Grieving Parent

Month: March 2011

  • Words of Wisdom, Hearts of Love

    Words of Wisdom, Hearts of Love

    We just attended our second TCF Frankfort KY Regional Conference, titled “Words of Wisdom, Hearts of Love.” This conference was scheduled for Friday and Saturday at the Capital Plaza Hotel in Frankfort, KY.

    The Best Plans of Mice and Grieving Parents

    We only live 30 minutes from the conference site, but we planned to spend the night at the hotel on Friday. It’s just more relaxing and simpler to just walk down the stairs from our room to the Saturday morning breakfast, rather than getting up early enough to drive in from home. We also get a chance to meet more people attending.

    But we have once again been reminded we aren’t in charge of life.

    My uncle Nick died a week before the conference. The funeral mass was to be on the Saturday morning of the conference. Se we canceled our hotel room and only went to the Friday session.

    Are Conferences a Good Thing?

    I’m still not sure how I feel about these events.

    It’s good to be with other bereaved parents. They know what we’re going through. The folks that have been missing their children for many years and have found a way to rebuild their lives are inspiration. Getting a chance to share experiences and feelings with others in the same boat helps us see we’re not alone, and the things we feel don’t mean we’re crazy.

    But I wonder if going through these events makes us just keep remembering the pain and hold on to it longer. Is it healthy to keep reminding ourselves of how unhappy we are? I’m not sure. I’m leaning toward the benefits are bigger than the risks.

    I also think we need to be there to help other, newer grieving parents if we can.

    The Sessions

    Our Friday session began with a welcome from our chapter leader, Dusty Rhodes. We then had a nice talk by Pat Loder, the current Executive Director of The Compassionate Friends. After a short break we had our first workshop session.

    I went to “The Workplace and Grieving” workshop. The main take-away from this session was employers have no idea how to deal with bereaved parents. I understand this. We’re all different. Employers can’t have a nice step-by-step management plan, so the current plan seems to be just ignore the issue.  They also have no idea how long this problem takes for us to deal with and regain our balance. They don’t like problems that last for years. Newsflash for you – we don’t either.

    The next workshop session didn’t have anything that really jumped out at me, so I picked “Impact of Stillborn & Infant Death.” I chose that because I have a friend and former coworker that had a miscarriage. I wanted to learn more about the issues people like her face. I don’t think our society does a good job of supporting parents in this situation. It was interesting to listen to the other couples there.

    The Slideshow

    Dinner followed the two workshop sessions. We had a speaker during dinner, a former TCF Executive Director whose name I didn’t write down. He gave a good talk. He was a pinch hitter for Gen. Mark Graham who was scheduled to give the dinner time presentation, but military duties called him away. The general made a video for us and we watched that.

    A short session of music followed, featuring Alan Pedersen, P. Taylor Reed and Mitch Carmody.

    Next was the slideshow where slides of our children were shown on two large screens. There were many infants and small children, but it seemed that most of the slides pictured teens and young adults, like Richard. So many bright, beautiful young lives gone too soon.

    Unlike last year I hadn’t heard many sobs or seen many tears in the early sessions, but this changed with the slide show. It’s just so hard to see your kid up there.  My eyes were watery and Debbie was sobbing when Richard’s smiling face hit the screen.

    Candle Lighting

    It began with a few short readings by local chapter members, including Debbie (pictured above). I don’t know how she was able to read after the emotional slideshow session. She’s one brave and strong lady.

    We each processed to the front to light our candles and say “We light this candle in memory of our son Richard Mudd” into the microphone. Of course, other parents/grandparents/siblings said the name of their lost loved one. But you knew that, didn’t you?

    Then we all held our candles up as Alan Pedersen sang.

    There is a powerful feeling in the air during these candle lighting ceremonies. It’s something you can feel. Very intense.

    We took another short break.

    Mitch Carmody was scheduled for a session called “Whispers of Love, Signs from our Children” which sounded interesting but we had to leave.

    We checked out the vendor tables when we were leaving. I think there was a celebrity at the conference. Dennis Apple had some of his books on the table for sale. I didn’t get to meet him, but someone told me they spoke to him, and his son’s picture was in the slideshow, so I think he must have been there. I recommended the book to a couple of people I saw looking at it.

  • Heaven Is For Real – Book Review

    Heaven Is For Real – Book Review

    Heaven is real.

    Can there be more important or beautiful words that any grieving parents could hear?

    Yeah, there could be better words. “Honey, wake up! You’re having a nightmare,” or “There’s been a big mistake, your son isn’t dead, he’s just been in the witness protection program. But it’s all OK now, so he can come back into your life again,” come to mind.

    But it’s pretty clear those words aren’t going to be played sweetly to our ears. Learning that heaven really exists is our greatest source of hope.

    Todd Burpo says he has proof, Heaven is real.

    Heaven is for Real: A Little Boy’s Astounding Story of His Trip to Heaven and Back is his book. He shares the story of his 4 year old son Colton’s trip to heaven.

    The early parts of this book were hard for me to read. Colton was in the Intensive Care Unit. Been there, done that, and don’t want the damned t-shirt. It brought back a lot of hard memories. It was intensely stressful – I think that’s where the “Intensive” part of the name comes from.

    Like Colton, Richard recovered and came home from the hospital. Unfortunately Richard also came home with scar tissue in his brain that would cause him to have seizures and ultimately kill him.

    Colton was touch-and-go, the doctors didn’t have much hope for him.

    But Colton made a miraculous recovery. He also came home from the hospital. He came home with stories about Heaven.

    Some of the things in this book will make the hair stand up on the back of your neck. For example, Colton was able to tell his parents things they were doing while he was out of it and in surgery. He couldn’t have possibly known what they were doing, each in a separate room and not with Colton. It gets your attention.

    Much of this story seems too perfect. The author, a pastor at Crossroads Wesleyan Church in Imperial, Nebraska, takes every detail of Colton’s story and matchs it perfectly with Bible scripture. It just seems too pat and lines up so well it’s hard to believe. Mr. Burpo could say anything he wants in his book. It just might be all made up.

    But it might also all be real.

    Debbie and I were talking about this. She made the comment,

    “If they had listened to the prophets back in Biblical times, we wouldn’t have all the problems we do now.”  She thinks we need to listen to the prophets God sends to us today. And this little boy just may be one of those prophets.

    You can read the book and come to your own opinion.

  • The Suit That Never Was

    The Suit That Never Was

    Our church consists of two separate church buildings connected by a central hall. There is the mid-1800’s era church we now call The Chapel. Our main church, the one where all the Sunday Masses are conducted, is on the other side of the hall. We call that one The Church. The Church’s entry doors are located inside the hall.

    So everyone leaving church after Mass must go into this central area, that we have given the imaginative name of The Gathering Space.

    Parishioners gather in The Gathering Space after Mass to catch up, chat and have a bit of fellowship.

    As we moved through the post-Mass crowd the other day we ran into Carolyn Gregory. Her son Andrew was one of Richard’s friends in youth group. About a half dozen of the guys in that high school group became known as The Posse. As you can see, we’re big on snappy names in our parish.

    As we talked with Carolyn, we of course asked about Andrew. Carolyn told us about his progress in school where he is getting close to graduation and the big job search. She mentioned about how they were going to go shopping for a suit for Andrew to wear on his interviews.

    Oh Oh. I was expecting Debbie to start crying. I had a lump in my throat.

    You see, Richard was getting ready to start his junior year in business college at the University of Kentucky. He was making plans for interviews and internships. He’d asked Debbie to go shopping with him to pick out a new suit for those occasions.

    She was looking forward to it a lot. I’m not sure if Richard was more interested in her taste in suits or her use of the check book, but his momma was thrilled with the request.

    But that shopping trip never happened.

    And our conversation in The Gathering Space served as a reminder of that. And the reason why.

    That’s how easy it is to get tripped up on the grieving path.

    We both left church with a heavy heart, but neither of us cried. I guess that’s progress.

    Photo credit: The image above was borrowed from The Men’s Warehouse website. I hope they don’t mind. If you need a suit or clothing, buy something from them to make it up to them.

  • Expecto Patronum

    Expecto Patronum

    When the kids were young one of my jobs was reading to them at night. First I’d read to Richard, then I’d go upstairs and read to Sarah. It gave me a chance to spend one-on-one time with my kids.

    I got to read a lot of good books I wouldn’t have ever read on my own.

    It was one of my favorite times. I read to them long after they could read to themselves. It was just a nice time.

    Richard was a Harry Potter fan. The Harry Potter series was on our reading list.

    Unfortunately because of my work schedule, I was only able to read on the weekends when we were reading the Potter books. If you’ve ever read them, you know most of these novels are long. Reading them only a couple of nights a week, it took a long time to plow through them.

    Richard couldn’t wait. On weeknights He’d sneak into our bedroom and get the book (I kept his current book on my bedside table), and read ahead. He then put the bookmark back where we had left off so I wouldn’t know.

    So he’d get a double dose of Harry Potter.

    If you’ve somehow managed to miss out on the Harry Potter story, Harry was a young wizard. Most of the action takes place at Hogwarts, a school for apprentice wizards and witches.

    His studies at Hogwarts included classes on spells. There were many exciting moments as the young students tried their luck at spell making.

    One spell was intended to call up their Patronus – a personal protector that guarded them from the dark forces.

    The spell required the use of a magic wand, thinking of powerful good thoughts and shouting out, “Expecto Patronum!”

    Here’s what Wikipedia says that phrase means:

    Expecto Patronum is correct classical Latin for “I await a protector”.

    Wouldn’t it be great if we could work the Expecto Patronum spell and protect our children?

    You could just point your trusty magic wand at the bad guys and other dangers of life, think up lovely thoughts… I’d probably remember the fun I had reading to my kids… take a deep breath and scream out at the top of your lungs…

    “EXPECTO PATRONUM!!!”

    Out would pop the magic Patronus to protect your kids. They seemed to take the form of an animal in the Harry Potter books, so Richard’s would probably be a cat.

    But that’s in Harry Potter. Fiction. This is real. There are no magic wands.

    So we end up at a website like this.

     

  • Church On TV and A Marathon

    Church On TV and A Marathon

    It was the Sunday before the SuperBowl. This was a Sunday with no football. Yeah, there was the Pro Bowl but come on, really, that’s not football. I didn’t want to watch that. What to do?

    The USA Network came to the rescue. They ran a 12 hour NCIS marathon. Starting with the very first episode, one I was sure I’d never seen, at 11 AM and running till 11 PM.

    Debbie and I watched the entire thing from start to finish.

    We decided we didn’t want to go out and deal with anyone that day. We just wanted to hunker down together and not face the world.

    The Archdiocese of Louisville has Mass On The Air every Sunday at 10:30 AM. We decided to go to church on TV.

    This turned out to be much like going to church at church. Mass On The Air has a rotating cast of characters; the priest, deacon, choir and participants from several local churches tape the shows ahead of time for airing on Sunday mornings. They usually tape two Masses back-to-back on Wednesday evening. As luck would have it our priest and parishioners were the ones on TV this particular Sunday.

    So we watched Mass on TV with Father Bill. My little sister Ann was even singing in the choir.

    At the end of the televised Mass we switched to the NCIS marathon on USA.

    I’m not sure why we still watch this show. Autopsies are a regular part of the show. It gets a bit, shall we say… uncomfortable, watching these scenes. I can’t help thinking, “They did that to my kid.” I don’t like the thought. But still we watch the show every week and we usually have on any marathons that get aired on the weekend.

    I think the show brings back nice memories for Debbie. While Richard was still in high school and living at home, they used to watch NCIS together.

    So we just spent the day… all of the day… sitting together on the couch watching TV.

    The truth is I’d like to spend every day like that. It’s really tiring going out into the world, putting on the game face and acting like the world isn’t spinning off it’s axis.

    It was a nice day.