Fourth Year Anticipation

Sisterhood of Widows S.O.W.  Psalm 126:5-6  Please share on your Facebook so that others can see my blogs and maybe help them through their grief.

Fourth Year Anticipation

Today will mark the fourth anniversary of Kirk's going to his Heavenly home.  I can't believe that it's already been four years ago that I last talked to him, seen his face, heard his laugh.  Some days it seems like it was just yesterday, but most days it seems like a lifetime. 

I know we all grieve in our own way and we all have our own timeline.  I can only talk to you about my journey and how I felt each year on June 25th.  The first year we busied ourselves with having my niece and one of Emily's friends spend the night with us and then we went to a large cat sanctuary with my mom.  We kept ourselves busy and made it through the day. I will be honest, I was still pretty numb and really just went through the motions of getting through that first year.  I wanted Emily to have fun and we had never been to a large feline rescue.  It was definitely an adventure but it was fun. 

The second year anniversary we were in sunny California.  We had spent a week of going to Disneyland, San Diego, Hollywood, and the beautiful beaches of Laguna and Dana Point.  We went to Venice Beach and Santa Monica Pier.  It was a dream vacation and I really would love to go back.  We flew back on the 25th and I can tell you when I opened my eyes that morning, I felt like I was right back on day one.  I wasn't prepared for the waves of grief that flooded me that morning.  I think it was the combination of his anniversary and leaving California.  Usually I am ready to go home after a vacation, but I can honestly say that I didn't want to leave, I didn't want to come home.  Once we flew out then I was ready to take on that second year. 

We were able to go last year on the third anniversary to a local amusement park named Kings Island.  It's only a two hour drive from our home and we went with a large family group.  We had a lot of fun and even though June 25th is a sad day, we were able to have fun and relax.  I think what helped me with this third year was that I found a couple of websites called A Widow's Might and Widows Christian Place.  Having these remarkable women write about their own experiences and share their stories and faith in Jesus has helped me tremendously. 

Now as the fourth anniversary is pressing down on me, I am praying for a day filled with thanksgiving and love.  I am hoping to remember the great times we had together and praising Jesus for the time that I had with Kirk.  I know Kirk is rejoicing in Heaven with his Savior.  Kirk isn't dreading his anniversary of going Home, he is praising Jesus with his hands lifted high singing glory, glory, glory.  Psalm 105:3 says, "Glory in his holy name; let the hearts of those who seek the Lord rejoice."  Psalm 66:2, "Sing the glory of his name; make his praise glorious."  Praising Jesus and going to Him with thanksgiving has helped me in the healing process and to trust the Lord with my future.  "Let us come before him with thanksgiving and extol him with music and song." Psalm 95:2 NIV.  I feel with this anniversary I have fully armored myself so that I can continue to heal and start to move forward.  I have started to entertain thoughts of dating one day, but my main focus is to continue to grow in Christ and to continue to raise my beautiful daughter that God blessed us with raising.

If you get a minute in your day, please whisper a little prayer for me and Emily.  This is the first year that we do not have any concrete plans.  I have started to have some work done to my house and had her room repainted so we will work on the last phase of my remodel vision.  I am making a hang out room for Emily and her friends and also am having a pergola built over my patio. We will get through today and come out on the other side ready to face our future with trust and hope in Jesus.  He will see us through today and everyday and continue to show us love, compassion, mercy, and grace. 

Lord please be with not only me and Emily, but with the rest of our family and Kirk's friends and his customers.  Kirk was a great man, incredible dad, wonderful husband, and the best tractor/trailer mechanic in Indianapolis.  Lord we miss his so much but know that you have a plan for us and you needed Kirk more than we did here on Earth.  Lord I look forward to the day that I am reunited with you and my Kirk.  I pray for continued healing for all of us that love and miss Kirk with all of our hearts.  Thank you Lord for blessing us with Kirk and letting me have him as a best friend and husband for 25 years.  He was truly a blessing from You!!!  In your precious name..Amen!!

Happy Father's Day!!

Sisterhood of Widows S.O.W.  Psalm 126:5-6  Please share on your Facebook so that others can see my blogs and maybe help them through their grief.

Happy Father's Day!!

This is for my dad!!  He is an amazing man that gives generously and never asks for anything in return.  He has always been there for me and my sister Crystal.  He is a Christian man that is full of integrity and everyone that knows him respects and loves him.  He was there for me in my darkest time after Kirk passed away.  Here is the background story of my dad and what transpired on June 25, 2011.

When my dad received the call that Kirk was gone, he was on his way home from taking a friend back to his nursing home after his visit for the day.  My dad was the second one there, but was about 45 minutes out when he received the call.  I don't even want to know how fast he drove to Kirk's shop.  He promised me that we would get it all figured out and that he would take care of getting everything arranged.  Kirk had his own mechanics shop and needless to say there were a lot of tools, tool boxes, paperwork, big pieces of equipment, your typical mechanics shop.  My dad owns a salvage and lumber business so he has several big trucks that he hauls big quantities of material.  The day after Kirk passed, several volunteers showed up and helped my dad and uncle and they cleaned out Kirk's business in one day.  We were afraid that other tenants would find out about Kirk's passing and would try and make themselves at home in his shop.  It wasn't in the best part of Indianapolis.  So once they got it all into trucks, then they had to spread it out in several buildings until we were able to start the process of an estate.  After Kirk's services, then the time came to finish out his business and settle an estate that we had to get going with help from a lawyer and an accountant, not to mention Kirk's bank.  My dad was with me every step of the way.  Even though I kept and still live in my house that Kirk and I had together, my mom and dad turned a spare bedroom into a very nice room for Emily and me to stay and crash the months after Kirk's passing.  My dad ran out and bought mattresses and made sure we were comfortable.  He helped me so much with the business end of the estate and made sure all of Kirk's tools, equipment, and trucks were sold at the right price.  Without my dad, I am not sure what I would have done.  We are never prepared for any death, but a sudden death of your husband that owns his own business is a tough process to go through.  Not only do you mourn after your husband, but also his business and all the what could have been.  My dad still continues to look after our best interest and helps me with anything that my crazy mind might come up with at the spur of the moment.  Happy Father's Day to you dad!!  Your the best!!

As for Kirk, I couldn't have asked for a better husband and father to Emily.  He adored her and loved her with all of his heart.  He wasn't sure about being a dad when I told him we were going to have a baby, but he sure did hit it out of the ballpark.  I know Emily misses him so much.  She brings him up from time to time and I am always telling her stories or sharing old pictures that his friends share on Facebook.  She loves hearing them and seeing him with his long, curly hair.  He was a guitarist in a couple of bands back in the eighty's so he definitely had the hair!!  I sure wish Kirk could share in her accomplishments.  I know he would be so proud of her and would love to be right there.  But Emily and I also understand that God called him home for a purpose.  We have asked the Why? question but we know that we might never know the answer until we are reunited with Jesus and Kirk one day.  Proverbs 3:5 NIV says, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding."  This verse was given to us by our counselor Debbie at our very first session with her and it's the one that I have kept in my heart for these past four years.  We do not understand, but God has a plan and had one from the very start.  It's hard to get a nine year old to understand that at the time, but now that she is almost 14 she gets it now.  I am astounded by her love of Jesus and it fills my heart to hear her sing hymns and praising Jesus even when she could be mad for the sudden passing of her daddy. 

I know today is a tough day for a lot of us.  The moms have to be both parents now and our children are without their daddy.  As other families celebrate their dads, we need to remind our children that they are not fatherless.  They have a Heavenly Father that loves and cares for them more than they can fathom.  In Psalms 68:4-6 tells us, "Sing to God, sing in praise of his name, extol him who rides on the clouds; rejoice before him-his name  is the Lord.  A father to the fatherless, a defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling.  God sets the lonely in families, he leads out the prisoners with singing; but the rebellious live in a sun-scorched land."  Please remind your children of this.  I know it won't bring back their dads that they are missing, but it will hopefully give them hope and know that God is merciful and salvation lies in Him and Him alone!!

Lord, please watch over all of these children that do not have a daddy here on Earth but they have You to soothe their pain and hurt.  I pray that these children seek you and strive to know you and thirst for your word.  Only Your word gives us what we need, there we find comfort and healing.  I pray for all the widows that are both mom and dad now.  I pray for their rest and comfort Lord.  It's a hard position to be in, but You picked us for a reason Lord.  Thank you for always being there at our right hand guiding and helping us every step of the way.  In your Precious Name..Amen!!

Kirk on Father's Day June 2011.  This is the last photo of him taken.  Just six days after this picture he passed away.  The cake was his favorite cake that I made him and my dad and brother in law every Father's Day.  A strawberry Jello poke cake.  He loved it.

 

 

This is my dad while we were waiting on our lunch at Outback.  We normally eat lunch together after church every Sunday.  He doesn't like his picture taken as you can tell.  He is an incredible man and dad.  Thank you Lord for blessing my sister and me with him.  

 

Happy Wedding Anniversary!!

Sisterhood of Widows S.O.W.  Psalm 126:5-6  Please share on your Facebook so that others can see my blogs and maybe help them through their grief.
Happy Anniversary my Beloved!!!

Do you enjoy listening to a spring/summer thunderstorm at night while you lie in bed?  If the storms aren't severe, I love to listen to the thunder and the rain hit the roof.  The sound relaxes me and helps me to fall asleep.  We had a storm move through the other evening and I started thinking about the storms that come through our lives.  Each one of us have experienced different storms personally.  There are family issues, financial problems, work situations, and death just to name a few personal storms that we encounter.  Some of us have encountered each one of these and unfortunately they have hit at the same time.  I have experienced each one of these issues, but the worst one by far is the sudden death of my husband Kirk. 

Tomorrow would have been our 22nd wedding anniversary.  It seems like yesterday we were planning our wedding day.  With help from my family and friends, we put together a day that was magical and memorable.  Our wedding wasn't big or extremely fancy, but it was an event that was "US".  We were married in 1993 so colors like fuchsia and blue were very popular.  We had candles that our bridesmaids used instead of flowers.  We were escorted from our church to our reception hall in an old model Cadillac.  Our reception was so much fun with lots of dancing and our DJ was a friend so he knew exactly what to play.  We were married on my Grandma Catellier's birthday so I made sure she had a birthday cake and we sang to her.  She shared her special day with us and gave me permission to be married on her day.  It is a day that I hope I will never forget.  I married the love of my life, got to share that day with all of our family and friends, and have memories that are even more precious than I could have ever imagined.  Sitting here reflecting on those emotions and excitement of being a newlywed couple makes me smile.  We had so much fun enjoying being married and knowing that we had each other no matter what happened. 

I miss having him in my corner.  I miss not being able to share our day with him.  I miss his laugh and his goofy personality.  I miss the way he loved me no matter what.  For better or for worse, we lived both sides of our vows.  He was a great husband, an incredible dad, and a wonderful man period.  We didn't get a chance to celebrate the last anniversary we had together.  I really regret that today.  Two weeks after our 18th anniversary, he went home to be with Jesus.  I'll never forget the day of our wedding, we had several storms roll through our area that afternoon.  Someone came up to me right after our ceremony and told me that it's good luck to have storms on your big day.  I think that person was wrong.  I do remember walking out of church and the sun was shining and the humidity had subsided.  The evening ended up being beautiful!!

As I sit back and reflect on this, I think this is how my widowhood has gone.  The day of Kirk's death, I was hit with a tornado that had no regard for anyone or anything in it's path.  The destruction it left behind was a total loss.  Nothing was left standing and no one could escape it's path.  That storm raged for a long time, some days it was relentless; some days I could see a  glimpse of sunlight. Tears would flow like a torrential down pour and I just wanted the pain to stop.  I cried out to Jesus and asked for relief.  Slowly I began to heal and the sun started to shine on me more and more.  I remembered the story of Jesus and how He calmed a storm while He and his disciples were on a boat.  "Then he got into the boat and his disciples followed him.  Suddenly a furious storm came up on the lake, so that the waves swept over the boat.  But Jesus was sleeping.  The disciples went and woke him, saying, 'Lord, save us! We're going to drown!'  He replied, 'You of little faith, why are you so afraid?'  Then he got up and rebuked the winds and the waves, and it was completely calm." Matthew 8:23-26 NIV.   Doesn't this sound like our journey?  I know it sounds like mine.  I went through a storm that came up as sudden as the storm the disciples encountered.  The waves of grief over took me and threatened to capsize me.  I cried out to Jesus and begged for help and mercy, please Lord calm these waves because I fear I will drown in my grief.  He heard my cries and has calmed the swirling storm that wants to swallow me.  I have allowed Him to have control over me, control over my grief, control over my fears, and He has calmed me.  He has gave me peace.  When I feel myself start to enter back into that storm, all I have to do is whisper His sweet name, Jesus and that storm flees.  Have you been able to experience this peace?  I hope you have been able to escape your personal storm and seek refuge in Jesus.  He has saved us by His blood, grace, and mercy. 

If you have not asked Jesus to be your personal Savior, I would ask you to examine your life and your path.  If your heart is tugging for you to accept Him, will you do so today?  We know we are not promised tomorrow.  We know personally that we can be called home at any moment.  Please ask Jesus into your heart and to forgive you of your sins.  I promise you it is the best gift you will ever receive.  It's the gift of eternal life with Jesus.

Lord I pray that you be with me as I enter into my wedding anniversary day.  It's going to be a hard day, but I know you are with me.  I know you will be with me every second.  I pray that those that are reading this and have not received your gift of eternal life, I pray that they ask you for forgiveness today.  Thank you Lord for calming my storms and never giving up on me when I felt like I could not go on a day longer.  In your Precious Name Amen!!

I love and miss you Kirk with all my heart!!!  Happy Anniversary!!!  I will see you soon!!