This year I wanted to do a preemptive strike...skip it all together. I told my family my thoughts. It would only be once in a while I would request this. We would go on vacation and enjoy the relaxing beach, or snuggle up in a hotel room and watch Christmas movies. We would not feel the need to buy gifts or open them except maybe a select few.
The empty hole that Declan left would not be so noticeable. I could have respite from a difficult time. But alas, I was overruled.
So I am gearing up for another Christmas. Each year since 2010 I have told myself this will be the year I don't wish it away. This will be the year I don't want it to be over before it begins.
But I'm pretty sure just like the previous years it will happen again and again. That hole in my heart and family will be there all my life here. I don't see it going away. I have been told many times that it will - someday it won't feel this way. Perhaps they are right...I fear they are not.
The only thing I know about grief is that it is different for everyone. We feel differently. We see things differently. So of course when the ultimate pain comes, we react differently.
So as I have tread these chopping and sometimes treacherous waters of grief I realize I am no expert. I have been asked for my advice a few times and each time I scratch my head and think, "I have no idea." Then I wonder, "How in the world do I have no ideas?!"
I think it is because I have seen the way everyone reacts. Sometimes it is like me. Then others who I think will be like me are nothing like me. I never know what will bring comfort or pain. So I tread carefully and let my empathy be my guide.
Maybe someday I will write a do not list for the grieving, but I do believe that has been done many times on the blogosphere...and that is for another day.
I don't hate Christmas. I don't hate Thanksgiving. I do wish sometimes it didn't have to feel that they came every three months...even though I know it is only once a year. I also wish it didn't hurt as much as it did...but maybe I would feel I was some kind of monstrous mother that didn't care that one of her children wasn't here to enjoy the magic and fun of Christmas.
I have come a long way since Declan died. On a day to day basis, I am really good. My head and heart are getting into a rhythm...they are out of sync once in a while, but on a whole they are enjoying a very nice symbiotic relationship. The only time it gets to be a disastrous problem is Christmas and a small extent Thanksgiving - the beginning of the Christmas season (lets be honest).
Declan's birthday I feel justified to be sad and just sit and think about him. When I need a minute during a day that brought up a memory or some milestone he should be going through I can take that minute and just breathe. But for some reason the whole of the Holiday season is exhausting and I find myself wanting to curl up under a fuzzy blanket and pretending the holiday isn't happening.
Then I feel bad for my family that I want to do that. I trudge on and I wrap gifts. I talk myself into decorating our tree. I promise myself this will be different this year! I believe it will. I push through it and hang stockings. I pull out my little Christmas tree for Declan and tenderly place those ornaments on it.
Christmas parties, going to see lights, and all other Christmas excitement. I plow forward hoping by the time I get to Christmas I am good to go. Then Christmas Eve hits and I fall into the rabbit hole and I don't resurface until after the new year.
The whole frenzy begins with Thanksgiving. Luckily, Thanksgiving has never been high on my list of favorite holidays. I like the food. I really like the gratitude spirit. But all in all, it isn't terribly hard for me other than the fact that as a family we are together...but really we aren't.
This year as my children and I kneel down to say our nightly prayers we all tell what we are grateful for. I do enjoy hearing what the kids say. I told them to do something different each time...and they do.
We do have much to be grateful for in this life. The convenience of life cannot be denied. Past generations had many hardships that many of us do not have. Our lives now are hardly easy, but in many ways the burdens have been lifted with technology and inovation.
I am hopeful this is the year. That I can have a Christ-centered Christmas that is not painful, but rather balm for the soul. That I can have a blast with my kids and not feel the pressure that I'm not doing enough or I'm not fun enough. It has been so long, probably since my second child was itsy that I have truly loved Christmas. When she was about 18 months, right before I got pregnant with Declan, that was a very magical Christmas. I have hopes that those Christmases will come again...
