Posts tagged The Search for Meaning & Purpose
HOPE & THE PRESENT MOMENT

I was asked to speak about hope at the PPMD conference earlier this year in Scottsdale Arizona. I had known my assigned topic months prior, but I sat with it - not sure what I wanted to say.

Hope can be tricky.

I wrestled with the topic, not because I struggled to find hope personally, but because I didn't want to trivialize the hard realities of hope.

The more I meditated on hope, the more I realized hope in the future is a seductive mirage. Hope in the future is a mirage because the future is forever out of reach. The only thing you and I will ever truly have is this moment.

I hope this helps anyone who hurts.

EVERYTHING WE KEEP

On his final day, Mitch slipped into a state of near unconsciousness. His body was motionless, his breathing soft as a feather and pillow stained with a feverish sweat; by stark contrast, the only sign of life was his heart pounding violently through his ribcage. Natalie placed her hand softly on his chest to comfort him. Occasionally, we’d get a soft hand squeeze from Mitch that signaled he could hear us. But Mitch was slipping through our fingers like a baby made of sand.

Although our hospice nurse told us what to expect over the next several hours, we discovered there is never any real way to prepare for the death of your child. Until that fateful moment, it’s all an abstraction. The deeper truth is there’s never a single moment you confront the totality of death. Instead, grief visits you each day as you learn to cope with layers of sorrow for years and years … and years.

My heart broke for my sweet son, surrounded by all his boyhood treasures. The bitter irony was Mitch looked to his future with youthful enthusiasm; what he thought was a beautiful sunrise on the horizon of his life was, in reality, a darkening sunset.

As his parents, we knew time was running out … we saw the sunset but didn’t want to frighten our son. So, we just held him and loved him the best we knew how and kept that terrible reality from his tender mind as long as we could.

This image was the moment I realized the sun in Mitchell’s life had disappeared behind the mountains – never to rise again.

Medicine failed us. Hospital bureaucracy and antiquated transplant policies failed us. We hoped and prayed something might slow the destruction of his heart from DMD – but such was not the case. Last-minute interventions were too little, too late.

I suppose there are a million and one reasons I could be angry with people, medical systems, and God (or the Universe) for all that’s happened. But I am not. I am only grateful. I am grateful for what I did have, for I had a chance to love my little child for 10 incredible years. He became my friend, and I became his student. Though I was his father, he taught me more than I ever hoped to teach him.

On my son’s journey through life and death, there were many times I cried out in my mind and heart, “Oh, this hurts. God, where are you?” After my son passed away, my world darkened by a veil of grief and sorrow – such that I wondered if the night would ever end. I had never known a darkness so pitch, a grief so heavy. Behind my smile was a broken, weary soul stumbling over pebbles. My eyes, scared with tears.

Years later, I can say with confidence there is light on the other side of all that darkness. That’s not to say I am over grief - because I’m not. Some days are as dark with sorrow as any day I’ve ever known. Grief is a chronic condition that I’m learning to live with. Yet, I’ve learned to carry grief in ways that won’t injure other parts of me – and for that, I’m grateful.

The question I hear over and over from others is, “Why?” I’m not sure it’s possible to know why we experience what we do. If you’re a person of faith, whether we settle the question ‘Is God the author of our suffering?’ or not is immaterial. If our suffering is caused by other means … whether from our own poor judgment or the harmful choices of others or perhaps our suffering is simply a result of life in motion … the fact of the matter is God could stop our suffering if He wanted to. That He doesn’t sends the most important message of all.

Despite my heavenward pleas to spare my son, a little boy I loved with all my heart, I now find myself on the other side of death. What I do next with my harsh reality matters. I can shake my fist at the heavens or universe in anger – but that won’t change heaven or the universe. Not in the slightest. That kind of rage will only change me … and probably for the worse.

Instead, I’ve learned to take a knee and search for understanding and wisdom.

The trouble with suffering is we exhaust too much time and energy asking the one question that can’t be answered. Rather than wondering, “why me?” I learned I was better served by remembering, “What am I to learn from this?”

I believe life is meant to be hard because the evidence is all around us. I also believe that suffering can strengthen us in ways we cannot imagine in times of comfort and ease. The key for me was to transform my torment into my teacher. That transformation didn’t lighten my sorrows – it only gave it context, meaning, and purpose.

Losing my little boy reminded me that we do not take our earthly treasures to that place beyond the hills. We only take who we are and what we’ve become. That’s everything we keep when all is said and done.

THE MEDICINE OF MEANING

Our goal was to get him home as fast as we could. Mitch had days to live, but there were times at the hospital he was so animated, we wondered if the doctors misdiagnosed him. But, like a thief in the shadows, symptoms of heart failure would suddenly emerge and turn the happy boy we knew into someone distant. Someone very, very sick.

Just moments before this photo, Mitch was laughing. My sweet daughter, Laura-Ashley, made cupcakes to cheer him up. She handed one to him, but Mitch turned his head and said, "I'm not feeling well." In his heart, Mitch wanted to eat one – but at this moment, his world was being turned upside down.

I'll never forget meeting with a team of specialists as we were preparing to leave. Each took their turn, educating us on what to do under certain circumstances. If I thought taking a newborn baby home to live was overwhelming, I had no idea what it would feel like to take our baby home to die. The instructions were soul-crushing. If something medically scary happened, there was no ambulance to call, no future hospital visits to offer a glimmer of hope. Just a constant stream of medicine to erase from my son's mind oxygen hunger, morphine to whisk away the pain of organ failure, and other drugs to buy a little time.

The nutritionist was about to tell us what Mitch should eat; she paused as if to remember Mitch only had days, then said, "You know what, it doesn't matter. Let him eat whatever makes him happy." I nearly burst into tears as my heart fell to the floor, bleeding and writhing. Medicine had taken us as far as it could. Nature, faith, and fate were all that was left.

While Mitchell's physical heart was failing, his spiritual heart remained tender and teachable. As parents, our spiritual hearts were being tested. But then, a beautiful paradox emerged as our son became our teacher. If Mitch could face death with a humble heart, we could, too.

Some wonder (even criticize) why I return to these moments, detailing agony and trauma. As if to retraumatize myself with each story. What I've observed about trauma is that it's first like a rapidly spreading cancer, weaving its tendrils into our minds and hearts, then it lies dormant. Seemingly invisible. It feeds off inattention and misdirection. I believe trauma can be seen to some degree, but the bulk of its roots seem to live in the deeper parts of our psyche. As far as I can tell, trauma thrives in the unexamined shadows of our souls, unexplored and misunderstood. If left unattended, the ripple effects of trauma can turn into waves and disrupt us for the rest of our lives.

I visit these moments to discover and untangle trauma, removing its poisonous dripline, root by root. Is it uncomfortable? Of course. But so is dressing a deep wound. And with each time I apply the medicine of meaning, I heal a little. Sometimes a lot.

So why this moment? This moment taught me what being courageous looks like. Sometimes having courage looks like being sick, sad, or tired. Sometimes courage shows up as tears and overwhelming heartbreak. Fake courage puts on a mask and cape and pretends it doesn't hurt. True courage is admitting we're trembling at the knees while mustering the strength to take one more step. And if we don't have the strength for one more step – that's quite alright. We can rest a moment and take another step tomorrow.

Separate from pain, trauma will likely come to us all in one form or another. We may not be able to change our circumstances or avoid outcomes, but we can change what meaning those experiences have for us. And that's an act of courage, too.


WHY WE SUFFER

As Mitch began to drift away, I'd look at him with deep sorrow in my heart. I desperately wanted to scoop him up in my arms and take him to someplace safe. A place like the children's books we often read to him – a place of hope and happiness, joy, and dreams. My little boy once glowing bright with laughter and childhood had become a dim candle about to flicker out. The light in his countenance had been growing dimmer by the day, and I was greatly pained therewith. When I took this photo, I had the distinct impression we were no longer counting the days, but the hours.

I remember cuddling next to my son just after I took this photo. I held him gently but firmly and said, "I am so sorry this is happening, son. You are so brave. I think sometimes God sends us the little ones like you to teach us grown-ups what it means to be truly grown up. And Mitch, when I grow up, I want to be just like you." Mitch squeezed my hand and smiled softly. I kissed his cheek and held him close to my chest as he drifted away, soft as a feather, into an afternoon nap.

While Mitch slept, I wept.

I wept so hard the bed was shaking, and I worried I would wake him. The grief I knew then was but a foretaste of the pain to come. For death was the easy part … the echoes of emptiness and longing were a more painful hell yet to come.

I learned long ago it isn't productive to raise my fist to the heavens and wonder why we suffer. Instead, I learned to turn my ear heavenward, to listen for secrets to the soul, and learn what I was meant to learn. Too often, people get hung up on asking the wrong questions – and therefore get no answers. They ask, "why would God do this?" When we hurt, it can be tempting to shake our fists at the Universe and bemoan our circumstance as though we're being singled out or treated unfairly. But the last time I checked, life isn't fair, and it rains on the just and unjust. Why should we be the only exception? The other day I learned over 150,000 people die each day. Countless others will suffer all manner of tragedies. In the few minutes it might take to shake our fist at the sky and complain about or own lives, hundreds of people will have passed from this life to the next, and a great many more will mourn their absence.

The world is filled with grief and suffering. Some sorrows we bring upon ourselves. Other suffering just happens, whether from an act of God or simply life in motion.

At least for me, I've come to discover suffering and sorrow are an important part of life's learnings. Any more, I worry less about the origins of my sorrows – for what difference would it make? Surely God isn't caught off guard or surprised by the events in our lives. Whether He's the author of some of our sorrows, as a divine teacher, or simply a patient tutor as we struggle with life in motion.

He could change the course of our sorrows if He wanted to. Perhaps the fact He often doesn't remove our sorrows is the most compelling message of all. I stopped asking "why me?" and began searching myself and ask, "Yes, it hurts, but am I listening?"

So, as I laid next to my dying son, weeping in the deepest of grief, I felt a pain beyond description, a pain that left my soul weary, bruised, and weak. I didn't want my little boy to go, for he was my tender son, and I loved him so. Though I prayed mightily for his safe return, the answer I received was, "No, my son, for there are things you must learn."

Thus began my journey with grief, down a bewildering path in search of spiritual relief. And though I still hear the deafening sound of death's terrible toll, I have come to understand our mortal bodies are but clothing to the soul.