July 11, 1985
Using Pain to
Heal
On July 11,
1985, my six-year-old daughter Alexa fell from a tree in her babysitter's
backyard. She had a spontaneous brain hemorrhage while in the tree. It turned
out the hemorrhage was from a malignant brain tumor. After sixteen months of
treatment, our darling child died on November 2, 1986. For those of us who have
experienced the deep sting of child loss—or any loss—anniversaries bring forth intense
feelings and memories. It's important for our continued healing to mark those
days, painful though they may be. They are part of our journey toward wholeness
and finding joy in life.
July 11, 2019.
It's been thirty-four years since July 11, 1985. That's so long. It's a
lifetime. It's more than a generation.
I still remember
what I wore that day: white pants and a sleeveless dark blue silk blouse. I
dressed well because Alexa had her gifted testing that morning and I had taken
her to school.
Her IQ tested
at 133—with a brain tumor mashing against everything.
It's still so
unfair. It will always be unfair. But it doesn't change.
It crushes me
and it's so hard to write these words because I want to avoid these feelings. I
want to put my pen down, get up, and run—outside, to the kitchen, to the
computer. Or pick up my phone. Or fill my empty coffee cup. I don't. Instead, I
push myself down and remain seated and continue the flow of words across the
lines and filling the page. These many years later, I know that running doesn't
help. It doesn't ease the pain. It doesn't change the arc of life and
experience—the experience that continues to call to me saying, “Here I am. I am
your pain. The only way to hold me and not let me crush you is to use me to
heal yourself first and then use me to help heal others.” In a small voice, I
accept with tears in my eyes. I say, “Okay. Show me the way to hold someone
else in their sorrow today and every day.”
For me, that
is the only value to grief . . . to hold others in their pain and help heal
their sorrow.
