Leaning into grief from my son's perspective

Philippians 4:8

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.


I received a facebook message from my son the other day. He said the trip has been tiring, but he was having a great time. He is in Orlando on his much anticipated band and choir tour. My son said to me that over the last couple of days he had been having 'flash backs' when the things he saw were places he remembers going to with his mom, myself and his sister Maria.  As soon as I saw that facebook message I sent one back reminding him that while he is there he is re-creating the memories of that place.

 Instead of it being a place to avoid because of the reminders of his grief over losing his sister Disney World becomes a place as the highlight of his Senior  year. Instead of never traveling back there  to avoid the pain of his loss he is choosing to control some the emotions of his loss by re-creating positive ones.

So often the response to a loss of someone close to us is to sell the home, move across town ( I heard from  a blog of one family moving across the country because they could not handle living in the city the loss occurred). This really illustrates that most people avoid going through the grief process by running from their grief.

I shared the story with my son about how I was able to create a new memory in a Panera's restaurant, It had been a place where our family of 4 ate all the time and where dad took his kids there for a special treat and conversation, but the year Maria passed away just driving by was hard to do much less getting out of the car and going into the place.  But after getting through the first couple of months of the shock of our loss I chose  to create a new memory of that place by actually stopping first thing each morning to have my devotions and write in my journal.  In time I was having good conversations with people who would stop by offering their condolences and their memory of our daughter.  It wasn't too long after that my family of 3 began stopping there for supper and having good conversations and enjoying the ambiance of the place.

I noticed that tonight my son and his band/choir will be performing a concert at the 'Give Kids the World Village. I watched some of the promo videos from the Give Kids the World site and tears flowed as I saw how this organization started. Briefly, it was started by a Alzwitz  concentration camp survivor who wanted to give back to children all the things he had stolen from him when he was a child. 

 Instead of spending his life in absolute misery and escaping his haunting memories he chose to provide a place where kids with disabilities and other health threatening illnesses can come to with their families for a fun time.  For just a brief period of time he wanted children to forget about their struggles so they can just be children and do what children do best which was to have fun.

My son is learning a valuable lesson on this trip which is to face the 'flash backs' and create new memories.  By doing so he is learning about places like 'Give Kids the World Village' and all the good things this place is doing in kids lives.