Sharing my mourning journey as my family learns to live a new normal after the death of my 19 y.o. son in an auto accident on 10/12/08.

Archive for the ‘friends’ Category

Trusting Again

Jordan in the newspaper room

Jordan's great smile captured by his friend Clare at school. This picture sits in our family room. I love that Jordan is looking back smiling at me every morning when I come downstairs.

I had coffee with a dear friend the other day. She asked how I was doing. As we talked further she wondered did I believe that as time passed I’d be able to have joy in my heart again. I told her I didn’t know. I hoped that I would believe in feeling joy again, that is as far as my commitment can go, the hope that joy might happen. I told her that at least once every day the thought, “I can’t believe someone came to my door and told me my son is dead” crosses my mind. She understood how surreal life continues to be as my family and I mourn and learn to live without Jordan.

Right now, glimpses of joy, real joy are tethered to guilt. Joy feels like leaving Jordan behind. Joy right now means accepting new memories, traditions, and a life that doesn’t include my boy. As my friend listened to why “hoping to believe” was all I could muster she responded by saying, “I’ll pray for you. Specifically I’ll pray that you embrace the belief that you’ll feel real joy again.” These were my friend’s words as she listened to my conflict and pain. Her faith was so strong and I was so grateful for her compassion and grace. She would pray for me. I clung to her words, even as I struggle to regain my faith, to have it be the anchor it once was in my life. She knows my struggle and has put joy reentering my heart on her prayer list.

My reluctance to believe that life holds joy that is not intertwined with guilt and sorrow are not new feelings for me. In the weeks after Jordan died, I was in regular contact via email with my friend Tom who knows loss intimately after losing his wife and two of his children over the last 20 years. I asked him the following question,

“Everyone who has lost a child says, “You don’t get over it, you get through it” and that grief is hard work and takes time. How do you get through the days and sleep at night without feeling eviscerated and numb at the same time?”

Tom responded,

“You don’t.  You try and allow yourself to feel everything there is to feel, as you are able.  Try to observe it all. Try to allow it to flow through you.  Every feeling and emotion will have a beginning, middle and an end.  I am living proof that you can learn to live WITH the death of your beloved son …and that your life will be filled with joy, again…impossible as that probably is to believe right now.  Try to hang on to that.”

The parents of one of my high school friends who was killed suddenly in a car accident in 1987 at the age of 23 sent me these words in the weeks after Jordan’s death:

“As your peers in this terrible fraternity, we want to help you. Time, distance and love have made us more understanding of the loss.” They then went on to write, “I can promise you that brighter days will follow. The days will never be the same but they will be bright, often illuminated by Jordan’s spirit.”

The words of my “fraternity members” echo in my head and I pull their words from my mind like reference books from a shelf and just sit with them sometimes; hoping that their words will wash over me and help me make it through the unbearable moments. Brighter days illuminated by Jordan’s spirit, what a wonderful peaceful image.

I am hanging on, as incredulous as it feels. Some days I live in disbelief  that I’m still a functioning human being. Death has torn me apart and I’m still here. The surreal moments in which I’m moving forward without the physical presence of my son, my children’s brother, feel like a strange fantasy, it has to be. I know it’s not. For now I hope, and I’m trying to learn to pray again. Prayer doesn’t come as easily since Jordan died. I told a friend and pastor who was my family’s spiritual mentor, and comfort in the days after Jordan died, “My faith is shaken. What does God do?” I revealed to him that every night when our family said grace we prayed the same prayer:

“Graciously heavenly Father, we thank you for this day and for the food we’re about to receive for the nourishment and strength of our bodies, in Jesus’ name we pray, and please keep Jordan safe. Amen.

No matter whose turn it was to pray, the prayer always ended the same way, “and please keep Jordan safe.” Every night that prayer was said. We prayed that prayer the night Jordan died. It didn’t work. When my friend said she would pray such a specific prayer for me about believing in joy again, I nodded grateful for her compassion, but left wondering, which prayers get answered? There are of course no easy answers to my questions.

Mark and I attended a grief workshop last spring and the woman sitting next to me articulated the feelings I had been struggling to grasp. She said, “I still believe in God, I just don’t know if I trust him.” As soon as she said the words I straightened up in my seat. She had put words to the internal struggle I faced daily. I didn’t trust God, because my most important prayer had gone unanswered. Jordan was gone even though we prayed for his safety. He was gone and his friends remained unharmed.

I have to figure out how to trust God again. My belief is still present, I know this because in the days and weeks after Jordan died when the pain of grief made me feel like I was suffocating I cried out the only word that my mouth could form, “Mercy”. I would lay curled up on my bed too exhausted and distraught to move, feeling like I could explode at any moment. With the bit of strength I had, I said over and over again, “mercy”, “mercy”, “mercy, Lord please.” Mercy was my plea until I felt my heartbeat calm, and I was able to catch my breath. I would finally feel soothed and able to face the next moment.

My distrust of God did not prevent me from praying for Jordan’s friends who survived the accident. In the hours after Jordan died, I got on my knees and asked God to be with them, to ease their guilt and give them the strength and peace they would need to live full lives.

As the days wore on and my heart was consumed with grief, my doubts grew and my trust in God waned. My pastor told Mark and I that being angry with God is completely understandable and that we should rail at God as much as we need.  He emphatically said to us, “Don’t worry, God can take it.” I needed to vent my anger and disappointment at God. I still had questions about why my prayers for Jordan’s safety had gone unanswered. I wrote to God hoping the answer would come. In December of 2008 I made this entry in my journal:

God,

You’ve made it so that I know my prayers don’t matter.

I can’t pray for the safety of my children it doesn’t work.

What is prayer for?

I pray for mercy

My heart still hurts

I pray for peace

I still can’t sleep

Prayer doesn’t soothe

It doesn’t benefit

It doesn’t protect

I prayed for safety

It didn’t work

I need to sleep

I want my son

My son has been taken from this life; words like trust, faith, and joy are incongruent with the surreal feeling of loss. For now I hope, I read, I rely on friends and clergy whose faith is stronger than mine to see me through. I want peace in my heart. My family still says grace every night and typically the person praying ends with, “and please keep Jordan in our hearts.” I know he’s always in our hearts, that fact I will always believe.

Even as I struggle to regain my faith, God still whispers to me in the most unexpected ways. The other night, with Mark out of town on business, my daughter said grace and ended with, “And please bring Daddy home safely.” With all that we’ve lost her prayer requested safe passage home for her father. The faith of my child is instructional in its honesty and simplicity. Her faith is still wide enough to include prayers of safety. She still believes.

What does God do? I think the answers are all around me. I’m slowly reaching out to explore trust again. It is not a linear path, but the diversions I have, bring lessons and I pray they bring me closer to my faith.

Category:

auto accident, friends, grief, guilt, Mother of Four, prayer, seeking joy

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Jordan’s Friends

Jordan and Matt

Jordan and Matt

Senior Prom

Senior Prom

The friends that Jordan grew up with continue to be his friends today. Jordan’s core group remained fairly constant from first grade throughout his life. There have been other special friendships that have developed. There are of course, young men and women that he met in summer programs and at college who were dear to him and are now dear to my family and me. That first group of friends however was the touchstone. They are the children, now men who learned from each other about fun, loyalty, adventure, and at Jordan’s death sorrow of losing one’s own.

One of the first things I knew I had to do after we found out that Jordan had been killed in a car accident was to notify the parents of one of his best friends and have them notify the other parents. In this age of instant information, I couldn’t have Jordan’s dearest friends finding out he was gone because someone had posted it on Facebook or MySpace. I knew how much these guys loved Jordan and they needed to be comforted as they were told. Around 5:30 am I made the call to the parents of Jordan’s friend who had become our friends because of our children. I knew the news for them would be so devastating. Matt’s house was Jordan’s second home. They loved my son and would struggle to tell Matt because of their own grief. The shock, screams of “No” and tears that met me on the other end of the phone line let me know that telling Jordan’s friends would put them in a place of grief and lost innocence. It was clear that for our community of parents something we never wanted to imagine had happened. One of our worst fears had been realized. Death had come suddenly and intruded in such an ugly way. Any vestiges of innocence that still clung to our children and to us were stripped away. One of their best friends, one of our children was gone.

All of these boys were away at school and had to be called so their families could notify them about Jordan. I made it clear that the core group of friends, the boys who had played together since first grade, – who went to each others birthday and block parties playing “cops and robbers” and “ghosts in the graveyard”, who went to their 8th grade dance getting dressed up in suits and nudging each other to ask girls to dance, and who went to senior prom with the infamous camping trip afterwards-these kids grew up together in front of my eyes and had to be told gently. That morning our house was filled with the parents of these buddies. They all assured me that their sons knew and then they told me-“I’ve never heard him cry like that.”

Such a departure from the scene when I had last gathered with the parents of Jordan’s friends at Jordan’s graduation party. Mark and I had a joint party for our sons, our youngest son about to enter high school, and Jordan off to college. The party was held in our backyard, although Jordan and his friends took over and hung out in the basement. I only had one planned activity for that day and it was to briefly have our family say a few words to our sons and for my sister to present Jordan with a scrapbook she had made for him entitled “Blink”-as in “the blink of an eye.” Jordan and his friends begrudgingly made their way from the basement looking uncomfortable amongst all the fawning adults as if at any moment someone was going to pinch their cheeks and call them “precious”. Jordan most of all looked annoyed. He hated public displays, especially those given by his parents. That day however I was not going to let his scowl deter me from the gift I wanted to give him. Jordan was blessed to have both sets of grandparents alive and well and able to see him graduate from high school. I wanted them to be able to say a few words to Jordan and his friends. Jordan quickly straightened out his attitude when I gave him my “mama look” and said for everyone to hear -“I see your face buddy. You’re just going to have to deal with it. We love you and we’re going to show it.”

Each of his grandparents said how proud they were of him and knew great things were in store for him. When it was my father’s turn to talk he changed the tone a bit. He spoke to Jordan and his friends in a way that I’ve decided is distinctly his own. He told them, “Look around. These guys you’ve been hanging out with since you were little boys are your friends for life. Don’t ever forget that. Don’t let distance, or interests, or anything make it so you don’t stay in touch with each other.” Daddy then told them about one of his best friends that he claimed to have known “since the womb” because their mothers were friends when they were pregnant with each of them. Daddy told them, “to this day Fred and I call each other once a month to give each other hell. Our families get together and we make sure we stay in touch. So, look around and remember, this is where your first friendships started, don’t forget them.”

I thought about that day as Jordan’s friends came home to say goodbye to their friend. Here were the guys who’d envisioned their friendships lasting the way my father’s had, well into old age. But a member of the core group was gone and most of them were feeling the pain of a significant loss for the first time. When they came home they gathered at each other’s homes to mourn Jordan together. One mom told me, to see this group of “cool dudes” sitting together openly weeping over the loss of their friend humbled her so.

All of them came to our home before the service to pay their respects. They also did so much more. Billy asked if it would be okay for him to wear a polo shirt to the service. Jordan always wore polo shirts and he wanted to honor him in this way. Quinn and Pat usually so reserved, hugged me with such openness that spoke volumes about their love for Jordan and their need to feel connected to him through us. Matt made a special video of Jordan with family and friends to show at the service. Lucas took a deep breath and through tears played “When the Saints Go Marching In” on his saxophone to end the service. And, as we received guests after the service, the mother of Jordan’s friend Sam told me what her son had done to honor Jordan. Sam attends a military college on the east coast and after hearing the news about Jordan asked that the school play taps to honor his friend. Sam’s mom then presented us with the flag that had flown the morning taps was played, folded military style to honor a fallen comrade. Sam was at the service but too distraught to give it to us himself.

These are the boys my son has a friends. They visit us whenever they are home. They come by to say hello, check on us, give us updates on their lives and talk about their friend. They also connect with Jordan’s younger brother whom they’ve all adopted as their own little brother. They come to our house because they know it’s a safe place to remember and miss Jordan. These boys, these young men who loved my son are now friends to my family. It is bittersweet every time we see them. I love these boys. I honor and respect their grace and maturity. They visit, and then they are back out into the world, something I’ll never get to see Jordan do. Every time they leave I weep as I watch their backs heading down the walk. Having them in our lives has given us so much. We treasure every visit.

Jordan's 10th Birthday party

Jordan's 10th Birthday party

Category:

anger, anniversaries, auto accident, brothers, college, death of son, facebook, friends, Generation Y, Jordan

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