I looked at the tree in the box, my thoughts going in a couple of different directions. Anyone that knows me knows that when I decorate, I go all out- no skimpy little tree in my house, I want a winter wonderland. And I want it in November. But who would blame me for not wanting to decorate THIS year? My friends and family know how difficult it has been for me. I lost my mama way back in January-the very beginning of 2014. That one thing alone is enough to bring sadness and depression to the first holiday season. Who wants to celebrate when the one that gave you life isn't there to share it? At least not the first one. Firsts are hard.
That one big thing that happened in my life this year was enough to cripple me.
But wait, there's more.
Four months to the day that I lost Mama, my beloved daughter Amanda also left us. She fought a long, hard battle with breast cancer. I'll never forget the day that she told me in tears two months before that she didn't want to die from this. A scene embedded in my mind. Amanda endured so much to try to stay here and left behind three beautiful children that miss her so much. But sadly, it wasn't her choice in the end. She struggled for every breath that last day to remain with us, with them. However, God said no to earthly healing, deciding instead to give her so much more. I had prayed just a couple of days before, Please God, don't take her on Mother's Day or the day after- He knew the reason why. She made it through the holiday, only to draw her last breath the next day, her brother's birthday.
So, perhaps we will just skip Christmas this year. Just sleepwalk through it. Maybe tiptoe around it. She loved the holidays so much, it is just too painful to imagine them without my Amanda Panda.
I made the decision that we would ignore Christmas. I can't do it. I am struggling my way through my grief, why should I want to celebrate anything? Then I began thinking how selfish I was being. Jeff loves the holidays. He told me it was okay if I didn't want to decorate this year.
Of course he couldn't know that my thoughts were already taking me to a place I shouldn't go in the middle of deep grief- I may just ignore it next year too. Possibly the next.
It is hard to think about celebrating when you hurt.
Even a future holiday season is painful to think about. I might just sell the stuff, that would be easiest. I looked at the box again, and finally decided- I will put up the tree, not for me, but for him. The rest would stay in boxes until I was able to think more clearly. Jeff helped me set it up and there it stood in it's nine foot glory completely bare and naked. It stayed that way for several days until I got up the courage to finally put a few decorations on it.
So this is Christmas without them- painful and hard. But I will somehow by God's grace drag my way through it.
Soon after, a major thing happened. Amanda's half-orphaned children were taken from their home. The reasons do not matter right now, but these precious little ones who miss their mama so much now have a much bigger hole in their lives, and right before the holidays.
What can we do?? Much conversation and prayer--should we, shouldn't we, can we, we can't, too old, too much change, maybe we should, God should we? we love them, they need us...and that was the bottom line. And our defining choice.
These precious little parts of Amanda needed us.
And just maybe with the year I have had, I need to be needed. An early morning trip to Greenville Texas yesterday morning for a meeting with a judge that would ultimately make the decision.
He did, and our lives will never be the same.
Tomorrow morning we go to pick them up. They have three sets of clothes with them, most likely all look as stained as the ones they wore yesterday. Right now it is temporary. Only God knows the future.
Tomorrow our lives become more complicated, much busier, and so very full of little arms wrapped around our necks with wet little kisses pressed on our cheeks. But today, I have other plans.
Today I have to decorate. For Christmas. You see, I have some very big reasons to ignore it, but I have three little reasons not to.
Our first pic as a family, December 5, 2014
Susan Kelley
Friendswood, TX
copyright December 2014
