More on Grief

I'm officially on summer vacation and this is the saddest I have ever felt about it.  Summer has always been a time of playing and family and carefree fun.  It is pretty hard to imagine any of that this summer, though I know it will happen.  If anything, the girls will make it happen just by being their adorable (and challenging) 5- and almost-2-year-old selves.

 

I wrote the following post a couple of days ago, because this has been a pretty tough week.  I was going to apologize in advance for posting this depressing stuff, but I'm not going to.  It is what has been rolling around in my brain, and I'm not going to be sorry for sharing it.  It feels good to get it out. 

 

So here goes.

 

What I learned about grief in the first month after Dad died was what we experienced together as a family.  Grief is crying (so much crying), disbelieving, hugging (so much hugging), planning, receiving condolences, figuring out what to do with death certificates, and making it through each day only to wake up for the next one and do it all again.

 

But what I’m now learning is even though we are all in this horrible situation together, the grief is so very different and personal- even in our immediate family. 

 

My mom lost her husband, soul mate, travel partner, calmer-downer, and biggest fan. She now has to navigate through the world without him somehow, all day every day.  Her life has been completely turned upside down without having the person she needs the most to help her through it. 

 

My sister Laura lost her dad, her boss, and her mentor.  She not only has to deal with the grief of losing her father, she also has take care of so many business details and deal with the pain of not seeing him at the office every day. 

 

My sister Mari lost her dad, her biggest supporter, and the person who was supposed to walk her down the aisle at her wedding next May.  She has to continue planning for a day that will be extremely wonderful, but also very hard. 

 

My husband Chris has lost his father-in-law, golf partner, and the person he would go to to talk sports, life, technology, and anything else that guys typically talk about together (they were the only two guys in our family for many years!).  He is now trying to support me in my grief, be there for our girls, and deal with his own loss as well. 

 

My brothers-in-law Craig and Josh, while new(ish) to our family, also lost their father-in-law.  They are missing him while supporting Laura and Mari and the rest of us.

 

I lost my dad, my biggest cheerleader, and my daughters’ Bops.  I am stuck in the middle of wanting to be there to support my mom and sisters as much as I can, but also needing to be present to parent my girls, even when it seems impossibly hard.

 

We all lost the same person, but his death has impacted us all in such different ways.

 

Grief is just so overwhelming.

 

A number of people sent us all a link to a post written by Sheryl Sandberg, an executive at Facebook. Her husband, Dave, died in a freak accident while they were on vacation just a couple days after my dad died.  Here is part of what she wrote about her experience:

 

“I think when tragedy occurs, it presents a choice.  You can give in to the void, the emptiness that fills your heart, your lungs, constricts your ability to think or even breathe.  Or you can try to find meaning.  These past thirty days, I have spent many of my moments lost in that void.  And I know that many future moments will be consumed by the vast emptiness as well.  But when I can, I want to choose life and meaning.”

 

Even in the midst of all this crazy, personal, sometimes debilitating grief, I know THAT is what my dad wants for us.  He wants us to choose life.  To do meaningful work.  To be grateful. To experience new things.

 

Because that’s what he did and how he lived his life. 

 

Toasting Dad with his Scotch (one of his new interests and experiences) on his 60th birthday.

 

(If you want to read Sheryl's entire post, you can click here.)