Wrestling

So tonight a good friend said "So, it hasn't really been that long, how are you guys really doing? Is it an every day grieving thing?" The question caught me off guard a bit but meant so much that she would ask. I love it so much when people push past that awkwardness and are just open and honest. I love knowing that others are still thinking of us in all of this even six months out.

As I have thought about this the word that came to mine was wrestling. That is what I feel like I do each and every day. It is a constant struggle and yet I fight with everything I have. Every morning I have to make the choice to be thankful for the day and allow my feet to hit the floor with the mindset that this life is not about me or my comfort or discomfort. It is about Jesus, the one and only. It is about what I can do to serve him for all he has done for me. It is exhausting, but I know it is necessary to my survival. He always gives me what I need to get through each day. Yesterday a verse from my devotional was this...

"Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until daybreak" Genesis 32:24

The man Jacob wrestled with was God in human form. He wrestled with God. But in the morning he was victorious, not because he could overcome God, but because he had given all he had and was weak and broken. He was so exhausted all he could do was collapse into the arms of his Savior and trust in Him. Jacob had come to the end of himself. He had nothing left to give. A few verses later in verse 28 the Bible says:

"Your name will no longer be Jacob, but Israel, because you have struggled with God and with men and have overcome."

Sometimes it feels like I am so deep into this grief thing that I cannot move. It is like being in quicksand to your neck. It presses on your chest and makes it difficult to even breathe or move. Anymore everything is a struggle. Tomorrow marks six months since I held sweet Asher in my arms and kissed his soft forehead. Tomorrow is also my oldest son's fifth birthday party. I have wrestled all week with why on earth I did this to myself. It was the only date we could get at the park we are having Luke's party and his heart was set on it. So tomorrow I will be celebrating five years with Luke and six months since Asher breathed his first and last breaths.

How is a person supposed to feel about that? Why does everything have to be so complicated and difficult? I want so desperately to be happy and to celebrate and yet I have this weight pushing down on my chest. Squeezing my heart. Anymore I feel like I am surrounded by new babies and pregnant moms and as badly as I want to rejoice with them and be excited for them, there is this gnawing pain in my gut. I pain I have to fight back daily so I can be the friend I want to be.

I also "wrestle" with borderline insane thoughts...Would you believe that one of the reasons I wanted my boys cremated was because I knew my crazy insane self and I knew that there would be a point down the road that if they were buried I would have this overwhelming urge to go dig them up and just hold them again? With ashes, this isn't a possibility. I just want to feel that weight. I didn't want to end up in a mental ward somewhere so I decided I would take this struggle out of the equation. A preemptive strike if you will. (Looking back this is maybe something I shouldn't have shared, but maybe some other mom out there can relate and will be glad to know we would be roommates in that mental ward) I am thankful for that decision tonight because I am not sure I could resist the urge if it were possible as awful as it would be.

Six months seems like so long ago and yet like just yesterday. I am so thankful for February 22, 2008 and yet I desperately wish the outcome would have been different. I wish I did not have to explain to Luke AGAIN why his brothers cannot die again and come back to Earth for his birthday party. I wish I were up tonight, not because I am going crazy and typing through tears, but because I needed to feed my six month old boy.

On Sunday at church I was asked (again) if I am pregnant again. This question I have to admit is the one that drives me nuts more than anything. I am not. I am just still fat. I had a baby six months ago and the evidence still resides around my midsection. (That and the Dove chocolate I use for comfort on the bad days or the ice cream that temporarily fills the void that exists in my heart, they do say the way to a person's heart is often through the stomach.). Nevertheless, the question stuns me and I have been asked three or four times now by different people. Note to all: NEVER ask a woman if she is pregnant unless you KNOW she is! Another thing I wrestle with...what to say when asked such things....What would Jesus do? :-) HMMMMM....


I come to you all tonight asking for prayer. Tomorrow will be a day that I wrestle with joy and grief yet again. My prayer is that the God of Jacob will continue to be faithful. That he will again give me the grace to get through a tough day, that I will come through my wrestling with Him victoriously, with a new life, one better than I could ever have imagined. If we have to keep wrestling until he beats all of the old out of me I am okay with that. I just pray I, like Jacob come out a new person. I don't necessarily need a name change, but I can only imagine what it would be like to hear God say, "You have wrestled with God and men, and have overcome." Oh, Lord how I want to overcome. I know He is the only way to do that so I am white knuckled, clinging with every ounce of strength I can muster, but man some days and especially nights are so hard.

I am continually astounded that so many of you continue to check in on our family and I covet each comment and email. Your prayers and encouragement mean more than you could know. If there is any way I can pray for any of you please feel free to email me! I would be honored. Again thank you for reading my insane ramblings of a grieving mother!