Arrival

It arrived so suddenly though I had expected it, waited for it with an anxious heart.

At the moment it arrived, I wasn't ready.  My mind tried to tune it out, change the path, avoid the destination.  I was waiting but I was not ready.

"I don't want you to go to heaven."  My kiddo sat trying to hold back tears with tiny sausage fingers.

Did that give it away to any of you?  Owen.

Me:  "I'm not going to heaven sweetie, I am staying here with you to be your mommy,"

Owen:  "But I was a baby once and I had a daddy that I loved and he went to heaven."

Yes, I gasped too.

I gasped so audibly that the air in the room rushed into my heart and opened the wound that I have spent much time tediously mending into a usable condition.

Owen's tiny little sausage fingers almost clawed at his eyes that were brimming with tears.  He was sad.  So simple.  In that moment I couldn't help but wonder why he felt the need to cover the crying.

We talked honestly about heaven, about his daddy, about being sad.  I told tiny fibs about staying here with him forever.  I sent out silent prayers to God that he make that part true. Really I begged.  It's my nightmare.  Nothing can happen to me.  Not now.  No cancer, no car accident, no ailment I can't cure with Tylenol and a nap.  Nothing.

Crushing is the weight of that conversation.

The follow up...I knew it was coming.  And it did.  On the next night.

Perhaps it's the song I sing at bed time, on his request.  We call it Serenade.  The Dixie Chicks call it Lullyby.  The lyrics ask, "How long do you want to be loved?  Is forever enough because I'm never, never giving you up."

Never giving up.  That's sort of my motto.  Hours after Chris died, I vowed I would not let this world fall down on them.  I would never give up.   

The follow up went a bit like this, Owen: "I'm sad.  I want my daddy here not in heaven. I love my daddy."

Me too buddy.

I do what mommy's do.  I reassured my sweet boy that his daddy loves him so much, that his daddy watches over him, that we can still love people who are in heaven and they love us in return and we feel it.

It's as simple as that.  The arrival of feeling.  Previously it was all fact.  Daddy is dead.  Daddy's heart was not working right and nobody knew it.  The associated feelings are now present in the mind and heart of my little man.

It's in this moment I recall the conversation with a friend who lost her mom at a very young age.  Her insight.. grief is evolving.  We grieve and re-grieve in different ways over time depending on circumstance and age.  I knew it was true by simply living the past 2 1/2 years watching Maya's every word, every nightmare, every story.  But Owen had yet to arrive.  His arrival has rocked my boat and made me question my ability to steady three ships in the storm of grief.   

The arrival of Owen's grief, I was waiting but I was not ready.  

  

Often I find myself mentally transcribing what I would write should I actually find myself sitting in front of my computer with a moment to spare.

Tonight I would have written about Chris' panic every time Maya split her lip open as a toddler (which was pretty close to daily til she was 2) and how I would calmly step in.  He would always ask how I was so calm with so much blood.  Tonight she split her lip and there was tons of drippity droppity blood.   

Last week my post would have been about Maya's nightmares, which have started again.... Last week she was terrified screaming "Run Owen, Run.  Hurry, Run!"  I will be honest.  I couldn't get myself to ask what she was dreaming about.  Big fail.  I didn't want to know.  I'm too often haunted by the dreams Chris had about Owen just before his death. 

Two weeks ago my post would have sweetly remembered the moment I said "I, do."  The declaration which has lead me on this whirl wind adventure of life I had never even remotely imagined. 

In March I perhaps would have told you about the fabulous La Faux and how for just a moment in the midst of drag queens and acrobats I couldn't help think of all the amazing restaurants Chris loved on Capitol Hill.

My point.

I need to write. 

It's cathartic.  It's hard.  At times I have no words for my feelings. 

Grief is every present, in differing degrees and involving a wide range of experiences and characters.  But it's there.  Some times it slips by like a whisper from the lips while during other moments it's the explosion of symbols, impossible to ignore.

Grief.

10.17.2012

I don't know how others do it...make it through these days.

Yesterday my head ached so badly that I convinced Maya to skip movie night at school to stay home and make cookies.  The thought of a gym full of exuberant kids made me feel nauseous.

It was painful.  It was grief.  My body ached.  I spent the day longing to lay in the cool sheets of my bed.

In the aftermath, two years ago, I forced every footstep, made my legs keep moving, willed my mind to keep going.  It's hard for me to stop, to step back, to give myself true space when I need it.

It makes me feel weak.

I know it's just in my mind.

But I've arrived, feeling weak, raw, vulnerable.  I hate it.  It feels disorganized and difficult to complete grasp.

In this moment I secretly feel vaguely proud.  Proud that I am doing it.  Proud that I have moments of weakness.  Proud that my feet keep moving and I keep doing my best.  Proud of who I am and hopeful of who I will become.

Today I will relive it over and over.  The sights, the smells, the sound.  The conversations will float back to me.  The phone calls.  My dad.  My sister in law.  The 911 operator.  The ones I overheard to my sister, my brother-in-law, my friends.  And the ones I imagined, to Chris' best friend....

No I probably won't talk to anyone about it.

My mind is so full of thoughts yet so empty of structure.  Writing is easy.  Speaking, is impossible.

Two year ago my husband died.  He was my friend, my chosen companion, the amazing father to our two precious children.  He was one of the people I respected most in this world.  He had experienced so much and brought extreme peace into my life.  He was full of love, laughter, intelligence and had a wicked streak of goofiness.

In my mind I hear his voice.  In my heart I feel his love.  In my world I feel his influence, encouraging me to keep going, to keep evolving, to accept my faults and to hope for the future.

Rest in Peace Christopher Michael Carpenter.

I will remember, always, always always,     

White Knuckling It

Two years.      730 days.    17520 hours.

These anniversaries become glass half full sorts of events.  Ok, truthfully grief is an honest look at the empty glass with feeble attempts at seeing it half full.  

Two years of head spinning, life changing events.  Freeing and overwhelming all at the same time. 

Two years of grasping at hope, holding on to faith and surreptitiously drinking in the love that surrounds me.

What's difficult about anniversaries like this is feeling in step, in sync with the last hours you had on this earth.  In these moments I can feel you close.  I sit looking up the stairs you walked up just minutes before you collapsed and see in you my minds eye as if it happened only moments before.  I wonder if I quickly walk over if I will see your footprints imprinted on the carpet.

In these final hours I open the cupboard for a glass and the mug that you left, half full of coffee on the bathroom counter screams to me, begging me touch it as if it would still be warm from your touch.

I was annoyed you were taking so long in the shower.  

I close the bathroom door and see your red Cougar Camp shirt and Addidas shorts in a pile and reach for them only to realize they have long since been packed away.   

The dampness on the floor of the bathtub coating my socks as I leaned over you leave my feet cold.  I can hear the water running, my sleeved soaked from reaching through to turn it off.   

My heartbeat loud in my ears.  The rapid breaths escaping my body.  My hands on your chest, awkwardly pressing your body into the ground.  My words to you sounding like a lifetime movie.  Please don't leave your kids.  They need you....

My heart willing Maya to stay in the living room despite my frantic phone call on speaker and Owen's cries watching my chaos, my counting... 39, 40, 41 and then the sound of heavy footsteps on the stairs.

But I see you and I know the truth.  You weren't leaving, you were gone. 

In my head it sounds unfamiliar, like someone else's story but I can feel it in my bones.

They ache.  Grief isn't just sadness...tears, depression.  It's the heavy down quilt, warm yet suffocating.  Alternating feelings of nausea and despondency.  Agony, anguish, desolation, despair.  A sickly sweet wretchedness oozing, sticky, messy.  Disorganized.

It's what I hate about grief the most.  It's disorganized, unpredictable. 

Now I yearn for you to know Maya and Owen.  She was barely writing the letters for her name when you died and now she's reading books, doing math, writing sentences.  Owen could speak only a handful of words and now he's "reading" me whole books he has memorized, counting to 30, spelling his name, making us all laugh.  They ride bikes, roller skate, play elaborate make believe games and are always looking for warm arms to snuggle in.

There lives and enormous pressure in my heart driving me to remember everything.  Your personality, your voice, your laughter, the way you moved through a room, how we were as a family.  But its so much and I feel overwhelmed.  The more I try to remember the more I feel slip from my hands.

I have not dreaded the days leading up to this anniversary though they have clouded my mind and engulfed my energy but am fearing the memories of the aftermath.  With few exceptions those days are foggy and full of nothing more but attempting to continue moving, breathing, feeling.

It's with this I look around and wonder if you are here.  I long for affirmation that you are fine.  I search for signs that you are close.  While others dream full, animated, colorful, lucid dreams, I wake up blank and are left with wonder about your final destination.