Grace in the Storm

Seven years ago, we were quietly celebrating another wedding anniversary. I had no idea it was going to be our last one that we enjoyed together. Everything that came afterwards irrevocably changed me. Sometimes it makes me so angry that no words come. There is only a dark knowing of how wrong it is. Other times, I accept that he’s gone, and with him, the old me. 

His death came suddenly about a month after our last anniversary together, like a storm from the water. I hadn’t noticed what was coming and it knocked me off my feet as it destroyed everything. I can never express the thoroughness of that destruction. I fought hard to hold things as stable as I could for the kids when everything we believed in was tested and more losses were piled up on top of Gage’s death. We had a life and future before the afternoon of June 2nd, and then a scary and foreign world opened up to swallow us whole.

The unfamiliar and unknown bring fear like nothing else. Our reality had to change significantly while the emotional and physical toll of loss took over every aspect of living. The breaking of expectations and things we counted on ruined my hope and let anxiety take over as the constant state of being. Though the dread has lessened over the years, it can still be exhausting when it creeps up. The resulting trepidation and wariness can really pull me away from others, especially as it did for that first year or two.

At some point, my isolation had me searching for those who lived like me, in the unknowns that came from death. Over time and with help from the right people, the kids and I built a new life. Some of the unknowns became the familiar truths that we live by today.

Now my wedding anniversary marks the beginning of a tough part of each year since he passed. May and June bring a shadow that I slip under when the time comes. I’d like to break the routine, but I know it’s comforting in a strange way, to acknowledge what I can’t cut away from myself. My grief has become as natural and as essential as breathing to me.

So I have to give space to pain when it wants to come to the surface because it’s integral to the new me. I can’t deny it, but I’m getting better at walking with it. It’s helped me understand this new world that I’m creating and why I’m doing it. I just need to have a little grace for myself during this time of year and I will keep learning from my pain.