Oh, 2015...

Good old Robert Burns.
Poet extraordinaire.

Penned a Scottish ditty.
You know it well..

Groups of revellers link arms around midnight tonight and belt various forms of it out ..

It's Auld Lang Syne.
And it's basically about how we can cast an eye back to what has been and a call to remember our old friends.
The ones we don't see.
The ones we have said goodbye to.

I said goodbye to my best friend in 2015.
I held his hand and watched him go.

Oh..  2015.

I don't know if I quite want to farewell you in a few short hours.
You, 2015... you are forever ingrained in my fibre. You are woven into my being... you are stamped on my heart.
You are the numbers that are his earthly end.

Oh, 2015...

You, 2015... you will be remembered and recalled by his sons and our future grandchildren.
Our sons will always know you... The year they witnessed their father so bravely, so courageously fight until that very last heart beat. That very last breath.
Fight for them.

On the last day of school, the boys principal reminded me of something profound.
He encouraged me to remember that 2015 was, yes..by far the toughest year I've ever experienced.
But... 2015 was also beautiful.
Stunningly beautiful.
Breathtakingly beautiful.

It was.
You were. Oh, 2015... you were horrendous and you were beautiful.

You offered us time.
Time.
Extra time.
Time in terminal waiting. But time.
Minutes and hours.
Days and weeks.
Time in the year 2015..
Time we knew was limited and fleeting.
Time we treasured.

So we grabbed you... oh 2015. We grabbed you and we treasured you.
We took the boys on the bucket list tour of theme parks.
We took a million photos.
We adored each other.
I linked my fingers into his.
I memorized his face.
I knew it was our last year.

In those minutes and hours that we... just me and him... spent together.
He prepared me.
2015 was the year he prepared me.
He told me I'd be ok.
He'd paint me a picture of my days in 2016..2017...2018.. without him.

Yes. 2015.
I'm not sure if I'm ready to say goodbye to you.
But... the one thing you've shown me consistently in these 365 days is this:
It doesn't matter if I'm ready.
You'll march on anyway.
Your days and hours.
You will march on.

You will end.
2015 will be over.

And I will sigh.
The sigh of someone who casts a glance back.
The sigh of someone who will whisper in Auld Lang Syne...
The sigh of a woman who misses her man.

And then.
I'll bring to mind the breathtaking beauty of these days.
These last days we had him.
The kindness. Oh the kindness that echoes through 2015.
I'll sigh.

And then.
Because he directed me to...
I'll bring my eyes foward.
To the coming days.
To the new that waits.
To the firsts and adventures that I will uncover in the days and hours of 2016.

So..
Goodbye 2015.
I hate you.
I love you.
I treasure you.
I rage against you.
You were our last one.
You were sweet.

Thank you.

Heaven.

There have been a multitude of claims made-
claims made by sharmans, theologians, philosophers, authors...
claims made by children who imagine and adults who wonder...

Claims about the existence of the subconscious after the act of dying.
Claims about the existence of... well.. a person... their continued reality in the absence of anything physical.

I've read the books.
I've watched the interviews.
I've wondered and imagined.

And I keep coming back to the same place.

I don't know how, or what it looks like in it's entirety..
I don't know enough to claim to be an expert.
But I do know something...
There is something that is so deeply tied into the make up of who I am, maybe of who we all are, that makes it imperative for us to lean towards this belief in an after.

An after this is done.
An after they have taken that last breath.
An after we have shrugged of the mortal.
An after we have said that final earthly goodbye.
Yes... There is a whisper soft call to believe in the after..

I believe in an after.
Many don't.
That's ok..

But I do.
I really do.

And I didn't find this belief in an after at the moment when my favourite people left this now.
There was no desperate scramble to latch hold of something nice and fuzzy that would provide me with comfort in the days and moments of my grief.

This deep seated belief in the after is not merely designed to be a pontoon for those who are exhausted in the throes of grief.
It is oh-so-much more.

We talked a lot about this after before he went there.
He was so comfortable talking about it.
He would wonder at the moment he would arrive..
He would laugh at the moment he would see her, my mother.. he would tell the boys how he would "kick Granny's butt" for so suddenly leaving us.

He would paint me a picture of what it would be like...
In his words..
In his way...

One day, months before he went there, we were driving out to the farm.
He loved to go the long way- up through the hills and along the dirt roads..
We came around a ridge and he pulled over to the side of the road.
He sat there for a while.
Quietly.
Just looking out across the little valley that was before us.
"There's going to be a road..like this..with big trees lining it. And when you come over the hill, you'll see the greenest ground. And at the bottom of the valley- that's where He's built my house.
It's going to have verandahs all around it and roses (he loved roses) all around it. And there's an entire workshop in it."
He turned to me..
"You know He was a builder right? And his dad was one too.... You never know... He might come around for a cup of tea and we'll make a table or something..."



He would paint me a picture of what it would look like...
And it was a stunning picture.
And I don't know quite how Heaven works, but I do know that Jesus promised to go and build a space for the ones would step into this after.
And I don't know quite how Heaven works..
I just know that it's real.
Like really real.
Because I can hear the whisper soft reassurance deep within me that it's there... just beyond the now, in the after.
 And today.. well. Today I can really hear it.
Today is one of those days..

Christmas is coming soon.
And Christmas is when this whole 'after' thing really became reality.
And not necessarily the Christmas we know and love, but that first Christmas.
The one where the Messiah, the perfect Lamb, moved into the neighbourhood of flesh and chaos.
That first Christmas when an eternal act of absolute adoration meant that I could access my after...
Meant that my after was now attainable.
Because a babe was born.
Because He walked the steps of this mortal toil and He knew grief and love.
Because He came to die a final death that would spell LIFE in the boldest brush strokes across the pages of mankind's history.

Yes..
Heaven touched earth in the most beautiful way the night a babe was born in a cow shed.
Yes...
I believe in Heaven.

I don't know quite how Heaven works.
I think about it a lot.
I talk to the boys about what they imagine it to be like.
Because isn't that maybe why we have an imagination..
To see a valley, with a house that holds a workshop, surrounded by a rose garden.
To see a reunion with a mum who shouldn't have left us when she did.
To see a little slip of a girl...dark curls cascading down her back as she dances and twirls and giggles in her perfection?


Yes.
I believe in an eternal, glorious after.
And I believe that it was purchased at a price.. the cost was such that it demanded perfection and sacrifice. Both something I couldn't afford and yet, it was purchased for me. By the One who holds my after, just like He holds my today.

Yes.
I believe in an after all of this, there is more.
That this is not all there is.
That there is an after that waits.

Yes.
I believe in Heaven.

Story of tears

I cried the night before the funeral.
My people had arrived en masse and songs had been recorded. I wanted voices that loved him to be the ones that sang those songs of goodbye.
Videos had been made.

Montages of him- as a boy. As he grew into a man. That moment he became mine and then the unfolding beauty of him as a dad.

So that night before the funeral,  all my people had gathered around me. Food was lovingly made and shared as strangers introduced themselves and instantly became comrades in this task of a beautiful goodbye.
My brother called me into the study to see the completed videos that would play at his funeral. And I cried.
I sobbed.
I howled.
In that room... watching that screen.
I felt the enormous weight of loss.
I asked some of my people to watch it with me.
I watched it again.
And again.
I watched it until the tears subsided and I could smile at the images.
We left the study and my dining room had filled with everyone, standing around the table. Waiting.
The songs were ready.
We listened.
And I cried.
I sobbed.
I howled.
In that room... listening to the music that would whisper all the goodbyes we wanted to say.
I was held close as I felt the enormous weight of my loss.

I'm so glad for that night.

I'm so glad that we had the opportunity to allow the heartbreak to be real and tangible.
To cling tight to each other in that moment of missing him entirely and completely.
We cried.
We sobbed.
We howled.

You see.
I needed to go to the place of deep grief that the funeral would insist on supplying.
Funerals are like that.
They are a goodbye of earthly, physical permanence.
I needed to howl the ugly type tears.
I chose to do that in my study.
I closed the door and I cried.

I guess this is the story of my tears.
They come in waves.
I try to keep them to myself.
But sometimes they are inconvenient and demanding in their release.

I made it to the traffic lights one afternoon last week. I was leaving work and the absence of him hit me hard.
And the flood gates smashed open.
I drove to our beach and staggered, in my high heels,  to the waters edge.
And I howled.
A lady walking her dog came close and asked in a concerned and, possibly slightly frightened tone, if I needed help.
No... I just need to cry.

I went to an afternoon tea this week.
It was held in the chapel at the Mater hospital and it was a beautiful remembrance time- a collective of people who had said that goodbye to family and friends were invited to come and be together in a time of remembering.
I'll be honest- it was so tough going back there. The smell.
The hallways.
They had become our final battleground.
They housed the memories of the last moments of his life.

Everything about those last days and weeks are tucked away in little corners of my mind.

Sometimes they demand an audience and I go there. I let them take centre stage and I'm suddenly remembering the way he smiled when his sons walked into the hospital room. How he didn't want to eat in those final days... Until someone delivered a tray of chocolate and caramel slice. His very favourite. I kind of love the idea that the last thing he ate was caramel slice.

My tears were shared that beautiful afternoon.
They were mine and they were ours.
It was beautiful to be in a place where a conversation with sobs was expected.

And today. 
I'm at school.
This is the story of my tears.
My inconvenient and demanding tears.

I was in an assembly.
And I heard a story about a family who suffered the loss of a husband and dad to cancer.
And it was a beautiful story.
A Christmas Story.
About giving and love.

Except it isn't a story to me.
It's my life.
My days.
My tears.

And out of nowhere.
The howling.
The sobbing.
The wail of grief.
It hit me.
Hard.

At school.

But that's ok.
I made it outside the assembly hall...
And I made it to the grass.
And I threw up my coffee.
And I wailed.
I howled.

Tears are amazing.
They are healing and wrecking and powerful.

I've tried to keep my tears to myself.
To close the door and cry.
But.
Sometimes it doesn't work.
And they demand a release.
They don't care that I'm at work.
Driving.
Cooking.
Happy.
Tired.

The story of my tears is this:
How worthwhile and wonderful my love for him is.
That they deserve these tears.

He gets to have these tears.

Operation Finding Christmas Spirit

Christmas PJ party, Christmas Eve. He's sooooo loving the Santa onsie!!!! 

It's not that I don't want to do Christmas this year.

I flipping love Christmas.
I love everything about it.
I can't get enough of carols - and if some old school, Sinatra type crooner is singing them, even better.
It's not the lights or the tinsel that I'm against this year.
Again. .. love it all.

Christmas, Newcastle 2012.. see....I love Christmas.

It's the simple matter of what Christmas had come to mean to us.
We married on the 11th December 2004- hottest day in the history of Mackay summers.
And Christmas that first year was about us being a family.

Me and him.
And by the time Christmas 2005 rolled around,  well we had a 10 week old bundle of blue eyed perfection.
And Christmas was about us being a family.
Me, him and our son.

More Christmases and more babies.
Christmas became pure joy.
Nothing can replace the satisfaction of watching the delight in your child's face when they see that tree and the wrapped boxes beneath it on Christmas morning. The joy of giving. 

Yes... I love Christmas.
It calms something within me.
For a moment everything is ok.
And God is on the throne.
And He gave us Jesus.
Yes...  I love Christmas.

Christmas Eve, Mackay 2013

I love the tradition that has been weaved into this season. 

We valued our family traditions.

The Christmas Eve family movie and matching pj's. 

Sheldon's epic Christmas cake.

But right now. 

A month out...

Christmas is a sharp reminder that me and him can't revel in being our little family this year.

There's no epic,  month long preparation for his Christmas cake.

Good lord,  I don't even know the color code system to set up the stupid tree. I would 'try' to help,  but he would just mutter something about me being in the way and being a perfectionist (!!???!!) so I'd leave them to it. 

It was us.
Christmas was us..

Christmas lunch...a few years ago.

Waiting to open presents 2012. How little they look!!!

And now.
Well.
I guess it's them.

Our bundles of joy.
They really are still just little kids.
They have handled this year and all of it's pain so marvelously... but they are still just my little boys.

And they want the tree.
And the lights.
And the corny carols.
They want gingerbread men and matching pj's.

They want Christmas. 

Christmas tree, 2013

Even though it's the first one.

The first one without their daddy... Their daddy who would carry them to bed on every Christmas Eve, after they'd stuffed their bellies with gingerbread men and hot chocolate, after they'd tried to stay awake and watch the Christmas movie.

I'm aware that time will be our friend and Christmases future will grow gradually easier, and perhaps I'll bounce into some future Christmas season with all of the joy I can muster.

But this first... Well, to be honest it feels like a bag of salt on a raw wound.

It feels like a spotlight... A glaring spotlight.. has been cast on the fact that we don't have him here. 

I walked past the mens shirts at Myer yesterday and found myself holding a shirt, examining it. I was tired, and my brain was not functioning at 100%.. I know this because I was holding the shirt, thinking about buying it for Sheldon.. To wear for lunch on Christmas Day.

I put the shirt back.

And I realised that it's a case of muscle memory.

My brain and my responses to Christmas are so strongly tied up in who he was and what we had created.

Christmas was about our family... Me, him and our boys.

I'm retraining my brain and my responses to the sound and the feel of Christmas. 

There is a grief in this season that is tempered by the joy that Christmas demands.

And I see that joy.

I see kindness still... Always kindness.

In the way I've had offers of Christmas company and the suggestions to find this elusive Christmas spirit.

I am finding it.

I know where it is.

It's just a bit of a painful discovery this year.

But my little boys want Christmas.

And lights.

And the tree.

And gingerbread houses.

All I want is a phone call from heaven.
Not too much to ask surely?
Just one phone call.
So I can ask him how to set up the bloody Christmas tree.

Lessons of love and hermit crabs.

My sons are singing. Loudly. 

It's a mash up rendition of Waltzing Matilda/the Australian National Anthem, the Cowboys team song and les Miserables. 

Yes. That's how they roll. 

Did I mention that it's early morning... And it's loud? 

So I'm listening to them. Wanting to stop the loud but actually loving it.

I read something yesterday that said "Happy children sing".

And it got me wondering how my sons are going. 

I get asked the question on a daily basis, so it's something that is always on the borders of my thoughts. 

I watch them and worry over the lack of tears, or the flood of tears.

I observe and listen and discuss....

How are my boys?

How are they navigating these moments of tough? 

Well.

 Let's just say that I'm learning so much about life, death and the moments of grief from these little men.

Let me share with you a couple of these lessons:

LESSON ONE:

I'm learning that love is stronger than the last breath a person takes.

Sheldon was sent thousands of cards in that August-leaning-in birthday month. And amongst them was a CD from an artist we have always loved.

Sheldon had already planned his funeral when he opened this gift. He'd picked the plot he wanted to be his final earthly, geographical spot. He'd told the funeral director he didn't want any babies breathe in the flowers... 

All we had to do was find a song.

I already knew what song we'd use to say goodbye to him. 

But he wanted a song that would say everything his heart whispered.

So.. We were driving along, the new CD gift playing and a song started. 

And we started to cry. 

And then I started to sob.

"This.... This is the one.." He said.

I nodded.

It said everything his heart whispered.

Here's what it says:

The worth of a man isn't measured in minutes

It's a journey that's measured in years

And it doesn't matter where you begin

As long as it brings you here.

You'll learn more from getting it wrong

Then you ever do getting it right

And you tell your life story 

With the love you leave behind

Before my time comes

I'm gonna leave some sign that I was here

Won't be what I owned

A fancy home

A car

Or my career

If I've lived and loved too hard 

I've made good use of my time

I'll make the world a better place

With the love I leave behind

The worth of a man isn't measured in things

It's secret and silent and strong

It's in the pride that you take in your name

And the children who carry it on

You can live on this planet for 80 odd years

But it's only a moment in time

You tell your life story

With the love you leave behind..

(The love I leave behind. Graeme Connors. Kindred spirit album. ***do yourself a favour and get this song****)

 Oh.. The beautiful power of a song. 

The way the art of melody and lyric can capture the essence of what we need to express. 

It speaks of the shadowed parts of our hearts, where mere words are incapable of capturing and communicating meaning. Those parts of our heart... They need music. They need the rise and fall. The heartbeat of timing and rhythm. 

It was a spectacular moment.

At his funeral...

This song and the pictures of his life that played on those big screens.

His message was clear.

And it's a message.. The great lesson that my boys remind me of.

Love is stronger than death.

Love didn't stop when his heart did.

Love didn't get buried at plot 19, Mt. Bassett cemetery. 

His life story is shouted everyday, on display for everyone to see....

It's found in this love that his sons grip fiercely.

The adoration that they have for him..

The deep, beautiful knowledge that he loved them with an overwhelming love.

It's a lesson that I hear when they speak about him... The love... The mountains of unconditional love. 

Yes. I'm learning about love.

I'm also learning about death. 

LESSON TWO:

I'm learning that death is easy to understand when you know about hermit crabs. 

I've been worried about Matthew.

He's 8. 

And he's such a gentle heart. 

He's so calm. 

His brothers raged and pleaded and released their daddy on that tough, final Saturday.

Matthew was calm. 

And in the past weeks, I've worried that he just doesn't understand what has happened. 

I've laid awake nights and wondered what strategies I should employ to break his calmness down so that he can cry, so that he can grieve..  and so that he can finally come to that realisation that his dad is gone. (Because, I mean, mothers know best right??!!?)

It was my birthday this week. 

(Thanks for the birthday love by the way...it helped)

Wednesday night, my stunning sons dressed in suit jackets and took me to our favourite Italian spot.

It was such a lovely night.

On the drive home, I thanked my three boys for making the day lovely- and I told them that their daddy would be so proud of the way they were treating their princess mummy. 

And then... We just started talking about their dad.

How he had made a cake for my birthday last year that had been covered, and I mean COVERED in the sweetest icing we'd ever tasted. It was ridiculously sweet. And he was a sweet heart. 

And after we laughed about the icing, the conversation lulled. 

And then Matthew said this-

"Hey mum.... You know how we had hermit crabs in that fish tank at Uncle Brendan and Jimmy's place?"

I "uh-huh-ed".

"Well... I reckon that dying is like what happens to the hermit crab.."

I waited.

"You know... The hermit crab lives in his shell and everyone looks at the shell and thinks that's what the hermit crab is. The big shell. But then the hermit crab leaves the shell and moves to a new one. And the shell is just a shell but the hermit crab is always a hermit crab. The shell doesn't make it a hermit crab. The shell is just a shell...."

I was speechless.

And breathless.

My calm, gentle Matthew had just expressed something so profound. So true. 

I didn't speak.

He continued.

"And it's like what happened with dad. He left his shell because it was broken. Sometimes hermit crabs look for a new shell if theirs is too small or broken. Dads was so broken, hey mum??" 

I'm sobbing silently by now. Not an easy task to swallow back those deep sobs and smile at my 8 year old calm, gentle boy.

Yes... I wanted to scream... So broken. So ravaged by disease. 

I kept silent.

"And... Dad is still dad. Just like the hermit crab is still the same hermit crab. They just leave their broken shell."

Oh... Can I express the beautiful agony of this conversation?

I heard the Lesson that my Matthew-the-calm-and -brave needed to teach me.

Sometimes it's good to leave the broken shell.

The heart, the soul, the spirit... They just moved out of the broken shell.

Moved home to a perfect shell.

One that will not fade or falter.

That's the lesson of the hermit crab.

It's beautiful huh?

So.. It's taken me a couple of days to finish this letter to you..

The tears made it hard to see the screen.

I cry when I write

of my boys.

When I think of the bravery.

The character of strength.

The loud.

The calm.

The naughty.

The love.

I've heard their lessons this week.

They have sewn deep into my heart's fabric.

The lesson of a fierce love that no last breath can diminish.

The lesson of the hermit crab and his broken shell..

So... If you're wondering... And please keep asking... My boys are doing good. 

Kindness Personified.

Oh.. my boys.

They miss him with a rawness that cannot be explained away..

I try to find diversions.. Both for myself and for my babes... But tonight... there is no diversion that can ease the reality of this. This missing.

Trust me- as far as diversions go, I've tried a whole stack of them.

Tonight- my eldest son wrapped his arms around me and whispered, "I just miss him, you know??"

I know.

It's a complex thing- this grief.

We are doing fine- and we miss him.

We are running ferociously into life- and we miss him.

We are smiling at the future as it promises us good things- and we miss him.

We are planning tomorrows and adventures- and we miss him.

I'm reminded, again, of the magnificent tension that we traverse in this new normal.

The tension that exists where the truly tragic meets the astoundingly beautiful.

I felt it tonight when I put my darling hearts to bed and we softly spoke of their daddy.

The beautiful pride and honour that they hold for a father who is not here to receive it. 

Magnificent tension. Beauty in tragedy. 

How often do I find that unbelievable beauty has moved into the neighbourhood of abject grief...

That is the reality of what we live each day.

My sons and I...

We have not been left to this tragic loss.

We aren't untethered and adrift, without hope.

We know the depths of this grief, but we aren't consumed by it.

Do we miss him?

Wholeheartedly.

Undeniably.

Are we ok?

Certainly.

Yes.

And that- well.. that is the magnificent tension that we tread upon.

That is grief.

Working itself out.

Allowing us the privilege of missing his presence, while we celebrate the man we had. 

Letting us wallow in the misery of his going, while we rejoice in the knowledge that he has gone home, free from the scourge of cancerous cells and pain.

It's a magnificent tension.

I keep finding out things I didn't realise about myself. It makes sense that I become self aware.. I am almost 36.. (upcoming birthday hint subtly dropped).

I have realised that I love to talk.

No- don't laugh.

Seriously.

You all might have realised that fact some time ago- but I'm not talking about how much I CAN talk- everyone knows that I CAN talk the hind legs off a donkey. 

No. I'm talking about this new found love of talking about kindness. And how it won for my family.

I have realised that I love to talk about how, in our darkest moments, we were pulled into a safe place by the constant and overwhelming kindness of our people, of a community who threw kindness our way.

I love to talk about how kindness gets to take the spotlight in this tragedy.

I want to tell you about how the magnificent tension...how the kindness of beauty in the midst of sorrow, has changed my life. 

I could tell you a million tales- but let me share this one with you.

I have an Aunty Heather.

And I love her.

She's the family we got to choose. 

I have been thinking about her a lot lately. 

She is standing knee deep in her own moments of magnificent tension right now, but for those days and weeks and months that he faded, she stood in ours.

She heard a silent, desperate plea for help that I made a couple of months before Sheldon died.

I was coming to terms with his going and I needed.. well, I guess I needed Aunty Heather.

Aunty Heather showed up and helped to ease the burden of the fading.

She couldn't take away the truly tragic, but she shouldered it.

She shared it and she made cupcakes, and lasagne.. She made cups of tea and patiently listened to Sheldon's 3am rambling conversations when he couldn't sleep. 

She organised my linen cupboard and she drove us to the funeral home when Sheldon was ready to organise his funeral.

She held his hand in those final minutes as he prepared to go,  she whispered that I'd be ok and that he could leave the pain and the burden of cancer and run into eternity.

Aunty Heather was the embodiment of the beauty of kindness showing up in the neighbourhood of abject grief. 

And it mattered.

It helped.

It changed those days that we had to live through.

Kindness changed those days.

Someone showing up and BEING KINDNESS PERSONIFIED changed those days.

Take stock of the people in your life.

Is there someone you know who is living in the neighbourhood of tragedy? Or disappointment? Maybe they are just plain down on their luck and could use a friend. Could you perhaps be the beauty of kindness that moves into that neighbourhood of their tragedy, their disappointment, their run of bad luck... And could you be like Aunty Heather- and just let kindness win...

Just show up and shoulder the truly tough. 

Seek out ways to make life easier for someone who is on struggle street. 

Be kindness personified.

Be. Kind.

Because listen when I tell you- it matters.

It changes things.

That magnificent tension- kindness in the midst of someones toughest day... well. That's a game changer.

Running from silent.

Silence. 

Loneliness steals in with silence.

It replaces the lull and hum of conversation that used to fill our moments.

Even when he was so very sick, he would murmer his opinions... We would engage in conversations. 

I would lean in to catch each whisper... Now there is a strange silence that belongs to these quiet evenings.

That's the beauty of a love- the right to conversation in those moments before sleep arrives. The words that are spoken...the sometimes constant chatter as life is lived. Did I ever recognise the privilege that conversation afforded to us? When the kids fell asleep and the wine was poured or the coffee was made...We would speak. TV might be on... Computers would be resting on laps and a lesson would be planned, an email answered.. And we would chat.Sometimes about important things, often about nothing much. 

How wonderful to talk about nothing much.

How I miss the nothing much conversations.

I've discovered something about myself- this process of grief uncovers a new knowing of how I tick. 

I've discovered that I run from silences.

I fill the spaces with sound..

I talk to the cat.

I play the piano for long hours.

I sing lullabies to my babes.

I text and talk to friends who are kind enough to realise that I'm filling a void that I have never known.

And yet I know that there is coming a moment when I will have to stop.

Stop talking and singing my silences away.

Stop running from this void of quiet.

It is disconcerting. This new lesson of being alone.

But it's a lesson that I am learning.

I'm learning to be still.

To stop chasing the right to be heard.

There is a beauty in stillness.. I just need to linger there. 

After I have pushed aside lonliness, there is beauty in the calm.

If you are living beside someone who fills your moments with opinion and useless facts, reminders and nothing much conversations-

Do me a favour..

The next time you are talking to your love, in between washing dishes and folding socks, as you chatter about nothing much... Will you pause and relish that sound. The privilege of a conversation. 

Time is fleeting...

Because he is gone, by its very murderous nature, cancer has also gone.

No more cancer.
Lukas, in his 8 year old capacity to process the big issues, has come to the conclusion that terminal diseases are stupid. When I asked him how he came to that conclusion, he shrugged and said.."Well... It wanted to kill dad.. and it did. But it ended up killing itself too. Stupid cancer."
Stupid cancer.

Cancer took so very much of my attention. 

I only realise now, in these after days, that everything that we did in the past 3 years was done with the shadow of the "what if...".
We pushed it back with all of our might.
We fought and we raged against it-

We did a very good job of living and working and filling up the time we had with really worthwhile moments, but it's only now that I can reflect and see what we were carrying.
We were carrying the knowing- the deep seated knowledge that time is fleeting and what we had left was limited.

Time is fleeting.

Don't get me wrong.
This is not, in any form, a conceding that cancer won.
The message stays the same- cancer is no victor- it is a murderous thief.
And somewhere in the chaos of losing him, I came to an understanding that time is fleeting.
And not just for the terminal.
Not just for the palliative.

Time is fleeting.

Some days are going to feel like they just won't end.

They will drag their stubborn feet in a dissolute and discordant chorus of the monotonous. 

I know. 

For all of those toddler years... Those days just felt like they would never end. 

Sheldon was the champion of the toddler years- I only barely made it through with remnants of sanity intact. 

The teething and the constant nature of having toddlers felt like it was my lot in life.

And I willed it away...

I would dream of a time when they would get themselves dressed.

And buckle their own seat belts..

I would wish them to hurry in their growing.

If only I'd realised that time is fleeting.

Time will always move.

I don't need to encourage it on its way.

I'm struggling with the idea of wasted time at the moment.

Time that I had..

When the boys were little and we were a "normal"  family.

Time when I would pick on all of the things that were wrong in my life without giving pause to celebrate the fact that we were alive, we were together...

It's not regret.

Regret is a painful burden of wishful thinking.

A burden of missed opportunity.

No... It's not regret that I encounter, but rather just the knowledge that I spent too much precious time willing time to move. Wanting change and demanding perfection. 

Wasted time.

Days and nights when I wouldn't speak to him. 

I'd be carrying a hurt or an offence.. I'd bundle it up and I would be silent.

I want to scream at her, that younger me, "Don't do this!!! Let it go. You've made your point, he knows you're upset. Now stop. Make this right. Time is fleeting."

I'm not saying I wish we'd never fought... He infuriated me and I drove him up the wall sometimes. 

I'm saying I wish I'd been quicker to let it go...

It's the time I left his apologetic, sweet text message go unanswered for hours.. Just to prove my point.

That's hours of wasted time.

Time that I ransomed.. Selfishly and for no gain.

I'm struggling with the memory of the times we said, "there's just no time..."

"There's just no time to go away for the weekend.."

Because we were busy. And because we didn't know, truly know, that time is fleeting.

"There's just no time..."

Listen... 

Make the time.

Spend your time wisely.

Let it go-If it can be resolved quickly, resolve it. Move on. 

Don't be fooled into thinking that the monotony of this current situation is going to define all of your days. 

Time is fleeting.

And you need to grab it with both of your hands and use it wisely. 

Because when there is no more time left... Well, there's just no more time.

 And time... Another hour. Another day. Another month. Yes... Time. 

Time is all you want. 

His last 24 hours

Dear Friends,

Writing to you all has been an anchor through these past years. I have posted 60 long and sometimes rambling letters- and in your reading and sharing them, and in your messages of support- you have helped me feel surrounded and enveloped.. you have heard me in my rawest moments. 

It's been a journey, huh?!

The horrible and the wonderful.

You celebrated the joy of last September when he survived the surgery and the pain of this March when we came to the point of terminal. 

So many of you have a story- in fact, everyone of you has a story.

Each of us has a tale of the horrendous moments that are typical and expected in this life- we don't want them but they are part and parcel of living.

And each of us are owners and partakers of the beautiful stories- the triumphs, the love stories, the overcoming.

I guess I just wanted to take this moment to thank you for being with us and sending love and support as we traversed the pages and days of our story. 

Now... 

I wrote in fragments in the final hours of his life. That Friday into Saturday were truly the most profoundly difficult hours I have known. And so I wrote. Writing is something akin to breathing for me these days.

So...

If you want to read on- please know that these words came from a bedside on the 4th and 5th of September, while our beautiful Sheldon spent his last breaths and heartbeats with us.

They are raw words that echo and reflect the pain that comes in saying goodbye.

If you can't- that's ok.

Maybe one day you will.

Friday- 4th September. 

11:13am

I don't know when or if this will be posted. Right now it's a simple matter of me needing to write. Needing to put these things down so that I can forget for a while and so that I don't forget in days and weeks to come.

There is no preparation for this. 

For sitting on the end of a hospital bed and staring for an hour at the face of a beloved.
Memorizing. When I actually wonder if this is what I want to remember,  but knowing that I will. This face that is so drawn and etched with the burden of these days.
No.. there is no preparation for this.
If you ever have to tread these worn steps of this goodbye,  don't be fooled into thinking you can prepare.
I stayed with him last night. The pull out bed that fits next to the window provided me the perfect spot to keep watch.
He didn't move.
No restlessness.
No midnight walks or 3am cups of tea.
He didn't move and I felt a deep gutted remorse that I complained those days and weeks when he would wander the house after midnight or offer me tea at ungodly hours.
He slept and I had the quiet hospital room and the distant murmurs of a grieving family three rooms down to keep my company. That's the horrendously beautiful thing about this ward. I know that the lady making a cup of tea is saying that long goodbye to her sister who has valiantly and bravely fought cancer. And the couple sitting in the courtyard are taking a moment before they continue their bedside vigil as their loved one fades.
It's a quiet and calm place.

Sheldon didn't want to die at home.
He made that decision and it was clearly a part of his palliative care plan.
I tend to think that it would be rather nice to be at home,  but he was thinking of the boys. He knew they needed somewhere to be loud little boys and not feel like death was looming. 

Home is that safe place.

      *****************************

1:30pm

I've come for a walk.
I needed to have the sun on my face while I process this.
My husband is dying.
Actually dying.
Right now.

My brother took my phone this morning and made the phone calls I couldn't make. 

Telling our people to come home. 

To be here while he goes home.

You can't be prepared.
For the breathing... the death rattle.
And the changing pallor of skin.
For the wave of selfishness that equally wants him to fight to stay and to relax into that place of no more pain.

I have never hated anything so much as I vehemently hate and detest the murderous thief that is cancer.

I have to go.
Back to sing my loved one the songs of our life.
The song we danced to.
The lullaby we sang to our boys.

*******************************

It's 2:37pm and I have come to the foyer to wait for his brother.
But really I just need a moment. Another moment to breath and process. To think forward to that moment this afternoon when I will sit our sons down and tell them what is happening. They know. But they don't. Their daddy's death has been an abstract. An unknown. Until now. Now we know. Now we see.
I hate this.
****************************

It's 2:05am. Saturday, 5th September
He's strong. I knew that. But this. This is a strength that astounds me. He has been progressively getting worse.
I thought I could do this. Let him go. Let him go home. To run into the arms of his Jesus who waits. But it's not a matter of simply letting him go.
It's processing the fact that I won't hear him talk to me again.
Or laugh.
Or complain.
Or give his opinion of the plot and character development of a movie while we watch it. (It frustrated me so. )

I'm so tired but I needed to focus on something. To focus on getting these fragments of thought out from bouncing around this fragile brain.

Everything that I have googled about end stages of dying didn't tell me that it's torture.

Listening to him battle to take a breath. While I will him to succeed and will him to let go.

It's coming.
I just can't... but I can.
Around me are strewn (and that's the perfect word) the sleeping and crying and waiting members of this watch.
We have set a watch.
My people and me.
I can... I just don't want to.
At all.

*************************************

3:32pm. Saturday. 5th September

The room is empty.

Quiet for the first time in hours.

I'm alone-

He has gone.

It took all of his stubborn, beautiful strength to hold on for so long.

And now..

It's quiet.

How to tell you?

How to capture what has taken place here in Room 116?

In the hours and days and years that come after this moment, I want to remember this day- these last days and I want them to be veiled in kindness and the beautiful- I don't want them to be a memory that is best tiptoed around. This is important- to remember how he left us.

He left us the same way that he lived- with strength and on his terms.

Oh, my stubborn, infuriating darling heart.

It's just me and him in the room now.

He's not really here, you know- but these arms. This face.

My stubborn, beautiful, infuriating darling heart.

The room, his room that he hassled the nurses to move him into, was full of our people today- and last night. 

I know firsthand the meaning and the living out of the word 'vigil'.

To hold vigil.

It looks like his loved ones standing around his bed, stealing seats from a neighbours room, finding a spot on the floor to stretch  out- all while we watched every tortured breath drag in and out of his failing lungs.

Oh, my stubborn, infuriating darling heart.

The vigil lasted all night- 30 hours in total.

30 hours and our people didn't falter once.

Thank you.

It seems trivial to simply say thanks for being with me while he went- but it's all I have today.

I need to go.

I need to go home to our boys.

They have been... I can't even begin to describe the pure courage that I have seen them show today.

They loved him and kissed his hollowed face.

They sang to him and they soothed him as he went.

Oh, my stubborn and beautiful sons.

For you- he would have stayed forever.

I need to go.

But I need to write this moment.

The silence.

No rattling breath..

No faltering heart..

No more cancer..

He is still.

And in no more pain.

He is quiet.

And I miss him.

Already.

One hour and the missing is deep rooted in my gut.

I need to go.

One more story I'll tell him, about how he has loved us and how we have loved life.

One more hug.

One more time that I'll stare at the rise and fall of his features.

He's beautiful.

I'm going.

He's gone.

I have to go home.

Oh, my darling heart.

Hello Grief..

We are home.
The coffeed up alleyways of Melbourne and the bittersweet familiarity of Sydney offered us a kind reprieve from real life. But we are home.  We walked in the front door yesterday and real life was waiting- with a pile of letters addressed to the estate of the late Sheldon Gakowski.
Real life was waiting- with the phone calls I had to make to institutions that require a certified death certificate before they talk to me.
Real life.

I despise these real life days.
And yet I embrace them.
I have to.
Sheldon spoke about these days often... preparing me,  encouraging me... willing me to face them with the same determination and peace that has marked all the days before this new real life.

He knew me so well.
He knew,  and told me often,  that I'd be OK.
It would make me crazy cranky when he would start to talk about these real life days that I would live without him here.
I would get snappy at him...accuse him of being cruel and heartless whenever he would chat about how ok he knew I'd be without him. Didn't he know that I'd be useless?  A hopeless mess? He'd roll his eyes and dismiss the picture of abject despair that I would paint.
And he'd paint me a new picture.
One where I'd be OK.
One where I'd go back to work.
One where I'd remember which day is bin day.

I realise now that it was his great love for me that motivated those conversations. He wanted to remind me that I can do this.
Because he knew that on that day that I came home and real life assaulted me in it's realness,  I'd want to run again. I'd want to turn tail and be anywhere else.
And as I stood in the lounge room yesterday,  one hand holding my suitcase and the other clutching the pile of mail, I didn't think I had it in me to be at home.
And just as I was about to say "nope... let's not stay. Who fancies a road trip to Perth??", I remembered one of those conversations that I hated.
It was a few weeks before he went.
He was tired and fading.
We were sitting outside,  enjoying the morning sun.
He just said it straight-
"You'll miss me..."
I looked at him and looked away. I wasn't prepared to have another conversation about my grief.
Silence stretched out. And then this:
"Just don't forget to feed the cat while you miss me... And water the garden. "

That's this grief.
My grief in real life.
Missing him.
Looking for him still.
Feeling ripped off.
Knowing that something precious and treasured was stolen right out of my hands. But then this grief is doing the missing and the looking while I pay the bills.
And while I parent.
And while I prepare to go back to work.

This grief.
It colours these new real life days.
It tones and tinges them.

I thought it would be a weight,  heavy around my neck. The heavy weight of a crushing grief.
Here's the dramatic in me. The all-too-concious of what social expectation demands of the 35 year old widow.
I wondered at a "grieving period", complete with an all black wardrobe. (Yes,  I watched Gone with the Wind alot!)
This grieving time... a window of time that I would set aside to grieve. And my imaginings had me distraught and useless.
So consider my surprise when I discovered that there is no specific and clear mourning period. No start and no definitive finish point.
And, hello, I wear alot of black but blue and grey were the colors I found myself decked out in these past few football crazed weeks.
Consider my surprise when I didn't feel the weight of useless grief,  but instead felt like laughing at the antics of my boys as they discovered Melbourne.
This grief is not relegated to a certain number of days. It ebbs. It swirls.
Sometimes it pushes. So ferocious in it's determination to announce itself. And yet sometimes it's silent. And I feel....normal. I feel ok.
This grief.
It's beautiful.
And it's horrendous.
It's testament to the immense love that I shared with him.
It's a tribute to the joy and the frustration he was.
It's the evidence of his impact.

And at the end of the day,  it's what I have.
This grief.
He knew it would be my companion and he made sure I heard him when he told me not to let it consume me.
He told me about it.
He prepared me in his beautiful and generous way to walk into these new real life days. He knew it was coming. 

So I welcome and abhor this grief that he prepared me for. 

He knew that I would miss him. And he demanded that while I missed him, in the moments and hours and days of this grief, he demanded that I remember to feed the cat.

And water the garden.

And laugh.

And cry.

And love our boys.

And live.

Football, doughnuts and runaways.

We tried to go home.

The house was so full of his voice.

The 'to do' list is just so long.

He left pink folders filled with bills and hand written instructions on what to do next. 

But I'm not ready to read them. 

I tried,  but the first note I picked up started with "I'm sorry you have to do this alone babe..."

It was the phone bill.

He was the bill payer. 

Most relationships have the bill payer. 

The person who knows what's due and when. 

He was that person. 

So.. we went home from the initial post-funeral  beach side escape and I paid the phone bill. I paid the funeral home. I spent three hours at the bank where I filled in the deceased estate forms and handed over certified copies of wills and death certificates. 

And my heart hurt.

It actually physically hurt.

And so. 

We ran away. Again. 

And I'm very aware that the list of what I have to do is still waiting for me. It can wait. 

I'm aware that this is not facing reality. 

Well. I'm ok with that.

I'm ok to let the reality and the realness of this be pushed back for a little bit longer while we follow our football team to the finals. While we find the best Nutella filled doughnuts in Melbourne. 

Because the truth is this- we know. 

We know he's not at home. 

We know he's not at work. 

We know.

We know.

And even this escape isn't far enough away from reality to stop that knowing from walking these streets with us. It's a shadow that is just there. Over our shoulder. Yesterday the knowing. .that shadow of knowing.. caught up with Krystopher. And he sat in a cafe in the middle of Melbourne and cried. 

I couldn't say or do anything to fix it. When the knowing catches up with you.. well. There is nothing to be done but to let it wash over you in it's waves. And then..as the harsh knowing receded and his tears eased,  we got up and went to the football. Because that's how we keep living through this terrible knowing. We just get up and we live. We live with the shadow of knowing. We live anyway.

And one day. When we're ready to run face first into that reality and routine of the real life, we'll go home and I'll open up the next pink folder. But not today. Today we have doughnuts to discover. 

235 hours.

It's been 10 days.
235 hours.

It doesn't seem like such a long time, but I feel the weight of each of those moments. They have rested on me like an unfamiliar coat.
In those 10 days of being without him, I have known the profound and sustaining love of so many of you.
That love and kindness has wrapped around me and my sons like a cocoon, sheltering us just a little from the sharp edge of loss.

Loss.
Such a simple word to look at. 4 letters.
Such a hard word to live.

I feel it- the loss of his earthly presence.
The familiar and ingrained habit of looking for him in a room, or calling his name when something won't work.
He was just always there.
Even in those days and hours that were amongst his last- he was there. Striving to calm his parents breaking hearts. Wanting to hug his beloved brother.
Turning his weary head towards me and whispering "I love you.". His last words. I got them.

Yes.
I have felt the loss of his earthly presence.

We have escaped for a while.
To a place with sunshine and good coffee.
To an unfamiliar apartment that doesn't remind us of him with every step.
Yesterday afternoon we walked over to the supermarket. Me and my three boys.
We wanted to stock the fridge with nutella and strawberry milk.
The cashier smiled and chatted her way through the beeping and the bagging. And then it came to the paying.
I froze.
I had a purse full of cards.
I had no idea what the pin numbers were.
Total and absolute brain blank.
I couldn't think of any numbers that I could string together..
I just stared at her smiling face.
Her smile faltered as she realised that the woman standing statue still with a trolley full of groceries might be a little unhinged.
I managed to recover and asked her to break the bill into amounts that I could paypass.

Don't worry- the story isn't about how I'm losing my mind and forgetting simple things. I always forget pin numbers. It happens with uncomfortable regularity.
No. The story is about how I would forget and look to him. And he would sigh and whisper, again, the numbers to me.

Yes.
I have felt the loss of his earthly presence.
And I guess I have to remember pin numbers.

I know that it's a process- this grief that we have to walk out.
And we are on that process.
We are walking the path where questions like, "Why did it have to be my Dad?" are scattered every few steps.
It's a rocky path.
Grief always is.
Watching these three boys... I'm astounded.
And heartbroken.
And proud.
They tackle grief head on- grabbing it and wrestling out the tough parts.
And the thing is- they always come to a good place.
They talk and they wonder.. round and round, until they come to a good place.
A place where the enormous unfairness of the burden of his going is paired with the peace that he is actually ok. The faith that he is not far away- just beyond the veil that rests between here and there.
I see it on their faces.
I hear it in their voices.
This grand wrestle that plays out- it ministers to my own wrestle.
These little hearts- mending my own as they consistently come back to the conclusion that their Dad is more alive now than he ever was in the cancer ridden body that we loved.
How precious these three are to me.

I want to leave you with a section from the legacy eulogy that I delivered in honour of him last Thursday:

 

The very best moments of my life are easy to recall.

There are three of them.

They are the moments just after our three handsome and very brave sons were born.

In the moments after you were each born, something truly profound happened. Your Daddy fell instantly, head over heels in love with each of you. If you've never seen anyone fall in love before, it’s very beautiful.

He saw you.

And he loved you.

He held you and he was changed forever.

He was braver, and smarter and stronger and better the moment he held each one of you.

That’s what happened when he fell madly in love with you- his sons.

The best, greatest and most important earthly word that can describe Sheldon is Dad.

 

You three. My sons.

Listen closely.

You are the reflection of your father.

You are his legacy and his imprint on this earth.

Today you each wear a set of dogtags that have Daddy’s thumb print on it. This is to remind you that YOU three, his greatest loves, his masterpieces, are his imprint on this world.

You will reflect his humour and his crazy obsession with B grade Sy- fy movies.

You reflect his generous love and loyalty.

You reflect his compassion.

You boys. You are the one reason he wanted to stay.

He was ready to go.

He was tired.

His body was failing him.

I never heard him complain.

But… he would have stayed a million years for you.

The love he had for you three little men is such a beautiful testimony of his life. I’m proud to have witnessed such a love. I’m proud to be your mum.

We will be the strength and the joy that he wanted us to be for each other.

 

The final word that I can give you today that describes Sheldon and the legacy that he has etched across this place is “Home”.

He’s home.

Sheldon knew the grace of Jesus.

He knew the unreligious, real love of a real, unreligious God.

He held onto one promise. “God didn’t promise to heal me of cancer..” he’d say.. “He promised to be with me. To never leave me and to walk me into eternity. That’s my promise… Home with Him”

That. Is the kindness of God.

Is it unfair that he is gone? Yes.

Does my heart feel about ready to shatter and disappear in the weight of this grief? Yes.

But even then. But even then.

The Kindness of a God who gave us Jesus. The Kindness of a Jesus who took the curse of being alone in death so that we would never have to be.

Yes, Kindness wins.

 

It wins because of Eternity.

Heaven.

Home.

He’s there. He’s gone home.

I’ll see him again.

And until that day my sweet darling heart.. Oh the grief of it! Oh the heart ache of it! I love you. Thank you for being so amazing.

Thankyou for being so strong and so very brave.

Thank you for the gift and the enduring legacy of these three beautiful brave sons who will surround me and protect me.

I love you.