˙Hi,
It’s once again, been a while since I’ve written anything.
I decided today was the day to write again, and share the navigational journey we have been on.
As you know, our beautiful daughter Anne died last year… I still can’t actually believe I am writing those words… and honestly, I probably never will get used to writing those words.
People, although mostly well intentioned, may ask, may wonder, why after a year and almost a month, I am still writing about this topic.
To those who wonder, I can’t explain, actually, there is no way to explain unless you personally have gone through the loss of a child. If you have, then you do not wonder why I will continue to write about this life altering event.
I am not sure how anyone else has/is navigating their reality, I only can speak to how I/we are.
My husband, whom I adore, and I actually physically moved twice.. ( as I shared before along with some crazy car shenanigans). For Bill and I we knew we needed to have a presence close to Patrick and the kids, not to be in their face, not to tell Patrick how to now run his family, but to be there. To be present, to have a place to go to, to have a spot where Megan and Bill can go to see Patrick and the kids… a place that’s a bit of a Saxelby refuge. No hotel, our space… a space we filled with the familiar… and memories of Anne… a place that is home in Brooklyn.
We also moved a second time, keeping the spot in Brooklyn, to North Carolina. We have a cute little place in Raleigh. Why Raleigh? Well, Bill was approached and offered a wonderful professional opportunity… a new exciting challenge. A company based in the Research Triangle working on life changing technologies that will help us all deal with the ever evolving configuration of Covid and respiratory viruses still to come.
My life, our lives, look nothing like I thought they would at this point in our lives. Megan, Bill, Max, Megan our children and their lovely spouses, their lives as well are forever altered.
How do you figure out what to do? How to keep living, how to find a path of peace and renewal?
Notice, I did not say healing. I do not believe you heal from an experience like this, I believe you learn to carry it with you as you continue with life.
Some days, the navigational beacons are calm, like navigating through the beautiful turquoise waters near our home in Islamorada…. and sometimes the navigational beacons are buried … catapulting through hurricane force winds.
No two days are the same, and that’s true for most people’s lives. Yet, when navigating through this storm the weight of what you are trying to carry with you, can pull you under.
When that happens, and it does, I go with the flow. I do not try to fight the current. I let the waves take me where they will.
We’ve, Bill and I, made a lot of changes in our lives this past almost 13 months. For us, that was the path that we chose, to seek new places, to leave the weight of the community that we raised our family in behind. To me, that weight was one thing I could make a choice about, and choose to let it go.
I do not have all the answers, or even a clear vision of how to navigate this journey. What I do have is love… for Anne, for Bill, for our entire family.
My navigation, as I continue to ride this wave, will lead me to where and how I am to continue living my life…
And… one thing I do know, is that I will do it well.
Anne would expect no less from me.
Thanks for reading,
Pam