There are times in this grief journey where I just want it to stop. I can’t go on with the pain. Just when it eases a bit and we get a tiny glimpse of normal life, something is triggered and we are back into the deep end of it. The memories, the flashbacks, the guilt, the missing, the mourning. It becomes unbearable. This week has been one of those weeks. Unbearable. This time the trigger was Father’s Day and the 5 month anniversary of Mikail’s death. The past three days I’ve needed to retreat to try and get a hold of myself again. I find this is helpful (as long as I don’t allow myself to retreat for more than a few days) although confusing to those around me, I’m sure.

I’ve been telling myself to keep on keeping on. To embrace the sadness, but allow the joy to fill me too. I loved how Jason approached Father’s Day. He said he was sad, but no more sad than any other day. Every day is hard, really hard and it’s still really hard on Father’s Day. When I asked him how he was doing, he looked at me and said something to the effect of ‘We have Olivia with us and she brings us so much joy and we need to enjoy every moment we have with her because she is here WITH us. I’m her Daddy and today is Father’s Day, so I celebrate that. I’m also Mikail’s Daddy and one day he will be in my arms again and we will celebrate then. The sadness of missing him is no worse today than yesterday, or tomorrow. It is deep and it hurts. Every day.” The perfect example of keeping on keeping on.

We’ve been thrown a huge curve ball, but God wants us to finish well and not quit. We’ve got to keep on keeping on.