Surviving a Child's Suicide - Some Truth at Four Years and Eight Months

I've noticed several visitors recently showing up via "child's suicide" searches, so I thought I'd give a brief report, in case it's of hope/help to anyone.  Of course, Josh's death has been much on my mind since it occurred while I was on retreat in September of 2008.  I am grateful for the days of silence and prayer, but they are not peaceful days for me.

 

In summary:

 

Overall, I feel pretty normal most of the time.  This is a fairly new and unexpected dedvelopment.  "Normal" encompasses some things it didn't used to, but I seem to have fairly typical reactions to most events and conversations, at least on the surface. I can work; I can engage in some fairly intense conversation and reading and writing; and I can sort through photographs and videos without trauma.

 

I still tire easily.  I still have trouble with short-term memory.  Much of the 2008-2010 period  is gone.  Some of that may, of course, be due to impending Birthday 60.  But I tend to think the majority of it is due to my mind being cluttered with things it should not contain. 

 

Flashbacks?  Oh, yeah.  If you are telling me about a recent trip to Chicago, or Yellowstone, or France, I am not seeing what you are seeing.  But I can live with it.  And I am trying  intentionally to replace the horrific memories with lovely, joyful substitutes.  

 

Some of the things I do for my work?  Let's just say the word: Dissociation.  I have a good time; I feel joy for the people who are getting married (by me), or whose baby is being baptized (by me), or who are receiving communion (from me).  I block out the rest.

 

Physical?  I'm pretty much a mess.  But I am back to walking three miles a day, which is a considerable help in many areas of life.  There are some weird bodily things going on that are probably grief-based.  Whatever.

 

Gratitude?  I'm feeling and expressing it these days.  I am grateful for my husband and surviving children, for their gifts and hard work, and for their incredible strength and resiliency, dramatically tested and well-honed in ways that most people in our world never have to know about.  I'm grateful for my home and my neighborhood and my brother and my friends, of whom I have far more than I could ever deserve.  I'm grateful to have staggered through seminary and spiritual direction training and to be able to serve God in some sort of direct way. 

 

God?  Well, I never write the full story.   We are doing better.  But we have a way to go.  I don't have the kind of confidence that a lot of my bereaved mom friends do in a reunion in the next life ~ whatever that means.  That's what it will take.  I preach my hope in the assured healing and restoration of all creation, which includes one person in particular, but I don't claim certainty.   Not privately.  (I guess this isn't so private.)  On many occasions, I still preach w-aaaa-y out there ahead of myself. 

 

I'm not a better person.  I am not wiser, I am not more compassionate, I am neither kinder nor gentler.  I might be more patient, but probably not.  I was enough of all those things Before, and the After has not created some  new Mother Goddess of Empathy.  I am mostly pretty pissed, you know?  But not always.

 

So.  That's one version.  It's not universal.  It's  mine.

Into the Silent Land Revisted

Martin Laird, O.S.A., journeyed to Wernersville last week-end to lead a two-day contemplative prayer retreat ~ for me, the retreat within a retreat.  Ninety people, probably all of them familiar with his books, Into the Silent Land and A Sunlit Absence, showed up to listen to his presentations and to spend time in silence with one another.

 

(Michelle and I spent some months awhile ago blogging back and forth about Into the Silent Land; those posts remain linked in my bar above.  I've read A Sunlit Absence as well and, to tell the truth, I couldn't make head nor tail of it.  I will probably give it another try soon.)

 

I thought I'd offer just a very few vignettes from the presentations, and explore them in more detail later, as I sort through my own prayer and reactions. I'm using quotation marks even though these are not verbatim quotations; they're close enough, and I want to indicate that the source is Martin Laird rather than myself.

 

*****

 

"Inner silence constitutes inner spaciousness."

 

"In our spiritual lives, we are like someone fishing for minnows from the back of a whale ~ sitting on the greatest catch of all, and yet satisfied with something puny."

 

"You will know that you are in the countryside of prayer when you experience joy and reverence at the same time." (That one comes from Evagrius rather than from Marty Laird.)

 

"The purpose of the Christian life is to open the eye of the heart, where God may be known." (That was one of Augustine's contributions.)

 

"In the practice of contemplative prayer, we move away from the chatter of discursive prayer in our heads in which, no matter how dreadful the narrative, we always have the starring role."  (A Laird riff on Evagrius, which I found hilarious, and oh-so-true!)

 

*****

 

As you might be able to tell, the presentations were divided roughly into material on the history of Christian contemplation and reflections on its actual practice.  Marty Laird is the master of metaphor, and listening to his measured, unhurried  observations is itself an exercise in contemplative prayer.

 

I've studied a lot of the material he presented and I'm somewhat familiar with the development of contemplative prayer in the Christian tradition.  (And even in my Presbyterian seminary, we were offered a tinge of an introduction to the desert fathers and mothers in the context of our church history sequence ~ a linear and factual introduction, not an invitation into the spirituality of the desert by someone who had himself delved deeply into its pathways.)  But to hear a master of the tradition, someone who has spent his life exploring its nooks and crannies, bring it to life is to be yourself immersed, however briefly, into that sea of prayer.

 

*****

 

We do, in reality, mostly relax in our beach chairs on top of the whale.

Retreat Lunch

Dramatis personae:  Bill, S.J. - Jesuit of fifty-plus years who has journeyed with me for the past three, and Me - Presbyterian pastor of less than two years, on a road and traveling, traveling, traveling, looking for something; what can it be?  (Yes, Joni Mitchell.)

 

Setting: Dining room, last day.

 

 

 

Bill, munching on salad:

Aren't you Protestants the ones who are supposed to be all about grace?

This One's For Karen EAST (No Sense of Direction!)

A day at Wernersville:

 

 

 

 

Retreat Pondering

While I was on retreat, the following poem by Veronica A. Shoffstall popped up on People for Others.  I commented that it might well be re-titled "Retreat at Wernersville.

 

 

 

After a while you learn the subtle difference between
holding a hand and chaining a soul,
And you learn that love doesn't mean learning and
company doesn't mean security,
And you begin to learn that kisses aren't contracts
and presents aren't promises,
And you begin to accept your  defeat with your head
up and your eyes open, with the grace of an adult,
not the grief of a child,
And you learn to build all your roads on today
because tomorrow's ground is too uncertain for
plans.
After a while you learn that even sunshine burns if
you get too much.
So you plant your own garden and decorate your own
soul, instead of waiting for someone else to bring you
flowers.
And you learn that you really can endure...
That you really are strong,
And you really do have worth.

 

 

 

I would say that there's a Part II in this for me, which I'll post in a couple of days.

Retreat: Calm Before Storm

No desk at which I have ever worked looks anything like this five minutes after I've gotten started.   I took this photograph of my desk at Wernersville after I had cleaned up one evening ~  as false evidence of a clear and thoughtfully engaged mind.

 

Journal collage page on the right: I spent a lot of time over the first few days on Matthew 14:22-33.  You might like to try that sometime.


 

Spa Week at Wernersville . . . Not!

So here's what I did on retreat:

I walked 3-4 miles every day.  Unfortunately, the retreat center sits atop a hill, so every walk, no matter the route, proceeds down and then returns up.   

I sat in the Adirondack chairs in the sun as much as possible.

I cut out pictures and made collages, and colored in lots of Celtic patterns ~ a methodically and rhythmically prayerful way of spending time.  (I have been so very, very sick of words of late, and so I took a huge bag of art supplies with me.)

I went to daily mass. Since I was there during a "nonofficial" retreat time, there were only a few people at the liturgy each morning. Once I looked around and thought, Hmm, six Jesuits and me.  Interesting crowd.  (And then a few staff members showed up.)

I got to meet George Aschenbrenner, S.J.  "You're the guy who taught us all to pray the examen!" I exclaimed, when I stopped him in the hallway to introduce myself.  "Well, the Holy Spirit had something to do with that," he responded.  I told him that I am a Presbyterian pastor and an Ignatian spiritual director.  "There seem to be more and more of those," he reflected.

I met with my spiritual director every day, and pondered and wondered and prayed with the observations he made.  Those are the times when it becomes most apparent that a silent retreat is not for the faint-of-heart, or for those dreaming of a relaxing spa day.  (In the summertime, I often sit in the Adirondack chairs in the afternoon sun and paint my toenails, but even then: tough stuff going on.)

I did follow the Boston Marathon case to some extent.  More than I should have ( iPhones represent a terrible temptation), but far, far less than I would have had I been home.

I was struck, as our small group gathered for mass the day after the marathon, by the awesome faithfulness of quiet Christian witness: a few people who considered that the most important thing they could do in the face of mind-bending violence and horror would be to spend half an hour celebrating a liturgy.

More on the week-end retreat-within-a-retreat later.