Bereaved Parent Support – turkey marks the beginning

turkey marks the beginning

Marks the beginning? Turkey? Turkey Day aka Thanksgiving marks the beginning of the holiday season and it has beaten me down a little this week.

I find it bittersweet because I love the holidays. Or I used to before we lost Kenneth. I want to be involved. I want to celebrate and enjoy the holidays. It’s hard though. There is always that lingering thought that Kenneth is missing.  We try as hard as we can to submerge ourselves into a holiday but the thought(s) never can escape us. We don’t want to be sad but there is a part of our heart missing so it’s inevitable.

I realized on Monday that it was only 2 weeks until our Thanksgiving. (Canadian Thanksgiving) At first I got really excited. I love making the dinner for our family and having it at our house. I love putting out Autumn decor and making the house look festive. I am all about traditions. LOVE THEM! As the week went on I started to really think about it and started getting sad that it’s another holiday without Kenneth. Another holiday that we don’t have any children or any coming. It’s a lonely feeling. Yesterday was a breaking point for me. I was sad. I knew a breakdown was coming. My husband got home from work and we discussed Thanksgiving. The more I talked about it the more anxiety I got. Finally I asked, do you want to just cancel Thanksgiving dinner? Without even thinking he said YES. Let’s cancel it. I kind of laughed and asked “really?”. He said yes really. If we’re feeling like this why act like zombies and just go through the motions of it all when we’re actually hating every minute of it?

He had a point. BUT I had an even better one. I said well then let’s go away for a night! We haven’t gone away for so long and really deserve it. Called my Dad and  he couldn’t have been more loving or supportive. He said DO IT don’t worry about me. So before we could change our minds we booked a night away! Oh yah we did! I had another epiphany after that. Decided we would celebrate Thanksgiving and do a dinner at my house the following weekend.

I felt all my anxiety was gone as soon as we had our talk and made those decisions. I said to my husband, Dad and sister that it felt much better to do the Thanksgiving thing the weekend after because it wasn’t the actual holiday. In my mind I can think about it in a different way. I can look forward to it and not dread it. I also have the night away to look forward to. It’s really important for me (and others) to have something to look forward to when hitting a breaking point in the grieving process.

Kenneth will always be missing and I will always feel it. I need to figure out ways to be “ok” (for lack of a better word) during the holidays. Thankfully I thought of a way yesterday!

turkey marks the beginning … Halloween next. How will I get out of that one?!

Tiffani

nicubereavement@yahoo.com

Bereaved Parent Support – 3 sleeps

3 sleeps … until Christmas

My blogs haven’t been very cheerful lately. I haven’t felt cheerful. I have tried and tried AND tried to get into the spirit of the holiday season. I’ve given myself pep talks, lectures and scoldings. I’ve really tried so much to break this Ebonizer mood.

BUT I did finally have one last tough love discussion with myself. One last attempt. I told myself that I can’t change anything before Christmas (or dreaded New Year’s Eve). I can’t bring my son back. I can’t bring my Mom back. I can’t be pregnant by Christmas or the 31st so I have to pull up my socks (so to speak) and just do this. That discussion is what kind of kicked me into gear. Perspective. Nemesis and friend.

What also helped is we made our donation to our local animal shelter in memory of Kenneth and in memory of our beloved cat Baz. This is our 2nd year of giving in memory of Kenneth (at Christmas) and it feels good. After that things have started to fall into place.

So I am in the spirit. I’m not over the top crazy giddy about it but I am in the spirit. The baking, prepping and last minute shopping; looking forward to it.  I am looking forward to Christmas Eve festivities with my family. I am looking forward to presents on Christmas morning. Looking forward to our Christmas breakfast and turkey dinner. The annual casino run after dinner; that’s something to look forward to. (the fight with the husband that usually follows after not so much!)

Thanks for your patience with my Bah Humbug attitude. I know it’s not the most pleasant to read. For all that read and support my blog (and me) thank you. Wishing you and your family a Merry Christmas. If your heart is hurting this holiday take it one minute at a time.

3 sleeps …

Cheers!

Tiffani

nicubereavement@yahoo.com

Bereaved Parent Support – BAH!

For the life of me I cannot get into the Christmas spirit. I keep trying but not much success. Tree is up, house is decorated, some gifts purchased, menus planned etc. etc. but quite frankly, I’m just going through the motions.

I am missing Kenneth and my Mom terribly this year. Damn grief.

The lead up to Christmas is excruciating.

Has made me think that Ebonizer might have been onto something … 😉 !

 

BAH humbug is right Mr. Scrooge!

Tiffani

nicubereavement@yahoo.com

Bereaved Parent Support – so this is Christmas?

so this is Christmas?

 Christmas is supposed to be the most wonderful time of the year. That’s what the song says. The song is wrong.

 What a week. I couldn’t climb out of this dark hole of sadness if I was given the tallest and most sturdy ladder in the world.

 We put up the tree. Our 2011 Heaven Tree. We lit a candle at Kenneth’s pictures before doing so. It’s supposed to make us feel like he’s here. He’s not. Imagine that. Instead of decorating a tree with your child you light a candle beside your son’s picture to try to ease the pain of him not being here. That was IT for me. It made me angry and it made me sad. I’ve asked myself and others this week “how is this my life?”. It’s unreal to me. I’ve felt almost like I did the day Kenneth passed away. So empty and lonely. Putting up the tree and decorating it was a struggle for me this year. Just like in 2008 I contemplated not putting it up at all this year. After we put it up I contemplated not decorating it. I stared at it for days and really didn’t care if it was decorated or not. But you’re damned if you do and damned if you don’t. If I don’t participate in Christmas I wonder if I’m making it worse for myself.

And so the tree was decorated.  Our 2011 Heaven tree in honour of my Kenneth and my Mom.

 It might look the same as the past years to anyone looking at the picture. We added a few more decorations. We have our “K” decoration for Kenneth that we picked up last year. I have the angel on top and a high-heeled shoe for my Mom. Some of the new ornaments we bought this year were silver sleigh bells. Sleigh bells were a big thing to my Mom. She’d ring them at night on Christmas Eve to signal Santa was coming and we better get to bed! I loved hearing them. My poor sister was terrified of them! (why I’m not sure!) So this year when we saw them we had to get them. This would be the year Kenneth would be loving Santa and we’d be ringing the sleigh bells.

The teddy bear underneath is the bear we bought for Kenneth last year. Every year we buy him a bear. Again, how sad is that? I’m not buying toys to wrap under the tree. We’re buying a teddy bear to put under the tree for Kenneth. It’s supposed to make us feel better somehow that we’re buying something. It doesn’t.

 

Another decoration that is dear to my heart is one my friend Tara got for us. She sent it for the 1st Christmas without Kenneth. It is so beautiful and it means so much to us.

My Christmas cards are waiting to be written in, addressed and mailed. I didn’t send cards in 2008 and 2009. I couldn’t stand to sign them without Kenneth’s name. That was heartbreaking. Last year we sent them. I signed them and put a little mini heart beside our names (in memory of Kenneth). This year I’m not wanting to. I’m back to where it is too sad to write out a card and not sign the main name. Kenneth. We’ll see how it goes.

To top it off we’re pretty much left off the list for invites. Even if people think we wouldn’t attend for whatever reasons, it would be nice to be thought of and invited. We lost Kenneth and we have zero living children but we still exist.

Christmas just feels super lonely. More lonely than it did in 2009 and 2010. This one is a rough go.

And I ask myself …

so this is Christmas?

Tiffani

nicubereavement@yahoo.com

Bereaved Parent Support – and so it starts

and so it starts …

Christmas. American Thanksgiving kicks it all off. The commercials, the stores, the movies, the Christmas shows on tv, the dreaded Facebook statuses and pictures etc etc. Everyone’s in the spirit.

Everyone but me.

I used to love Christmas. Christmas was MY holiday. I loved it all. Snow, winter, shopping, decorating, Santa … EVERYTHING!

My Mom made it so special. She made it magical. I always looked forward to Christmas Eve. Spending it with my Mom’s family. My Aunt hosted Christmas Eve every year when I was little. It was a huge tradition to go over on the 24th. Being with my Mom’s family was such a huge part of Christmas. I was just as excited to go to my Aunt’s as I was to try to catch Santa! My Mom made a HUGE deal of Santa being real. I cannot even remember how old I was when I realized he wasn’t real. It was so magical.

Then in 1993 my Mom passed away. It was heart wrenching to do anything for Christmas. We made the most of it. My sister was only 8 years old when my Mom passed away so the magic had to keep going. It was hard. I never quite felt like I belonged at family events. I felt like the 3 of us were so abnormal. It felt weird being around family. It was so painfully obvious of who was missing.

As years went on it got a little better. I never shook off the feeling of feeling like our piece of the family puzzle was missing. But Christmas got a little easier.

Fast forward to when we first suffered from our infertility problems. It was odd being in my 30’s and not having any children. Again I felt that abnormal feeling. We so badly wanted to have a child/children to celebrate the holiday with.

Christmas 2007 was great though. I was pregnant and looking so forward to 2008. I would have a child the following Christmas to celebrate with. For the first time since my Mom had passed away I felt “normal”. I felt included. I was actually looking forward to the holiday.

Then we lost our beloved son. 2008 was not going to be this wonderful Christmas I had hoped for.

Every Christmas since losing Kenneth has been heartbreaking. We didn’t even want to put up a tree or decorations for our first Christmas without Kenneth. For me that was a big deal. Most that know me know how much I loved the holiday. We decided a few days before to put up the tree. But we didn’t want to put our old decorations on. I decided our tree was now a “Heaven” tree. I wanted only white decorations. We ended up doing white and silver (as a lot of decorations were sold out a few days before).

This was our 2008 tree. Our beloved cat Baz is in the picture. I never noticed until today. He passed away in February 2010. He was our little protector when Kenneth passed away. I’m glad he’s in this picture.

We’ve kept with the Heaven theme every year just adding more decorations to the tree.

This is our 2009 tree with a few more decorations.

And then there is last year’s. 2010 Heaven tree.

The angel on top represents my Mom. Looking out for everyone.

We’re thinking we might put up our decorations this weekend. Just to get it over and done with. I’ve thought about not putting decor out year after year. Then I think that if I don’t participate it will make me feel worse. So we go through the motions and keep putting up the tree and decor. Maybe we’ll go out this weekend and get some more decor to add to our Heaven theme.

I really wish we were bringing Kenneth with us. I wish he was loving the tree and getting excited for Santa. I wish we were buying presents for our son. I wish that Kenneth and his cousins would be celebrating together on the 24th. I wish I was making Christmas magical for my son 😦

I am really feeling like this Christmas is going to be an extra hard one.

and so it starts …

Tiffani

nicubereavement@yahoo.com

Bereaved Parent Support – BOO! oh and HISS

BOO Hiss

Halloween. Ohh scary BOO! Another Halloween without our son … BOO Hiss.

And the holidays have started. Our Thanksgiving was a few weeks ago. That’s always the kick off to the holidays. Now Halloween. The children’s holiday. This one hurts.

Our grief as parents is looming. It’s been a tough week because as a couple we’re dealing with the same issue but we’re dealing with it in different ways. We haven’t really talked about it because then there must be acknowledgement and that leads to sadness. I would prefer sadness to take a permanent vacation! So the house has been a little silent.

My husband has been on auto pilot all week trying to sort through his grief. He is missing Kenneth terribly. His mood has been a clear “down”.  I’ve been the opposite.  I’m ok. I’m not ok.  I’ve been trying to avoid it at all costs but there are too many triggers to avoid it. Pumpkin patch pictures wallpapering Facebook. Chatter about costumes and plans. STORES!  Any store I walk in to I make sure I am no where near the kids’ costumes. We know the costumes we would have dressed Kenneth in. To see them is painful.  A few weeks ago we were buying decorations and this week it hit us like a ton of bricks.  We still have the house decorated for Fall/Halloween. We try to get in the spirit. But there are moments where our hearts feel completely stabbed and we wonder why we’re bothering.

I used to think that shutting it all down and hiding from the holidays was the way to go. Now I find that if I shut down and am not part of things it makes it worse. I feel odd as it is not having any living children so for me not to participate just alienates me even more. 

I still find it hard to answer the door on Halloween. The first year we lost Kenneth my sister came to our house and took over the duty. After that we’ve done it. It’s still hard and I vow each year that my husband has to answer the door to the trick or treaters. But as soon as I hear that door bell/knock I am at the door with him. I still enjoy seeing how excited kids are and I love seeing the costumes. It’s weird because I want to avoid it but I don’t want to miss out. 

That’s how odd grief is though. All over the place with emotions, thoughts and plans. You think you can’t face or handle something and then in the moment you find you can. OR you make a plan and think you can go ahead and when the time comes you know in your heart it’s not right and cancel at last minute.

So with every holiday I take it minute by minute. Day by day.

Halloween – BOO!

Halloween the holiday – BOO HISS

Tiffani

nicubereavement@yahoo.com