“But you have another child”

Really doesn’t make Mother’s Day any easier, we sort of pretended it was just another day…sorry Hallmark.

Yes…we are blessed with another son, we have another child….who is witty, deep, still remembers to say “yes ma’am, and “no sir”…we just like staring at him which I am sure wigs him out.  We like  staring at him cause you feel like you can never stuff your heart full enough of his presence, the luxury of being able to reach out and pinch him…literally, which I did yesterday – on his sunburn – cause it proves to me he is alive and next to me.  God bless his patience and good humor with me.

Perhaps people remind us that we have another child because it makes them feel better? I always think of one of my first bosses who loved dachshunds, his theory was that it could die and you could replace it and the kids would never know cause they look the same.   Well our children are  not dachshunds, human beings are irreplaceable,  unique.  It is not like we have forgotten Ryan when we grieve or miss Justin.  I tell you something though, it takes an enormous amount of courage and energy to stay engaged with your surviving child.   When Justin died, 25 years of living with our lives entwined,  emotionally invested in each other and continuing that investment on an adult level was severed.  I believe it to be totally natural to want to self-protect,  to emotionally distance oneself from that unimaginable pain…to not allow it to ever touch you again.  We live with the reality that Ryan could die too,  it is a searing pain to  live in a world where children die, an entire new way of living must emerge as the psyche sorts and relocates this information.  I thought I was a mama grizzly before Justin died, the bear might be old, but she still has bite.

To not want to die and to want to live are not the same thing and they should not be confused as such.  One can not want to die, but have no desire to live…you exist…you make coffee, feed the cat…you might even get the mail in or pay bills.  You may not actively seek death, but you also are not actively seeking life,  you survive.  To want to live is a conscious decision that has to be made every day, several times a day until it becomes part of your fiber again.  It is terrifying to live again,  it is terrifying to love,  to be vulnerable, numb is much better. To chose to live is to open the door to major swells of anxiety, to learn to reroute the mind not to plan for disaster and heartache.  To chose to live is to examine that which gives life and that which draws life from you and then to put in place those things which bring life.  To chose to live is to learn how to live in a world where children die…you don’t recover, get over, get closure….you recreate, you expand, you navigate,  your world will not look the same as before your child died.

I believe that I had a moment of life on Saturday.  We watched as Ryan slid into the passenger seat of a stock car for laps with a professional driver before he got to drive solo.  I  asked my brother, who made this day possible, “do they know that’s my baby?”…he assured me that they did.  We quickly climbed up to the roof of the media center to watch and it was thrilling.  Then Ken said “c’mon, suit up and I will pop you in with a professional driver, I promise you it will be fun”..flashbacks to a crushed white Chevy Achieva…the endless pictures in my head of Justin’s car flipping….then making the conscious decision to want to live, to saying “yes”…..and he was right, going fast in a stock car with the bright blue sky, and the wind and the smell of the track was absolute fun, not to be missed.  And to see and hear the sound of smiles and laughter, to not want the day to end,  to relax for a moment…it was good.  I found I was in no hurry to get out of the race car…in fact, I was hoping that if I was quiet they might let me stay, cause for the seconds that it takes to lap the Monster Mile, I felt alive and  I wanted to live.

We got to take a break from our grief on Saturday and it was a great blessing and privilege.  So grateful to a big

brother who had the courage to plan,  to encourage, to think of us and build an incredible day.  To family who

drove to  Dover International Speedway  to share the day, to make memories.  To the gracious and wonderful welcoming staff at Monster Racing Excitement  for providing such an out of the ordinary venue, to make memories to last a lifetime, thank you.

Justin, I thought of you every moment, we all did. It is so hard to learn how to live again, to live without you, to want to live.  It won’t happen overnight, but small steps forward….learning that for every good day, there can be three horrid ones…and that’s okay….recreate, expand, navigate.  We are rebuilding.