Time.--- the Great Un Healer.
Without Prejudice
The counsellors I had for Grief Counselling after Lauren died told me many things in the longed for visits I had with them. Sometimes I had to drag myself there, not wanting to deal with reality, but I knew I had to if I was ever going to go on. One of the things they told me was
"Time heals nothing"
It was a myth.... that grief gets harder,
not easier with time but becomes more private.
That if someone was still crying in public twelve months later, they would be as counsellors very concerned. I rang up Compassionate Friends on Laurens first Anniversary, begging for help and they told me to come to one of their meetings in Camberwell and I did.
Finally meeting people just like me who had lost a child. It was awful and sad and despairing and I asked the question of others outside in the hall on a break, had they also had a premonition of their childs death and all of them had.
One lady was walking down the road, her son in a pusher, and an elderly man had a heart attack at the wheel of his car and crossed four lanes of traffic, careening out of control and struck the pusher, killing her son in front of her. Just before it happened, an unbidden thought had come into her mind,
"I will never walk down this road after Robbie is dead"
Just like that!
My thought on Lauren had been, when she bought me me in a big bunch of flowers about a month before she died,
"Lauren, you are too good, too innocent, to survive this world, you are not going to survive"
And I had ignored that unbidden thought as well.
Another lady had a four year old son and a two year old son, who she said was like a "Golden child". When she took him out of the bath, she said, he just "glowed". She had the same thought as me, he was too good for this world. Shortly after she took the 4 year old to a kids birthday and she stayed, not knowing the people that well.
And her two year old went missing and trying not to panic she asked the other people at the party had they seen her son? She ran out into the road and heard a scream like no other from behind her and ran back. There was an old spa bath covered in branches, hidden in the back garden and her "golden child" was found face down in the dirty water, dead, within minutes of his disappearance.
Another woman had left her teenagers in charge while she went upstairs to have a shower and her also 'golden child" also 2 years old, had ventured out to the swimming pool and wandered straight in as someone had left the pool gate propped open with a chair, and the Teens weren't watching him, thinking he was safe. A little boy, born so many years after the others. She said that her little boy was the most loving sweet child, he had a glow about him too. and her marriage had not survived the terrible accident. Neither had mine and neither had any of the others.
They encouraged me to bring Lauren's siblings to a special meeting and the only one that would come was Debbie. We stood around all of us that were there, drinking tea and talking, we all had name badges on with the name of our children who had died and their ages when they died. Debbie started to chatting to one lady telling her of Lauren and Deb had thought the only thing worse than what we were going through was Murder.
And the lady responded to Debbie's query about the two names on her name tag. She was bright and smiling and Debbie, dull eyed asked her about her loss. her daughter had been murdered by her boyfriend, shot in the head at point blank range and she was pregnant with her first child, the lady's first grandchild, a girl.
The lady and her husband had had to fly to Queensland where her daughter had moved to with the boyfriend who they didn't like, but accepted for their daughters sake, claim the body and fly home with her. Then had to fly back a gain a year later when his trial was held. Sitting in the court and listening to the evidence, he was jailed, but is probably out by now.
Deb was crying by the time we left and I knew I couldn't take her anymore, she was too affected, but she was amazed at the woman's bravery, smiling and greeting people with warmth and happy greetings, while inside her heart must have been breaking, tearing, two children gone, senselessly, needlessly.
And I decided I would become that woman. I could no longer help Lauren but I was determined to help others, if that woman who had lost 2 children could smile and be happy in spite of tragedy, I would too.
I went for about twelve months to the meetings and then I could do it no more, sit around and talk about my dead child and they theirs, it was too sad and I felt unproductive. It wasn't helping me. I needed to "do" something, reach some goal, anything to help me and others, there had to be something.
And the counsellors were right, time heals nothing. It's still there, the grief, I call it the "Monster", it comes to "get" me every so often. If I'm driving I pull over not wanting to hurt others with my driving while my heart breaks. And I wait for it to pass. One time screaming at her,
"Why??????"
Why did she go to a pool at night, did she know that she was going to hurt us for the rest of our lives and I raged at her and called her stupid and selfish and every other name I could think of, hating her for doing this to us. Hating her for leaving us here and wanting to be with her, so hating and angry I was and wanting to die, just from the pain.
And I still had to get back in the traffic and drive home and I didn't want to. But the counsellors had told me I would get angry and I was, furious, ranting and sobbing, but I had to be careful not to take it out on others. Innocent people, who were just driving home to family home and hearth and I was driving to nowhere.
They also told me my ultimate goal was acceptance, and I thought they were crazy people, telling me I would find a reason for her being born and for her dying.
"Nut jobs", I thought
There was numbness and anger and pining and bargaining with God and rage, towering rage and it never got better until lying in the bath one night, it hit me,
" I hadn't taken her there to that pool. she had walked there with Tanya"
"She had walked there and had wanted to go and had wanted to get in and swim"
It was a childish dare that had gone terribly wrong.
And I was not to blame, which is exactly what I had been doing, blaming myself. And if that was some sort of acceptance then, I would be OK. I would from then on try to do my best at everything, because my child jumped off the edge of the world, one day.and she was beautiful, and I had to make sense of that, absorb it, and go on living for my other girls
To Be Continued
love Janette
The counsellors I had for Grief Counselling after Lauren died told me many things in the longed for visits I had with them. Sometimes I had to drag myself there, not wanting to deal with reality, but I knew I had to if I was ever going to go on. One of the things they told me was
"Time heals nothing"
It was a myth.... that grief gets harder,
not easier with time but becomes more private.
That if someone was still crying in public twelve months later, they would be as counsellors very concerned. I rang up Compassionate Friends on Laurens first Anniversary, begging for help and they told me to come to one of their meetings in Camberwell and I did.
Finally meeting people just like me who had lost a child. It was awful and sad and despairing and I asked the question of others outside in the hall on a break, had they also had a premonition of their childs death and all of them had.
One lady was walking down the road, her son in a pusher, and an elderly man had a heart attack at the wheel of his car and crossed four lanes of traffic, careening out of control and struck the pusher, killing her son in front of her. Just before it happened, an unbidden thought had come into her mind,
"I will never walk down this road after Robbie is dead"
Just like that!
My thought on Lauren had been, when she bought me me in a big bunch of flowers about a month before she died,
"Lauren, you are too good, too innocent, to survive this world, you are not going to survive"
And I had ignored that unbidden thought as well.
Another lady had a four year old son and a two year old son, who she said was like a "Golden child". When she took him out of the bath, she said, he just "glowed". She had the same thought as me, he was too good for this world. Shortly after she took the 4 year old to a kids birthday and she stayed, not knowing the people that well.
And her two year old went missing and trying not to panic she asked the other people at the party had they seen her son? She ran out into the road and heard a scream like no other from behind her and ran back. There was an old spa bath covered in branches, hidden in the back garden and her "golden child" was found face down in the dirty water, dead, within minutes of his disappearance.
Another woman had left her teenagers in charge while she went upstairs to have a shower and her also 'golden child" also 2 years old, had ventured out to the swimming pool and wandered straight in as someone had left the pool gate propped open with a chair, and the Teens weren't watching him, thinking he was safe. A little boy, born so many years after the others. She said that her little boy was the most loving sweet child, he had a glow about him too. and her marriage had not survived the terrible accident. Neither had mine and neither had any of the others.
They encouraged me to bring Lauren's siblings to a special meeting and the only one that would come was Debbie. We stood around all of us that were there, drinking tea and talking, we all had name badges on with the name of our children who had died and their ages when they died. Debbie started to chatting to one lady telling her of Lauren and Deb had thought the only thing worse than what we were going through was Murder.
And the lady responded to Debbie's query about the two names on her name tag. She was bright and smiling and Debbie, dull eyed asked her about her loss. her daughter had been murdered by her boyfriend, shot in the head at point blank range and she was pregnant with her first child, the lady's first grandchild, a girl.
The lady and her husband had had to fly to Queensland where her daughter had moved to with the boyfriend who they didn't like, but accepted for their daughters sake, claim the body and fly home with her. Then had to fly back a gain a year later when his trial was held. Sitting in the court and listening to the evidence, he was jailed, but is probably out by now.
Deb was crying by the time we left and I knew I couldn't take her anymore, she was too affected, but she was amazed at the woman's bravery, smiling and greeting people with warmth and happy greetings, while inside her heart must have been breaking, tearing, two children gone, senselessly, needlessly.
And I decided I would become that woman. I could no longer help Lauren but I was determined to help others, if that woman who had lost 2 children could smile and be happy in spite of tragedy, I would too.
I went for about twelve months to the meetings and then I could do it no more, sit around and talk about my dead child and they theirs, it was too sad and I felt unproductive. It wasn't helping me. I needed to "do" something, reach some goal, anything to help me and others, there had to be something.
And the counsellors were right, time heals nothing. It's still there, the grief, I call it the "Monster", it comes to "get" me every so often. If I'm driving I pull over not wanting to hurt others with my driving while my heart breaks. And I wait for it to pass. One time screaming at her,
"Why??????"
Why did she go to a pool at night, did she know that she was going to hurt us for the rest of our lives and I raged at her and called her stupid and selfish and every other name I could think of, hating her for doing this to us. Hating her for leaving us here and wanting to be with her, so hating and angry I was and wanting to die, just from the pain.
And I still had to get back in the traffic and drive home and I didn't want to. But the counsellors had told me I would get angry and I was, furious, ranting and sobbing, but I had to be careful not to take it out on others. Innocent people, who were just driving home to family home and hearth and I was driving to nowhere.
They also told me my ultimate goal was acceptance, and I thought they were crazy people, telling me I would find a reason for her being born and for her dying.
"Nut jobs", I thought
There was numbness and anger and pining and bargaining with God and rage, towering rage and it never got better until lying in the bath one night, it hit me,
" I hadn't taken her there to that pool. she had walked there with Tanya"
"She had walked there and had wanted to go and had wanted to get in and swim"
It was a childish dare that had gone terribly wrong.
And I was not to blame, which is exactly what I had been doing, blaming myself. And if that was some sort of acceptance then, I would be OK. I would from then on try to do my best at everything, because my child jumped off the edge of the world, one day.and she was beautiful, and I had to make sense of that, absorb it, and go on living for my other girls
To Be Continued
love Janette
