But today, with it being Thanksgiving and all, I just have to write about thankfulness. I have to admit, I have not decorated for fall or Thanksgiving or Christmas or any holiday in a very long time.
If you are friends, and do Facebook, you might have noticed my "status" today: Thankfulness and sadness are not mutually exclusive. For all of those (us) who feel the loss of a loved one from the big, nasty D's (Death, Divorce, Disease and Distance) -- May God bless (y)our hearts as you grieve. May the reminders be more sweet than bitter. And may you always remain thankful for the times you had together.
I'm one of those people who are grieving today. I'm thankful. I'm so grateful and I've been so very blessed. But I miss my little brother today. I miss his family. We still have not seen his kids since the funeral in July. My heart breaks for all of us. For his wife and children having to go through this. For my mom and dad, for my sisters. It hurts. And it is easy to be sad. It is easy to let the tears define the day. It would be easy to hide or to escape in a wall of video games.
This weekend is a huge family tradition. We will go to Springfield and go to the Bass Pro Shop to have breakfast with Santa. We've done it for over 20 years. My husband and I went before we had children. It is my mother's gift to herself to pay for us all to go. She looks forward to it all year and buys the tickets the first day they go on sale.
Ronnie and his family didn't always go, but they'd been the last few years. And we'd seen them so much more since he discovered his kidney disease. We were all so thankful for that. My family is like that - we constantly see the "silver lining" of bad situations.
This month is no different. My husband had a horrible skiing accident and dislocated his knee. He tore three of the four ligaments. He had surgery Tuesday. He will be on crutches for 4 weeks minimum. Physical therapy will take months, and hopefully in a YEAR he will have close to 100% function again. He will never have 100%, but they hope to get him close.
That (and having to replace our college daughter's car last month) has wiped out our savings. The doctor's appointments and surgery, upcoming PT, etc. has thrown my schedule to the wind. I missed eating Thanksgiving Potluck with our Co-Op group. I've had to cancel classes. School is in crisis mode (only stuff for co-op gets done) and this chaos has put me very behind in several areas. The house is a wreck, laundry is piled up. The lawn is a mess. Wood needs to be stacked... You get the picture, right?
I'm having to literally wait on him hand and foot. He can't do anything by himself. The nurse explained it this way, "Pretend you have a raw egg under your foot. Don't crack it." No weight whatsoever on that leg. If he wants to move, he has to have crutches, that I have to get for him. He has a machine for PT (I'm going to have arms of a body builder after lugging that thing on and off the bed!!) He has a machine for cold therapy. He has bandages and a drainage tube.
But seriously, I kid you not, I don't mind. NOT ONE BIT. Don't you go thinking I'm a saint. Nope. I'm completely and totally selfish. In fact, when it happened, before he could fly home, I was literally giggling and smiling when I told people about it because it didn't take me but a minute to figure out the silver lining of all this...
My husband will be home the rest of the year. Oh yes! What a blessing! {Happy Dance!} He has been calling in to the 'office' and in between appointments and surgery/recovery has been doing all the things he needs to do. Who knows, maybe this will be the start of him being able to work from home more often in 2015? I would not put it past God to bless us in such a wonderful way.
I would never, ever, in a million years, wish this on him, but I certainly am not one to let a blessing go unnoticed. Thank you, God for this wonderful side-effect!
He holds me at night, even when he is in pain, because it makes HIM feel better. (sigh...) We talk without texting. No voice mail! No need to email. We hold hands and just sit next to each other. (This is also why things are piling up around the house.) He is interacting with the kids, and even though he falls asleep at the drop of a hat in the middle of their games, he is physically here. And it is so nice.
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| Steve has just fallen asleep in the middle of a game. |
Seeing him with the kids in the bed or in the chair beside him makes my heart happy. But I realize that others don't have that luxury. My sister-in-law will never get to hold her husband again. Those kids will never sit with their daddy. My brother was a good daddy. I know his kids miss him. As much as we miss him, they miss him so much more.
Although as a Christian it is easy to see the silver lining for my brother, finding it for his family is difficult. I pray that God blesses his wife with a new husband and those kids with a new daddy -- in His good time, and in the meantime that He will bless them as their heavenly father. That his presence will be felt in all they do.
And if you are sad this Thanksgiving, if distance has kept you away from the family you love; if divorce has made your holidays complicated; if you or someone you love got to spend the day eating turkey puree in a hospital bed; or if you miss so terribly one who will never come home...
May God bless you today as you walk through sadness. May your silver lining shine so bright you can't miss it. May God turn your sorrow into gladness. But until then, hang on. It is OK to be sad. Walk through it and own it. You can be thankful and sad. They are not mutually exclusive.
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