Living in the shadow

One thing I realized and am starting to come to term with is that when you lose a child, you will forever live in the shadow of grief. No matter how much light and positive I have in my life, they are forever shadowed with this sense of darkness. I often feel guilty about not being able to allow the positive bright lights to overshadow the darkness because it keeps me from being fully present, engaging at attentive at times to the ones I love and are the lights of my life.

Since Rachel died in September 2016, it has been life changing and aside from losing my daughter, I had to define, rather define myself. Although it has been a brutal time, I have to say I have had happiness, which was a relief that I can feel this again, but still, I always have the heaviness and shadow lurking in the background.

The goods things are worth mentioning, it’s important to recognize and acknowledge both the positive and negative things in your life, to assist with keeping some kind of homeostasis. Since Rachel passed, I met, who I consider to be the love of my life. I must say that I truly felt my  daughter, Rachel sent this man to me. The intense love I feel for him is a constant reminder that I am still very much alive, even if part of me died on that day. My kids are doing better, they still miss her tremendously, but being kids they are more resilient and can adjust to even the worse of things. Another thing I am so grateful for is my family. I have an amazing family, without them I don’t know where I would be today.

I spent 46 years living my life, gradually growing and gaining things such as my independence, education, my own family, a sense of self etc… and now I am forced to live with losing something/someone that I created, loved and cherished. I was forced to live incomplete, part of me is missing and nothing will or can replace it. One thing that gives me a sense of peace is that my daughter and I were very much connected here on earth and I feel we are still very much connected in a beautiful manner.