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Turning Point

Christmas has come and gone. I let out my breath and it was okay. A few weeks later, I let out another breath…

I pulled up in my driveway and a song I hadn’t heard since I was in college popped into my head. Thank God for YouTube. A quick search and there it was. It’s like all the breaths I had been holding since December 30, 2018 escaped my chest–deflating me, yet freeing me. It was the cry I had been shouting internally for months yet was so scared to let out. But that night I allowed myself to feel all the anger, desperation, sadness, confusion, and trauma of my brother’s death. I needed release. I needed healing. I needed the fullness of my grief to be heard and to be known by God. So I opened my mouth and lamented:

As I fall to sleep
Will you comfort me?
When my heart is weak
Will you rescue me?
Will you be there
As I grow cold?
Will you be there when I’m falling down?
Will you be there?
When I’m in retreat
Can I run to you?
Will my pain release
At your mercy seat?
Will you be there
As I grow cold?
Will you be there when I’m falling down?
Will you be there
My heart grows cold?
Will you be there when I’m falling down?
Are you saying so?
Oh, I gotta believe it
Are you saying yeah?
When your love comes down I can rest my eyes
Feel your grace and power flood into my life
As my brokenness and your strength collide
When your love comes down
Falling Down
As I fall to sleep

-“Will You Be There” by Skillet 
I wasn’t healed in that moment, but it was my turning point.
Here’s what I’ll tell you about this journey:
Death of a loved one is an awful experience. It shook me to my very core and brought things to light that I had no idea existed inside of me. But it has also allowed my heart to be more compassionate and loving toward others. It has urged me to appreciate each present moment. It has been the shock I need to be more patient with my son and husband. It has cemented my faith in God, even when my emotions are chaotic and my feelings are completely against Him.
I encourage you who are on your own grief journey to allow yourself to be brutally honest with your emotions, thoughts, and feelings. Write it down, talk about it, sing about it, whatever. Just get it out of you.

Count Down to Christmas

Take a deep breath; now hold it.

That’s kind of how I’m feeling about the holidays, in particular Christmas. I have a two year old so of course I want the magic of the holidays to be alive and well in our house, but nearly every time the excitement begins to rise, there is an ache inside. Phil won’t be here.

I played Christmas music the other day; slowly my smile turned to tears as I listened to it. Phil loved Christmas. I turned the music off and tried again another day. This time it was better. Still thought about him; still missed him, but no tears. I’m sure they will come again.

The first time my son met his uncle Pepe was at Christmas; the last time I heard my brother’s laugh was on Christmas. Man, I miss his laugh.

I honestly have no idea how to manage the joy that comes with the holidays while also experiencing the grief. Will it get better or worse as Christmas draws closer?

I can still barely talk about him or his passing in person. Sometimes I can make a comment to my husband about him, but it’s always a brief memory or a quick tidbit about him.

My conscious self still struggles to remember he’s gone. That’s the part that worries me the most about Christmas and being around family–I’ll be reminded. I’m scared to be around family and loved ones who will be feeling the same ache. I worry that I won’t be able to hold back tears or escape the sadness. Maybe that’s good. Maybe that’s the next step? I don’t want it and maybe it won’t even happen that way, but the very thought is enough to keep me up tonight.

 

 

Maybe?

It’s the strangest thing. My brother has been gone for almost a year and I still have these moments of realizing he’s actually gone. I’ll be going about my everyday business, then out of nowhere the thought hits me–he’s gone.

Maybe that’s why in my dreams I can still be reminded of this fact. Maybe that’s a coping mechanism? I lost my grandma, grandpa, and uncle many years ago, yet I get to see them at least once a year in my dreams, alive and well. My dream self always acknowledges the fact they are gone but I relish in these brief moments I get to see them again.

The night Phil died, I begged God for a dream like this about him. I desperately wanted to see him alive and well. To my great frustration, I didn’t see him. And for the many months that followed, and even sometimes still, I am brutally reminded within my dreams of his death. I can’t even express the despair I feel every time these nightmares greet me.

But maybe this is a good thing. Maybe this is a part of coming to terms with who I lost. Although it can seem brutal, maybe these acknowledgements are allowing my mind to come to terms with what is. Maybe it’s part of a healing process. Maybe my mind needs to feel the trauma of what was because my wakeful mind still struggles with dealing with it. Perhaps, once I can fully accept he’s gone, that’s when I’ll get to visit him in my dreams.

Birthday

Today would’ve marked 36 years. I haven’t celebrated my brother’s birthday with him for nearly 13 years, so today is a weird day. My normal routine would’ve been to call him at some point before bed. Normally, I would’ve said “Happy Birthday, Brother. Whatcha doin?” At some point in the conversation, he would’ve cut me off and asked how my husband was doing (because once we got married, my husband became the cool one Phil had to know about. Gotta love it). My normal has changed and I really don’t know what I’m suppose to do.

 

My brother loved photos. He wasn’t able to travel because of the seizures, so I got the idea that photos would connect him to my world more. A few years ago, I got him a photo album and for his birthday, I would get a whole stock of photos printed for him so that he could fill up the photo album. My mom told me how much he enjoyed looking at the photos; he would sometimes carry the album with him to show people what his sister was up to. I always had the intention of printing photos more frequently for him, but I would always forget…until his birthday. Sometimes, even then, he would have to wait months before getting more photos.  Why didn’t I just take the 5…10….15 minutes to go through photos and print some for him? It’s one of my many regrets.

But today is his birthday. It’s not a time to reflect on my regrets; it’s a time to share photos.

 

Love you, Phil.

Big Rachie and Phil
2016: “Beloved Sister” and “Brother”
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July 2018: This was a big  moment. He got to laugh and celebrate my son’s first birthday with the whole family! I will forever be grateful for this.
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July 2018: Love for “Tio Pepe”
Little Rachie and Phil
We were just too cute

Hospital Room

I can’t stand silence. When everything gets quiet, the memory of being in the hospital with my brother gets so loud, it’s deafening. When it’s quiet and my eyes are closed, I am right back in the hospital room hearing the life-support machine; I’m right there seeing my brother’s face so lifeless. I hear my mom’s cry; I see my cousin holding my brother’s hand; I feel my heart racing, just wanting this to be over but not wanting him to go. I honestly cannot understand why some people have a need to see their loved ones like that. For me, it has tainted everything. When I am asked about my brother, I instantly go to the hospital room; I see and feel everything again. Eventually I remember there was life before that. I can remember that we laughed together and talked about nothing, but to get there I first have to walk through that hospital room. So I avoid it. I avoid him.

Hurt

“Faith endures; but my address to God is uncomfortably, perplexingly, altered. It’s off-target, qualified… I want to ask God protect the members of my family. But I asked that for Eric…Lament and trust are in tension, like wood and string in bow.”

–Lament for a Son, Nicholas Wolterstorff

My brother began to have visible seizures at 12 years old. Before that, he acted and behaved as a normal kid. He was an artist and an athlete. When the seizures started, though, he slowly began to change. By the time he was in his 20’s, the seizures, medications, and surgeries took a toll on his mental and physical capacities. His speech started to become more and more slurred. His ability to communicate became more delayed. He had a permanent lump on the back of his head from the many times he had fallen during a grand mal seizure. My once athletic brother could barely walk by himself in his 30’s. I can remember seeing him a few years ago and being taken aback by how bad he looked. I think it was at this point my grief actually started.

I can’t tell you how many times I prayed for his healing and truly believed that it would happen. I felt it so strongly. Once I called him, crying, telling him to keep believing that it would happen. It’s almost embarrassing to confess that now.

I feel like that if he had simply passed without many years of my constant hope that he would one day be “normal” again, it wouldn’t hurt so bad that his healing didn’t happen. Like Nicholas said in his book, “faith endures, but my address to God is uncomfortably, perplexingly, altered.”

I attempt to pray, but as soon as I start a deep hurt wells up within me. How am I to pray when I don’t feel safe with Him? How am I to say “your will be done” when I’ve seen the result of his will? I know that death will be faced by all, but why do some get to experience a long and beautiful life while others have a short, painful one? How do I entrust my son to a God that didn’t heal my brother? Do these thoughts and feelings show a lack of faith? I cling to and find comfort in the teaching Jesus gave his disciples:

The apostles said to the Lord, “Increase our faith!” He replied, “If you have faith as small as a mustard seed, you can say to this mulberry tree, ‘Be uprooted and planted in the sea,’ and it will obey you.” -Luke 17:5-6

Truly, I don’t think I have felt more strongly that having faith as small as a mustard seed could be enough.

Welcoming Tears

Just wasting time.

Life has been feeling pretty normal. It has been a couple of months since my brother died and already things have felt “normal” again. The anger is not as raw; the thoughts don’t swirl as much; the dreams, or rather nightmares, have dimmed. Life feels normal again. I often feel guilty about that. How could life already feel normal? How can I allow myself to move on? Did he not mean more to me than that?

But then a welcomed mournful moment happened. As I was just wasting time watching a Scrubs episode, it came to a scene in which the brother of one of the characters died. My first thought, “Man, that’s really sad. Her brother died.” Then it dawned on me…my brother died. The thoughts began to swirl again…Phil is dead. I won’t see my brother again. To that, the tears began to flow. The rest of the day I was reminded of my brother’s influence in my life. Every song that played on Pandora linked itself to him. I hadn’t realized how much of my musical taste over the years was inspired by him. Song after song, I could recall moments of us listening to that artist or me being annoyed that once again he’s playing that dang song! He notoriously broke VHS music video tapes, cassette tapes and at least one boombox because of his obsession with a particular song or artist. Oh man, I can remember begging him to stop! Ironically, many of those same songs or artists became some of my favorites too.

I wanted to call him. I wanted to ask him if he remembers listening to those songs, then give him a hard time for his obsessiveness. I wanted to say, “Hi brother. Remember when you broke Mom’s boombox because you kept rewinding that tape, and the play button stopped working?” He probably would’ve laughed that laugh then said, in a low slow voice, “Yeah.” It wouldn’t have been a profound or life changing conversation, but not being able to have it is profound and life changing. It’s amazing how those simple things that are so easy to take for granted can feel like such a gift when it’s no longer available.

 

Sparrow Unseen

“…His eyes are on the sparrow, and I know He watches me.” –Civilla D. Martin

What if His eyes are distracted? What if a sparrow does go unnoticed?

God knows each sparrows He sees each one when it falls. When my pastor made mention of this I screamed inside. Questions I have struggled with pour into my mind. Then why the hell did my brother die? Why didn’t you heal him like we all thought you would? Why did you let him suffer while someone else gets to be healed? How am I suppose to trust you?

My pastor said that God knows the details of our lives…my teeth start to clench and internally I am taking a sledge hammer through a wall. In my mind, I am punching, screaming, wailing. The aggression I feel is so intense at that moment that I have to hold myself tight in order to keep control. Breathe–inhale….exhale. When I leave church and continue living life, the aggression subsides; distractions take their course. My emotions settle and things feel more normal.

Entering church brings it all back.

I am starting to realize my anger doesn’t just lie in the fact that my brother wasn’t healed and is now dead; it is also lies in the feeling God doesn’t actually care. C.S. Lewis really puts it best in A Grief Observed: 

“The conclusion I dread is not ‘So there’s no God after all,’ but ‘So this is what God’s really like. Deceive yourself no longer.'”

I have two options in which to live in. I can tell myself that God doesn’t care and feel fear, dread, and anger.  My second option is to scream at him and feel the fear, dread, and anger but have hope that he does care. Currently, I am choosing the latter.

On Repeat

My brother is dead. He died. Phil is gone.

I knew this day would come; I talked about it with my husband many years ago and many times since. Phil had epilepsy which caused him to have intense seizures. The hospital was memorized, and he was memorized by the hospital. He had a total of three brain surgeries to help with the seizures. Surely, I just knew that a seizure would be the end of him. It was so obvious. How could a seizure not take his life?

So then, how am I to process when a blood clot dislodging into his heart is what takes him away? What am I to do when the expected happens in an unexpected way?

My freakin brother is dead.

His face won’t grow old. There are no more memories to be had and, as C.S. Lewis is teaching me in A Grief Observed, the memories I do hold will only be a mere shadow of my brother; not even a true shadow. My mind will form its own truths of who he was. How shitty is that? I won’t even be able to look back on memories and know they’re true. What I say is a memory might be an inaccurate representation of what truly was. It’s often said that “he/she will live on in your memories.” The awful truth is that he/she won’t. No memory I have will make my brother live again. I hate that so much, but at the same time it’s kind of comforting. If a person could truly be held completely in our memories and, therefore, “live on”, were they really a full person? My brother had so many facets to him. Some I knew; some I thought I knew; some I had no idea existed. So I guess in knowing that, I’m glad my memories aren’t where his life will carry on.

I can’t believe he’s gone.