Keep Swimming: The Gift of Grieving
When I went to add the blog, I realized it has been a year since I last posted.
Time really does fly by.
At the bottom of the post I am sharing new shirts to purchase. If you want to skip
the lessons on grief just scroll on down! You will not hurt my feelings :)
Our beloved share love field day DJ, Jermaine , told me that he loved being a part of
"The share love movement". I loved the idea of a share love movement.
Please share with the link with anyone you think might want to join the SHARE LOVE MOVEMENT.
"One word frees us of all the weight and pain in life. That word is love."
— Sophocles
As I dropped G off at Briarlake this morning, Ms. McKay opened his car door.
She was wearing a Share Love T-shirt and had her warm smile.
Graham gave her that T-shirt in kindergarten, back when he used to run from the school every morning.
Because, well… he was five, COVID was happening, his dad had died, and the thought of separating from me was overwhelming.
Ms. McKay would kindly and calmly call him over with her gentle voice.
She would sit patiently and lovingly beside him on the concrete steps by the back side door.
During COVID, they divided the kids by the upper and lower halls.
The little ones had to enter on the lower side, through the kindergarten hall.
No parents were allowed inside the building.
For little ones, this was overwhelming.
She would sit with him and show him pictures of her cats.
I could see him relax a little and sink into her presence.
My aching heart would also relax as I walked away and as tears of deep gratitude flowed.
Tears flowed out of love for a community that held my kids.
Carried my kids.
And loved them through the pains of life.
This morning, when Ms. McKay opened the door wearing her Share Love T-shirt,
I cried as I drove away.
Just like I did on those kindergarten mornings during COVID.
Tears of gratitude and love.
And tears of grief.
I think I am living in anticipatory grief this year.
This coming spring, we will end another chapter,
another era: the elementary school era.
One at Briarlake… Home of the Beavers.
Once a Beaver, always a Beaver, so they say.
This special place loved my kids and kept them swimming through the roughest seas.
Especially when their mom felt like she was drowning in grief… and was also being held up
by the lifeboats of family, friends, and this sweet school community.
Ms. McKay opened the truck door this morning with the same genuine, loving smile I have come to know
From all the teachers and staff there.
Graham got out happily.
Well, as happy as G can be about a 7 a.m. wake-up call. Lol.
He got the sleeping gene from his dad.
From pre-K dropout…
To fifth grade with confidence.
I am so grateful for the love that was shared unconditionally ,
with all three of my children by these angels.
Time seems to be moving at warp speed.
Jake gets his license in a month… well, hopefully. Lol.
(Update, a few weeks later: He got his license!)
Celia will go to high school next year with confidence and Mike’s social skills. Friends abound.
I am trying to make time slow down.
I am living in the ashes again.
Grieving more things.
Like childhood innocence.
Gone are the days of worrying about whether they had too much cake or too many Capri Suns at parties.
Instead, I find myself thinking about the overconsumption of alcohol.
Let’s be real.
There was a time when I felt confident in my mom skills.
Now, I am being humbled more and more each day by how little I know,
and by how much I rely on God and prayer.
And on family, friends, and community.
I surrender.
A few Tuesday nights ago, we had a fire on the back deck in Mike’s fire pit.
The one his family friend made, with the fleur-de-lis etched into the side.
Just the four of us.
I have been reading a book. Yep, another grief book, shared with me by my dear widow friend.
The Wild Edge of Sorrow. Francis Weller
The author talks about rituals.
Which I learned I should never call this activity with two teenagers.
“Could we please just have a normal fire and call it a fire? And just eat the marshmallows and candy like a normal family?”
Noted.
Because right now, I will desperately do anything to get them to agree with any idea I have.
So, a fire it is.
Also… there you are, Mike.
In their humor and in your dislike of Kumbaya rituals, too. Lol.
The book suggests the ritual of letting go.
Surrendering.
Writing things we want to release on paper and watching them turn to ashes in the fire.
Making room for new light and new life.
I thought it was a great idea.
Teenagers?
Nope.
Celia humored me and wrote down one thing she wanted to let go of in the fire.
So we had a fire…
Not a ritual.
Insert loving eye roll here.
With too many marshmallows consumed to count.
I know they miss him.
They talk about their friends getting their dads to help them with math.
“No offense, Mom. It’s okay that you can’t do math.”
But also, are you sure your dad would have been able to do that problem?
That is what I wanted to say. Lol.
I will keep letting them think you would be good at math, Mike.
I get it though… It makes me sad, too.
I wish we could ask you ourselves instead of having to wonder.
Jake said,
“I think I will keep the Dory in the truck. It might be low-key cool.”
Dory has hung from the rearview mirror since 2020, a few months after Mike died.
I had taken little J, C, and G through the McDonald’s drive-through ,
as an activity to escape grief and our homes during COVID.
The kids’ meal prize was a stuffed Dory keychain.
That day, the little stuffed Dory became my desperate connection to Mike.
I was drowning in the sorrow of missing him.
Keep swimming, he told us that day.
And still does on all the murky, McDonald’s McFlurry-kind-of-grief days.
The sun has faded Dory over the last six years, from blue to purple.
Yet her reminder is brighter and more life-giving than ever before.
Jake will be the first to keep swimming without his floaties.
The first in the drivers seat.
He could not be more excited, and I know that makes his daddy proud and happy.
I say a prayer.
Many prayers. I have enough gray hair already.
Be near him, God.
Be near him, Mike.
I wish you were here to teach him to drive.
I think I am a “mid” teacher. Lol. More teenage terminology.
Papa and D did a much better job.
Your 42nd birthday is coming up on Saturday.
I have felt the air bubbles of grief filling up inside me again.
Air bubbles slowly releasing themselves, trying to reach the surface.
But we have been too busy to give them any attention.
I have been holding my breath.
I have needed to grieve.
To slow down.
To release my breath.
In The Wild Edge of Sorrow, this quote led me to the idea of our “normal fire,” not a ritual.
“We must honor the needs of the soul during times of grief.
If we aren’t allowed time to grieve, wounds close too soon, remain infected, and never heal.
Without adequate time in the ashes tending to the loss, sorrow mutates into symptoms of depression, anxiety, dullness, and despair.
We must honor the needs of the soul.”
We have done a lot of healing and grieving.
We have honored our souls.
Yet I am realizing that we will always be grieving something.
Like simply a 5th grade graduation .
I have to take time to slow down and come up for air again.
Tend to my soul.
After a long swim.
And, man, has it felt like a long swim lately.
Celia and Jake have both made their phone backgrounds pictures of themselves with Mike.
It might be about the only thing I love about them having phones.
But the pictures also bring back the hot flames of grief.
And yet, instead of being burned by the grief and longing,
I am finding that something is melting slowly. Instead of burning.
Melting back into this sea of love.
The place where we find your love and feel so close to it.
The ritual was really just because I wanted them to remember that it is okay to be sad.
And to miss their dad.
To remind them, although I truly believe they know deep down, that he does see them.
And that he is proud of them.
Just like Mike and Dory have taught us…
When we let our hearts feel the warmth of the fire,
whether we are burned or begin to melt,
and when we sit in the ashes,
we are given the light, hope, and strength
to keep swimming
with even more courage.
This is the gift of grieving.
I think this lesson was for me.
The important part of the fire for them?
The s’mores and going to bed late on a school night.
As I grieve and mourn this season coming to an end, I am trying to surrender again.
Tend to my heart.
Sit in the ashes for a few minutes.
Seeing Ms. McKay and her shirt this morning made me grateful for love.
Love doesn’t end.
The love we felt.
The love we shared.
That is the gift that lasts.
That’s all.
How you can help share love this fall!
We need your help :)
I am sure you have heard by now that we have postponed Field Day this year.
The decision was not taken lightly.
But I needed a chance to slow down.
To get back to the heart of the mission.
As everything feels like it is changing (and I have never been someone who does well with change),
I felt a quiet nudge to tend to my own inner fire.
Instead of Field Day, we hope you will purchase one of these two shirts: a black one or a white one.
Maybe you are in the dark ashes and shadows of grief and cannot see any signs of light.
Or maybe you are in the light, where wounds are healing and the darkness is no longer overpowering you.
Either way, sharing love matters.
Unconditional love matters.
I know without a doubt that sharing love has the power to bring healing.
Because of your belief in the Share Love Foundation, I have been able to surprise people, both anonymously and face-to-face.
This gift continues to heal my heart.
I have found that my most peaceful, grace-filled days are the days when I have mailed off a package, sat with someone, or shared a shirt.
You have given me that gift through your belief in our mission.
It is something I do not take for granted for a single day.
These gifts are not just from me. They are from all of you, and from a power greater than any of us can imagine.
When you purchase a shirt, you will receive a package with your new shirt and a small stack of older shirts.
I am also trying to clear out inventory!
To make space for new life, new ways to share love, and space for God to fill us with new opportunities to love others.
My prayer is that you will trust yourself to know who to give the extra shirts to.
Slow down and listen to your own intuition.
I hope you experience the joy, love, and healing I feel when I give them to others.
I encourage you to consider doing it anonymously.
With unconditional love.
In the hope of nothing in return.
When my kids see the shirts, I do hope they feel a hug for their hearts from their dad.
But honestly, as time goes on,
I just hope the shirts remind them of the healing power of love.
That love can free them from the weight of the pain of this world.
And that they may learn to love themselves with that same love.
Unconditional love heals the deepest of wounds.
That’s all.
The store to purchase shirts will be open for the next three weeks.
You will receive your shirts a couple weeks after that.
Just in time for the Holiday season.
Purchase here at….
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