Reflection, Renewal and Healing

It has been less than a month since my father's death and I have been doing a significant amount of reflecting on grief, loss and the way our society deals with these issues. At work, no one and I repeat NO ONE, acknowledged my father's death. Not one "I'm sorry" or "How are you doing?" I know that I am a new employee and that some of the people I work with are younger. But not one acknowledgment seemed so bizarre and insensitive. What are we teaching our young people in school, what are parents teaching their children about life and death?

I know that an elderly parent's death warrants less sympathy in the grand scheme of things than a young person or even middle-aged one. There was sympathy provided when my husband died. But somehow this blatant disregard in acknowledging the loss of my dad hit me very hard.
When I mentioned that my father had died on 12/21 to the group of friends I went out with on New Year's Eve, one of the women actually told me to stop talking about it because she did not want to ruin her evening. I wasn't planning of dwelling on the subject. I just mentioned it because it was a big factor in my life. To have such a major event dismissed is troubling to me.

The last week has been insane. Dealing with the repair of two vehicles, getting the boys through finals, filling out the college financial aid reports, going to work, trying to shop for an outfit to wear to my father's service (unsuccessful), and dealing with all the requirements of getting my oldest to the talent contest, in addition to all the other normal duties of life as a widowed mom pulled me under the waves. There was just too much on my plate. I was exhausted and absent minded. I ended up losing the key to our mail box and having to pay $40.00 to have the lock changed. I also lost my knitting bag and all my expensive gadgets, implements and a skein of yarn from the project I was working on.

We got home from the talent contest at 2:00 a.m. Sunday (I'll post about the talent contest in another entry). I awakened tired and still had to quickly go through boxes and bags of my father's photos and awards to take to the service, starting at 1:00. I was upset with my family for being put in the position of having to jump through hoops to attend the ceremony. I felt more consideration should have been given to my situation with the talent contest where we could have held the ceremony either the week before or after that event. Again, I constantly struggle with how so few people get how hard it is to be an only parent. To just get through a normal week is challenging enough but to add on extra ordinary events pushes me beyond my limits.

I certainly was on an adrenaline rush last week. But now I seem to have crashed. I am exhausted and it is so cold here. I just want a day to myself, to take some time to reflect on my father and to renew my spirit. I am reminded of my husband's death and how there is approval for grief during the funeral and early period which gradually dissipates around the three month mark. Now that my father's service is over I'm supposed to be magically recovered, only I am finding that I'm not. The problem becomes trying to find the time to reflect and renew. As a widowed mom there is even less opportunity to fit this into my life.

I read in Dr. Phil's column in this month's "O" magazine about a woman who feels smothered by her husband's attentiveness - she lost both her parents in the past year and he apparently is worried about her well being. She feels he is being overattentive. Good for him I want to say. There are some of us out here dealing with grief and life on our own. We don't hear many words of kindness or concern or receive the support of a loving, caring spouse.

I recently was told that phrase I have absolutely grown to hate - "God doesn't give us more than we can handle." First of all, how does God really know how much I can handle? I've pretty much reached my limit as this past week has demonstrated. Message to God here - "You can stop the challenges for awhile. They are not making me stronger. I am becoming weaker, in fact. Ease up on the worn and weary and especially the widowed. We already carry such a burden in our hearts and souls." For those who believe adversity brings on strength, I will counter that sometimes that is not the case. I know it is contrary to what one would expect. But people only can handle so much before breaking.

As for the weeks and months ahead. If I have learned anything from my husband's and my Mom's death, it is that I will not stop grieving or put my needs aside because of the discomfort of others. I need time for healing, reflection and renewal with this new loss. I won't stop talking about it. Maybe I'll ask for a day off.

The dead deserve respect and we provide that with services and memorial. But so do the living and somehow we seem to shortchange the ones left behind. We are expected to go on demonstrating strength and courage. The reality is that without taking the time for renewal and healing, it isn't really possible to go on successfully.

The Scarf of Grief

About the time the lunar eclipse hit Chicago land last night (approx. 1:30 a.m.), it was cold, overcast and snowing. I was up reading - a frantic, rather annoyed and angry mother because my oldest was out and hadn't checked in, nor was he responding to my calls to him or texts. The book was "Second Chance" by Jane Green, an author I very much enjoy. The plot revolves around four school chums who are reunited after 20 years when one of the group is killed in a terrorist attack. The following words about grief so well stated how I have felt over the years:

"The problem with grief is that it doesn't go away. As time ticks on, the rawness dissipates somewhat, and you find yourself settling in to the pain, becoming accustomed to it, wearing it around your shoulders like an old, heavy scarf.

And life has to go on. There are children to look after, meals to cook...playdates to organize. Grief has to be filed away, compartmentalized, allowed out only when the rest of your life is sufficiently organized when you can have time to yourself to give in to the pain."

I love the analogy of wearing grief around your shoulders like an old, heavy scarf. And I know that it can be terribly challenging to go on with life, putting grief on the back burner for lack of time, feeling as though there may never be an opportunity to fully mourn.

At same time as I was reading this passage and the solstice and eclipse collided, my father passed away. The hospital had my brother's work number as a contact and of course when they called his business there was no one there to answer. He had been aware that my father had been taken to the hospital but due to the heavy snow and late hour did not travel the 45-minute distance from his home to the hospital. In the morning he called the hospital to be told that my father had been discharged! He then called the assisted living facility to be advised of my father's passing. A confusing, strange exchange of messages and phone calls to say the least. I guess the hospital should have better informed my brother that my father had been "discharged" to the morgue!

I decided to go into work but felt shock and numb, sad but happy that my father is no longer suffering physically on this earth. He was in the hospital around Thanksgiving and I refrained from mentioning it because frankly, I had become so sick of the medical efforts to always heroically "save" my father's life only to have him back in the hospital the next month. When I sat in the hospital back in November with my brother we had an opportunity to talk and heal and then over Thanksgiving, the same occurred between my sister and I and we have been talking, emailing and texting regularly since. A small blessing of my father's last hospitalization was that it did bring family back together, perhaps in anticipation of what would happen less than a month later. I predicted my father would be back in the hospital by Christmas but did not think he wouldn't pull through this time. He has had more than nine lives - always making it. I should add that the last charge for his ICU room in November was $90,000.00! For a single day! Incredible!

It is tough to be a widow wearing the scarf of loss once more. There is no one here to put comforting arms around me. I read the draft of the death notice to be placed in the paper and got upset seeing that I am the only family member with no spouse's name beside mine in parenthesis. A trivial thing to be bothered about but it I can't deny that it didn't. When you lose a spouse, much of the grief borne is a solo experience because the person you relied on before is gone.

There is a different sense of loss with that of my father's passing. He was 89, in ill-health, not 54 like my late husband, in the middle of life and career with young children to raise. But there is still loss and grief and sadness. The mere knowledge that I am now without my parents is sobering.

I think between the snow, the eclipse and solstice last night that there was some magic in the air. I see my father being picked up by a sleigh, possibly even being driven by Santa and flying through the sky as he is transported to his next destination!