Saturday's Sayings - Thinking of Fathers Missed, and Grieving Fathers on Father's Day...

Saturday's Sayings

Thinking of Fathers Missed, and 

Grieving Fathers on Father's Day...

With love, to my precious father who is now in Heaven...

~~~~~

With love, 

to all the precious fathers who are now Grieving Fathers...

MY DAD IS A SURVIVOR

My dad is a survivor, too

which is no surprise to me.

He's always been like a lighthouse

that helps you cross a stormy sea.

But, I walk with my dad each day

to lift him when he's down.

I wipe the tears he hides from others.

He cries when no one's around.

I watch him sit up late at night

with my picture in his hand.

He cries as he tries to grieve alone,

and wishes he could understand.

My dad is like a tower of strength.

He's the greatest of them all!

But there are times when he needs to cry.

Please be there when he falls.

Hold his hand or pat his shoulder

And tell him it's okay.

Be his strength when he's sad

Help him mourn in his own way.

Now, as I watch over my precious dad

from the Heavens up above

I'm so proud that he's a survivor

And, I can still feel his love!

~ Kaye Des'Ormeaux (Written October 16, 1998 and dedicated to the dads who have lost a child.)

BROAD SHOULDERS

Strong and tall, with shoulders so broad,

bearing all that doesn’t come lightly.

Daddy lost his child today

and is sad and weary from the pain.

Being strong for all those around him,

giving a shoulder for them, on (which) to cry.

Smiling through a pain so strong,

finding it difficult and oh so long.

Wanting to weep, but showing a strength

that is constantly deep and ever solid.

Never knowing that a stray tear has escaped,

from the loving eyes full of pain.

Trusting that his family will be out of harm's way,

not able to save the life of his child.

He drowns in the heartache of memories past,

frowning with frustration of a life not saved.

Experiencing a pain that is so awfully deep,

it won't go away and he cannot sleep.

Waiting, waiting, waiting,

but not to return to his fold,

innocently left by his darling child.

Comforting the mother of his loved one true,

through the heartache, the pain and the searching.

She's yearning as much as he too,

shrouded by pain as deep as the ocean,

like waves crashing and pounding without an end.

Weeping in the arms of each other,

clutching tightly and grappling for fear of losing

all that is left of memories and goodness

found in the eyes of the child that was stolen by death.

Solace the feeling that lasts only a while,

Daddy is grateful for the time that he had.

Cannot accept his precious and kind child is gone,

praying and wishing for his return to his

Father that will love and miss him until the end of time.

Reeling from the darkness when times get bad,

Looking to the future living on a thread.

Feeling so helpless that he can't give the love of his life

the child that she lost to the universe of heaven.

Quietly grieving for the loss that he feels,

showing naught to others, while repressing the need

to shout and scream by pretending it's not real.

Frustration at the wild anger he keeps in check,

wanting it to stop to allow peace in his shattered heart.

Like a knife in his chest, so sharp like steel.

Hoping that it is a nightmare too terrible to be real.

Anger, hurt, pain, frustration, longing, sadness

Those are his feelings and thoughts everyday.

Wanting to touch his child who's so far away,

Never knowing when this will come to pass.

His arms are empty and light, wishing that he could

take flight to gather his child from deaths door.

Accepting forever the pain and heartache,

He will take to his grave.

Patiently waiting to meet again,

The child of his loins and rid himself of the pain.

Loving his family till the end of his days.

Not wanting to leave them, but part of him did the

day he said goodbye and scattered the ashes

of the loved one unique in his own special way.

Forever the Daddy to the others he'll be,

Not knowing when his time will be free,

To once again talk and reminisce with his

Child of the spirit life that he has lost.

~ Lesley Couzens, in loving memory of her son Leedon

HOW DO YOU?

How do you describe an empty heart

Or a mind that will not sleep?

How do you measure the depth of pain

Or the volume of tears that weep?

How do you find new direction

When life's compass has no reference points?

How do you energize listless limbs

With death's arthritic joints?

How do you see the future

Through a lens of opaque glass?

How do you reconcile her name

On a plaque of tarnished brass?

How do you rekindle interest

In a life that was complete?

How do you overcome loss and pain

And the desire for social retreat?

How do you explain to those you know

The pretense that you have to project?

How do you smile when expected to

But your facial muscles object?

How do you trust a God you once knew

Or the power of goodness and prayer?

How do you put your faith in his hands

When those hands threw the switch of despair?

How do you absorb the colors of Spring

Through eyes that see only black?

How do you control the endless pain

Of wishing she was back?

~ David T. Kerry

When a loss hits us,

we have not only the particular loss to mourn

but also the shattered beliefs and assumptions

of what life should be.

These life beliefs must be mourned separately.

Sometimes we must grieve for them first.

We can't grieve the loss if we are in the midst of

"It's not supposed to happen this way."

We intellectually know that bad things happen,

but to other people, not us,

and certainly not in the world we assumed we were living in.

Your belief system needs to heal and regroup as much as your soul does.

You must start to rebuild a new belief system from the foundation up,

one that has room for the realities of life

and still offers safety and hope for a different life:

a belief system that will ultimately have a beauty of its own

to be discovered with life and loss.

Think of a lifeless forest in which a small plant

pushes its head upward, out of the ruin.

In our grief process, we are moving into life from death,

without denying the devastation that came before.

~ Elisabeth Kübler-Ross and David Kessler

(On Grief and Grieving : Finding the Meaning of Grief Through the Five Stages of Loss)

"I don't think of him every day. I think of him every hour of every day." 

~ Grieving Father Gregory Peck, in an interview many years after his son's death

The famous psychiatrist Sigmund Freud once thought we could "move on" from our grief, and put our energies into a substitute of some sort… that is, until he lost his own daughter Anna. After that, he realized we Child-Loss parents will never get over the death of our child, as written to his friend in the above quote, recognizing that he himself, a Child-Loss father, would always be "inconsolable."

And, a Grieving Father's loving note 
to his child, now in Heaven...

Pictures and graphics, thanks to the following:

~Saatchi Online Artist Helena Eierzbicki, for acrylic painting of 2013, "Tormented"
~Grief The Unspoken
~I Miss Those Close To Me Who Are Now In Heaven As Beautiful Angels
~Out of the Ashes
~Journey of the Survivor (From Grief to Survival)
~Missing Loved Ones via ~Out of the Ashes
~In Loving Memory via ~WingsOfHopeLivingForward
~Grief The Unspoken
~The Social Butterfly
~Journey of the Survivor (From Grief to Survival)
~I Miss Those Close To Me Who Are Now In Heaven As Beautiful Angels
~Out of the Ashes
~The Far Side of the Rainbow
~The Far Side of the Rainbow
~The Far Side of the Rainbow
~The Far Side of the Rainbow
~The Far Side of the Rainbow
~Grief The Unspoken
~Out of the Ashes