Happy Christmas!

Just want to say happy Christmas to everyone - although I don't know if anyone actually reads this other than Rachel.

I'm feeling a lot better than when I last wrote. The car is definitely a write off, but I'm ok about it now, just feeling a bit frustrated. I wish it had been my car but there's no point in wishing. It's generally been a good week and I'm really looking forward to being with all the family at Christmas, especially my brother's little kids.

I know that from now on Christmas will never be the same as it was, but I suppose as you grow older it isn't anyway. Perhaps it will be fun to make new traditions.

So I hope everyone has a lovely time!

Steps backwards

It hasn’t been an easy weekend. I feel like I have taken so many steps backwards in dealing with everything. So many of the awful feelings that I had felt at the start, and had thankfully eased a lot, came back this weekend.

I was fine on Friday. We had a carol service in the evening at church and beforehand I was there by myself decorating the building and feeling all Christmassy. I was honestly beginning to believe that I was strong enough to get through Christmas and still have a great time despite the obvious absence of Dad. But just before I was going to pop home for some dinner Dan called and said that someone had driven in to him and that although he was fine, the car was a bit of a mess, and very likely a write off.

This would be annoying in normal circumstances, but the car is Dad’s car that we bought off Mum. It means a great deal to us – perhaps a bit too much as it is just a ‘thing’. But it’s a lovely car that Dad was so proud off. My Dad and brothers were very into cars and seemed to know everything about every car going. For as long as I can remember there’s been a lot of friendly rivalry over cars in our family and it’s been a lot of fun at times. Despite this, Dad was very disciplined and had the same old car for about10 years, until finally in February he got this new car. He was very chuffed with it, and when he died it was difficult seeing the car in the garage not being used. We have tended to keep cars in the family, so we all agreed that Dad would have loved it if one of his children had the car. We had hoped to be able to keep it for many years and use it one day as a family car.

So, although many people may not be able to understand, it has been really upsetting to see the car all smashed up and to know that we probably won’t be able to get it fixed. It is so much more to us than a car – it is a reminder of many of the fun times and friendly banter we had with Dad. I went straight round to the pastor who lives next door to the church after I heard. We are very close to him and his wife, and both have been fantastic through this. I said I feel quite guilty being so upset over losing a possession, but he didn’t think there was anything wrong with this at all. Having lost parents at a similar age to me, he knows that sometimes possessions become far more when they are associated with someone we have lost. He reminded me that we Christians can be so hard on ourselves sometimes when we think that we are thinking or feeling something that is wrong for a Christian. But being humans we are bound to feel certain things, and this is one of those situations where I shouldn’t feel guilty for how I’m feeling.

And it’s not just about the car. It just brought so much back. When Dan told me, I had the same feeling that I had when we had it confirmed that Dad’s problem was his heart – the feeling of ‘hang on a minute, this can’t happen’. It was like waiting again, not knowing how serious it was. Wondering if we were going to lose the car brought back intense feelings of wondering if we were going to lose Dad.

So the rest of the weekend has been tough. Many emotions have come back that I thought I’d got over. I’ve started feeling sorry for Dad again, something that I really, really struggled with when it first happened and just couldn’t work through. I’ve also started dreaming about him again, something that had stopped and was a great relief that it had. I’ve also felt very fragile and tearful and all the carol singing and Christmas stuff this weekend has all been a bit overwhelming.

However, I am now feeling a bit more philosophical about what has happened to the car. I really want it to be sorted out, but I wonder if it is the best thing if it can’t be. I wonder if maybe Dan and I were too protective over it and that maybe I was holding on to Dad through it. We have no need to hold on to him because he’s not lost, but has gone home! Dad was not one to be precious about his possessions, but the car did mean a lot to him, so I think to others in my family it is sometimes quite a painful thing to still have around. Although it’s sad now, perhaps it will make things easier for everyone in the long run. If it can be fixed, I think I will now be far more ready and prepared for the fact that cars are fragile things, which can be ruined in an instant. They are certainly not objects that we can expect to always have around.

So now we will just wait and see what happens, and I’m sure, as I have been, I will be able to work through this set back and through Christmas, however tough it may be.

Seasons blurred

I absolutely love Christmas - everything about it! One of my favourite parts is wrapping presents and trying to make how I dress them look better each year. So I was having a lot of fun last night wrapping up presents for the family in red or gold paper, tying them with thin bits of tinsel and putting bows on them, when I came to write the gift tag on the one for Dan's Dad. Suddenly I stopped and the tears came with no warning.

I've been doing really well these last couple of weeks. I've been so busy - out every evening last week either with meetings for work or something for church, then there's been all the planning for Christmas and things have just been so hectic. I have to say I haven't had much time to think about Dad - that's not to say I forgot him because I think about him every day now - but I haven't had time to stop and think about what's happened and carry on with grieving. I've been going to bed after midnight most nights too so even those times late at night where normally I would feel low have been taken over by tiredness and I've quickly fallen asleep. Some people may say it's good that I've been like that, but I really feel it is so important to have those times to stop and reflect, to cry or feel depressed, to ache to see the person you've lost and to think about the future with out them. I've never been one to bottle my feelings up, and while I am still grieving - which I know will be for a long time yet - I need those times to help me work through the many different emotions that I've been feeling over the past couple of months. I feel a real need to grapple with those feelings and to eventually reach a point in the future where I am no longer feeling confused by the shock of Dad dying so suddenly, and at the thought of him being taken away before I had chance to share so much more of the future with him. I feel content that God has taken him, but death is such an unnatural thing that it's very hard to understand. God didn't create the world with death - it was as a result of human sin. So yes, dying is unnatural and even when we have the wonderful assurance of knowing loved ones have gone to be with the Lord because they trusted in Jesus, it is a strange thing for the mind to process for those of us left behind.

So back to wrapping the presents. Because I have not been giving myself time to deal with what has happened lately, it's hard to handle when small things trigger thoughts. I was about to write 'dear dad' on this gift tag, and it dawned on me that I wouldn't be writing one for my own Dad. It was such a strange feeling - we are living and getting on with life without Dad, even though none of us have still fully taken it in. The fact that we haven't bought him a present is one of those small confirmations that it really is true that he's died. Sometimes it needs those small confirmations - I saw him 20 mins after he died, I went to his funeral, I've visited his grave, I've told people over and over about the events of that weekend - but they are all big things that have in many ways seemed surreal and looking back it feels wierd that they happened at all. But not having a gift tag to write to him was such a small thing, but something that hit me as a reality. It seems so wrong not to be including him in Christmas. When I think hard about him I can hear him and see him and completely imagine all the laughs and jokes we shared. He just seems so real still. He is not a memory yet. I only saw him once every few months anyway, so it still always feels like he's just at the family home as always, just on the end of the phone or a text message away. I ache to see him because I know that I can't, but I haven't begun to truely miss him yet. But I know that I will, and I am pretty sure that it will begin in just over a week when we all get together to do Christmas. There are so many things about him that I am going to miss. I still have text messages from him on my phone - he wrote the funniest things in them. He had a unique and wonderful sense of humour and sometimes I just expect to look at my phone and see a text from him to brighten up my day at work. But they haven't come. I know why of course, but it's so hard to believe that my strong, funny Dad, the man who I know was proud of me, who's eyes twinkled when I acted loud and stupid just to make him sigh in despair when really he thought it was funny- him - he's not here anymore.

It's taken me ages to write this. Life has been going along as normal for so many days now that while writing I've had to stop so many times and just think, scrunching my forehead in bewilderment that I'm actually writing this stuff at all. Christmas will no doubt be hard, but it will be one hurdle over with in what will be a difficult year ahead, as the seasons go by without him for the first time. I guess I will take things as they come. It's difficult not to start thinking about the summer, and the enjoyment we shared over many of the things that make summer what it is - what is usually my favourite season will be blurred with sadness. I think of summer and I think of Dad. But for now I will just approach Christmas knowing that there will be a huge gap this year, but thankful that i shared 24 Christmasses with him. I have no feelings of bitterness about it - I haven't been 'robbed' of these times with him. I've been blessed with a childhood full of him, and it's great to think of how he contributed to my childhood Christmas fun! And now he will be enjoying far greater delights with the Lord than we can ever experience at Christmas.

Dear old Dad!! How we'll miss him.

Puzzled

Today I was walking along going from one building to another for a meeting and I got that funny feeling that I often get now when I’m getting on with my day and focussed on the jobs I’m doing for work. It’s that feeling where suddenly your thoughts stop in their tracks, and you find yourself feeling puzzled - puzzled that anything is wrong, puzzled that anything has happened at all. Today I found myself having to say to myself in my head a few times that Dad has died, it has actually happened. But it feels so unreal when I’m away from anything that would remind me of him, like today where my mind was focussed on the meeting I was going to and what I was meant to be doing there. My thoughts just suddenly switched in a flash, and it felt so weird to think that Dad is dead and that we will never see him again. Did that day of the 9th October really actually happen?

I have 3 good friends who have lost a parent, and chatting with them in the past before it ever happened to me made me think a lot about Mum or Dad dying. I couldn’t imagine it ever happening to me, not until I was a lot older when it’s bound to happen. But today, there I was saying to myself that my Dad has died. I couldn’t quite get my head around the fact that it was actually me saying it for real and not one of my friends, as it always has been in the past.

I get those times a lot, because you can’t just stop daily life in a situation like this. It’s easy to get caught up once again with the busyness of life, and then when reality hits, sometimes it’s like a punch in the stomach and the pain feels fresh once again; but other times, like today, it’s just puzzling….

The joy of flowers!

After I finished writing earlier I discovered a new blessing for today as I left the house to go back to work. Outside our house we have a small patio which has borders all around it. We have lived in our small home for just over a year now, and about a year ago Dad came and planted our borders with bulbs (all part of his love of gardening, making sure we have lots of flowers too!). So we enjoyed a late winter and early spring of these flowers. Then he planted summer flowers for us. Obviously the summer flowers are gone for good now and I’ve just recently got rid of the last of the dead ones. But the great thing about bulbs is that they re-flower. And when I went outside I noticed some little green shoots coming up! Not knowing a great deal about flowers, I didn’t expect to see any this time of year. I thought nothing would grow until January at least. I don’t know what they are yet as they are just tiny shoots, but it was a real joy to see them. Little things like that will always mean a lot now. Those flowers will be a lovely reminder of Dad coming and helping us out with something fun, and it’s something he did that will continue. Just a small thing – but a blessing!

Blessings!

I've been thinking about where to start with all of this. Do I start from the beginning when Dad died 2 months ago or start from what i'm thinking now? Obviously the weeks immediately following were filled with the most intense emotions while the pain was still so raw. So there was so much going on that I could write about. But that would take me such a long time. Now that constant overwhelming feeling of grief has gone and I'm left with more of a dull ache that is always there in the background that every now and then flares up. Life has changed in a big way in so many ways, so I am sure so much of that will come out as I go on with writing all about it. Everything I feel takes me by surprise, and emotions hit at random times.

So anyway, today I thought I would write about the many blessings that me and my family have found through this time. It's my lunch break from work at the moment and I'm feeling ok as I usually do while I'm getting on with normal life. My friend Rachel was wondering the other day if it is possible to be happy and sad at the same time and I really believe it is. Although, as she said it is a confusing thing, and hard to explain. But as I go on with normal life I am very happy as I was before this happened. I do love my life, but now there is a sadness within my heart that i don't think will ever completely go away while I live this life and Dad isn't part of it. But I still enjoy myself and I hope that this new knock in my heart, and any future knocks there may be, will all help to make me a more Godly person who looks heavenwards and is not so caught up in this life.

So, going back to my point(!) today is a normal day and one of my favourite types of winter days where it is cold and frosty, but the sun is shining and the sky is completely blue. I love these sort of days where winter doesn't seem too dull. I have lots of memories that associate Dad with these types of days - him working in the garden, going for walks, going to buy real Christmas trees (very exciting)! - but they are warm memories and not making me feel sad right now. So it's one of those times where I'm able to see so many blessings from God.

I was going to write about them, but now I've taken up too much time going off the point, so I will come back later to do it! But the real point of this particular blog is that although sadness always lingers, God has been so good in helping me to see past the sadness and the loss to look at the great times I've had growing up, and the blessings through the events themselves. I don't always feel this positive, but it's great when I do!

I've thought about starting a blog since Dad died 2 months ago. Losing a loved one is something I have never experienced until now, but thought about a lot in the past. The experience has changed my life in so many ways. I've felt new emotions, thought more deeply than I've ever thought before and have a new perspective on life. Dad dying broke my heart, but has also brought me such blessing. The last two months have been so tough but God has been so good, and I know that Dad was a strong Christian who is now in heaven.

People ask me how I'm doing, and it's so hard to say in the moments I snatch with close friends. I have written a lot of my feelings down and it's those thoughts that I want to share with my friends. So, I decided to create this blog to share my thoughts and feelings about Dad's death, as they change each day. It's been such an emotional roller coaster and I think it's important I don't forget those emotions. Also, I love to talk about Dad as I know he isn't dead, but more alive than any of us are while we still live on this earth. So to share my feelings and my thoughts really helps me to know that I only grieve for my loss, but not for his life. The quote at the top under the title is from a book called 'Letters of Samuel Rutherford' which helped me so much in the days immediately following Dad's passing away. Samuel Rutherford was put in prison in the 1600s for spreading the gospel, and while there he wrote fantastic letters, many to people who were grieving. In the letter from which I took the quote, he reminded a father who had lost a son of God's sovereignty and this is a fuller quote from the letter (excuse the old fashioned language!):

"Your Lord may gather his roses, and shake his apples, at what season of the year he pleaseth. Each man cannot make harvest when he pleaseth, as the Lord can do. You are taught to know and adore his sovereignty which he exerciseth over you, which yet is lustred with mercy. The child hath but exchanged a bed in the garden, and is planted up higher, nearer the sun, where he shall thrive better than in this out-field moorground".
This may be a bit quaint, but it really comforted me. To know that God does as he pleases - and that includes taking Dad to be with himself because he wanted to - gives me such strength to get through it. Also, it seemed quite appropriate picture language because Dad was well known for his love of gardening and he kept a beautiful garden So that is why I have called this blog what I have.

I hope this won't be morbid or depressing in any way, as I have been blessed and however hard it is, I am thankful for this time in my life. I just want to share what I would if i was talking face to face with my friends, but so many of you I hardly get to see. So this is the start of sharing. It may not be a permanent blog, but I know that it's not going to be an easy year ahead, so for now, I know it will help to write my thoughts out.

Just one last thing. Soon after he Dad, i was speaking with a friend who lost her Mum. She said to me that afterwards she had wanted to become a more beautiful person because of what happened, not inspite of it. That has really stuck with me, and I hope it can be true of me.

Tha's it for now. Sorry it's so long!