Learning to Survive

We talked with some new friends this past week about their experience losing their son nearly 18 years ago. He was only a day old when he passed into the next world at the hospital. We cried together as we shared our experiences with one another.

As we compared notes, we realized that both of us had a very similar experience when we left the hospital after the day our children died. The first thing we realized was that we were hungry, and we went to a restaurant to eat.

Looking back on it now, I think this was our first act of survival. And that is exactly what parents do after losing a precious son or daughter: they learn to survive. For many years, I've noticed in obituaries how they list the deceased person's family members who are still alive in this way: He/she is survived by.... and a list follows of siblings, children, etc. I had never realized how literally true this is.

The funeral home that made the arrangements for Liza Jane gave us a helpful pamphlet called "Surviving the death of a child: How to live when your child has died." It described the experience of losing a child more eloquently than I can.

"The death of a child is viewed as the greatest of all tragedies. When we lose a child, it is as if a part of us dies, too. We feel our children's every hurt, we instinctively know what they need, and we live to protect them. When they die, the loss of this connection can bring on the most terrible kind of grief. There are ways of managing the pain and grief, however, so that it doesn't overwhelm your life and does allow you to move on."

The Free Dictionary online says that to survive is to remain alive or in existence, to carry on despite hardships or trauma. Surviving is hard work. It takes an effort to make a choice to go on living. There have been many days over the past year where it has taken an act of my will to get out of bed in the morning. It has been a battle to make simple choices to eat nutritious food, to get myself out of the house into the fresh air, to exercise and do simple things to take care of myself. All of these things are part of surviving.

It is hard sometimes not to feel guilty for enjoying life when she is gone and can no longer experience it with us. Over time, the intensity of this feeling does lessen, but her absence still remains.

A working mother in a novel I read described the experience of being separated from her infant son while she was at work. As she left him with his nanny and began her journey to work, it felt like a spool of thread inside of her was unwinding, with the other end being attached to her son. All day long, the further she got away from him in time and space, the more that spool unwound until at the end of the day, she felt as if she would fall apart. She would race to get back to him as quickly as possible so that spool of thread would wind up tightly again, bringing them back together at the moment he came into her arms.

I felt this way each evening that we left Liza at the hospital so we could go home for some nourishment and sleep. Each morning, I felt almost panicky until I got back to the hospital. My spool of thread was unwound, and it wouldn't be right again until I was back with her.

Now that she is gone, though, I can't get that spool of thread back together. She is out there, somewhere, dangling at the end of it, and I am unwound inside, missing her, longing for her. This feeling is more intense some days than others.

And yet, life goes on. The sun continues to rise and set. We have to go on getting up in the morning and participating in life. Sometimes it is tempting to try to make something happen so that spool can be tightly wound again - I won't lie. But it is my choice to honor my daughter's memory by living... not only that, but living as well as I can, and with as much love for those around me as possible. I'm learning to survive.