Tag: grief

Posted in Moments and Musings

This New Season

Posted on by Vikki Lynn Sorensen

A few short years ago, both my girls were planning to get a place of their own. I sat looking through apartment listings (just for fun), looking at one-bedroom places and dreaming of how I would decorate it without any input from anyone else. I pinned meals “for the single gal” to my Pinterest page and thought about how grand it would be to have the whole TV all to myself.

I could do what I wanted when I wanted. The ultimate single life.

We moved in here and shortly after, Emilie got married. And then there were two.

Emilie has always been my “big idea” girl. Big dreams. Bigger plans. So full of sparkling conversation. She outwardly expresses everything and this lead to hours upon hours of endless chatter. She filled my days with talking. I honestly can’t remember a time in her life when she wasn’t talking. So many late night talks, some full of fear but most filled with faith and a lot of tears.

But Shelby isn’t like that. She doesn’t have huge dreams.

Shelby works an overnight job and sleeps during the day. She has her own set of nerdy friends she prefers to spend time with, which is very normal for a girl like her. I want to give her that
space. I don’t want her to feel like she’s her mother’s entertainment committee. The few times she’s decided to spend her day with me has been a gift and I’ve made the most of it. Her big ambition right now is to work, make some money, and play video games with her friends. Even when she is with me, she’s quiet. There’s never been a ton of conversation that’s
happened between us.

So, my home when from being loud to being very quiet.

In the beginning, I took advantage of it. But it wasn’t long before conversations with Jesus
turned into mindless chatter with either myself or with the dog. (He doesn’t ever engage. He usually just licks himself and finds a new comfortable space on my chair.)

Now, that season is ending. I just bought a house with my sister. And my other sister (there’s four of us girls in my family) will be moving in with us along with Shelby. My very quiet, boring existence is about to be replaced with conversation and activity once more.

I can’t wait!

Moving to my current home was a huge blessing. We moved right in the middle of 2020 from a super small apartment to this one. My old apartment was only a mile away from the home we shared with my mom for 12 years. It was the home that healed us from a painful divorce. It was my mother’s house and for 12 years, we were secure and stable.

Then we lost her and everything changed.

The two years we spent in that first apartment after she died were so full of grief and pain and adjustment and just emptiness. We had no family nearby. My girls and I clung to each other and together, we held onto Jesus. But that grief – it was so hard to heal. I remember when we moved into this place, it almost felt like I was leaving my grief behind. So much closer to my sister, this place gave me breathing room, and not just literally.

It changed everything.

Being close to people who I loved and who loved me was the healing balm I needed. We healed together, in a way. God blessed us so much in this place and in this current season.

God gave me this season and I have not squandered it.

But now it’s time for the next step in my life. To go back to living in a space where I can put color on my walls and have my own laundry (it’s the little things). I won’t just be close to family; I’ll be living with family and closest I’ve been to my dad and stepmom in decades.

The challenge now is to stay in an attitude of gratitude. I’ve got just under 2 months until we move into our house – hopefully, our forever home.

Seasonal transitions are hard because the closer you get to the new season, the less tolerant you are of the season you’re in. It’s easy to get edgy and start to dislike what once was a blessing.

I’m determined not to let that happen to me. I love my home. I love every minute here. And before I leave, I want to pray over it, touch each wall and walk its floors one more time. I want to leave a bit of Jesus here. I want the next family to feel peace, love, comfort, and healing when they want through the door – just as I did.

When I get to my new home, I’ll do the same. Touch the walls. Walk the floors. Speak Jesus to it all. This home was a home of healing but the next home…that will be a home full of joy!

Photo by Tierra Mallorca on Unsplash

Posted in Moments and Musings

My Christmas Carol

Posted on by Vikki Lynn Sorensen

Driving around, taking care of some errands the other day with my daughter, Shelby, and she turned on some Christmas music. The Little Drummer Boy by the Harry Simeone Chorale came on. I was instantly transformed to being 10 and sitting alongside my mom in the car listening to her sing along. This was always her favorite Christmas carol.

This year marks the 5th year celebrating the holiday season without my mother. I miss her. I miss her excitement at having the family together. I miss her making her grocery shopping lists only to still go up and down each aisle “just in case I forgot something”.

I miss her voice. Her presence. Her very nature which turned my house into a home for so many years. I miss the way she’d have a story to tell about the ornaments we still put on our tree. I miss her stuffing, which is famous in my family. (This is my first year making it without her.) I miss her eyes lighting up at the idea of a night filled with Christmas movies and a bit of hot cocoa.

I commented to Shelby how much I hate having this love/hate relationship with the holidays. I love this time of year so very much. The cold weather. The fireplaces. The cinnamon. The cookies. The tree. Family gatherings. Dad’s magic Brandy Alexanders and “religious experience” cookies. I love it all!

But I hate that she’s not here. And so much has changed for me this year. My daughter became a wife and my mother wasn’t here to see it. I’m getting my life ready to buy a house which is something I haven’t done since I was married. So many changes, big and small and she’s not here for any of it. Somehow, I feel it more acutely at Christmas time.

People say, “this is life and you have just keep moving forward” and I do. Lots ahead. Grandbabies to come some day. A new home to build. Family outings and trips to take. That’s in addition to the day to day living I get to do quite comfortably surrounded by the love of my family.

So this year, like the 4 behind me and the many ahead of me, I’ll hold her memory tightly to my chest and let it be a salve to my heart. I’ll put up the tree. Make her stuffing. Hang ornaments, both new and old. I’ll pull out THE family cookie recipe and make a batch or two with Hallmark Christmas movies playing on the big screen.

And I’ll remember her, over and over again. Yet in the midst of the pain, there will be peace.

Who knows? I just might pull out one of her silly Christmas vests she used to wear.

Yes, I know it’s blurry but this was the best Christmas photo I have of her.
Posted in Bookish and Bingeable

How To Make Friends With the Dark

Posted on by Vikki Lynn Sorensen

By: Kathleen Glasgow

I lost my mom unexpectedly 4 years ago. Every unspoken thought, every emotion I couldn’t name or couldn’t face, every fear and anxiety unvoiced all came floating to the surface for me in this book. I can’t remember a time when I’ve highlighted or annotated so much. In fact, I’ve never annotated any book I’ve ever read outside of for a class.

It was for these very reasons I found myself unable to turn the page yet I couldn’t stop myself from reading on. Kathleen Glasgow reached into my heart, took all my grief and allowed it to manifest in this story. Oddly enough, and without planning it, I read this just around the time of the anniversary of losing my mother.

A few highlights resonated with me:

“I don’t understand how things keep going when she has just stopped.”

The weirdest thing in the world to me was driving home from the hospital and not really understanding how no one else was affected by this but my family. For everyone else, it was just a regular, every day Friday and they were doing what they’d always done. For me, however, my whole world just shut down.

“I want to hurt everyone right now. I want to break things so the world looks like how I feel inside…”

I remember going to Kohl’s to buy a blouse for Mom to wear to her funeral. The lovely cashier told me to have a wonderful day. I remember fighting the urge to punch her in the face. My mother just died. And she wasn’t supposed to so I wasn’t sure how I was going to have a good day, good week, good month, good year, good life. Of course, I gave a weak smile, took my bag and left.

“I need my mother to come get me, to save me from the fast that my mother is dead.”

This is one of those gold nuggets I knew I felt in the earliest stages of grief but didn’t have words until I read this book. I prayed for this many times. It’s the only prayer that was never answered.

And then there’s….

“I miss my mother so much right now it’s loud inside me, like the worst thunder, the kind the shakes the windows, shoves the side of your house, makes you feel unsafe.”

It took two solid years and moving closer to family before I finally felt safe again. It’s a new experience for me. Only when I felt safe was I able to begin to heal.

I almost feel like this should be required reading for anyone who has lost something, especially unexpectedly. Grief is long and terrible and deep and painful and has its own timeline. You cannot rush it, push it, skip over it or wish it away. It is inevitable. It will let you know when it’s done with you. And those who’ve never lost someone cannot and will not ever understand this.

This book is deep and so very personal. And I’m so thankful to Ms. Glasgow for sharing it with the world and with me.

My rating: :star: :star: :star: :star: :star: