Midnight Memories

 It has been nearly three months since my mom left this earth, but tonight of all nights, I cannot sleep. 

Grief is unpredictable. It sneaks up on you when you least expect it, even in the middle of the night—maybe especially in the middle of the night.

Earlier in the evening, I was reading a book where a character was wearing a fentanyl patch, and as I lie there thinking about it, I suddenly remember that my mom had worn a fentanyl patch to ease her pain in the days before her surgery—a fact that has managed to slip my mind these past few months. But now, the memory comes tumbling back, and I think I understand for maybe the first time what it means to be “triggered.”

Because, from there, my mind is gone—reeling down a rabbit hole, and I am back in the hospital room, back in the ICU where she was after surgery and I’m wondering why they didn’t give her a fentanyl patch then, when she was in so much pain. 

I am back spending the night in that recliner next to her bed, outfitted with sweatpants and slippers and my sleep machine and a scratchy, beige hospital-issued blanket, being awakened by Mom’s sweet little Middle Eastern nurse, tiptoeing in to check on her breathing. I am feeling the urge to pee, but the public restroom is down the hall and on another wing, so I kick off my slippers and don my sandals for a 2 am adventure past the beeping machines, past the nurse’s station, and through the hospital. I will do this again in four hours to brush my teeth and make myself presentable for the day. 

I am back in Mom’s room again, looking out at the 100-degree world, noticing that the view of tall buildings and sprawling oak trees changes depending on the time of day and where the sun is casting its shadows. I’ve memorized this view so that I can see it even now as I lie here in the dark. It’s imprinted on my memory forever. 

I am back there, using context clues to parse that Mom’s next-door neighbor in the ICU has passed away suddenly, and there is a hubbub outside our door with tight-lipped nurses and hospital management parading through. But by afternoon, the bed has been stripped and changed and is ready for the next patient. The nurses never utter a word about it, and I am struck by how much death they witness every day. 

I am back there with my mom, making small talk with one of our favorite nurses (named Kayla? I can’t remember), as she shares her plans to go wedding dress shopping on her day off. We will never see her again (Mom will be moved to hospice before Kayla’s next shift), and I wonder now if she ever found her wedding dress and whether she is married now. And I wonder if nurses ever find out what happens to their patients on their day off—if they ever find out that the person they cared for ended up dying that week. 

I am back there with my mom, and we are laughing together at how the drugs make her loopy and say funny things. And then it’s right before surgery and she is trying to sign consent forms but having trouble holding the pen. So I take her hand and guide it in the scrawl of her signature. And we giggle as we do it. Moments later, the anesthesia has already kicked in and put her to blessed sleep. 

I am back in the waiting room, and I remember how the 8th floor waiting room is quieter and cleaner and cooler than the 7th floor waiting room (where it’s always 80 degrees and people move chairs together and lie across them). Nobody seems to know about the 8th floor waiting room; it’s like it’s our family’s little secret. But I am in the waiting room when my dad calls and says the doctor wants to talk to us, and so I take the elevator down a floor and rush down the hallway. Dad is standing at the nurse’s station with a Nigerian doctor who is gently suggesting in hushed tones that we start thinking about a DNR order and end-of-life palliative care. And I can’t believe that this is where we are. 

I am back there in her room, taking every opportunity to hold my mom’s lovely hand, memorizing every wrinkle, every mole, the color and texture of her skin. She is asking me to adjust her legs, and I do so, but then I rub her feet too—just older versions of my own. And it doesn’t seem real that there may be a day very soon when these hands and feet are still—that this physical body may expire. 

I am back there on the day that they tell us there is no treatment available and that there’s nothing they can do. After the doctor leaves, I ask her if she understands what they’ve said—what’s happening—and she answers (although a little bit gruffly) “yes.” I swallow hard and tell her that we are still asking God for a miracle, but that she may be with Jesus very soon. My voice breaks, and yet seeing her in this kind of pain and agony, I know that going to be with Jesus will be best. 

Now, in the present, it is 12:30 in the morning, and tears are streaming down my cheeks and soaking my pillow, the memories of three months ago still fresh and keeping me from the sweetness of sleep. There’s no stopping the barrage of thoughts chipping away at my brain; one memory flows right into another. It’s like the word “fentanyl” is a key to unleashing the memories from where they’ve been buried in a safe room, deep within my mind. 

And memories are fine—in their right time and place. But this isn’t it. 

“Jesus!” I cry out silently. “Please help me now. Give me peace!”

And He speaks to me in quietness, so that I know He’s reassuring my spirit: 

“She’s with Me.

She’s with Me.

She’s with Me.

She’s Mine.”

And I know that she is. 

I picture my sweet mama right there next to Jesus, staying in His shadow. 

“I am my Beloved’s and He is mine. His banner over me is love.” 

And I know in my heart that, after all she suffered at the end of her earthly life, her passing was actually God’s mercy. 

And there’s no place she’d rather be.

***

“So be truly glad, there is wonderful joy ahead.” — 1 Peter 1:6 

Adventures in Empty-Nesting

It got harder, and then it got easier. 

Ryley is now in her second semester of her sophomore year, which means she is already nearing the half-way mark of her undergrad experience. This school year has been markedly better than the last, as she's finally getting into her groove as a college student and (literally) living her best life. She has a gaggle of friends who are just as bubbly and crazy as she, and she has a wide array of interests, as seen by her ever-changing major (currently English Lit with minors in History and Linguistics, with sights set on law school). She juggles her classes with a job at the campus museum and, soon, a job at Starbucks, where she just got hired. But she's still a sophomore, so she is not super-stressed about any of it, and she also knows everything there is to know about the world, obviously. 😉

A year ago, I became so depressed after her January return to school following Christmas break that I cried more than I did in the days after I dropped her off the previous August. This year, however, it was easier. August was easier; January was easier. I'm still sad to see her drive away each time (we gave her our second vehicle last February), but it is so rewarding to see her becoming the independent, self-assured person she is meant to be. 

As the months pass, I become increasingly aware that we are simply a home base for her now. She will never again be happy living with us long-term. So then, her visits are "treats," instead of the norm.

Whenever she's on her way home, I find myself spiffing up the house (as if she wasn’t the reason our house was trashed for the last 19 years!). I want it to be a place she likes to return to—a place where she feels comfortable, even though she didn't grow up here. From a fabulously hot summer to our cozy holiday breaks, we've lived up every moment we've gotten to spend with her. Because we know what it is to live without her, we drink up her youth and enthusiasm, her hugs, her joy, her love. We relish in it, feast on it, indulge in it, knowing it won’t last forever.

Actually, her return to home is not always easy on me at first—me, who has gotten used to having Ryan’s ear all to myself. Suddenly, I find myself at war with this freckle-faced gal in the backseat, yammering on as she’s done all of her life. How quickly I'd forgotten! She’s my competition. She and Ryan gang up on me; but she and I gang up on Ryan, too. There’s an ebb and flow of conversation, teasing, nagging, and always, always, trash piling up throughout the house, undoing all the spiffing-up I did before she came!

And when she leaves again, we ease back into our routine without her, and it's (gulp) not as hard as I thought. Not anymore.

They said this would happen, and I believed them—but I also didn't believe them—because obviously I love my child so much more than they love theirs! 😉 But it's true; life continues on. In the same way our bodies are adapting to no longer think 83 degrees is all that hot, we find ourselves adapting to our new normal without her.

*** 

In the midst of a personal trial I was going through, and because I needed to make friends in our new town, I did something I’d never done before: I joined a Bible study.

I know, I know. I was never a “Bible study person.”

It’s not that I thought I was too good for Bible studies? But maybe I did think that, deep down. Maybe I’d felt like my relationship with God and my spiritual knowledge were above the need to sit in a circle with other ladies and discuss. Maybe I had some (dare I say it?) spiritual pride.

But desperation will make you do some crazy things. And you can’t expect a different outcome without changing some of your habits, right? 

And when I tell you that this Bible study was transformative for me … that it opened up my eyes to dimensions of Jesus that I had been blinded to before … It was exactly what I needed at a time when I was crying out internally for divine intervention and guidance.

I think a lot of us were raised with a two-dimensional gospel—one of flannel graphs and recitations and stories you knew … but maybe you didn’t really KNOW. And then one day, you got to thinking about 2,000+ years of Christendom and how, if people were willing to be persecuted and die for their faith, if Christianity had survived through the dark ages and over all the centuries, then those Christians who carried the gospel through that darkness must have known something you don’t know. There must be more to it than your hazy, two-dimensional understanding. It must be more powerful and more glorious and real, or surely the light would have died out at some point. They must have experienced something you hadn’t yet experienced—not necessarily because you didn’t believe, but because, in your experience and understanding, there seemed to be a neat little box around your faith—four walls and a limit to its capabilities.

But if God exists, then God is infinite—or else He wouldn’t be God. What use is a limited God?

And if He is infinite, then the potential to know Him is infinite. There will always be more of Him to learn and to know.

So, desperate as I was, based on these flailing thoughts and that assumption, I asked Him to show me more of Himself.

Over the next couple of months, it’s like the veil over my eyes was lifted, and suddenly I saw the truth in three dimensions and even four (if there is such a thing), and my faith came alive. There had been some major gaps in my understanding. I’ve needed context and answers, and I was finally getting them. There were actually answers and explanations to some of my biggest questions!

I started reading more scholarly apologetics-type writings, which hit me differently than typical topical sermons. Preaching has its place, absolutely, but I wasn’t lacking good preaching. I needed something more. In my readings, I learned that there was a method and a structure and a plan to each of the gospels. Nothing was willy-nilly. I soaked up what other ladies said in our Bible study discussions and gleaned from their learning, too. I dove into the Bible and listened to commentaries to help further my understanding of certain passages.

I wasn’t looking at a felt board anymore; I was seeing layers and meaning and purpose and an overall story arc and theme written by an infinite God who was good and whose principles were consistent and orderly and true.

And because He is infinite, our relationship with Him has infinite depth and potential. It’s just based on our willingness to open ourselves up to that (which, honestly, I found a little scary).

Privately, I wondered why nobody had made it clear to me that there’s a difference between the flannel graph and true life in Christ. But then I began to wonder (somewhat pridefully) if maybe THEY didn’t know either. Maybe they were content to live out the humdrum of a flannel-graphy, two-dimensional, legalistic version of Christianity.

Did I just stumble across something here? I thought. Is it possible that I’m the only one God has shown this to?

Stupid spiritual pride! Ha! I can be so dumb. But I share that just to show you how vast the difference was between the two-dimensional belief and the three-dimensional belief. It was so eye-opening that I wondered how I hadn’t known such a difference existed! 

And then, suddenly, the person that was kind of the “crazy” happy Christian at church? They didn’t seem so crazy anymore. They’d been living the truth, while I’d been quietly judging them for their eccentricity and excitement. I obviously wasn’t the first that God had revealed His infinity to. But each person has to come to understand the truth of Jesus on their own. And because of my growth in the last year, in case you’re in the same place I was, I want you to know that it IS out there. There are more dimensions and levels and layers.

And the devil is working every day to make sure we don’t experience it.

I look back at our lives in Colorado, and I feel like I just floated through my 30s in a haze—in survival mode. Sometimes I get down on myself for the clarity I’m having now that I never had before. Like, why did I never have these thoughts? How much time did I waste just skirting through my life? Well, I hadn’t asked Him to show me Himself—not like I did most recently anyway.

When I look at coworkers’ LinkedIn accounts, I’m a little envious, realizing that at my age or younger, everyone is so much more accomplished in their lives — so smart. I do feel behind. Yet, I know that God was there in those years, in that cloud of mere existence. He was teaching me, and I was learning where I was, even if it doesn’t seem particularly profound now. It was profound to me then.

But now I have a hunger to be better, to care for myself, to grow in Jesus. So, in addition to the Bible study, I joined another support group, a book club, and a monthly bunco group in my neighborhood. I’m committed to reading more, to writing more, to doing a daily devotional reading, to making friends and reaching out. I’m hopelessly awkward in situations where I feel like an outsider, so it all takes time and a little bit of bravery.

In all of this, I came to the realization that one of my biggest hang-ups has always been anxiety and a fear of internal pain and suffering—of loss.

I think it started when my uncle was killed in a car accident when I was 11, and it continued when my best friend’s mom was killed in a car accident when we were 16. I became deeply afraid of losing people I loved, and the devil used that fear as a weapon against me for more than half my life. The war between the desire for a pain-free existence and my inner anxiety of imminent pain was brewing within me for years. I still occasionally struggle with the gnawing feeling of impending doom and gloom.

I had to be willing to do some inner work to dig all that out.

I had erred by operating under the assumption that I shouldn’t have pain in this life. And I had some pretty high expectations that were dashed quite low. The truth is, there is no avoidance of pain, whatever that word looks like to each of us.

The prosperity gospel misses the mark on this. It’s taught us to believe that we are entitled to a life of abundance—without pain and suffering. But it’s simply not true. Life is filled with pain. And Jesus wants to show us his abundance of peace in the midst of a storm—His abundance of spiritual life, as opposed to spiritual death. He wants to show us that His yoke is easy, and His burden is light.

“I wish that you prosper and be in health, as your soul prospers,” John wrote.

The given there is that our soul is already prospering in Jesus. Anything above that is just gravy.

So, that’s where I’m at. I’m still working at digging out all the anxieties and this limited two-dimensional mindset about God, letting Him do what He wants to do in me. And because He is infinitely good and I am inherently flawed, there will always be more work He can do.

I guess my point is this: sometimes when you’re happily empty-nesting, God will decide to disrupt your little nest with some intense soul-searching. And you’ll finally have to deal with some of the deep-seated issues that have been plaguing you for the last two decades! Because, without the incessant mess and noise that comes along with kids, you finally have the time to think. 😉

Here’s to our souls prospering in Jesus! 😘