When were we programmed to be rescued? I thought about the concept recently when a guy my daughter went on a date with said he thought it wouldn’t work out because going on a date didn’t make him feel better. The comment bothered me, like why is it someone else’s responsibility to make us feel good about ourselves, fix our self-worth, heal our depression, entertain us, rescue us from our problems?

When we had our fourth daughter, I had dozens of people ask over the years if we were trying for a boy? My husband, Todd used to say, “we missed that class in Jr. High!” I really disliked this response because it implied, we should feel ashamed for having four, kids let alone girls. I told Todd to start telling people we wanted 6, we just couldn’t have anymore, and when people made terrible comments such as, “the planet is already overpopulated,” like while I was pregnant, I would respond, “better it’s me repopulating….”

The raising of daughters has significantly changed culturally, even since I have been a parent. My belief that you can do whatever you want to do (within your own physical limitations) has become a standard concept. Thirty years ago, when I was first entering the workforce, it was uncommon to see a female chief of surgery, a female orthopedic surgeon, and other largely male dominated positions in medicine. There is still a huge gap in female leadership in most careers, but the glass ceiling is slowly breaking.  I say all that to say the idea that the female characters we grew up with being rescued by the prince is dead, or it should be.  All the movies, books, records, toys, that paint the feminine role as the weak, helpless, damsel in distress need to be rewritten into current versions in my opinion.

What about our boys? They were raised to believe they had to grow up to rescue their fair maiden. It is no wonder that they think they should feel amazing when they do. They should meet the damsel and feel clouds part, bells ring, and angels sing right? If they don’t then it couldn’t be the right fair lady. What about the pressure of having to rescue someone? In this day of inflation, millennials can barely afford to take care of themselves let alone the burden of being “man enough” to be responsible for all the ladies’ problems also. 

When I was raising my girls, I tried to project that a woman can wear a beautiful dress and still throw on a pair of combat boots and outshoot my competition. I tried to show that with hard work you can accomplish goals at any age. Did my husband sort of rescue me at age 23, when I was feeling lost? I always thought he kind of did but looking back I think we made a choice. He decided he could handle my amount of crazy, and I decided he was the rock I could tie my balloon to. 

It is ok to lean on another person when you need someone to hold your head up. Then you are their person to lean on when they need support, but we need to stop teaching our little girls to wait to be recused by their version of the prince and our boys that their job is to rescue their future partner. That leaning on someone through a situation is one thing, letting someone lean on you indefinitely is enabling. That there are healthy boundaries and then there is codependency. Where is that fairy tale/life lesson Disney? 

ASK THE STORY

I listened to the Certified Registered Nurse Anesthetist (CRNA) tell another bad Dad joke as I finished getting ready for our next surgery. I always wondered if his sometimes bad or dark humor, he vacillated between the two, was his natural personality or if the death of his brother many years ago flavored him like it does my own. Ever since a few years earlier when he had told me he had lost his brother in a tragic accident and that his mother had never fully recovered, I felt a weird kindred spirit to him because somehow he, John the CRNA just got it.

I was having a normal day. It wasn’t a day I regretted going to work, something that plagued me ever since the loss of my own daughter, I wasn’t lost in the sea of grief that day nor was inflamed with my weird autoimmune issues, and I was working with people I could stand so all and all a decent day. The thing was I always tell people to share their stories but how can people share their stories if we are afraid to ask them?

I have had the. worst short-term and even long-term memory loss since I lost Mikenna. I was afraid to ask something he might have told me before but I thought what the hell… “Hey John, did you lose your brother in a similar way I lost my daughter,” I asked. There are so many wrong ways to ask someone about suicide and I can tell you as a mom, don’t ask how, it’s not your business unless it’s part of their healing journey…anyway he says, “no it was on the way to climb Kilimanjaro.” Here was the little synopsis he gave.

John’s brother was into traveling, bucket-list kinds of things, and at the top of his list was Kilimanjaro. He traveled all the way to the other side of the world, packing, and all to Tanzania in Africa. He was on a travel bus, sightseeing with other tourists from different countries on a two-lane road. A short way down the road and around the bend a semi-truck in a hurry to get where he was going came across a herd of goats meandering across the road. The truck driver most likely going too fast to stop plowed through and massacred a group of goats. In Africa, the laws require the driver to pay for the damaged property to the owner and he now owed a large sum to whoever the owner was, most likely not too far off.

To avoid paying the large sum the semi-truck driver kept going speedily away from the scene of the goat crime. As he rounded the bend he hit the curve of the street too fast and swerved into the oncoming traffic hitting the tour bus and killing every person on the small tour bus except one man from Norway who lost his entire family traveling with him. John’s entire family flew out to Africa with the tragic news of the loss of their brother and son.

At this point in the story, I imagine the man from Norway, the phone calls being received for twenty other mothers, fathers sisters, and brothers. I remember my own, the sound of my husband’s voice, “Mikenna died.” the only words he croaked out to me over the phone as I stood in the tiny locker room of the Peruvian hospital. I heard a scream and later realized it was my own. I knew the mother’s vulnerability. To be thousands of miles away and feel helpless. Then John told me about their synchronicities and I knew I needed to hear the rest of the story.

The people in the part of Africa where the tour bus sat are very poor. To say they didn’t have much is an understatement. As soon as the bus sat there unattended, the personal belongings of the accident were looted. Everything that could be grabbed or used, sold, or repurposed was taken. The amazing part was John’s brother’s camera and SD card more specifically were left behind. All his travels and the beautiful pictures of his thrill-seeking adventures were saved and were a treasure to his family. The family resolutely set out to sprinkle the ashes of John’s brother atop Kilimanjaro.

Halfway to the top John’s mother, desperate to fulfill her son’s goal, came down with altitude sickness. She was not able to go on. John and the rest of his family had to go on without mom, who sadly waited now at the bottom expecting the ashes to spread without her. They made it to the top but didn’t want their mom to miss out on the experience so they chose to take the ashes back down with them and take their brother on Safari with them where they can all be together and release the ashes.

As they drove out on Safari they listened to the guide as he described each animal in the landscape and knew the area like he had taken groups on Safari many, maybe hundreds of times. The family found a time and area and decided to spread the ashes. As the ashes spread and before the silent reverence could fall the sound of thunder came from all around them. Wildebeests big, small, prehistoric-looking stampeded and dust flew as something out of Jurassic Park flashed before their eyes. 45 minutes they came and ran, back and forth. At that exact moment, they had released the ashes. The experienced tour guide explained in shock that had never happened before and never had that many Wildebeests for that long. I imagine mom smiling through tears and the knowing feeling that her son had wanted to give them one last adventure smiling back at them.

As I listened to the quick little story, I could see the stampede, I could see the dust, I could feel the awe of the group and I could feel the love and the knowledge, especially from the mamma. I heard the story and I knew there was another mamma out there that shared the pain 5, 10, and 15 years later of smiling and pretending they were fine so that her other children didn’t worry. I was guessing she also wanted to be ok for them but hurting sometimes for no reason at all. Like today I saw my daughter’s pillowcase and started to cry, but I then pictured the wildebeests, tried to visualize and imagine the sound that must have been deafening and my heart doesn’t hurt quite as bad.

This week, my friend asked me over text, what brings you Calm and Peace? Joy? What fills your cup? My first negative thought was nothing brings me Joy, do I have Joy? How can I have Joy ever again? I moved on to the next item on her list, Joy wasn’t easy to dissect. Calm? I have found some calmness and peace in different ways, the first advice I give to any newly grieving person, is to find a way to drown out the noise in your head. I found it by walking and moving, and it truly saved my life.

There is a science behind moving and mental health, but all I can say is that if you are in this place with me or you have a friend in grief, walk with them as much as possible, pull them out of their bed in the PJs if need be, and walk the neighborhood to start. Let them cry and walk, talk, or just be. It brings some calm. I have also found it with journaling, and by being on or near water of any kind. It calms the negative thoughts.

Laughter was something at first I never thought I would hear from my body again. I cried so much the first two years after my loss that I made my eyelid muscles weak. I had no idea you could even do that to yourself. I couldn’t even wear eye makeup for two years, there was no point. I found laughter though when my oldest daughter and I were gifted comedy tickets within the first year. At first, I wasn’t sure it was a good idea. Two sad people at a comedy show? It ended up being a healing night, we laughed and cried and laughed again at Iliza Shlesinger and reminisced over the Britney Spears music playing before and after the show. I remember feeling relieved to laugh, and surprised that I could, I felt somewhat guilty for laughing. I found my laughter in comedy and even now if I’m feeling a bit grumpy I will search for stand-up. It’s a form of escapism, like reading, but sometimes not being in your sadness is ok. It’s also ok to be ok!

What fills my cup is easy, it’s also what drains my cup, but it’s doing things for others and if I do things in my daughter’s memory it mends my broken heart stitch by stitch. My absolutely insane primary care provider has this saying, “feeling nervous? Then acts of service!” A lot of the things she says make me mentally throw up, but she has a point with this one. Little things like collecting books as a memorial tribute since Mikenna loved to read, and donating them to a local charity that gives books to children in need, fills my cup. Driving around and passing out tins of turkey dinners to our local homeless in tents, (makes me nervous) but also fills my cup. Everyone deserves a hot turkey dinner on Thanksgiving.

What about Joy? Can you have Joy when there is an undercurrent of sadness? My oldest daughter graduated from college 6 months after she lost her sister. I was so proud and happy filled with Joy, but I was crying tears of sadness I would never see her sister graduate and her sister wasn’t there with her. It was the first time I considered if I would ever feel joy again. Would every special occasion be clouded with sadness, would I be able to feel happiness/joy and if I could, would I let myself feel it without feeling guilty?

I searched my memory for similar situations I had ever heard of. All I could come up with was the night before Jesus died. He had to be both joyful to be going home and sad to be leaving his closest friends. His disciples had to be feeling sad to know that they would not ever be sitting having a meal with him again, but joyful for the knowledge of prophesy he was fulfilling? Not that I know what anyone was feeling in those moments, but I am guessing there were conflicting emotions.

Michelle Obama, during her Becoming tour, talked about giving up her successful career so that she could support her husband’s path. That must have been difficult. She must have felt joyful and a part of her was sad to leave it. She had worked incredibly hard to get to where she was. Can we have two conflicting emotions at once?

I had the opportunity to possibly punish a person that was somewhat legally negligable in my daughter’s death. I needed somewhere to direct this sunami of rage I had welled up in me. The problem was I was also stating her non-profit, and it was filling my cup in a different way. I found on more than one occasion I could not live in both worlds, I could not be pursuing legal revenge at the same time I was trying to build her legacy. I chose to let it go, after 2 years of getting to where I could legally aim my anger at someone, I let, it, go.

This year, I have let myself have moments of joy. I have stopped feeling guilty for having them. I have swam in the ocean, I have laughed with my childhood BFF, and I have let myself experience moments of happiness. I have also sobbed on her grave, sobbed over her pictures, and mourned the fact I will not hold her children as her childhood friends are now getting engaged and some are having babies. If you live here with me, I want you to really hear me say, it really is ok to sometimes be ok.

I was told by a brilliant professor recently that we cannot really multitask. I was offended because I thought myself a professional multi-tasker. He informed me that we just move from one thing to the next quickly. There were studies to prove it. You actually cannot do two things at once. I believe it is the same with joy and sadness. We have to reconcile our loss. Reconcile means to live with both, it doesn’t mean we have to feel these emotions at the same time, but we need to be ok feeling joy, because trust me, sadness hasn’t left, it’s just waiting its turn.

Standing in the kitchen eating the entire thawed holiday loaf of ginger bread tears clouded my eyes. I had reasons to feel depressed but that wasn’t at the forefront of my mind this morning. Why did I feel so lethargic? Was it the worry of my daughter in college moving out and not being able to continue school, was it the worry of the direction of my youngest, was it the worry of my oldest daughter’s health or the fear of losing connection with my husband as we become empty nesters? No, these were worries but not the reason for the feel of draining complete tiredness.

No this was just plain depression, it had reared its ugly head throughout my life, post-partum and other times but not like this.  I wasn’t feeling overwhelmed with grief today, but I felt utterly noodle-like.  Why?  The gift my daughter that left me was this. She left me with the full feeling of what it really felt like and a glimpse of what that battle might have felt like.  In truth I never understood, I made it out of the horrors of young adult hood so I assumed my children could.  This was a gift of understanding that it was a daily battle, one maybe she could have continued fighting, but she wasn’t in the place to do so.

Looking at the chores looming around the house all I could feel was a lack of motivation, a desire to go back to bed.  The feeling that everything was pointless and that I had not a pinky toe of energy to start.  How to fight a battle like this?  I remembered a class I took on ADHD where I learned that it had to be hit from many sides as a parent.  The only hope in battling this kind of heavy fog was to hit it from everywhere.  Were the beginnings of menopause making it worse? Wear the dumb patch. Would the anti-depressant help? Maybe if you actually took it consistently. Would prayer and meditation help? Undoubtedly if I actually sat still long enough. Would having things to look forward to make me leave my house? Probably.  I had a knack for making plans and then the day the plans arrived I wanted to do absolutely nothing, once out though I found it to be exactly what I needed.

How do I teach survival and hopefully the ability to flourish despite overwhelming sadness to others? I was going to have to find effort somewhere in the depths of my being. Fake it until you make it, I have said. Force the smile, the outing, the walk the laundry and the feelings, that one little serotonin cell will clap for joy in accomplishment. I don’t want to waste this gift of understanding. I’ll make the bed, I’ll go on the outing, I will spend some quiet time, I will take the medication, wear the patch and hopefully each day will knock down this wall that was built up in side me.  

I always loved when someone’s advice when I was in an autoimmune flare was to go exercise. I would think to myself, “my feet are cement, my body on fire but sure, I’ll get right on that!” It about that level of difficulty when fighting your own wall of sadness let alone trying to help others feeling that way. Stone feet but I will make them move inch by bloody inch. 

I have been asked about the need to share such deep information, especially on a public platform. I write things I don’t even say aloud. It is simple my daughter died she lost her battle. If I could help one person not feel so alone with their thoughts then sharing my deep inner thoughts is worth it. Sending love today for all the people fighting their own wall today and if you were able to move one inch, it was one crack of many cracks to soon pull your own wall down.

On my mission trip in Mexico at first glance the area seems just dirty, hot and miserable. I couldn’t find any reason to want to live in the rubble besides it being the only option the people were given. Then slowly I noticed the beautiful, almost hidden plants outside many of the small cubicles called homes. They were vibrant planted amongst the rocks and sand. They required little water or anything special to survive. These were each homes crack in their harsh world, a sign of hope and beauty against all odds. I’m sure I appeared a bit off my rocker running from fenced yard and skirting flee-filled dogs to snap a quick picture of the beautiful flowers, but they filled me with a feeling of hope and one I hope I was able to capture.

Walking along the old Hood River highway, I drank in the prehistoric beauty of the Columbia River Gorge. The deep ancient carved rocks whispering stories of sharp brutal winds and rising turbulent waters from the Columbia River. The early morning was unusually warm and sunny unlike most days where fog and precipitation blanketed the sleepy vacation community. Wind surfers and morning exercise enthusiasts could already be seen dotting the waters edge as I slowly moved by the houses. Most of the rustic houses sported newly painted siding, manicured lawns and not so randomly placed wildflowers along the edge of the road welcoming the traveler to their vacation home.

I carried my borrowed mug of Folgers coffee and meandered down the hill towards the train station. During the weekdays the train brings Portlanders around the mountain or tourists to experience the fruit loop, the local breweries, wineries or for the braver sort, to try their luck at kite boarding or wind surfing. The deserted train station looked ominous with outdoor buildings missing walls. Instead of walking down the sidewalk I decided to take the trail through the train yard. In hindsight, I probably shouldn’t have been walking alone through the woods but it appeared like a shortcut to the cafe and a much needed morning espresso. A few steps down the path brought stairs that marked “The Ruins” it seemed a bit dark being only a stones throw from the souvenir shop at the train station. A few more yards brought another rustic wood sign on a tree announcing a school. Where was the school? I soon found myself daydreaming about a portal similar to Hogwarts where the ruins lead to the infamous school for the secret society found only among the trees behind the abandoned cars. Stringed lights were hung across the partially standing roofless walls at a desperate attempt to dress up the platform as an outdoor BOHO, Shabby Chic gathering spot. It all seemed strange as I popped out from the wooded path onto the busy sidewalk where the cafe proclaimed caffeine and my life’s blood.

After obtaining my espresso and overpriced hot water I wandered back along the bridge to observe the mighty Columbia River and gain some perspective on my own meager existence comparatively. Years ago I had found beauty in bridges, the design, and their differences in size, shape, materials and structure. I stopped to take in the wild beauty of the river and the contrast of the man-made metal above it. I stopped here and contemplated water. People underestimated the power of water. They underestimated the currents that flowed beneath it and if not careful were harmed by it. I compared it to my own life. People can not empathize with what they could not see, what they could not feel or had not felt. I myself have been guilty of not giving enough grace to those I could not understand. My sweet relative who lost pregnancy after pregnancy never to have a child, my friend who lost her son in second grade to a virus, my grandmother who lost a child soon after it was born, I did not know of the wild currents beneath the surface, I could not understand.

My own grief drives me in ways not understood by many. One minute I am moving in one direction and the next minute I am swirling and swelling towards another. I am trying to first and foremost care for my surviving children who themselves are also survivors, as well as stay true to my daughter’s legacy and honor all the while keeping my own head above water, sometimes only being able to float.

Lost in thought, I find myself at the end of the street so I turn to walk back the direction I came, heading back to my still sleeping husband and friends. Walking on the other side of the overpass I again observe the Columbia now from the west instead of the east noticing the slight differences in the lighting, the curvature of the water’s edge, the angles of the bridge now visible. The river and bridge perspective changed. It brings me to thinking about personal perspectives and how they vary looking at the same thing. Many relationships do not survive the death of a child. One reason is the vast difference in grief’s toll between a couple. It can be night and day, but it is the same. Two sides of the same coin. For me I could not contain it, I screamed, I pulled out my hair, I beat my fists against the wall. My husband went in, he went away, he buried it inside himself as it burned. Somehow even without understanding, we gave each other grace to move in our own way. I am not even sure how we stumbled through it, and still stumbling through it.

I picked up the borrowed coffee mug I had hidden along the path earlier, glad I hadn’t lost it and walked up the hill back to the rental. One day at a time, the song and the saying says, Oh how it used to sound so cliche.

I recently went to Bend, Oregon with a friend to a concert. It’s about 4 hours away depending how fast you drive. My walking partner, also my concert partner, couldn’t allow us to leave Bend without going on a short hike. At breakfast we asked some locals for advice on a small hike in the area and they pointed us in the direction of Double Falls.

You start the hike at Tumalo Falls. Since Tumalo falls can be driven up to, with only a few yards to walk to visualizing the falls, every local with the day off seemed to be trying to get one of the limited 30 parking spots. After wrangling one of the spots we started our pilgrimage towards Double Falls.

Watching streams of people, young and old, walking in single file up the path, I felt like it was some sort of Bend pilgrimage or some rite of passage the locals must accomplish. I was fighting off the start of a head cold, and of course always concerned about Covid anytime I have a sneeze, a tickle in my throat or a headache, even though I’m vaccinated and hardly wander from my house, it turned out to be a head cold. Needless to say I wasn’t feeling the hike if you know what I mean.

Not to mention, as grief works, it had hit me hard that morning, it has been over three years since I lost my daughter, but it can hit with a thought, a memory, an image. I had both visiting me that morning and I felt waves of immeasurable sadness hit my frontal lobe like a migraine. First was the lyrics from the concert we had gone to the night before. NEEDTOBREATHE, a Christian band Folksy with a bit of metal to it, who knew you could use a banjo and and then an electric guitar and it would sound so good?

I’ve never told anyone how I found the band because it sounds a bit metaphysical or just strange in general. When I first heard the news of my daughter’s passing and in the first couple of days I had many panic attacks. They mostly consisted of hyperventilating and then sobbing. I kept saying in my head, I need to breathe, I can’t breathe, I just need to breathe…

Months later I was texting with another grief mama, it’s what I call the other mothers who have lost children. I found they had no one to vent to, someone that wouldn’t tire of listening to them cry or ask why. I was telling the other mama that I had these words come to me, keep your eyes open. I can’t remember now if it was something I heard in a dream or heard in my head. It was somewhere in the blur of the first year where I can barely remember how I shuffled through it. I told her I felt like those words were significant. I decided to google the words and was surprised to see not only was it a song, Keep your eyes open, but it was written by NEEDTOBREATHE, a band I had never heard of, but words I had said to myself many times in those early days. I goggled the lyrics and felt the words sink in.

If you could soldier on
Headstrong into the storm
I’ll be here waiting on the other side
Don’t look back
The road is long
The first days of the war are gone
Take back your former throne and turn the tide’Cause if you never leave home, never let go
You’ll never make it to the great unknown till you
Keep your eyes open, my love
So tell me you’re strong, tell me you see
I need to hear it, can you promise me to
Keep your eyes open, my loveJust past the circumstance
The first light, a second chance
No child could ever dance the way you do, oh
Tear down the prison walls
Don’t start the curtain call
Your chains will never fall until you do’Cause if you never leave home, never let go
You’ll never make it to the great unknown till you
Keep your eyes open, my love
So show me your fire, show me your heart
You know I’ll never let you fall apart if you
Keep your eyes open, my loveOpen up
Open up
Open up your eyes
The weight is unbroken
Open up
Open up
Open up your eyes
Keep your eyes openDon’t let the night become the day
Don’t take the darkness to the grave
I know pain is just a place
The will has been broken
Don’t let the fear become the hate
Don’t take the sadness to the grave
I know the fight is on the way
When the sides have been chosen…

-Keep your eyes open, NEEDTOBREATHE

After sending my friend the lyrics, not sure if the words fell on her the way they did on me, I was then invited to this concert by another friend surprisingly, and then two years later a second friend, the one I was hiking with. The songs echoed in my head as we soldiered on up the trail.

The second memory that hit me on the trail was like a hazy dream. It was my daughter and her friend who lived in Bend along with her mom and I, dragging little ones in tow as the girls giggled and scurried ahead of us, leaning over the rail at the waterfall as we reprimand the girls to keep away from the edge. I can see the girls, braces gleaming, the sun shining off the water and then what feels like a frog builds up in my throat and I hug the memory while it slips away.

Along the path you can’t help notice that everywhere you look can be found burnt branches, and the remains of a previous fire. A quick google search tells me its a 2019 fire that most likely wiped the trail out for quite awhile. Someone had cut off all the damaged trees and branches and they lay in piles where they had been cleared. This way the path could once again be enjoyed and the falls observed.

I kept looking at the tiny small ferns, the new underbrush, trying to judge how long ago the devastation took place. Did it really matter? I then wondered was it a man-made fire or was it lightning? Whose fault was it? The though came to me again, Does it really matter?

The beauty and power of the falls was remarkable, but what caught my eye was the tiny growth of green plant life growing on the burnt, destroyed remains of a pine. To me that was the beauty, the growth among the darkness where nothing else seemed to be growing and it resonated with me. I felt a kindred spirit to the tiny patch of green.

Many days I feel like the tiny plant trying to pretend to being a giant pine, but I know I need to be thankful for the growth that I have somehow managed. I should be even a bit impressed with myself for surviving in an inhospitable environment one of destruction and sadness.

There are many days I feel like I’ll never be my old self again, and in truth I will never be the pine I once was. I get down on myself for not being able to accomplish what I think I should for that day, or week. I get down on myself for being unable to do all the things the other pines seem to be able to do, work, shop, raise kids, smile, laugh, love, play and dance. Like a large pine swaying in the sunlight, but I am not a large pine, I am the regrowth. I am the survivor. I also can dance a bit, I can grow. It will never be the same display as the mighty pine. But I am surviving in a place many cannot, and my tiny movements are big movements for me.

In your ocean, I’m ankle deep
I feel the waves crashin’ on my feet
It’s like I know where I need to be
But I can’t figure out, yeah I can’t figure outJust how much air I will need to breathe
When your tide rushes over me
There’s only one way to figure out
Will ya let me drown, will ya let me drownHey now, this is my desire
Consume me like a fire, ’cause I just want something beautiful
To touch me, I know that I’m in reach
‘Cause I am down on my knees, I’m waiting for something beautiful
Oh, oh, ohh something beautiful…

-Something Beautiful, NEEDTOBREATHE