled my heart and eyes. (yes, emotions can fill your eyes.) I kept it together for the most part..not wanting to make it about me. I have shared in the past that i feel closest to my daughter IN mass or in our church...unified with her as we receive communion..Christ's own body and blood...as we worship in union with all the saints and angels. But this is a wedding. "This is THEIR beginning. Don't make it about you, Chris. Surrender. Sacrifice. Shut it down. Do whatever you need to do to keep it together." So i did. And i think i've gotten pretty good at compartmentalizing this grief. I only let it out with certain people. *thank you, you know who you are. i love you.
What i am able to express about how i felt goes like this:
never would i wish what we've experienced on anyone. But i remember our wedding day. I remember the optimism, the hope, the joy. And lately...it's so hard to pull up that memory without the taste of death. I know that's just par for the course and let me tell you..it SUCKS. But it's our reality now. And some days I receive it with joy and obedience. And some days i want to flip every one off. The anger is natural. yes. But i feel like i'm somehow failing God when i get angry or impatient with our healing. Somehow, i feel like if God has asked us to carry this cross, and someone who may not know the joy of the Lord comes into my path, and it's an angry day, or hour or minute, then somehow i've let God down in glorifying him.
So i don't wish this newlywed couple to ever know the sorrow of losing your child. But a part of me looks at them and longs for the naive wedding day we had. Before we knew of Oct. 9th, 7:45 pm.
It's amazing how different your life is after you know your child is very sick and dying. Things take on a totally different perspective. Praying for you guys. And bittersweet is definitely the "word of the day".
ReplyDeleteThank you for you beautiful comment on my blog. People DO cry at weddings, so maybe your tears wouldn't have seemed out of place. 'Bittersweet' is definitely an appropriate word to describe what our lives are like now. There is no timeline on grief; you are not letting God down by being impatient. I feel the same way too about being a poor witness during my not so lovely moments. You are not alone :>)
ReplyDeleteThank you for your comment on Looking for Blue Sky. I'm so sorry that you are going through this too. It's so hard. People just don't understand the daily pain. They don't know what to do to help. That's exactly why I felt led to write my blog. I want people to RUN TO those that are hurting NOT FROM them. That's what Jesus did.
ReplyDeleteHugs,
Trisha