As some of you know, I lost my son, Andrew, 3 years ago... just 10 days after he turned 18. It's never easy to lose a child but there's something about losing a teenager- just when their life is supposed to be starting, like a flower bud that's just starting to open...to become that thing of beauty and potential. In the blink of an eye, he was gone and I'll never know what he was truly meant to be in this life.
It's been a tough couple of years but at the beginning of 2011, I started to see a glimmer of hope. A little slice of light at the end of a very dark tunnel. It has been a crazy year yet one filled with new friendships, stronger old friendships and well, just HOPE. Hope that things really do get better, hope that one day we'll find a cure for that life robbing thing we call cancer.
I feel that God really speaks to me through music. One song that spoke to me enough that I felt it was a turning point in my healing is this one... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZhQOvvV45w
I don't really even know what the song is about but it's catchy. Then I really started to listen to the chorus. When the chorus finally sunk in, I was mad! What's so good about this life? How can life be good anymore? It was then that God spoke to me. He let me know that I needed to MAKE it good. I needed to find ways to honor my son's memory by living...really living. For 2 1/2 years, I did what I had to do, what was expected of me, enough so that people wouldn't worry about me but there was little happiness in it.
Now, I'm crafting and sewing and blogging (irregularly). haha
It's only through God's strength that I'm here today. I can look back and see, like the Footprints poem, how He carried me through those tough times and walks beside me now. In His strength, I can focus on helping others and bringing love and care into their lives using the gifts that He gave me.
It's not that I'm "over" the loss of Andrew. Of course, I still miss him but instead of focusing on the fact that he's not here, I can focus on the day when I'll see him again. I still cry, I still ache but I'm also REALLY living! All glory be to God! Amen...
