12 years later

 It’s been twelve years tomorrow since Joe had his heart attack. Twelve years since I heard his voice.  My life has certainly changed in that time. I’ve remarried, had two more children. And I’ve most certainly aged! 

 I have been struggling the last few months and couldn’t really put a finger on why it’s been hard again until I started writing this post. He’s been gone now longer than we were married. My children have all been without him longer than they had him. Our children are almost grown. Our oldest Taylor (26) is married and Madi (22) is in a serious relationship and in college.  Melyssa (18) is out of high school, working and trying to decide what she wants to do with her life.  Tori (16) is a junior in high school, her personality is so different than when Joe was with us. Jonny (15) is a sophomore, he will be getting his license in January. He is 6’2, he looks and acts more like his dad than ever. 

He has missed so much! They have missed so much! I hurt for him and for them. It hasn’t been easy, that is for sure. I’ve tried to keep his memory alive for our kids. For the youngest three, that’s all they have, stories I’ve told them along the way. The older two remember him and honestly, I’m not sure which is worse. It’s harder to miss what you don’t remember having. Yet, not having any memories is also hard. 

God has been faithful, He has held me up when I thought I couldn’t go on. I couldn’t have done this life without knowing God was always there, just a whisper away. 

Years ago

Four years...

Four years... It's amazing what all happens in four years time. People come into your life, others who you thought would always be there, walk away.  There are days where you're so happy you think your heart will burst, and days when you feel as though your heart has been ripped from your chest. 

Children grow up. They leave babyhood and enter adolescence, leave adolescence and go right into young adult. I've watched as they started kindergarten and another finished high school and headed off to college. 

Four years is a short time but it's also a very long time.  

Thinking of you today.  Going to hug the kids a little longer and a little tighter. Wish you could see them now! 

Titles

How do you refer to yourself after you are widowed?  Do you call yourself his wife, his widow? The survivor?  And how do you refer to him? Your husband, your late husband?  I struggled with what to call myself for a while. I hated the word "widow" and yet I wasn't his wife anymore, that was "till death do us part", so who am I?

I still struggle with what to call him.  My late husband? He was always on time, I was the late one.  ?  Umm NO.  Husband? Well again, that was until death do we part.  EX husband? No! Someone once referred to him that way while speaking to me and I thought I was going to lose it! Or I could call him "the kids' dad" but then it seems like he and I were never married. It is strange the way our minds cling to one thing and turn it into something BIG. 
After four  years, I still call him my husband and then I catch myself and call him "my first husband" and then think that maybe people will think we were divorced, so I then feel the need to explain.  It's hard to know how to refer to him. 

I still hate the word "widow".  When I think of a widow I think of someone who is way older than I am.  I am 37, I should not be a widow yet. 

Hospitals (Old post I just published)

I hate going to hospitals now.  I never found it to be great fun before, but now it really stresses me.  My Grandfather is currently in the hospital and while I love to be there to see him and spend time with my Grandmother and other family members; it brings back so many hard memories.  It's not the same hospital, but the sounds, sights and smells are all the same.  If I could I would never step in another hospital, but obviously that is not possible. 

So what do you do when you find yourself in a situation that brings memories rushing back?  You brace yourself and let it come. You give yourself permission to cry for a bit and then you dry your eyes and get back to the business of living.  We can't just give up and let life pass us by.  We have to keep going.

Warning: this is a rambling of thoughts!!!

Today I completed my last task as Joe's widow.  We are coming up on four years and until today my checking account still had his name on it. My name was still Mabrey on it.  I couldn't bring myself to take them his death certificate until a few months ago. Even after they had it I wasn't ready to take him off the account.  I wanted to keep him connected to it.  I'm not sure if it was such a big deal to me just because it was the very last thing I had to do or what.

 Today I walked into the bank to do something completely different and while I was there they told me they needed my signature to remove him.  I was out of time.  I stood there and had tears rolling down my face while I signed my new name removing him from the account we shared.  I thank the ladies there for being so kind to me while I made a utter fool of myself.

Who knew what an emotional attachment we could have to an account. :-) Its been a very emotional day for me.  Actually it's been an emotional week, month even.  Early this month I found myself driving the same route I took the day Joe had his heart attack and drove right by the hospital.  It was hard, I was remembering talking to my sister on the phone on the way there.  We were discussing possibilities of what could have happened (all I knew was there had been an "incident") so we were thinking someone may have hit him. Or perhaps he got caught in the truck.  Any number of things. Never dreaming he'd had a heart attack. I was thinking all these things and doing a bit of crying while remembering.

Wednesday my step-dad had a heart attack and was rushed to the hospital.  I went there to be with my mom, again unsure of what I was walking into.  We weren't sure at the time if it was an actual heart attack or what.  I walked in his room to hear that not only did he have a heart attack, but he flat-lined in the ER. They shocked him and got his heart beating again. They rushed him to the cath lab where they put a stint in his heart.   I lost it and was sobbing.  It was so surreal, like being in the ER with Joe all over again.  I spent the night with my mom.  The next day the doctor came in and informed us that 30 minutes later and dad wouldn't have made it.  He told us that not only did he flat-line in the ER but again on the table while they were putting the stint in.

This has been so rough on all of us.  I know this isn't about me at all, but I'm reliving times with doctors in the hospital with Joe and I can't help but ask, why. Why can they save some heart attack patients but not others.  Why was he taken from us at 41? Why are his children growing up without him? 

I sit here and write this all the while hearing those words in my head "life is for the living". Joe is in a better place. He's made it, he finished his race. His time had come and God called him home. We aren't promised tomorrow. I think all these things with tears flowing down my face. 

It's been four years this month since Joe had his heart attack and I miss him fiercely.  I have been able to move on. I am remarried and have a new beautiful baby boy. But that doesn't diminish my love, or feelings of loss and grief for Joe.  There are days I want to give up, there are days I feel like there is a knot in the center of my chest and a constant burning behind my eyes.  But there are also days of extreme happiness, where I think how lucky I am to get a second chance at life.

Remember friend, grief is like the ocean.  It comes in waves, some waves just run across your feet and some knock you flat with no warning. We still need to enjoy the small ones and just know a big one could be on the way.

Madelynn's birthday

Today is my daughter Madelynn's birthday.  She is 13 years old and is turning into such a beautiful young lady.  I am recalling the day of her birth.  Inevitably, I am thinking of her daddy today as well.  Is he watching her from heaven and seeing how wonderful she is?  I am reminded of how he looked, standing by my head in the seconds after her delivery. I'd never seen him cry before that day.  Tears welled in his eyes and rolled down his cheeks as he held out shaky hands to hold his daughter for the first time.  Madelynn was Joe's first biological child.  As much as he treated Taylor like his own, there is something different about being there at birth and watching your child take her first breath.  There is something different, you know that this child truly is yours, bone of your bone, flesh of your flesh.  Joe was so proud that day.  I had a hard time getting him to hand Maddie over to me.  The doctor had handed her straight to Joe and from that moment they had a bond like none I'd ever seen before or since. 
We brought Maddie home the day after she was born, she was perfect at 6lb, 0oz.  She was smaller than Taylor had been and I was surprisingly nervous with her.  Joe had no such issues.  He held her, changed her diapers, burped her after she nursed.  Changed her clothes and was able to swaddle her in her blankets like he'd been doing it for years.  Maddie was a screamer.  She would scream for HOURS.  Nothing I did calmed her.  I walked the floor with her for hours at a time and as soon as Joe walked in and she heard his voice she was instantly calm.  He would take her from me and she was suddenly the happiest baby around.  Maddie was a daddies girl through and through! From the day that Maddie was born till the day that Joe went into the hospital their bond was unchanged.  Maddie would get sick and want daddy, happy and want daddy, sad, scared, mad you name it, she wanted her dad.

I've been thinking about that today.  And it makes me sad for Maddie because her daddy isn't here with her. I find myself fighting the feeling of bitterness because of how unfair life has been for my children.  I am angry all over again, but so very sad at the same time.  It's amazing how many emotions fight for control.  And  then I hear my Grandma's voice in my head telling me that the emotion that will win is the one that you pay the most attention to.  So, I'm going to give heed to my feeling of gratitude.  Yeah, in all this mess I still have that.

 I am so very grateful that my children had such a good daddy.  They didn't have an abusive father.  Their daddy loved them so very much and what's more is they knew it.  I am grateful for the time they did get with him.  I wish they could have had more time, but I know they could very well have had less.  I am grateful that my children didn't have to watch their daddy suffer with cancer or a long painful illness.  I am grateful that he didn't die due to a drunk driver which would have given them motive to be angry at someone.  I have a lot to be grateful for and today those are the things I am going to think about.

Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable--if anything is excellent or praiseworthy--think about such things. (Philippians 4:8 NIV)