Tracy BradshawThank you, Sawyer, for being in my dream this morning. I would like to share with you all that I can remember and my interpretation too… You and I were going on a cruise. I had checked myself in and stepped ahead to turn and get a picture of you checking yourself in by sliding a card much like a self-checkout at Kroger. I hit the button to turn on my phone and tapped the camera app wanting to snap your photo. I was quite puzzled when a picture of Your Uncle Todd popped up on the screen in camera mode. It was his picture caught in midair as if he was in the middle of a big jump. I chuckled at the photo and tapped to return to camera mode as you swiped your card to board the cruise ship. You placed a pair of black framed glasses on the white swim platform and said that you needed to get some things from your room. When you left, I noticed water lapping up on the platform. I worried that your glasses would be washed away. Just as I was thinking that very thought a wave came up and slid across the platform taking your glasses with it. I watched as they began to very slowly sink into the water. I reached for them and they seemed to travel in slow motion remaining just beyond my fingertips. When my arm was completely submerged in the water, I still hadn’t reached the glasses. I thought that you might not be able to see without them and decided that I’d dive in for them. I retrieved the glasses from the ocean water and returned soaking wet and hair dripping. I opened the ear pieces. They were stretched out too far. I recognized them as an old pair of my own reading glasses that I didn’t want anymore and realized that they weren’t yours at all. When you returned you were younger and smaller. You stretched out on your stomach on the swim platform in a tight outfit which may have been a tightly wrapped towel, but it looked much like a strapless dress. I slid my hand under the fabric between your shoulders and felt the soft skin on your upper back. I raised the material and found it loose though visually it appeared to be so snug. My limited interpretation – Since the day you passed away, I’ve been trying to save you somehow. Your love, your memory, your personality, your presence; I cannot allow these things to pass away too. I thought by sharing you via Sawbear I was saving you, but in reality, I was saving myself. Sawbear keeps me going because sharing you through his eyes, heart, and adventures gives me purpose. You left the glasses for me, so I can see what is closest to me. That understanding has been just out of my reach for several years. I had to submerge myself in Sawbear before I could see what saved me. Thanks for the glasses. I love you, Sawyer. I miss your physical presence so very much. Love, Mom |
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Category: coping
Unconditional Love
Sharon Carmichael
“I will lend to you awhile” He said
A child to call your own.”
“To nurture and to care for,
Until I call her home.”
“To know her is to know, unconditional love,
This child of mine.” I say
“Thank you God for entrusting me,
With such a gift, I could never repay”.
“I searched far and wide,” He said
For a special family, for who she could belong.”
“Just love her with all your heart,” He said,
And help her to grow strong.”
“She has special needs” He said
And needs a Mama, Strong and True.
To walk with her, and hold her hand,
On this path, she has to go through.”
“She also needs a sister,” He said
To love and stand always by her side.
She looks at her sister, with love, and proudly tells all who listen,
“That’s “My Sister” with a smile.
“Thank you, for this family,” I say
That you have given me to cherish.”
But how can I endure the pain,
When you call her home to rest?”
“I don’t understand, “I say
Why so soon, she had to go?
I thought we had many more sunsets,
To watch as we grew old.”
I miss her smile that greeted me,
With the dawning of each day.
Whatever am I supposed to do,
Without the smile, that lit my way?”
My heart is broken, I feel so lost.
My life stretches before me, never to be the same.
There is an emptiness, that can’t be replaced.
My tears, they fall on my pillow, like rain.
“I know you have questions, Why?” He said
And I know My child, you are in pain.”
“ I see every tear you cry, And catch them,
As they fall down your face like rain.”
“Just know, as you were with her,
As she drew her very last breath,
I was also there to greet her,
As she came into my outstretched arms to rest.”
“Now she is singing in the Angel’s choir,
That beautiful smile upon her face,
I know you couldn’t imagine her to be,
In a more loving place.”
“I Thank God, “I say, “even through my tears”
“For this child of mine from above.”
“For to know her, was to have a gift,
From an Angel that gave me,
Unconditional Love
Hop John
Pam Ooten
| Oh, my love, my precious son Hop John, Life has changed since you’ve been gone. If I could just hear your voice once more Or for you to just walk in my front door, Oh how I want to hold you in my arms, To protect you from all the world’s harm. There were so many things I had to say, I have tried my best to be strong, I look to Heaven and throw you a kiss, I am waiting for that Reunion Day, |
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Poetry from 2016
David Arnold
This is what I woke to spinning in my head this morning. It is about a group of mothers that have 1 thing in common the loss and bereavement of a child.
Yes there really is a group here in the surrounding area where these moms meet to help one another find a new path without their child in their life…..
The Listening Hearts
When a woman gives birth to a child her heart grows bigger in every way. As her children grows she prays everyday to keep them from harm in hopes that they will grow strong.
Then one day there comes a knock on the door, it’s the worst nightmare a mother can hear as she falls to the floor, she was given news that the child she did bore was found living no more.
Her heart gave out as she started to shout, what will I do, I can’t live without you?
As the days grew longer the nightmares got stronger and she found herself not wanting to live any longer.
Then along came a friend that said, “let me lend you a hand, I want you to meet other mothers like you that do not know what to do.”
These mothers they meet to find answers they seek, instead of the hand they find a new friend whose heart is broken just like them.
They listen with understanding and compassion to every word you are passing for they too, are hurting like you and are needing a new heart and asking, where do I start?
Listen, do you hear that beat?
It’s other mothers that are here now standing at your feet, and they greet you with kisses on the cheek. It is these other mothers who have lost their child’s hearts too and they now welcome you.
There is a bond that no one other than a mother of the Listening Hearts can hear as they tell you that you my dear are always welcomed here!
Listening Hearts where moms find others in a similar struggle, a bereaved heart that is missing a beat from losing a child.
In Honor of Michael
I wake up screaming “My son is dead!”
Or was I just screaming inside my head?
Oops
Amparo Atencio
I think I’m ready. I love my friends. I want to spend time with them. And so I accept the invitation for Christmas dinner with my dear friend and her family. Dinner will be served at 3:00, so I arrive at 2:30.
Oops, I didn’t get the update that dinner is now scheduled for 5:00, but that’s ok. I’m welcomed with open arms.
My Coping Journey
Lee Ann Christ
One thing we who have lost children are faced with daily is how will we cope and possibly go on without our child. After our son, Brian, died in 2004 at the age of 22, our lives came to a standstill. We moved in and out of activities with our two daughters, 15 and 18 at the time, and in and out of our other chores, work, life in general, in a slow motion fog. At times, people had to remind us to breathe as we were mostly taking shallow breaths and then deep,deep sighs.