Brownies and society-an anniversary alone

Tomorrow would have marked nine years that Storm and I had been together. Today, I am missing him.

I found myself at a social gathering on Friday evening. I don't often find myself at social events that are not family-based. I typically feel so awkward and out of place that I simply long for home. This was really no different.  As I was standing there trying to decide if I should go first or last, awkwardly waiting for some social cue, it occurred to me that I wouldn't have felt that way if Storm had been there.

Storm instinctively understood some things about me. He understood that I was not good at society. I stood there and thought about how he would have taken the lead, he would've directed me, he would've asked all the questions, carried the conversation, and he probably would've made my plate. In that moment, I wanted to cry. I had to go to the bathroom, had to take a minute. I really wanted to go home right then, but I stayed and managed to make it through dinner. I think I probably smiled in the right places, and I don't think I made a huge mess out of my food. I didn't break anything, and I probably even said the right things at the right time since I don't remember anyone looking at me like I'm crazy. Nevertheless, I escaped as soon as I could politely get away.

That same sort of memory had me crying over a pan of brownies tonight. I began cutting a chunk out and it was on the corner. Storm used to eat all of the edges of every cake or brownie substance that came through the house. He did this because one time I told him that I preferred the middle pieces, and he decided I should never have to eat a crust again. As soon as something came out of the oven, and was cool enough to handle, he would cut off all the edges and leave me only the middle.  It's been some time since something so silly has inspired a crying fit. I guess I was due.

Tomorrow I will not have time to wallow. I don't take time to wallow, because I don't like wallowing. Aside from that, I have responsibilities and Thanksgiving dinner on Thursday.

Immediately after Storm's death, getting out of bed in the morning was the hardest thing. More than once, I went back to bed. I didn't have the luxury of wallowing then, either, so I would get up, and stand at the front window, and pray, "This is the day that you have made, Yahweh. Please help me to rejoice and be glad in it." 

I hope tomorrow is not that kind of day. I hope that I wake up and forget all about November 24th. Since that is not actually likely to happen, I pray that Yah will help me be glad and rejoice in it. 

Shalom.

9 Months

Last night I shared my experience, and listened to the experiences of others at the once monthly suicide survivors support group put on by our local Hospice.  I have been to the group several times before, but have missed meetings lately due to the fact that I’m too busy living life, which is better than crying. 

There were a couple of conversations that stuck to me.  Often things will go with me from the meetings, and I quite often pray over others that I meet there, but rarely do I take anything home that gets the hamster in my brain running on his wheel.  Last night was the exception. I can still feel him in there, squeaking away on that thing.   I think I need to get it out so the freaking hamster will find something else to do.

The first conversation was regarding the cause of suicide.  A quick aside: I know that not all suicides are the same, and that everyone is unique.  I also know that it’s hard to hear something about a loved one that seems less than complimentary to them.  However, I have to deal with this my way, and I will try to be respectful to others dealing with this their way.  This is my way.

I started quite the conversation by saying, “Suicide is caused by mental illness.  Everything else is a contributing factor.” This seemed to help the man I was saying it to, but two people in the room objected.  I’m glad they did.  Not ALL suicides are caused by mental illness, but I would amend it to say ALMOST ALL suicides are caused by mental illness.  I wish I had been able to explain but since one of the people who seemed most reluctant to talk opened up about it, and that was good, I decided to let it go, and let him talk.

If I had been able to explain, I would have said this: “Self-preservation is one of the strongest forces in human behavior, and to override that takes not only a tremendous amount of courage (I may expand on that another time, so please don’t get hung up on it)but it also requires overriding one’s most basic self-preservation instincts.  To override that, one has to NOT be in their right mind. 

“It brings me comfort to think of it that way.  Mental illness isn’t the fault of the person who is suffering from it.  It’s like a cancer.  It makes them ill, and it causes them to act ill, they want to die.  Sometimes they seem to get better.  It goes into remission.  Sometimes, they really are better.  But often, it comes back.  Sometimes, it’s terminal.  In other words, it really wasn’t their fault.  Really.”  

In those harsh, bitter days immediately following Storm’s suicide, my world was filled with questions.  My questions mostly remain unanswered.   This one I do have an answer for now:

               Q: Why?
               A: Because he couldn’t help it.

In the immortal words of Forest Gump; “That’s all I have to say about that.”

The other matter was regarding something I didn’t speak on, but I watched and listened.  There was a mom and her mom there, and they were talking about marking a son’s suicide date every year.  They were talking about the various different ways they were doing it each year.  They seemed so worn out and tired from it. 

I don’t think I’m going to do that.  I don’t think I want to.  

February 13^th is going to suck.  Make no mistake.  I’m probably going to cry, and I’m probably going to eat chocolate, and have a movie marathon, and stay in my jammies all day, use a whole box of tissues.  I might even let the dogs on the couch.  That day is never not going to be what it is.

However, the biggest part of my struggle with all of it has been fighting through the anger and betrayal to be able to just grieve the man I knew.  Storm was an amazing human being.  He was my southern fried Aussie redneck.  In public, he was who he was at home.  He was loud, rude, obnoxiously honest, and way too free with his opinion.  He was angry, and bitter, and not afraid to use that energy to control the environment around him.  He could make himself the center of attention in an instant, and then disappear so thoroughly in a crowd that even I had to search to find him.  He was larger than life, and people were drawn to him for reasons I am sure I will never understand.

Out of the public eye, he was all of those things, but he was also Rose’s Storm, my husband.  He loved me in an unreasonable way.  It was uncompromising and unflinching and bared open for the world to see.  No one who ever met him didn’t know he was married to his Rose within 5 minutes of meeting them, because I never left his mind or his lips.  At home he put me first, always.  He tended to me, to use his words.  He asked if I was hungry, did I need a drink, is something wrong, would you like a hug, Love?  In fact, he spent half of his days some days asking me how to make me happy.  One neighbor said we talked to each other like we were in a movie because we spent so much time speaking our love out loud.

That’s the man I want to remember.  That’s the what I want to commemorate.  Not the last few unfortunate minutes of our life together, but the other eight years of love and kindness and friendship.  I want to mourn HIM, celebrate HIM, miss HIM, and his presence and his person, and not focus in on the last thing he ever did.  

Right now, I’m not sure what I will doing February 13^th.  It’s a still a ways away, and I have some living to do before then.  I tell you what I won’t be doing February 13^th.  I won’t be setting any balloons loose, or releasing Chinese lanterns, or liberating any butterflies. I don’t judge anyone who does so.  I just don’t think that’s how I want to cope.  I hope I’m doing something so amazing and so incredible that I don’t even care that it’s February 13^th.   I don’t intend to turn it into a personal holiday.   

What I’m going to do is celebrate his life.  I’m going to celebrate his birthday, every year, no matter where I am or what I am doing.  Every year.  January 3^rd.  I’m going to buy a bottle of whiskey, and every year on his birthday I’m going to drink a shot to him and toast him with anyone nearby who’s willing to drink with me.  I’m going to try to make it a good day, and try to do things he would have enjoyed, but mostly, I’m going to think about his life, and not his death.

You see, I would like to believe that the heavy importance of February 13^th will start to fade some day.  I don’t want to define the rest of my life by that day.  I never want to forget Storm Treasure.  Hell, like anybody ever could forget Storm Treasure. :D  What I do want is for it to fade.  One year, eventually, I’d like to totally forget it’s February 13^th.  I never want to forget January 3^rd. 

Ultimately, I am most grateful to my father, Yahweh, who pulls me up each day, and helps me to rejoice that each day is his.  He hears this widow’s prayers, and he has put a light on the path to healing.  I am grateful for the level of healing that I have reached in a very short amount of time.  I am grateful that he forces me to look at things honestly and never compromise to soften the truth.  I am also grateful that he is kind to me, and sends me comfort and friends and smiles and chocolate.  Lots of chocolate.  Most importantly, he sends me wisdom, often from the mouths of others.  May we all find shalom.

Today I went to a memorial of a woman that I barely knew.  I listened to the lovely things her friends and family had to say, and I admired a woman that had such a profound effect on those around her.  Though I'm cordial with her husband, I can't say I know him well.   I went because my god told me to be there, and because I wanted to show my support.

It wasn't long after I began going to my little Baptist Hebrew Roots church this year that I heard that the wife of the associate pastor, who I only knew by name, was ill. I think I met her one time.  In fact, I'm certain she wouldn't have known who I was.  She passed away early on Friday morning, leaving a quite obviously large and aching hole in the lives of those who loved and were impacted by her love and her faith.

I can't help thinking how rough this past Shabbat must have been for her husband.  Storm died at 4:16 on a Friday morning.  I had  survived that Friday, full of well-meaning huggers and kind visitors and loving people who, with complete sincerity, spoke to me the platitudes they have learned to say when someone dies.  I had talked to the people who had to be talked to.  I had made the phone calls I had to make.  I had answered the police and the neighbors and the questions and the dogs scared looks and the phone over and over again.  Night finally came that Shabbat, ending that worst day, and for the first time in 23 years I dreaded a Sabbath.

Waking up that day was waking to the second worst day of my life.  A few bright spots were in the day.  My daughter brought us breakfast, and her father-in-law brought Malachi, and he brought sunshine to my heart.  The day improved, and so did my life.  But that first full morning, that first Shabbat sunrise, the whole day looked like a bleak desert of empty time.  It was the first day I remember looking out the window at the sun, too bright and shiny when I hurt so much inside, and saying out loud, "This is the day you have made, Yahweh.  Please help me to rejoice and be glad in it."  He heard my prayer that day, and the many, many mornings I would say it after that.  I realized today that I no longer say that in the morning.  Each day starts with a soft, purring cat, and is full of work and service and joy and great blessings, and there is no time for me to wallow in pain and trauma and grief.  Life is short, and it is for living.

My church is like homecoming for me.  I still mostly try to make myself small, and still mostly feel out of place, like a single gray chick among the yellow ones.  I walked away from church and church fellowship many years ago; I was a gray chick even then.  My belief grew and changed and I developed my dogged determination to learn and obey Torah.  I had searched for congregations, and had given up.  The only reason I went to Cornerstone that day was because the father impressed upon me I needed prayer, and I remembered this church kept a Sabbath meeting.  I went and received the prayer, and then the message, and then the food; all nourishment to my broken soul. I tried to be small and invisible, and the Father mostly let me. I thought I would only go the once.   Somehow, I found myself waking up again and again on Shabbat morning, and making my way to the little church, and trying to be invisible in the pew.  Each week I felt a little better, a little more equipped, and a little more in awe of my god.  Each week I received something that helped me gain insight into the past week, and to get through the next, and it was all nourishment to my soul.  I'm sure the Father saved my heart through this church, and it might have even saved my life.  I have come to love these people, and their beautiful hearts.  

Today, watching these folks who love Torah so much express their love for this woman made me love them even more, and helped me realize once again how very blessed I am to have found them.  I realize how much I love the air in my lungs, and the feel of the cold against my skin, and the sound of a room full of people fellowshipping in His name.  I realized how much I love my soft cat, and my warm bed, and my quiet life, even if it isn't the life I would have chosen.

I am constantly humbled that Yah hears my prayers, and that he sees me at all.  The knowledge that this IS the day that Yah has made, and he wants us to rejoice and be glad in it has driven me from bed morning after morning, and the knowledge that I would be embraced in his love through my fellow servants in him helped me to rejoice in it at least once a week.  Yah has created something in the Torah that is more than just words and laws and rules; it is the framework of his love for us.  It is the embodiment of the caring and kindness he shows toward us every day, and it is the medicine that helps the grieving recover, and the brokenhearted to find healing.  Psalm 119 is all about the glorious blessing of the Torah.  Vs. 50-51 This is my comfort in my affliction, For Your word has given me life.  The proud have utterly scorned me, I did not turn aside from Your Torah.  Also vs. 93 says: Let me never forget Your orders, For by them You have given me life.    My favorite is 165: Great peace have those loving Your Torah, And for them there is no stumbling-block.   By believing in Torah, I knew what I was going to do that first Shabbat; rest.  The same as I have done every one since, and before it.  Resting. Though I dreaded the long day without Storm, I took comfort in knowing what to do that day.  I rested in Torah, in my grief, and in my Father.  I know that, whatever horrible things might happen in life, the rules have already been established at the foundations of creation.  All that I have to do is obey them, and Yah will take care of the hard stuff for me.    

I saw that same faith in the husband tonight.  I saw the grief, the pain, and that familiar feeling of "what am I supposed to do with myself now?"  But I also saw that framework of Torah.  That knowledge that whatever pain and sorrow life may bring, there is such a blessing in knowing that the guidelines for what to do are already in our hearts.  That faith that the Father has set his will into place, has spoken the creation into being, and he has spoken his law into being, and it is very good, and it will comfort and bring peace.

Maybe that is what I was there for; to see a mirror.  To see my own faith in Yahweh's Torah reflected back in the face of another believer who has lost that which they had cleaved to them and now find their love bleeding out.  To see the reflection of myself nine months ago reinforces where I am now in recovery.  Maybe I dunno.  I do try to understand, but I mostly try to obey.

Nobody wants my advice, but if I were to give it to a new widow or widower in faith, I would say this: Yah sees you.  He knows your pain, and he will bless you.  He will lead you out of this time of darkness and into the light, because the darkness has not overcome the light.  Just obey, and keep your faith, and it will be rewarded.  THIS is the day that Yah has made.  Yes, even THIS day; the one where the most important person in your life died, is his.  Try to rejoice and be glad in it.  I would tell them it gets better, and to take care of themselves, because they are the temple of Yah.

May Yahweh bring this family shalom.  May he hold them in their loving arms.  May he help them rejoice in every day.  May he remind me to pray for them daily.

Amen.

My house and my soul

The days after Storm's suicide are, in my mind, awash with anguish and a dream like sort of haziness.  It was also a time of great spiritual and mental awakening and growth for me, as in many ways, an old me had died, and a new me was born. 

My life was also plunged into a state of chaos and insanity that I could never have imagined.  I knew right away that I had to move out of the duplex we had rented for the past six years.  I had never liked the place, and had not wanted to move there.  This was one of the few sticking points that Storm and I never really navigated, though we mostly avoided arguing about it.  No sense fighting over spilled milk.

We had to move out of the house for three days to clean up after Storm, and my landlord, my slumlord, "moved" my things.  That is to say, he shoved them all into my daughters room and the kitchen, barely cleaned up the floor, then laid down the worst replacement floor I have ever seen in my life.  From the first night back, I was trying to gain control of the chaos and craziness that is my life, but it seemed like there was no end to it.  Sweeping up glass and finding broken items, missing items, and our short lifetime together piled up in boxes and shoved into chaotic craziness took days, then weeks.  

I immediately started packing to move.  I didn't have a place to go, but I knew I wasn't staying there, whatever the cost.  For months we lived in a semi-life state of half moved, half not moved, trying to find things on the go.  Boxes filled corners and spaces, and unwanted items slowly trickled out the door.  Yet, it seemed there was no end to the sorting, organizing, boxing, and packing.  It was a strange, moving-out sort of limbo.

Then I found my house.  She looked ugly on the outside...and kinda ugly on the inside.  However, she wasn't moldy, or rotted, or falling down.  The electric and water worked, and a number of updates had been made.  Most importantly, as soon as I closed the door to the outside world, the silence enveloped me and I felt at home.  I think in that moment, the healing began.

We have since moved in, and we now live in a semi-moved-in state of limbo.  It's very similar to the moving-out state of limbo from before, with a few exceptions.  Most of my things are in the garage or the storage room, and I am unable to move fully into my bedroom.  Paint supplies occupy the space under the living room table.  The walls are painted, mostly, and it's almost time to move back out (yes, BACK OUT) to refinish the floors.  Finally, I will then be able to move in.  My bed is still on a box spring on the floor, and my bathroom is still not remodeled.  I don't have baseboards, and there is STILL painting to be done.

I've come to see this little home, my tiny House of Treasure, as a metaphor for my life and what's happening inside of me.  Emotionally, I was completely broken at the beginning, barely able to feed myself and shop for groceries.  My heart, my brain and my spirit were broken.  The half moved-out, chaotic state of my old home reflected the state of my heart and mind, and this new, half-moved in home reflects the current state of my heart.  I don't have all my paint on, and my baseboards are missing, and the floors are a wreck inside of here.  I can't put anything away, because I have no place to put it, and I cannot put anything new in here, because it will just have to be rearranged to work on something else.

However, like my home, the foundation is strong.  I have great faith, and I have seen the hand of Yah open up for this new widow over and over again.  My body is strong and disease free, and I am surrounded by the people who want to help, and who try to give to me.  The same as my home is improving, I see improvements in myself.  I see myself standing up, saying no to what I don't want, content to be by myself.  I see myself choosing these colors, and styles, and furniture, and it's not so overwhelming anymore, and inside of me, I am choosing who I want to be, and what life I want to live.  I see the the vision of my home that is in my head coming to life in the reality around me, and I feel blessed that I am able to live in a space so uniquely mine.  I am beginning to love being in my home, and I am beginning to love the woman that is emerging from the cocoon of pain.

I am very forgiving of my poor little home, and it's half-finished state, and I have learned to be more forgiving of me, and my broken, angry spirit.  Today I will finish the last remaining interior paint projects on my initial list.  It took almost five months, but like my healing, my house doesn't always happen on my timeline.  We will box up the paint supplies and move them into storage, and I will smile and praise Yahweh that I am able to do so, for the first time since I've lived in my home. 

The final bit of painting - done!

I also realize how very far I still have to go.  The floors need refinishing, then the baseboards, then the electronics installed, and then finally some furniture, and etc, etc, etc.  In fact, the list is so long, I can barely wrap my brain around it.  The inside of me is the same.  I want to love and be loved again, but that feels like something distant and unreal.  I am happy loving me for a minute, and embracing the silence that I have craved in my head and in my life.  After last week, I have a spark of hope that I might be able to love again, but I leave it in Yah's hands if that spark of hope ever becomes a flame.  When I look at all of the healing that must be done, all of the brokenness that is still inside of me, it seems like a very long way to go before I am complete enough in my spirit to contribute anything worthwhile to anyone else.  I will leave that part to Yahweh, and trust him.  His faithfulness (truth) endures forever.

The difference in my home is noticeable.  The rooms, once empty and ugly, are bright and full of light and color.  It's almost time for pictures to be hung and for furniture to come in and for life to begin in my home.  My plants will love the front windows, and my heart will love having all of my plants greening up my house.  

The same is true inside of me.  One often hears the term "suicide survivor" to describe someone who lost someone they loved to suicide.  I think it's an apt term.  These past several months, surviving is really what I've been doing.  Getting up and moving, even when the moving hurts.  Eating because I have to, sleeping because I can't not.   This week, something changed.  This week I realized I am not just letting life happen to me.  This week I realize I am participating in my life.  I am actively engaged in what's happening, and I am actually excited to be a part of it.  It no longer feels like something I have to do, something that will never be complete, but something that I WANT to do, and something I WANT to see completed.

I find myself living again, instead of just surviving.  It's good to know that healing really is possible.  It's good that Yahweh sees me, hears my prayers, and helps me.  I see a light here at the end of the tunnel, and it looks like life and love.  

Shalom.

Dear Ring,

Dear Ring, 

I don't know why I am still wearing you.  I really don't.  I look down at you there on my finger, the finger where you've been for these past several years, and I think to myself that I should take you off.

You were only $15.  You're a miserable looking little thing.  White gold with a channel for tiny, almost microscopic, diamonds.  There's plenty of room around, under, and between the tiny chips of shiny substance to carry around plenty of life's dirt and junk.  When I slide you off, you scrape over my knuckle in a familiar sort of way, and I see the thin band of silvery filament that is bent and warped, too fragile for the clumsy likes of me.  

I only bought you because Storm and I could never decide on the ring we wanted, and we never had the money the few times we did. I wanted the world to know that I was Mrs. Rose Treasure, and I resolved to find SOMETHING.   Finally, I saw you on that discount site and figured, what the heck?  Storm made fun of me, and you, when you arrived, though he didn't realize he hurt my feelings.  I never really told him, but I think he figured it out.  He let it go, and I decided to do the same.  I didn't take you off, in spite of his ridicule.

The first time I put you on, you felt strangely comforting, though a little bit sharp.  You looked humble and strangely right, sitting there on that old familiar ring finger, and I quickly became accustomed to righting you back to diamonds up with my thumb, since you always seem so determined to be upside down.

I wasn't wearing you when Storm died.  We had finally bought other rings, and you had begun to cut into my finger in an uncomfortable way.  I wasn't wearing a ring at all.  The other rings disappeared, stolen, I'm sure, by dishonest people.  I thought you were gone, too, until I was ready to move.  I slid open a drawer, and there you were, crooked and tiny. 

So I put you back on.  I put you on and I was satisfied.  The groove you had created never really faded, anyway, so you settled right back where our two parts become one.  I didn't really consider at that moment how long I would wear you, I just knew that I wanted to, and that was enough. 

 A few months later, I still see you sitting there, glimmering dully up at me.  I pass each month anniversary, the flipping calendar going thunk-click like an old fashioned clock in my head on each "13th," and I think to myself, "How long will I wear it?"  I sometimes even take you off, and consider that strange looking, grooved and naked finger.  The answer is, "I don't know."  I slide you back on, satisfied as you bump over my knuckle.

It's not that I want people to think I'm married.  In fact, I don't care what they think.  I'm not wearing you because of anyone but me.  You're mine, somehow a part of me.  I've been married three times, but I never really understood wife-ing, or marriage, or deep, lasting love until I knew Storm.  He loved me in a committed, overwhelming, life-swallowing way, and being his wife was the most important thing I could do in my life.  I never really understood wearing a ring, a marker of someone's claim on my life, until him.  

My head doesn't understand it.  My head wants to find a quiet retreat, a solemn and natural place, and make a small ceremony of taking it off, as if that would make it better, faster.  My heart doesn't think that will work.  My heart still wants it there, with the diamonds pressing against the inside of my palm, where my thumb expertly seeks to spin it back round.

"When will I take it off?"  My head asks my heart.  My heart doesn't want to answer.  My heart often doesn't pay any attention to my head.  We're all ok with that.  My heart is broken.  My head will have it's turn again, soon enough.

I know that I will take you off.  I have to.  Someday.  My head knows this, and gently reminds my heart. It's fraudulent, in a way, since I am not really married now at all.  A lie, of sorts, which I hate.  My heart ignores.  I look down and see you there, think maybe I should clean you, but I don't, and I am satisfied.

My heart knows the answer.  It just doesn't want to answer, because it's no answer.  The answer is some distant someday.  Someday, I will not feel like the Mrs. is missing from my name every time I say it.  Someday, I expect I will look down and see you, little ring, and not feel so satisfied.  Maybe I will feel like you don't belong.  Maybe you will feel constrictive and unnecessary.  Someday I might wonder what I ever found so satisfying.

I will take you off, little silver band, when I no longer feel like his wife.  For now I see you there, and I am satisfied.  That will be enough. 

5 1/2 Months Unshaken

Shaken

My husband’s suicide shook my entire life.  It changed the way I view myself, other people, and the world around me.  It changed the color of the sky.  It launched my life into a sort of chaos and insanity that I never could have imagined enduring.  My home is in chaos, my career is in chaos, and my emotions are in chaos.  Everything in my life has been challenged.

There is one thing that has remained unshaken: my faith.  Understand that I do not boast of my own strength.   It is not because I am faithful that my faith was unshaken, it is because the Messiah is faithful to keep his word.  He said, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.”  He said everyone who hears his words and acts on them will be as if their house is built upon the rock.  Surely, he has kept that blessed promise.

In the very first moments after Storm’s suicide, I was praying.  I was crying out, and Yahweh was sending help, he was sending love, and he was sending hope.  That first weekend was filled with prayer and crying and so much pain, and yet I never felt like Yahweh had ever been closer to me.  He sent my daughter and her family to help us, and he sent those who love us with food and love.

It sounds insane, but I have never seen more blessings in my life than I have in the last five months.  Yahweh has opened his hand, and the blessings have poured into my life.  So many of the ones that come to mind, as always, are physical blessings, but the spiritual blessings have been tenfold, one hundred fold in my heart. I have found myself surrounded by people that not only care, but want to help.  I am enfolded into the arms of a good congregation, that will help me in all ways.

You see, I was thinking about loneliness.  The nice folks I sometimes have the privilege of sharing my pain with often speak of their crushing loneliness, and how isolated they feel.  I have tried imagining that.  One of my many, many blessings, I discover over and over again, is my family.  They have once again wrapped themselves around me, and they are protecting me.  I have only ever actually lived alone for a very short time in my life, so the concept of loneliness seems strange to me.  

The other night, I was imagining what if Elizabeth was not here.  What if I couldn’t just walk up the stairs, or send a text if I was lonely, and say, “How about a burger?”  How about if I didn’t have anyone to text?  My life would be greatly, greatly diminished, and my loneliness would be acute, I’m certain.  But I would know that, regardless, I would never be alone.  

I first prayed the sinner’s prayer when I was a very young girl.  Yahweh has ever been with me, and I am never truly alone.  That one fact has kept me strong in the face of all that I face.

Every time someone tells me that I am strong, they are saying that Yahweh is strong in me.  They are seeing him, and the blessings that he has opened into my life.

Someday, we will all face him.  I pray that he leads me down the path of the good and faithful servant, because I long to look into his face and kneel at his feet in gratitude and love.  

Psalm 31:3
Since you are my rock and my fortress, for the sake of your name lead and guide me.

Shalom.  

Four and a half months: The beginning of the end...I hope.

Saturday I added his ashes to the sea. Our grandchildren flew kites.  I set him on the beach in the white box, and his dog Cowboy laid down next to him, and watched him, and waited.  When I took him down to the sea, Cow followed, and sniffed the box as I opened it, and wagged his tail as if to tell me it was ok.  My big black dog Bear ran in with me, watching his momma, doing his job.  My father and brother and sister and children and family waited while I walked into the cold, cold ocean, and I opened up that bag, and I watched the ashes swirl and move and it was beautiful, somehow.  I felt like I had set him free. I watched a wave come and take it all, and then he was gone, and I turned back to the shore, back to life, back to my family.  I ran through the cold, my big black dog at my side, shivering, and they wrapped their arms around me, all of them, and I cried, and I was not cold anymore.  

Four months - six days: Missing my Husband

I always said I wouldn't be able to heal while living in the place where I watched Storm die.  That is very true for me. 

Now I am here, and I am in my own home, and I have some quiet, and some time to think, and some time to feel, and I realize how little grieving I have actually done for my husband.

Certainly, those first few days I grieved him.  I missed him in every moment, every time I looked at my phone and it wasn't him, every time I crawled into that big empty bed.  Every time I looked around my house, and in the fridge, and almost everywhere.

But somewhere along the line, I kicked into survival mode.  I took all of those feelings of missing him and thinking of him and wishing for him, and I shoved them into a closet in my soul, and I bricked that doorway up.

I can't grieve him like most other people grieve.  Every grief is unique, every griever is unique.  Suicide grief is unique.  Every time I miss him, I know he did it on purpose.  Every time I think of a good thought of him, I think of the pain of missing him, and the anger rushes in.  It rushes in and I am no longer missing him; I am too pissed to miss him.  This grief is filled with anger.

Why?  Because our lives were filled with so much good.  Storm saw himself as a loser because he didn't work for a number of years, for reasons of our own.  His friends saw him as the luckiest man alive.  He had a lovely wife, who never became angry with him because things didn't get done inside our outside, who never got angry with him for spending the whole day playing a game, or playing cribbage, or drinking, or sleeping, or whatever his pleasure was that day.  I just wanted him to be happy.  He had a wife who literally served him hand and foot.  I showered him, brushed his hair, brought him drinks, took care of his laundry and often his dishes, ran his errands, and gratefully enjoyed his sex while I gave him mine to enjoy.

I say this all the time, but there was no reason for him to do this.  There was no end of the rope.  There was no horrible earth shattering event.  Every area of our life was going remarkably well, and then Storm ended it all with the shrug of a shoulder.  That's how important our life was to him.  The shrug of a shoulder.

I wake up every day to the reality that I was a participant in the death of the most important person in my world, and Storm created that.  I live every day thinking of the last angry, crazy things we said to each other, and Storm created that.  Every single good he ever brought into my life is tinged with pain and regret, and Storm created that.  He said all the time that all that he wanted to do was make me smile.  Instead, he left me the worst pain and regret and emotional disability that I ever experienced, and Storm created that.  As a husband, it was his job to love me as he loved himself.  That's not what happened.  All of our life together, I thought that was true.  That he loved me as he loved himself.  Or maybe, he did, since he pretty much hated himself.  Either way, the result is the same.

But this week, something shifted.  I'm not sure what.  I can think of him and cry for what was without immediately being angry.  It was probably a combination of things, including getting enough sleep to feel rested.  It was also the moment of taking a shower, when I sensed I should take it without the distraction of my phone.  I stood there, in hot, hot water, and I cried for the first time for my husband without feeling angry and guilty and bitter.

I can think about the times he used to barbecue for me at 5 in the morning, in the freezing snow, in our garage in Illinois.  I remember how he freaked out when we were trapped in the back of the van.  I remember how determined he was to get me home to my family.  I can remember his sexy voice, and his distinctive whistle that made both the dogs and me pay attention.  I remember how hard it was for him to be nice at people's social events.  I remember how much he loved his grandbabies, and how he loved my daughters, even when he didn't want to. 

I'm glad to be in this place, even though it means more tears, more crying.  I do enough crying these days, that's for sure.  In fact, I sometimes don't make it out of bed before I'm crying.  Nevertheless, I'm grateful.  So grateful. 

I don't want to hate that I love this man.  I don't want to hate missing him.  I don't want to hate the thought of him, or the smell of him, or the foods he used to make. 

I believe the healing has begun.  I see it in the dog bite scar on my leg.  The deep wound has left a scar, a tube of scar tissue through my leg, but the tissue is healing...the two spots are fading, and I think my heart, maybe my soul, looks the same inside of me. 

I turn to Yahweh every day in prayer, and I have trusted from the beginning that he would help me become like refined gold through this trial of fire.  Though I am often alone, I am never really lonely.  Yahweh sustains me.  He makes me strong. He is my strong refuge, my rock.  Today, I turn to him in gratitude, and give thanks that he has allowed my heart to heal. 

Blackberries in the garden Storm grew me.