Grieving Parent

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  • The Lost Christmas Eve

    The Lost Christmas Eve

    It may be a long night.

    I’m sitting here listening to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra album called “The Lost Christmas Eve.” I’m on the second repeat so far. There will probably be many more. When I get in these moods, I can listen to the same music over and over for hours.

    The lost Christmas Eve… the lost Christmas spirit. It’s now our life. Christmas has gone away.

    DO ANGELS KEEP THE DREAMS WE SEEK
    WHILE OUR HEARTS LIE BLEEDING?

    I remember Richard’s first Christmas. He was 4 months old. We put him on the floor in front of the Christmas tree. He would light up brighter than the bulbs on the tree, squeal with delight, and try with all his might to wriggle to that tree.

    As he was growing up he liked to crawl up under the tree, lie on his back and just lay there looking up through the branches at the lights.

    Richard always made sure the lights on the tree were plugged in. He wouldn’t let us vary much from our Christmas traditions and rituals. He loved it.

    AND THE TIME AND THE YEARS
    AND THE TEARS AND THE COST
    AND THE HOPES AND THE DREAMS
    OF EACH CHILD THAT IS LOST

    Last year we only turned on the lights a couple of times – when we put up the tree at Thanksgiving and again at Christmas.

    So far this year the tree is still in the box.

    SOMEWHERE IN THE DARK
    BEYOND ALL THE COLD
    THERE IS A CHILD
    THAT’S PART OF MY SOUL

    And now Christmas is lost. It’s buried in an oak box, under a couple of feet of earth. And I don’t know how to find it. And I sit in the wee hours of the morning riding the music, when I should be sleeping.

    THE LURE OF A DREAM
    AND I’M AFRAID TO WALK BACK THROUGH THAT DOOR
    TO FIND THAT I’VE AWAKENED

    I feel guilty because I can’t find Christmas. I still have a beautiful daughter. A great wife. A loving and supportive family. Friends that care.

    GOT TO GET BACK TO A REASON
    GOT TO GET BACK TO A REASON I ONCE KNEW

    And I know Richard has now reached the great promise of Christmas. That same promise tells us we’ll be with him again when the time is right.

    But that’s such a hard thought to hold onto.

  • A Meeting Place For Grieving Dads

    A Meeting Place For Grieving Dads

    Being a grieving dad is no fun. It has all this emotion stuff. Let’s face it, most of us guys aren’t too good with that kind of stuff. And the resources geared toward grieving dads seem to be limited.

    Kelley Farley, a two time grieving dad, is trying to improve that. He’s working on a book for and about grieving dads. He also has a blog.

    One of the posts on Kelly’s blog, Nightmares Have Taken the Place of Dreams, has become something of a meeting place for dads trying to deal with the loss of a child.

    In his blog post he shares the story of Jody Dark Eagle Breedlove, who lost his son to suicide two years ago. It is a very powerful story and a testimony of the struggles of dealing with this sort of huge loss.

    Other dads left encouragement for Jody in the comments. Jody responded.

    The post was written in June. It has continued to be a place where dads come to post in the comments when they need a little help from their fellow grieving dads. It’s not the normal way blog posts work, but there’s really nothing normal about dealing with the loss of a child.

    So maybe you might like to check it out. You should probably bookmark it so you don’t have to search for it every time you go on Kelley’s blog like I do.

    Oh, if you leave a comment make sure to check the box to get notified when a new comment is added so you can stay in touch.

  • Watching Football

    Watching Football

    Football season was always one of my favorite times with Richard – at least during his more adult years.

    While he lived in Lexington he came to most of our pre-game tailgate parties at Commonwealth stadium, when we went to UK games. He didn’t miss much free food. He also liked to come and “discuss” the game.

    We discussed and debated a lot of games. OK, we argued about some of them. But it was always in good fun for us both.

    But anyway, we watched a lot of games together on TV. College games. NFL games. Lot’s of football.

    His room is decorated in a Miami Dolphins theme. He had a Dan Marino bobble-head.

    So this year to celebrate the new season I brought down Richard’s TV set and replaced ours with his. He had a very nice big screen LCD HDTV. According to his cousins – former roommates – Richard was very proud of his TV. It’s much bigger than our little 32″ LCD model. It’s been setting up in his room with all the stacks of his other stuff we brought back from his apartment.

    So now I watch football on Richard’s TV. I’m sure he’s pleased about that. He tried to get us to buy one like it when we got our little set.

    I guess using his TV gives me a little piece of him. A very little piece of him.

    But grieving parents have to take what we can get.

  • Silence of the Birds

    Silence of the Birds

    It’s Halloween. Richard always had a good time with Halloween.

    So after church this morning we stopped in Kroger and got a couple of helium filled Mylar Halloween balloons to take to the cemetery.

    It was a beautiful morning, perfectly clear sky and crisp but not too cool air.

    A hundred feet or so from Richard’s grave is a small grove of trees. There are a couple of real tall trees there. As we left our car and started walking to Richard’s grave we were greeted  with birds chirping. It sounded like hundreds of them, coming from those trees. Reminded me of the old Alfred Hitchcock movie The Birds. They were just chattering up a storm.

    So we were standing there holding our balloons and talking to Richard. The birds were making a racket.  We couldn’t see them, but it sounded like those trees were filled with them.

    Finally we told Richard happy Halloween and Debbie and I released our balloons into the air, hoping maybe they would sail up to him in heaven.

    As our fingers pulled away from the strings and the balloons started to rise into the sky – the cemetery went silent. Not a tweet. It was like the birds just vanished.

    We watched the balloons rise higher and higher, until they vanished into the sun filled sky.

    And the birds were still silent.

    We stayed a little while longer, talking to Richard more. And the birds never made another sound. It was still quiet when we left.

    That was really kind of weird.

  • Zombie Shopping

    Zombie Shopping

    Richard spent a few months working at Sears. He was in the tool department.

    He also liked Halloween.

    He always liked to run the haunted house at our church’s annual Halloween party. He was big into fake blood. He liked to paint on all sorts of cuts and bruises, black eyes and missing teeth. He had a very worn and torn t-shirt he always wore.

    Sears is running a special Halloween website. It has Zombies. They use Sears appliances for things most people don’t think of. Like chilling brains in the fridge.

    Richard would have approved.