Second Hand Loss

 
     Today I experienced another what I've learned to call, a second hand loss.  It's something you no longer have because your loved one is gone. Second hand loss is directly or indirectly a result of them being gone. Although this loss has been there for a while, it hit me today.  It seems silly, but sometimes you don't realize what you have till it's gone.  I found the loss while looking in the grocery store for hamburger.  Ok, now quit laughing and pick yourself up off the floor.  Yes, Hamburger.

   I remember when Tyson first moved out and was at college, and he called home to tell me, "Mom, I just wanted to tell you that hamburger from Walmart sucks."  Today, I realized I couldn't agree more. (Although I was at Dan's Super Value, cause I couldn't stomach the thought of Walmart hamburger.)

   Our whole married life, Todd was either working full time, or part time on ranches, and then we started having our own cattle.  Having beef on our table was just part of the job, weather it came in 'wages' or one of our own that we were grilling up.  And I have to say, we raised some of the best beef. I remember cutting a steak with a plastic fork, that's how tender it was.  

   But today, I was digging through a grocery store cooler, wondering how in the heck does one buy good beef.  I've never had to deal with % of lean before, or worry about price per pound.  We raised it, and paid the butcher to cut it up.  Now that's gone from my life too and has been for some time, but now the emptying freezer has caught up with me.  

   On a side note, since I was raised on a farm, we always had our own beef (or venison) as a kid growing up too. 

   Another change, another loss, another stark fact that my cowboy is not here with me.

   So to my wonderful rancher friends out there, if any of you have a quarter of beef to sell, let me know, cause I'm VERY interested, cause hamburger from Walmart sucks.  

Love in a Dixie Cup

Just the other day, I saw some beautiful pictures of some crocus's that one of my photographer friends had taken and posted on Facebook.  I so desired to see some, (but not enough to go drive out to where they might be), but even more than that, it brought back memories of Todd, for every spring, he'd always bring me the first crocus that came up.  I was really missing them and Todd.  Todd only bought store bought flowers a hand full of times in the almost 32 years we were married, but he often brought me the wild flowers of the prairie.  Those are even more beautiful, though sometimes still crawling with some little critters.   All summer my table would have a glass with flowers in it, some I'd picked, but often ones Todd had found.  

    But just when I was thinking I'll never have flowers brought to me again, Philip showed up at my door last night, with a Dixie cup full of crocuses.  I hugged him and cried.  He turned to his friend that was with him and said, "See, I told you she'd like them." 

     I loved them!  They are more beautiful to me than a dozen red roses, because I had a son that remembered that his Dad always brought me crocuses, and how much I loved them.  Thank you Philip for showing me love in action tonight! 

Ellipsis

   I learned a new word today, but I've known how to use it for years.  Ellipsis.  It's a grammar term, you know the three dots used at the end of a sentence to say there's kind of a pause, there's more...   Or can also be used to show something has been left out, like in quoting  someone,  or some passage, but you leave out part of the quote that was not neccesary to make your point.

     But what does that have to do with life?  It's good to know how to use it in writing, getting the grammar right (something I struggle with- grammar) but you're not reading this to get a lesson in grammar.   (I certainly am not the one to give a lesson in grammar!)  Can I relate it to  those times in our life, when we feel like we've been put on hold, or life has been paused.  When God doesn't seem to be answering our prayers, at least not in the way we want, or think He should.  There's just this pause...

    It's in those moments, that you find out what's in you.  Do you give up and throw in the towel? Blame it on God and say, "See He didn't answer, He doesn't care," or get real spiritual and say, "It wasn't God's will,"  or do you hold onto God's promises, even when everything doesn't make sense, and say, "I don't care what it looks like, I don't care what's happened, God's Word is true, and that's that!"  It's learning to put an ellipsis, or maybe a comma, where life is trying to throw you a period.

    I can't tell you how many times, I've been in that ellipsis stage of my life.  When I've prayed and prayed, and nothing happened, when every prayer I pray 'feels' like it's hitting the ceiling (if it got that far) and falling back down to earth.  But those are the times when I've stood my ground and said, I don't care if feels like God's not answering, and that He feels a million miles away, I KNOW that the Word says He'll never leave me nor forsake me.  I also know that the Word says that if we pray according to His word, He WILL answer.  Some miracles come after that pause, some are still on the way.

   I remember in the early years of our marriage, Todd and I wanted kids so bad.  Especially me, I had this incrediable longing to be a mom.  But month after month went by and still I was not pregnant.  After a while, people started joshing us about - aren't we ever going to have kids?  Some went so far as to send me sexy little nighties saying maybe that would help.  What they didn't know, was the heartache we were going through.  Disappointment at its greatest degree.  We prayed diligently, I studied God's word fervently seeking out everything God had to say about children.  I have a notebook, with every scripture I could find that mentioned children and child bearing written down.  I lived daily in that notebook, standing on God's promises.  I remember once Todd and I wrote out our prayer based upon the Word that we knew God had promised us children.  Shortly after that I  became pregnant, only to carry the child for two months, and lose it in miscarriage.  I was devastated.  Everything we'd prayed for, everything we were dreaming for that child, died.  I remember my doctor telling me, oh don't worry, give yourself a month or two to and you'll get pregnant again.  I so wished that would have been true, but month after month passed us by, and then year after year.  

    Every meal time, Todd and I prayed, "Your blessing will be upon our food and water, and you will take sickness far from us, and there shall be none barren in the land." (Ex 23: 25, 26)  Now folks, we weren't just all about prayer, and not doing our part.  There was only one immaculate conception, that's not what we were thinking.  But when things weren't going according to how things should go, and the doctors were saying it didn't look hopeful, you need a miracle.  

    For our 5th wedding anniversary, we went to the first Glory and Power meetings, that year held in Eveleth, MN.  Jim Kaseman and Brad Brade Ministires hosted the meetings.  I remember many wonderful things from those meetings.  But it was at the end of the meetings, Todd and I went up to the guest minister and asked him, if he and his wife would pray for us.  (They had a combined family of 12 children, both having been widows and remarried joining their large families).  The wife said, she wouldn't. I was shocked.  She told us, every time, she's prayed for someone to have a baby, she'd gotten pregnant, and her husband said, no more children.  She smiled at us, and said, she knew someone who loved to pray for people to have children, and she called Sally Ann Kittle over to us, and asked her to pray.  This wonderful woman of God, laid her hands on us, and prayed a simple prayer, with her southern accent.  "Oh Lord, just fix whatever is wrong, and bless them with a child. Amen"  That was it, but it's what she said next that I knew there was faith there.  She handed us a card with her name and address on it, and said, "Everyone I've prayed for has had a baby within a year, please send me an announcement."  Well, exactly a year and 10 days later, our son Tyson was born.  How we rejoiced beyond measure.  Todd's face was smiling from ear to ear, my Dad chuckled and said, he was worried Todd's face might break in half.  But when you've seen the fullfillment of years of praying and standing on God's word, and you're holding it in your hands, you can't help but smile and rejoice.

    On another side note, on the 20th Anniversary of the Glory and Power meetings, I got the privilege of attending the meetings again.  They were held in Willmar, MN that year.  I got up and shared how twenty years ago, there was a miracle that took place on the very first year of meetings.  Now twenty years later, Tyson was attending church and school in Willmar, and was even playing drums for the worship team for the Glory and Power meetings.  How God brings us full circle when we don't give up and don't quit.  I would not take those unanswered prayers as ending in a period.  A failure.  I saw them as an ellipsis...  there was more to come, there was only a pause till the answer came.

    I could give story after story in our lives of similar miracles, where we didn't give up, even when it looked like we should.  God came through. But there are also some dreams we let die, I'm sorry to say, cause we did give up, maybe some of them needed to die, maybe some of them we gave up to soon.

    So what happens when you have a dream or prayer you let die, or it really did have a period at the end of it?  There can't be an ellipsis any more.  What do you do now?  

    I think of the biggest period ending in my life so far was Todd moving on to heaven.  There's no bringing him back now (not that I would want him to come back and continue suffering either.  I do rejoice that he is free of all the suffereing, but oh how I miss him.)   What do I do now?  Did God fail?  No.  Did I fail?  No.  Did our prayers fail?  No.  But how do we handle what looks like more of a failure than a miracle?  By continuing to keep trusting the same God who makes the miracles.

     I know a lot of people could be wondering why didn't Todd get healed, it's not like we didn't pray, it's not like we didn't have faith.  Some people could be angry at God, some people have gotten angry at me and blamed me.  But God didn't fail, and neither did I. 

     For years, Todd and I both stood upon the scripture that his soul would be restored. (Psalm 23).  Our soul is; our mind, our will, our emotions, and in Todd's case because of the accident and his injury, his soul was damaged.  His physical brain suffered damage, that affected his thinking, his emotions, his will.  Over the last twelve years, I watched him slowly deteriorate more and more. Most things other people wouldn't pick up on, as you had to be with him 24/7 to really see some of it.  I was really in denial for many years, thinking he can't be getting worse, it's just my imagination.   I remember years ago, someone said to me they thought Todd acted like someone with dementia, oh that ticked me off.  No, it's just a brain injury.  I didn't realize at that time, that brain injuries can lead to dementia.  And as far as I've read and studied, there is no cure medically for dementia.  But by the time Todd was medically diagnosed, June of 2011, he was already in the severe stage of dementia.   The severe stage is the second to last stage, before death takes over. His mental score on the test was a nine, normal is 30.  I was like, no way, this can't be dementia, that's only for old people right?  I upped the amount of prayer, knowing medically nothing could be done, we needed a miracle, one of those, man says this, but God...  There it is, the ellipsis.  I knew beyond a shadow of doubt, God is full able, to do the impossible, and frankly, the impossible was what we needed done, we needed a miracle.  I had killed my lion and bear (reference to young King David in the Bible before he killed Goliath), and I knew this Goliath was gonna go down.  

     About a year ago, the Lord started showing me things, I did not like seeing.  He also started showing Tyson too and he didn't like it either.  Three times, I had visions of Todd's funeral.  Not an open vision, but a clear vision in my minds eye.  I was ticked beyond words, and shaken.  That's not what I was praying about and believing God for.  I wanted Todd well, and whole here on earth.  But God kept showing me differently.  Why? I don't know, except he was preparing me, for what was to come.  But at the time, it made me pray all the harder, I felt as long as there is breath in him there is hope, hope for the miracle I (and many others praying with me) wanted so bad.  At first I thought, maybe God is showing me this, for me to pray so that it doesn't happen.  That has happened before for me, where God showed me in advance something is going to happen, and it wasn't God's will, so I prayed, and the problem was stopped, or in one case at least lessened it's negative outcome.

    All this time, though when God kept showing me these visions, I felt like God was a million miles away, I felt like he was ending the sentence with a period.  I didn't like it.  Last November sometime, after leaving the nursing home one weekend, I heard on the inside of me, "He'll be gone before Christmas."  Man, that really made me mad.  I figured that has to be the devil putting bad thoughts in my head, I didn't want to believe that one, but in retrospect, it really was God, again preparing me, telling me what's gonna happen.  

    I know I've asked God why a few times, why did it have to end this way?  He's never directly answered me.  But I also know, that something aren't for my knowing, somethings were between Todd and God, and it's none of my business or anyone elses.  Maybe I'll know when I get to heaven, but I think by then it really won't matter.  And to be frank, knowing why won't make things any different, it's really the wrong question to be asking.

     So was Todd's death really a period at the end?  I'm starting to see differently.  It wasn't the healing I prayed for and wanted with all my heart, but like Kristi said to me recently, it still was a win for Todd, he is in heaven free of pain and suffering, he is rejoicing.  His legacy still lives on in our kids, and in me.  

      There were dreams that Todd and I had together, that I'm starting to feel they need to be resurrected, things we let go of or lost sight of. He's not here to finish them, but I'm still here.  Yah, it won't probably get done the way Todd would have done it, but Jesus and me, still can get 'er done.  I still remember one of the last days Todd was in the hospital, and my sisters and Kristi and I were all in to see Todd.   He hadn't slept for a couple of days, and was refusing to sit down or lie down.  We started singing.  I coaxed him over to the bed, and sat with him there.  Before long while we were singing, he fell asleep, so we laid him down on the bed, but continued to sing.  There was a very sweet presence of The Lord in that awful hospital room.  I began to pray for Todd again, like I'd done so many times before, but this time, I prayed, "As long as there is breath in you Todd, I stand on the Word for your healing, but if you choose to go on home and not finish your course here on earth, I want you to know, I'm asking God to not only help me finish my course but yours too.  I don't know if that's possible, or even if God does those kind of things, but that's what I'm asking."  Whether God answers that prayer through me, or my kids, I will always know that the life of Todd Reuer ended but God...

      I think the but God... part will be  not so much how there wasn't a miracle of a getting out of the suffering, but the miracle of God bringing us through.  Before Todd died, I had told several people, there really was only two choices, 1. Todd would be miraclously healed, or 2. Todd would die and go to heaven. Both were a win for him, the second would just be hard for us.   We all know #2 is what happened.  So now, God working through us, bringing us through to total victory and healing in our hearts.   My hearts cry is to bring glory to my Lord.  That what I've been through somehow, can be turned into a victory to help others turn their sorrow into joy unspeakable and full of glory.  

A Grief Thermometer

      When I got home from the last Grief Share Group, I was sitting at the piano singing and playing, and I was thinking about a question I had asked the group.  

    "How does one know when they're through grief?" 

    The general consensus from the group was that you're never really ever through it, as you never forget your loved one, but there comes a point when joy replaces that pain.  One lady described it as, one day you realize your every thought hasn't been on your loved one who's gone.  The pain is replaced with joy.  Someone else shared, it's when both joy and pain can coincide at the same time.  

    As I was playing piano and singing, I had this thought, wouldn't it be great if you could have a grief thermometer.  You just insert it into your heart, and it shows if you still have pain that needs healing, or even better, you're on the road to totally being healed.  But in real life there isn't such a tool.  Kristi mentioned that maybe our thermometer is when we think of them or remember something about them, and there's no longer that pain in our heart.  Maybe  this thermometer  could also detect other things in our heart that need fixing too.

   The Bible puts it this way, "I will turn your mourning into gladness; I will give you comfort and joy instead of sorrow." (Jer. 31:13)

    One thing I've learned as I've walked this road of grief, is everyone grieves differently.  What's grieving for one may not be even be an issue with someone else.  This is true because every loss is different.  Even if I met someone with a similar loss, it still would be different, because they didn't have the relationship Todd and I had together, nor I have their relationship.  But I can certainly understand their pain.  Even though it may differ from mine, I still know the feeling of the pain of loosing someone you love so much.     

    It seems strange to think it's joy that replaces your sorrow and grief.  It's not like you're joyful that your loved one is gone, but there comes a joy in your life, that you know you can go on, even though they're not physically with you any longer.  A strength of knowing God is still with me, even though Todd has moved. 

    We were asked in the Grief Share class, what we've all learned and gained from it.  Several people shared their hearts, and how God was helping them in the journey.  When it came to me, I said I felt going through grief has begun to show me who I am.  Who is Kelley without Todd.  While visiting my sister-in-law Georgia over Easter, she made the comment to me, it was never just Kelley or just Todd, it was always Todd and Kelley, cause we did everything together.  That's what being a partner is all about, that's what marriage is, togetherness.  I've heard it described so many times, and I've said it myself, I feel like I've been ripped in two, and only half of me is left.  Now to find out who that remaining half can be all by itself.   God has had me on a rather unusual path, I've been describing it as a journey.  It's hard to explain, but I know it's working.  This wouldn't be the road to restoration for some people, but it is for me. God always knows what's best for us.   I told a good friend of mine recently, there's a lioness arising within me, and you better get ready cause she's about to roar. (To really understand that you need to read the book Lioness Arising by Lisa Bevere)

     Do I still hurt at times?  Oh yes.  Do I still cry?  Yup.  Is my heart healing? Most definitely!  Every teardrop is one drop closer to a completely healed heart.  Someone once told me, that tears are a good washing, but laughter is a good dry cleaning.  I kind of like that.  They both bring a washing and cleansing of our soul.  For a merry heart does good like a medicine.  So don't feel sorry for me if I'm crying, or criticize me if I'm laughing, I'm just cleaning out my heart to make it whole again.