A good day!! But only after days of grief.....

I've noticed I often blog when I have those knock-down grief experiences.  Those moments that take me to my knees without me even seeing it coming. But I do have good days.

Yesterday was a good day. The office was full of joy, it was a beautiful day with the arrival of cold weather, I had a productive counseling session.  It was simply an all around good day....

....and then here comes the grief sneaking in again.  Today was a bit harder than yesterday, but not as bad as this past weekend.

The weekend going into Monday was excruciatingly painful and heartbreaking.  It all started on Saturday. We were eating lunch and Tom asked a innocent question about why we have an afghan on a chair that we never use.  That started the conversation among us leading to the fact that it was probably something that Brandon wouldn't want....so why do we have it?  And just like that - the wind was knocked out of me.  It hit me like a freight train that I don't have a daughter to pass things down to.  I have dishes, jewelry and linens that were my mother's and grandmother's. I cherish them and have special memories of them and the ladies that gave them to me.  The pain of realizing I no longer have a daughter to save all that for and have the joy of passing it down to another generation was unexpected. We preserved my wedding dress in case one day we had a daughter and she wanted to use it. I bought birthstone jewelry for each child so that it could be passed down to them when they got older. 

(Amanda used to love to go to my jewelry box and ask to see her "birth-ring".  She couldn't wait until she was old enough to wear it.)

Saturday, the realizations just kept coming like tidal waves of all those things I would miss out on with Amanda and I couldn't stop the tears. I sobbed at the sink, I sobbed clearing the table, I even just collapsed and sobbed on my laundry room floor because it hurt so bad.  My heart was breaking all over again and there is no way to heal it.  So I cried until I couldn't cry anymore.  That grief stayed with me through the next two days.

Let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess for he who promised is faithful.  Hebrews 10:23

I've said this before, but I am amazed at how many aspects of the mother-daughter relationship there is that I have lost, and it seems to be still slowly hitting me as the days go by.  My mom is one of my absolute best friends.  To say that I am crushed that I won't to get to experience that with Amanda goes way beyond heartbreaking....

I know that the ten years we had with her were a gift.  She told us not to be sad, but rejoice because she was going to heaven.  But that doesn't make her absence here any less heartbreaking or at times easy to accept.  I'm simply thankful I have that truth to hold on to and I know that I will spend eternity with her.  I'm almost to the point that I can sometimes break through the grief with that truth, but I'm not fully there yet.

Isaiah 55:8-9

For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
    neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.

For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
    so are my ways higher than your ways
    and my thoughts than your thoughts.

The crazy part of all this is the continued realization that grief is never really over.  It is made up of layers and you never know when that next layer will be painfully ripped off.  It's a life-long process that I think it is something I will learn to "manage," but I know it will never truly go away. There will never be a day without thinking about her and the fact that she is not with us and all we are missing because of that.....

At this time last year we already had the Christmas tree up and Christmas music playing.  Amanda loved Christmas.  I dread the next two months.  The holidays are already hurting me.  Walking through Hobby Lobby brings me to tears.  I find myself looking at items and thinking what a great chemo gift it would make (how long ago has that been?!) or seeing something that would be a great Christmas stocking stuffer and find myself planning on what gifts to buy the kids. We haven't even hit Thanksgiving and yet Christmas is tearing me apart.  I have always loved to buy gifts for my family at Christmas.  It's just "one of my things."  

I am praying for Brandon's heart during this season.  I will often be a wreck, but it is my hope that for him, I can celebrate when the time comes.  I work hard at balancing my grief from being something that he sees and allowing him to comfort me, to something that I do privately to allow myself to really be able to just let it all out.  Sometimes, those ugly, heartbreaking, wailing, gut-wrenching moments can conquer grief better than anything else can.

So as I close this day, it is with anticipation, prayer and hope for a good day tomorrow.

After the past few days, I am thankful that we get to live one day at a time, new mercies every morning and that we can wake up knowing that He will give us what we need to face that day.

Psalm 118:24

This is the day that the Lord has made;  let us rejoice and be glad in it.

And so, we can just pour out the fullness of our heart, the burden of our spirit, the sorrow that crushes us, and know that He hears, He loves, He understands, He receives; and He separates from our prayer all that is imperfect, ignorant and wrong, and presents the rest, with the incense of the great High Priest, before the throne on high, and our prayer is heard, accepted and answered in His name.  A. B. Simpson

Just one year ago:

That smile takes my breath away....