Rediscovering You
Following the death of a child, parents are consumed by grief. It takes all of their energy to make it through each day, much less think about creating a hopeful future. Once bereaved parents negotiate their way through the haze of the intense grief, life without their child is now the new normal and they discover they are no longer the person they once were. They’re searching for a balance between honoring their child and moving forward in a hopeful, happy, and purpose filled life.
So much has been stripped away. It isn’t simply the role of parent to a particular child, it’s trusting the world will work out and the worst can’t actually happen. It’s the hyper vigilance protecting yourself and your loved ones from the other shoe dropping. It’s the vulnerability of feeling completely stripped of everything you’ve known to be true. It’s the loss of the future you thought you’d be living. It’s the redefinition and in many times loss of every relationship in your life as others are faced with a new you who bears a tremendous weight. It’s feeling like a person who negotiates the perpetual conflict of being both nakedly vulnerable to the savages of the world and its mercurial happenings while also toughened beyond belief trying in vain to protect themselves against another crippling and potentially life ending onslaught.
I know because I felt all of this firsthand. Growing up as an only child of divorced parents being raised by a single mother all I ever yearned for was having a family of my own with a handful of kids. So for the twenty-two year old version of myself, marrying a man with three young children actually seemed like a good idea. Three years later we added a daughter, Alison Belle to the family.
After a year of multiple hospitalizations for pneumonia, the ultimate diagnosis came. Three-year-old Alison had a tumor in her brain stem, virtually paralyzing her vocal cords – causing the bouts of pneumonia. Two years later my only biological child died in my arms. Within a month of her death, our marriage had fallen apart.
So, within the span of a few short months, I went from being a wife and stay-at-home mother to four children, one of whom was critically ill, to a childless single woman putting herself through college while working full-time. Yes, it was hell, and no, I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, AND I recognized the challenge and the unique opportunity handed to me. It’s not every day someone is given a blank slate to virtually recreate her life in a way that brings her joy, happiness, and meaning.
When I made this decision, I didn’t have those words. It wasn’t yet articulated in positive forward thinking. Instead, I thought and felt viscerally in terms of what I didn’t want. “This will NOT define me!” And “I have a dead daughter, but I am not just a bereaved parent.” And finally, “I am divorced, but I am not a divorcee.” I knew I wanted to accept and integrate my life experiences into the fabric of my being but didn’t want them to be all of who I am or how people saw me.
It was in this spirit I went on my own journey. It was often an intentionally solo mission. I feared if I aligned myself with any particular group with a shared story i.e. bereaved parent or divorced, I’d latch onto that as my new identity. It would’ve been easy, but it felt like a way for me to short circuit doing the hard work of getting to know the entirety of me.
With all of the hard work, making even one step closer to feeling good became a crucial daily goal. When I’m feeling good everything seems to click and come together, regardless of the circumstances. If Alison’s death taught me one thing, it’s that I can’t rely on controlling external events to maintain my inner wellbeing.
What I discovered after losing Alison, and well... most everything else, was taking that one step felt like a leap across the Grand Canyon. (The curriculum of all ‘Ohana Oasis resources is a compilation of what I did to make that leap). By Honoring my Past, I prepared myself to be ready and willing to consider the leap. Without doing this, I don’t know that I ever could’ve or would’ve allowed myself to leave the mental and emotional space where I last held Alison. It may have felt like a betrayal, a moving on, or a negating of her impact on me and the world.
Once I knew for myself I’d found ways to honor my past, I began Living in the Moment. First, I had to reacquaint myself with myself. Grief changed me. Losing Alison redefined much of who I was. To feel safe making the big leap I was contemplating, I needed to know and trust who I was becoming in the present. Did she or would she have the tools, strength, and savvy to clear the jump?
The more I grew grounded and confident in the present, I got curious about what life would look like if I made another step into Embracing the Future full of feeling good. Then I did it! I took the step, and here I am, sitting on the beach with sand under my toes and a salty breeze blowing my hair, periodically gazing out at the ocean, searching for the right words as I type this post.
Today, seventeen years after Alison’s death, I am living on the Hawaiian island of Kaua’i, running a non-profit, providing resources to other bereaved parents. This is a life far different than I could have envisioned for myself before Alison’s death. It’s brimming with freedom, happiness, play, connection, and meaningful purpose. It’s the living the result of the hard work I did of rediscovering who I am and what truly brings me joy.
