Missing my Kid
Artist:Giotto
I miss my kid.
A few months ago I did a ten-part series on the worst pains of parenting a kid with mental illness (you can find that here). There was one I left out, not because it didn’t belong, but because it seemed like it needed its own space.
The mourning over the kids who used to inhabit our lives aches in us. So much can be stolen away: laughter, silliness, moments of growth, flashes of new insight. The “awww” moments of peeking in on them while they sleep. The messy, chaotic, normal interactions with siblings full of play and squabbles. The way they enjoyed their hobbies or sports.
When Nicholas was really sick, he seemed gone from me. It wasn’t that I didn’t love the boy who was there. I did, fiercely. He was still mine. But the Nicholas from before mental illness seemed to be present only in briefly glimpsed shadows. Sometimes I spent long hours looking at photographs of him and other times could hardly bear to think about him, my boy from before. It wasn’t that he had grown up and moved away. He had not died and left this world. He was just gone.
Sometimes when I left visiting hours at the hospital, I would get back in the car and turn on songs about loss. Volume up, almost to pain, I would sing along with force and rage. I would get to the end of a song, press repeat, and sing it again. I wrote one too:
“In a paper gown in the sonogram room
The door clicks shut and I wait.
If I stay in bed, can I keep you safe
Or am I losing you today?
Four months later I hold you close
As I meet you face to face
Glad I brought you this far
But every mama knows
She’ll lose her baby someday…”
I’ve heard that being being a parent helps us understand God’s heart toward us. I find this true- the protective, do-anything-for-you, unquenchable love that I have for my kids echoes the love of God. My grief over my boy from before also echoes this love. When Israel had turned away from their God, He yearned over them:
“When Israel was a child, I loved him,
and out of Egypt I called my son.
But the more they were called,
the more they went away from me.
They sacrificed to the Baals
and they burned incense to images.
It was I who taught Ephraim (Israel) to walk,
taking them by the arms;
but they did not realize it was I who healed them.
I led them with cords of human kindness, with ties of love.
To them I was like one who lifts a little child to the cheek,
and I bent down to feed them.”
Hosea 11:1-4 NIV
God understood my heart. More, I had a window into His.
Dear friends, maybe you are grieving your gone-but still-here kid. I pray God will comfort your sore heart. If I can pray for you, please let me know in the comments or through my contact page.
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