Five years ago, October 1, 2016, my son woke up for the last time.
I know through the accounts from his room mates and friends, the broad stokes of his last day.
It was a Saturday. My son was a tennis coach. He met one of his clients at 7:30 a.m. to play tennis for two hours. It was a beautiful fall day in a beach town on east coast of Florida. My son’s passion was tennis, as was his client’s. This man shared with me that my son was in an inordinately cheerful mood that day. They left the court with the plan to meet the next morning, same time, same place, to play again.
He got paid the day before. He went to the grocery store. His room mate shared that he went to bed in a great mood at 10:00 p.m. He laid out his duffel and his tennis clothes before bed, ready to jump into them early Sunday morning.
He went to bed and did not awaken. I will spare all of the details but he died in his sleep.
In the meantime, in Tennessee, my husband, our youngest son and our daughter, and I went to a pumpkin patch. It was a gorgeous day; 70 degrees. We took silly pictures with a scarecrow and filled a red wagon with pumpkins. It was one of those days that even as I was experiencing it, I knew it was a perfect day. We returned home, neatened up our patio and our front porch. We scattered our pumpkins on the patio and porch.
Little did any of us know that was the last normal day, as we knew it, any of us would have.
My husband and I received the life changing phone call on Sunday night. On Monday morning, we phoned our adult children and shared this sorrowful news. We made arrangements to have his body flown home to Tennessee. We made funeral plans. We phoned friends and relatives. His body did not arrive in our city until Thursday afternoon. Visitation was Friday night . The funeral was on Saturday morning. It was a beautiful fall day; 70 degrees. After the funeral friends and family gathered on our pumpkin decorated patio for a meal served to us by friends.
In one week, our lives went from all of us enjoying a perfect fall day to a sorrow that still lives within us. The pain has softened, but honestly it took me a full four years before it wasn’t the first thing I thought of when I awakened every morning and the last thing I thought of when I went to bed at night.
We all are able to experience joy now but there is always a feeling that someone is missing. Based on the accounts of other bereaved parents further along than we are, that feeling of a missing child never quite goes away. It is as if there is a wound that takes a long time to heal. Eventually the scab turns into a scar, but the sight of the scar always reminds you of the day you were wounded.
If we knew that it was the last day of one of our beloved children, we would say I love you, I love you, I love you and hug them without letting go.
Five years feels like a long time, yet feels like yesterday. Somehow though, five years feels significant in some way. I feel proud of us that we made it this far with a lot of self care. We have become even stronger as a family.
Every year on this day, we try to do an act of kindness for someone else in our son’s memory. This year, I have been asked to do flowers for a young couple who are getting married Saturday. I have been working on this wedding for the last two days. Today, my husband is helping me with some of the heavy lifting. Tomorrow, we will deliver and install the flowers.
Two months ago when I was asked to do this wedding on this particular weekend, my first thought was this was my son’s fifth anniversary. I knew this would be a hard day. I hesitated for a moment, then agreed to do it. Flowers give my husband and me a lot of joy. We will enjoy pouring our love into this couple’s special day in honor of our son.
It is said that when a child dies there is a hole in a parent’s heart forever. Healing is when you learn to find joy and learn to live around the hole.
Peace and love to all who share this journey with us.
She writes about life, death, grief, and recovery.
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- Healing After Child Loss - June 19, 2022
- “You Are So Strong” - March 11, 2022
