It is the time of year for this Fresno mother to recall the son who died too soon

A few days ago, while perusing a book in search of a courageous passage to get me through the upcoming month, I stumbled across words by Jon Kabat-Zinn, who writes, “We are on a path, whether we like it or not.”

It’s that time when I face the stark reality of yet another year without our son, Alex. My grief, now at the 17-year mark, falls into a new, somewhat awkward category — no longer fresh and foreign, but matured, quieted — no longer the first thing out of my mouth when I meet someone in the grocery store checkout line. Instead, I guard it as though vaulted and sacred, a string of words, softened images, forever etched into memory.

Since the release of “Griefland: An Intimate Portrait of Love, Loss and Unlikely Friendship” (2012), people have been writing to share their stories — the unabridged shock and horror of loss, the utter disbelief, and the sense of living outside the normal realm of reality. Today, these voices amplify even more. We inhabit a grief-stricken, post-pandemic world. Many of us are baby boomers living in an era of loss — losing aging parents, work colleagues, friends and siblings. Some, like us, have lost children.

They come in droves, these letters, e-mails and texts. From everywhere and everyone — men, women, grandparents, siblings, friends, strangers. My stash includes notes written on fancy, embellished stationery, some are scribbled across cocktail napkins or florescent sticky notes, each describing the unique and often times lonely experience of loss, grief and heartache:

I remember feeling a searing pain — the world stood still, then stopped, the information could not be processed — I guess in retrospect, it must have been like a circuit overload , scorching my brain forever.

***

Is this nightmare going to end soon? At this point, no one really cares any longer because, “Shouldn’t she have moved on?”

***

I want so badly to tell people just where they can take their “lack of compassion” and stick it. I just keep hoping it never happens to them. It takes all the strength I have not to open my mouth and say what I feel. I’m so afraid if I did, it would look like a scene out of the “Green Mile” when John Coffey, the psychically gifted gentle giant, opens his mouth after taking the “badness” from a prisoner and releases it into the air.

Darkness surely would pour out of my mouth, and anyone within range would become a target.

***

It is suddenly as if you don’t recognize yourself anymore — looking in the mirror at an alien. Is that me I hear screaming?

***

My co-author Nancy Miller and I, following the death of our children Alex and Rachel in 2004 and 2008, respectively, asked ourselves if it was possible to take the worst day of our lives and use it as a newfound reason for living. We needed to believe that unimaginable loss held the potential for making us more human, better stewards of life on Earth. Together we decided to chronicle the acute, moment-by-moment experience of grief — conjuring an anatomy of loss, and the grim climb back to a vibrant life, even though our worlds would be forever changed.

While we may not be able to control what happens to us, we actually possess a “weapon of mass instruction” — to make re-entry into the land of the living by sharing the journey with others. Even though devoured by tragedy, when we hear an account about how one person is surviving, we see ourselves in others’ pain, in their loves, in their grief, in the meaning they ascribe to the relationship they are/were in, in how they are re-imagining life and, maybe, even reinventing themselves.

Hearing each other’s voices, we forge sacred bonds. Create tribes. Those traveling along are often kind enough to pause in their stride, grab our hands and make discourse with us. In these moments, we learn we are more than the sum of our broken parts and not alone. It is this connective tissue that keeps us from crashing off the ledge of life.

A member of our dreaded cemetery club wrote us saying that notably, she is not the same happy, funny person who people once loved to be around. There are only a few who love her now in this new “after-grief” state. But she goes on to say that grief has done one thing for her. It has “cleared the rubble from life, leaving gleaming gemstones in its wake, if only we are open enough to see them.” These words hold true during this pandemic. We purge things that no longer work or fit our new normal. Maybe we start with the mundane: linen closets and spice cabinets, but eventually dig deeper — re-evaluating relationships, personal commitments, time spent on social media, deciding how we wish to live out the remainder of our days and upcoming chapters.

This morning I find myself pondering the future, wanting to understand what happens to grief when days turn from weeks to months, years to decades. These are questions I now set out to explore as my own grief morphs through time. Is there a difference between fresh and advanced grief? What does each look like, feel like? Where are the long-haulers now and how are they managing? How does grief manifest itself over time? How is it honored, given voice?

During the past few weeks, I have re-read early grief journals stored high in my closet and carrying words I have been too scared to read until now. I have also scavenged through boxes of notes and letters, printed out e-mails from members of this unlikely club to which I am now a lifetime member. For all of us, life was normal, and then, suddenly, it was not.

Seventeen years is a long time. I should be better at this by now, I tell myself. I am still fumbling through my grief. But I have noticed, as of late, moments of joy. Even as I drown myself in writing this particular morning, as I befriend the silence that arrives this time of year, I feel a hint of gratitude and more importantly, hope, knowing tomorrow I will be greeted by a day inviting me to start all over again.

Make no mistake. The timetable for healing cannot be minimized or abbreviated. We must honor the scars, the cracks, the meltdowns and milestones, and each grief relapse following a sleepless night of remembering. There is no shortcut to acknowledging the empty chair at the table.

If we are lucky, we eventually find ways to use grief as a path to inspiration and personal transformation, recognizing that life can emerge from the rubble of catastrophe. As a mom still navigating the delicate and steep terrain of Griefland, I know full well it takes a lifetime. And any way one gets through it is heroic.