Evans Daily Griefing

I’ve wanted to do a pride post for a while, but I didn’t want it to be political or controversial. That’s not the purpose of my blog. My blog has always been a place for me to share my experience with grief. So, here goes a part I haven’t talked much about. Ever since losing Luke, I can’t stop looking up at the sky. I’m mesmerized by the clouds, stars, the moon and anything that’s up there. I could sit and stare at them for hours. Sometimes I wonder if my boy is up there. Heaven seems so far away. Grief changes everything. You look at everything a little differently. Clouds and stars have always been there, but I look at them with longing now, with an appreciation and wonder I didn’t have before. Their meaning has changed for me. It’s more personal now. I have a small decorative wood sign that sits on my mantle that says “Never stop chasing rainbows.” I love it because to me it speaks to following your dreams, finding happiness, and living life with joy and passion. I love that m...

This week marks another anniversary, four years. I’ve been a little depressed about it. Every year that goes by is another year that we have not seen Luke, talked to him, had him physically in our presence. Time does not fix that. In fact, it makes it more sad to me.  So, I went for a run this week. I use the word run somewhat loosely. It’s more of a light jog. But I do a lot of thinking when I run. I find it an excellent, though somewhat torturous, way to clear my mind and sort my thoughts. Sometimes I plan what I want to think about or work through, and other times I have no agenda and my thoughts just lead me along. Either way, I usually end up feeling better and more enlightened as a result. Sometimes I just feel like I could pass out. Is this the runner's high people talk about? 😉 My run this week was different. I started thinking about all we have experienced this year. It was an eventful year with lots of life changes and milestones. I just started talking to Luke about it...

      I had occasion recently to share with someone a family tradition we’ve had for many years. It started because one year my children seemed to get passed over for every award at their school awards ceremony and it was hard to see their disappointment after working so hard and wanting to be recognized with their peers. We decided to hold our own family awards ceremony that year and give our children awards we felt they deserved. It was a huge success and it became an annual tradition. We try to be creative with the names of the awards to make it fun, but it’s always something positive, a quality or an achievement, that we have seen in them that year. Last year Ryan got the “So Saxy Award” for his awesome skills on the saxophone and Bryn got the “Mona Lisa Award” for her art. We haven’t come up with the awards for this year yet.  My daughter Bryn graduated high school yesterday. I sat there with a million emotions and quite a few tears as I reflected on what her hi...

Early in my grief journey as I connected more with other parents who had lost children, I started noticing the word Forever followed by the age the child was when they died. “My sweet little Jacob, forever 13.” Or, “Megan’s Mom, forever 21.” It didn’t make much sense to me. I didn’t think of Luke being stuck in time forever. I thought of him as moving on to the next phase, being in heaven, progressing. The concept of him being forever 17 was foreign to me and didn’t resonate.  Fast forward a few months to the spring of 2020 and his friends were graduating high school. I started getting graduation announcements from his peers. I saw lots of facebook posts about college plans and mission trips and life after high school. It made me a little sad, but I still felt like Luke was part of it all. We went to the graduation ceremony and were honored when his name was called with his classmates. We got a diploma for him because he had earned enough credits to graduate. He was still getting ...

  They’re just as mysterious as triggers—you never know when you will get one and you can’t predict what they will be. They’re like little drops of water in the desert of grief. Whenever and however they come, they are precious. I am talking about signs and I’ve been lucky to have experienced several since Luke has passed.  Some signs are subtle, like a cloud or a bird or a gust of wind, and others are more obvious like seeing him in my dreams. Some feel like they’re directly from Luke and others feel like they’re from God telling me it’s going to be ok. Sometimes I can’t tell the difference, but I just know it’s significant and it brings me comfort.  I will share some of the signs I’ve experienced on this journey so far.  Dreams are my favorite. I don’t know why some people get dreams of their loved ones and others don’t. I feel lucky that I’ve had multiple dreams with Luke in them and while I won’t take the time to write about every one, there are some things in co...

People have asked me how often I think of Luke. The short answer is all the time. On a typical day, I encounter so many reminders of him. In our house, we have pictures of him, his cello, the piano, and a whole curio cabinet full of gifts and mementos from the funeral. We still have the car he drove. Every time I go to Walmart and check out, I think of when he used to work there as a cashier. I drive around town and am flooded with memories of places we have been or experiences we had with him. Facebook memories often come up with him in them, not to mention the many photos of Luke on my camera roll on my phone. He was part of our life for 17 years. The memories are everywhere. Sometimes they make me sad. Sometimes they are a comfort and I relish them.  Occasionally, however, I come across something that unexpectedly elicits an enormous emotional response. When these moments hit us out of nowhere like a rogue wave, we call this a grief trigger. I don’t have them frequently, but whe...