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the best question anyone could have asked
With laughter from the party still ringing in my ears, I headed toward the coat rack, hoping to grab my jacket and slip quietly away into the early evening cool to make it home before dark. But just as I reached the door, he turned and caught my eye. We smiled. Who can resist the…
READ MOREleaving behind limbo
I have two items on my to-do list that I can’t get done: Order gravestone. Buy car seat. Every week they stare back at me blankly from my planner. Five simple words. One phone call to make. One purchase to click. Every week I turn away. I can’t tackle either one. (Yet.) Both must get…
READ MORE5 favorite books on motherhood
This post contains affiliate links. May means Mother’s Day. I’ve written before about the complicated nature of this holiday (and the need to remember all kinds of mothers on Mother’s Day). But it remains a beautiful time to celebrate the women who have mothered us—and the mothers that many of us are becoming. In honor…
READ MOREwhat it means to outlive
On the morning of my 22nd birthday, I woke disoriented. It was no youthful hangover. Not the tiring drag of gazing out onto another gloomy day of Indiana grey. No. I felt strangely lost. Adrift and unmoored. I had outlived him. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Grief was woven into the fabric of…
READ MORE4 books on grief you’ll actually love
This post contains Amazon affiliate links. Trust me on these. I know, I know – I joke to my husband that over the past year, this blog morphed into “vaguely poetic reflections on life and death.” (I still scratch my head that anyone else wants to read along, but I’m so grateful you’re here!) But…
READ MOREwas it a holy week?
This week we remembered the anniversaries of Maggie and Abby’s births and deaths. As I journeyed through the three days, a brutal triduum, I began to see how deepest grief can take the shape of the paschal mystery. Dying and rising. As the first year after loss ends, I find myself turning toward new directions.…
READ MOREwhat love looks like now
I had just thrown up when the doorbell rang. I wiped my mouth clean and pulled the door open to let February chill rush inside. “Laura?” asked the stranger. “Have a good day.” He handed me a hulking bouquet, plastic wrapped against the wind. “Ooo, Mama!” chirped the small boy at my knees. “Those are…
READ MOREthe world is never ready
“How can you choose to have a child now?” She asked me honestly, the way a wise and good friend can. We’d spent half of dinner talking about how the world is spinning mad, careening out of control. And then she leaned over the table in flickering candlelight and asked me – me sitting there nauseous,…
READ MOREthe journey of the magi (one year)
‘A cold coming we had of it, Just the worst time of the year For a journey, and such a long journey: The ways deep and the weather sharp, The very dead of winter.’ One year ago was when everything started to go wrong with our twins. When the worst-case scenario became the present-day reality. When…
READ MOREthe homecoming
He stands at the top of the stairs, bare feet dancing in dinosaur pajamas. His bright eyes meet my own as I climb. His face beams with delight, blue stars flashing with brimming joy. MAMA! He shrieks with joy. MAMA! You are HERE! He tips his head backward, golden curls bouncing with glee. He laughs with bliss, bursts…
READ MOREwhat i learned from 2016
I planned on this post for year’s end. But I decided to share now. Because something tells me I’m not alone. 1. Grief is transformative. Loss is exhausting, unrelenting, unraveling. Every explosion of worst rushes to the surface, and you are forced to stare at the wreckage that is turned reality: hope evaporating, best-laid plans crumbling to…
READ MOREfor all our souls
We are the weird ones. We sign names of the dead on Christmas cards. We hang their photos on our walls. We count them in our family when strangers ask at the grocery store. We tattoo their memory on our skin. We know you may think this is strange. We are trying to tell you a…
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