When someone we love dies, we crave their physical presence. We crave a connection with them. Unfortunately, there is no guidebook that gives us the 5-step process on how to cultivate this relationship, but the cool thing about that is we get to discover it for ourselves. I believe figuring this out is part of the grieving process. Part of the self-discovery. Part of the invitation we receive when someone we love so very dearly leaves their physical body. 

In the early days we cannot even breathe. Every moment is difficult and we have little bandwidth for this big monster of grief. I remember so well going to sleep and waking up with tears running down my face because I discovered another day and the reality remained, Ethan isn’t physically here.

I have come to believe there is a universality to grief. That it actually looks more alike than we care to admit and there is a thread through all of our stories that sews us together. In the early years I would have hated this sentiment. I think what we are actually articulating is that the relationship we have with the one we love who has died is unique. They are a unique being. Our story of how this terribleness all went down is unique. Yes, that story needs to be told, heard and validated many, many times over. That’s why we need a community of those we have walked a similar journey. Seeing ourselves in others and sharing the communion of grief with them is powerful and unifying. 

So on that day abundance was walking in the middle of the frustration of disability and beautiful nature. The weekend of my brother’s wedding it was saying no to things that would distract, add anxiety or worry so I could be fully present to the significance of the weekend. It was in the missing of Ethan and dancing the night away. It was in the frustration of traveling with all of Bodey’s stuff and seeing him all dressed up for the wedding.

It’s an oversupply of the good stuff of life, not of the pretty stuff or the easy stuff. Yes, we should still desire, want and work for the pretty and easy. I know I do. But it’s being able to see fullnes and beauty where so many others miss it.

 I’m a believer in walking in the middle spaces of life. Here on these balance beams, in these tensions, where most people don’t care to abide, are the sweet spots. Being and doing absolutely go together. In fact, they intersect at one of those sweet spots. We are called to be doers and creators in this life. If you read enough of my blogs I know you will get that sentiment from me. I don’t think we are here merely to exist, but to do and create big, beautiful things. In my experience these big (I don’t mean in size, but in what they give) and beautiful things often stem from suffering and difficult life experiences. I love learning from people to have struggled and created beauty from it. To me it is the quest for healing personified. 

Over the last four years I have let Bodey into my heart. We love him more than anything. He has helped to heal us. I have watched my boys care for him, protect him and love him. With each piece of equipment that enters our home, my heart hurts and yet it also leaps because we can help him some more. He looks so much like Ethan. It’s uncanny. And I’m sure no accident. It’s as if he’s continuing the refinement of our hearts that Ethan began. 

 Each day we walk in deep love, on the path of the unknown. It’s hard. It’s physically hard, emotionally hard and many days it feels horribly unfair for us and for him. Yes, my heart aches when I see a four-year-old riding their bike and carrying on full conversations with their mom.  But I’m also aware that something deeper is happening here. Bodey is teaching us to hold our suffering and hope in tension. His life is not a mistake. He is not less than or other than. On the contrary he is a living invitation for us on a daily basis. I could write many chapters just about Bodey, but I leave you with four things he has taught me. Four things I’m very thankful for.

Don’t look down any longer. Not is shame, or guilt or comparision. Not in despair or hopelessness.

Look up.

Receive this life, all the parts, all the sadness, all the pain, all the shame. And then listen to what you are being called. Can you hear it? What is this heartache inviting you to become, to see, to hear, to love, to transform, to lead, to change, to grow, to give, to be?

And if you can, say one yes, and then another, and then another. Until you can say one big YES to the life you’ve been invited to. The one that has been given just to you.

No, it’s never going to be perfect (no one’s life is)  and your friends might not be banging down your door for it, but you will make it beautiful. You will make it signature you. Full of all the “youness” that it’s designed for.

And when you do. Raise your hands, call out to this world, and say THIS IS ME! I accept this invitation and I’m going to make this one life beautiful!

As women we struggle with self worth, confidence, the inner critic. Grief and special needs parenting have been huge hits to my self-confidence, to my vision for the future. But deep inside I have met the me that God created. The one designed for the story I am living. There’s no mistake in the story, nothing out of place or unseen by God. She may not look like the woman I planned for, but she is home. In low moments I wish I wasn’t her, in high ones, I know I’m exactly where I’m meant to be.

In my heart, I have gone from a place of needing complete knowledge, to a place that is willing to accept the mystery. But each tragedy, each heartache, each time something happens that our hearts cannot grasp, it is okay and it is important to re-ask,

“Are You there? God
”Do you exist?
”What is this all about?”

Each time is an invitation to dive deeper, search harder, ask the questions, feel the hurt and feel the Presence.

For me, I just keep coming back to Love. To a Love that is constant in the change, that is present in the pain, that I do not always understand, but that I choose over nothing at all.

As accept I am not in charge and my prayers are not passports to my plans, I appreciate the strong, constant Evergreen.

This Evergreen Love is ever present and stands with us as the seasons of life that ebb and flow, sometimes fading into the colors of our lives, sometimes standing in contrast. Especially in the contrast. Present, strong and right beside us as we surrender (and re-surrender) to life.

Do you feel like you are living there now, deep in the thick, dense forest? Do you long to see a path forward or out of this space?

Can I make a recommendation? Don’t despise this time. Lean into it. Learn to appreciate the solace, the cool crisp air, the new vistas. Think about embracing this space you never wanted to stay. When you do, I promise you will find others there too. In your space, in your wilderness. Some choose it now because they see the value and the freedom it offers. Some just arrived and they feel so far from home. 

I now find the wilderness to be home. To be a place from which I learn and create in a way I never would otherwise. We are called to embrace the life we have and to create from that space. Yes, I said CREATE. Not just sit or wallow or throw up our hands, but to dig in, figure through and CREATE.  

 I’m not willing to be just one part of my story and I don’t think you should just be one part of yours either. I’m not just my history, I’m also my future. I’m the person I’m growing into. And not just my future either, I’m my history. We should not run from our story, from those defining moments because they can be a springboard from which we create. 

We are all tapestries, colorful conglomerations of the people God has so beautifully created us to be. We need to start embracing all of our gifts, our interests, our talents, our heartache. All of it. We are not one dimensional, we are not just our careers or our interests, or that one defining moment when it all went so wrong.