9 Months

Phillipians 1:6 – “And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns.” NLT

When you lose someone, you find yourself ticking off dates. Firsts, seconds, and so on. That first Christmas after. Your first anniversary after. Their birthday. Father’s day. Mother’s day. One day that has stuck with me is the 5th of every month. Each one that passes is a reminder that it’s been one more month since my husband passed away. Sometimes you approach the date with anxiety and apprehension. Sometimes the date catches you off guard. Each milestone date is in its own way, bittersweet. Some of them are just hard. Our first anniversary was just at the three month mark. I was so apprehensive about the date. Do I celebrate with good memories? Go on a trip? Spend the day with friends and family? I arranged for the girls to be away at sleepovers. I spent the morning in my tub, crying and listening to songs that made me think of him. I allowed myself to feel all the feelings, and have all the memories. I exhausted my emotions. That afternoon, I picked up my youngest and she and I went to a movie. We made new memories together and spent a wonderful evening.

The first part of July, I knew the 5th was coming. I prepared to brace myself for a tough day. Then I came to the realization that I was approaching nine months. So much can happen in nine months. The typical school year is approximately nine months long. Students learn so much in those nine months. Although a full-term pregnancy is actually closer to 40 week, we still say 9 months. There is a lot of growth and change that happens in those nine months.

As I thought back on the previous nine months, I realized that I had grown, changed, and learned so much in that time. I was no longer the girl I was before. There were so many days when I didn’t even recognize myself. And that’s ok. I’m not meant to be who I was before. That girl had never handled anything like this. Not to say that I have handled it perfectly, but there is no Widow Handbook. There are no guidelines and no correct, or incorrect, way to navigate loss. News flash, the “Stages of Grief”???? Those were never meant to be about bereavement. They were created by Elisabeth Kubler-Ross and were introduced in her book On Death and Dying for terminally ill patients. This makes a little more sense, as grief after loss is not linear, and doesn’t have an ending point. You can have multiple emotions at the same time. Yes, there are forms of denial and acceptance, but with whom do you bargain? And depression definitely makes its appearance. So, as I approached yet another milestone date, I spent some time looking back on how far I’ve come in my journey. There have been good days, and bad, and some devestating ones. There have been many days where it took monumental strength to get out of bed. Even more to get out of the truck and go into work and do my job, show up when my body and mind and heart are all exhausted. It’s not because I’m strong, or Wonder Woman. I show up because I have to. Bills need to be paid. Kids need to eat. Fish gotta swim. It’s literally the natural order of things.

So, if today, you only got out of bed, well done. If you made it as far as getting dressed and/or brushing your teeth, well done. If you woke up and spent the day wrapped in your blanket, well done. If you made it through your work day and went through the drive through to feed your kids, well done. There is no pattern of behavior that we are supposed to follow. Grief is hard, and it’s hard work. If you took a nap instead of folding laundry, that’s ok. Trust that He is working a good work through this.

We will get through this.

You are not alone.