Losing a loved one to cancer is never easy. You try to move on, but there are always reminders. Little things. Sometimes big things. At the dinner table, there’s always an empty chair. Just a few days ago, we broke out an old Scrabble game, and there were still some score cards revealing just how…
Tag: grief
Cancer – the monster that never sleeps
People have asked over the years what it was like to live with someone who has cancer. I’m never quite sure what to tell them, but I try to be as honest as I can, while also extending as much hope as I can. But one thing I don’t think people realize about living with…
Going to the hospital, Part 2
If you follow my blog, you’ve read several stories about the illness and death of my wife, Tracie. But there’s one story you don’t know – because I’ve never told anyone about it before. Until now. Many of you have read before that shortly before she passed away in the fall of 2004, we spent…
My wife displays grace, while I try to comprehend
It’s an afternoon I’ll never forget . . . because it’s still so hard to believe. It was a sunny, fall afternoon in either September or early October. I can’t remember now which it was. But the details are still as fresh as yesterday. I was sitting at the dining room table with my wife,…
The worst Saturday of my life
It’s difficult to watch anyone suffer, but it’s even more so when you have to watch a loved one suffer and there’s nothing you can do. You feel helpless. If only you could do something, anything, to help. And then sometimes, you can, if only a little . . . It was a Saturday in…
More than filling a vacancy
I once made a terrible mistake. Yeah, yeah. I know. I’ve made a lot of mistakes over the course of my life. But this one . . . it was the worst. If you’ve never read my blog, let me give you a little background. My wife and I had our son in October of 2003.…
Adopting new traditions in the face of grief
It was only a week or so before Christmas day 2004, and I hadn’t bought a gift. Or gotten a tree, much less decorated it. Or put up one Christmas decoration. There wasn’t one thing in my house that would have indicated it was the holiday season, unless you could have found a calendar. But…
Holding together the jello 