Empty Bedroom

The devastation of losing a child never quite goes away.No matter how many years separate us from the tragedy, the heartache always looms, often returning in waves, to crush and paralyze us once more. Yet at some point in the sustained nightmare of grappling with the sense of pointlessness that accompanies inconsolable grief, something seems to click faintly inside: ever so slowly, and at first with great hesitation, we seem to stumble on a source of strength to embrace another day,and to broaden our horizon in order to find a slightly, perhaps even significantly, recalibrated purpose in the special occasion that's life. This improbable breakthrough, this renewed daring to see life as a special gift worth celebrating, despite our ever-painful awareness that it was snatched away from our own child, may well be the key to a process of healing. Grief forces us to question our values, priorities, and goals. It compels us to reevaluate our lives. After my son's death, I was gripped by confusion and doubt. I began to question my faith and sought solitude, deliberately disconnecting myself from the world. I had locked myself in complete despair. I thought there was no way out.Yet what I could not possibly fathom in that depth of despair was the fact that the human spirit is malleable to an inconceivable degree, with a built-in survival mechanism which can not only help us cope with adversity, but enable us to perceive a given situation through a fresh lens, in effect empowering us to transform our reality.It took time... I slowly but surely began to emerge from the darkness.The breakthrough, almost a Eureka moment, came in the form of the realization that in fact my hand had always been held by a universal power - that which we might call God; that which I knew to be God. God is everywhere. He is the universe. He is in the mountains I hike, the air I breathe, the people I say hello and goodbye to. He is in the things I don't see with my own eyes, in dimensions that the human mind cannot comprehend yet. He is the energy, love, and life force behind everything…from sunrise to sunset. The process of perceiving the world anew also had unexpected concomitants. In my dreams, my son showed me where he was affording me glimpses of what we might refer to as the afterlife. I know he is no longer in the material world, but I'm also certain that he is in a dimension we know nothing about. I am convinced of this because I was there with him. As significantly, there have been numerous instances where I have felt my son's presence in a form of energy that surrounds me. It has felt as though he was hugging me with his energy. I acknowledge and accept these experiences, given their indisputable realness, their palpability. I know they are my son's way of communicating and saying, "Here I am, mom, still around… giving you a sign that there is an afterlife and it is wonderful!"