When my little boy died, many people told me that it would get better, except for one man who was honest with me. He said, "It doesn't get easier. It doesn't hurt less as time goes by."
He was so right.
However, in my own experience, you *can* become better at living with the pain. It's been a little over ten years now and the pain is still excruciating to the point where I can't breathe and my mind wants to explode. But I have learned to tuck away the pain to get on with my life--for the sake of the other children--and carry it with me in silence. Then, when I am alone, I take it out again because I miss him so very, very, very much and all I want to do is be with him. I guess I've learned not to sink into total anguish because I am afraid I will lose my mind to grief.
I also have learned how to think of him and remember the good times with sweetness and smiles instead of the sorrow. That was a very hard thing to learn. But I had no choice but to learn this because I wanted my other children to be able to do so and I had to teach them by example.
As in your article, I used to think, "How can the rest of the world keep going on as though nothing has happened when my little boy just DIED!?!?" I felt as though the sun, moon and stars should fall from the sky, that the earth should stop spinning. But no, everything kept on going and I had to keep doing laundry.
I identify with your insufferable suffering, Christine. I am so sorry you have this burden. Death is a burden. Then, life is a burden.
And it shouldn't be this way but it is for a mother who has to live without her child.
