June 2, 2020

This is my June 2nd, in the middle of a global pandemic and social unrest spilling into riots over longstanding issues. I wonder if we can use all this heartache to find lasting solutions. There is no easy way.

I’m exhausted. Embattled. Raw and empty. 

Mostly because I need to find a meaningful way to mark this sixth anniversary of Gage’s death in the crazy world we are all in now. It’s a struggle every year no matter how I prepare or try to help my kids.

Even now, there are instances in my grief where time slips and the pain that first came when I realized Gage was dying ripples through me in a force I can’t control. I remember the very second it came into being and I am taken hostage in that memory. Time or work done to move forward does not lessen that first jolt when it hits me. Many talk of transcending grief, but maybe I’m old fashioned in that my grief is still tied to my love. One without the other doesn’t seem right. 

It’s not debilitating. It doesn’t hold up my life. I work at finding a balance. I just have to acknowledge it and give it space when it comes since it did so much to define the person I am today. And it springs from the love of a man who mattered so much to me that there’s still a little hole in my heart. How could there not be?

So I don’t have answers on how to live a better life in grief. I don’t know how to fix the pain of a broken heart or the broken world we live in now. I just keep trying every day to be the best person I can be for those around me. My kids, my family, my friends, my neighbors. Sometimes it takes everything I’ve got to do that. Today, I don’t know if I have enough in me to be strong. But tomorrow, I’ll try again.