3 Years

I woke up feeling okay. After wrapping my mind around what day it was (the usual wake up and figure out what's on my plate for the day) my first thought was, "I'm glad I've been processing all along."

3 years isn't catching me off guard. I've been doing the hard work of grief this whole time: leaning in, remembering, processing, feeling.

So far it feels like just another day ... though even as I write that I feel a burning in my chest.

This day 3 years ago started off normally-ish. I reread my account if it earlier this week and am aware that nothing was normal or okay but nothing made me think G was about to die either. Death snuck up on us.

When someone has many close calls, you think they will survive the next one. It's a prideful presumption but also a hopeful practice. What is another bump in the road? Surely it's serious but manageable with the right cocktail of help.

But death is not manageable. Only the Lord of Life can control it. There is no stopping or reasoning with death. It come when it will.

Maybe the biggest surprise is not that G died but that we loved. It has not been my time, and God has sustained me through the impossible sorrow just as he sustained G through the horrors of his heart and mental health. It is God's hand that kept G going. He removed his hand that kept G's heart beating and lungs filling and it was over. And He has kept me going too- functioning, doing the next thing, processing, growing. And now it's 3 years later and I can say that by the grace of God alone I have survived. He is good. He has carried me. He fulfills every promise.