If only it were that easy.
If only it were even helpful.
What I know to be true is that in remembering we heal. Remembering is about revisiting those painful parts buried and recognizing the pain to be real, preserving the path traveled leading to tomorrow.
Outside of just grace alone, remembering has been a saving force in my life during the past year. Together, me and the girls have shared memories that have both lifted us and saddened us, but in the end, each time we remember, we are lighter and freer. Friends and family have shared thoughts and memories of Marianne. In those shared memories, I am pleasantly raptured back to the moments they happened. The past healing the present, opening the future. Remembering doesn’t lock me down in a time but allows me to steal strength from yesterday as I build and anticipate tomorrow now. For the five days while Marianne was in ICU gently swaying between this life and the next, most often the next, I sat in memories, enveloped in a warmth that kept my cooling heart. In tears, I smiled genuinely. Even as death drew nearer and my heart grew heavier with sadness, there was a hard-to-explain calm in my heart existing. We had the best life together worth celebrating in remembrance. This was both the reason for the calm and reason for the pain. During those days, I spoke a small question that had the form of a prayer, “What will I do now?” In response, I heard, as clear as a certain and plain thought, “You will remember.”
“Remember what?”
“Everything.”
To a large degree, this is why writing has been so healing for me. I am remembering. I am recalling memories that I do not always like to think about, memories that I’d rather sometimes forget. Like a survivor recollecting fractured images and memories of a horrible accident, I am giving life to what I loss, what I loved and what cut me the deepest. I am aiding in the rescuing of myself. This is more for me than it may ever be for you. But I was the one needing to be found.
It is becoming a full year. In just a few hours beyond seven days, we will cross a marker, three hundred sixty five days since Marianne died. I will remember three hundred sixty five days of being found.
Over the course of the next week, I want to share just a bit of my heart as it was during the five days Marianne was in the hospital, the days just before she died. I really hope you will be able to get a sense of God finding me as I sank deeply. It is truly the most beautiful thing that has ever happened to me. And it happened in the darkest moments of my life.
I so get that. Beautiful.
Thank you for such honesty in your words. My heart is heavy for you as I try to imagine what this last year must have been like.
I've lost in my life, three sweet babies in my womb that I will only get to meet in heaven, so I understand to a small degree. However, the grief and pain has to be so much greater when you lose the person you built your life with.
God bless you, Guy, as you work towards the future God has for you. And you said it just right, healing is through remembering. Never forget your memories of Marianne and talk of her often.
Looking forward to hearing more of how God found you as you sank deeply...
Thank you, Jenica! I'll be writing more later this week leading into the 30th. That's the anniversary. I really appreciate your kind and encouraging words.
Felicity, thanks!! I hope to see you both at STORY next month.