It is complicated
August 8, 2012 at 9:26 pm | Posted in after death?, Grief, life after loss, Love, normal? | 10 CommentsTags: child loss, death, grief, hope, Jake, quotes, Sawyer, twins
It is complicated to explain. Or maybe it is not. The twins are doing and will continue to do things that Jake and Sawyer never did and never will. This is a fact. A bittersweet part of our lives.
There will be no first days and no last days. And nothing in between. Sometimes I play the pointless “What if” game. What if there were more time with Jake and with Sawyer?
I just read True Compass: A Memoir by Ted Kennedy. He included a letter his father Joseph Kennedy Sr. wrote to a friend whose son had just died:
Dear Jack,
There are no words to dispel your feelings at this time, and there is no time that will ever dispel them. Nor is it any easier the second time than it was the first.And yet I cannot share your grief, because no one could share mine. When one of your children goes out of your life, you think of what he might have done with a few more years and you wonder what you are going to do with the rest of yours.
You never really accept it; you just go through the motions. Then one day, because there is a world to be lived in, you find yourself a part of it again, trying to accomplish something–something that he did not have time enough to do. And, perhaps, that is the reason for it all. I hope so.
Sincerely, Joe
I hope so too.
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A Mourning Mom 
Great post. Thx
Comment by jenny— August 8, 2012 #
Wow. That is an amazing letter. Thank you for sharing it.
Comment by dilovely— August 8, 2012 #
Lovely….going to print it out as a reminder to myself 🙂
Comment by jenrad-HelpingHimGrieve— August 8, 2012 #
Beautiful quote lanie
Comment by the mama bird diaries— August 8, 2012 #
What a great well written letter to go with your beautiful thoughts.
Comment by Daphne— August 9, 2012 #
Thanks for sharing this!
Comment by SusanFB— August 9, 2012 #
Oh wow, goosebumps. Thank you for sharing this, I needed to read it.
Comment by Jessica Watson (@JessBWatson)— August 10, 2012 #
And I think so too. Good letter to post–I’m guessing you share some of those same thoughts.
Comment by Eden— August 20, 2012 #
That is an amazing letter. I am sobbing reading it. I’m sending it to my husband right now.
Comment by Anna— September 6, 2012 #
[…] Mourning Mom posted this letter from Joseph Kennedy Sr. to one of his friends who lost his son. When I read it, it seemed so […]
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