Still Getting Used to This

Today somebody whose name starts with your same letter and shares a letter in the middle with you texted me.  When the name came up on my phone, I instantly got the same feeling I had for years when I got one of your texts. For a split second I wondered what you wanted to tell me or ask me. So many times you would just text to say hi.

A few days ago marked one month since you died. That did not go by without my remembering. I will always go back to that moment I learned you were gone and life changed so dramatically. I screamed and asked God why. I said "that's my sister!" and could not understand. I still do not understand.

I cried off and on but it felt like I was crying non-stop. I cried in the shower. My kids and almost every stranger saw me so distressed. We drove like mad people to get your kids who had been left without you in a state they didn't know surrounded by strangers. I couldn't get to them fast enough. I tried my best to love them as much as I could and hug them and comfort them. I let them know that it is OK to be sad and to grieve and to be angry or bargain. I can't wait to see them again. They have to live like few of us have to, like you and I never had to.

I am realizing just how much I thought of you when you were alive. I am constantly reminded of you. I think people are a little uncomfortable when I mention you now. I will respond with "my sister used to do that", or "my sister and I used to do that", or "my sister..."; you get the point.  I think people expect me to break down when I speak of you. I don't. I love remembering you.  It has made me realize how often I always thought of you before. It is second nature to think of you and how you fit into my life.

I'm sad today. I still don't understand why you had to go. I never will. That's OK. We will see each other again someday. God holds me in His hands and strengthens me. He is teaching me and healing me slowly. He is the one blessed assurance we have in this life.

I should get back into my prayer journal. I just checked it, empty on the day you died, and the verse is very poignant: "Many are the afflictions of the righteous: but the LORD delivereth him out of them all." Psalm 34:19.