I want to thank all of you for your love and support during the past months as my son, John, lay dying with cancer and afterwards for the visits, the food, the phone calls, the cards, the donations to Celebrate Recovery in his memory and for attending the memorial.
It has been such a heartbreaking time for me.  Where did the years go?  What could I have done differently?  Over and over all the questions keep running through my mind.  Every time I lay down to try to sleep I keep seeing him as a little boy, then in the hospital bed with all the tubes attached.  Only a mother can understand what I feel now.
John was a precious human being and loved by all who knew him.  He had a lot of hurts deep down in his heart that he was never able to overcome.  When he got hit by a truck when he was eleven and was crippled for life his childhood was over, his friends didn’t want to play with him any more since he couldn’t run and play, but as the years went on he became close to many loyal friends and he was a loyal friend to them.  He had a sixth sense about someone who was hurting and he would have done anything for them to make the pain go away for he himself was hurting and he understood their pain.  He was a friend to many young people and in his last years and months he talked to young people about the fallacy of their using illegal drugs and just a week before he went to the hospital one final time he urged a young man to go to rehab and he did.
Life is full of heartbreaks and we have to deal with them so as not to loose our sanity.  Losing a child is so awful that there are no words to suffice.  I loved him better than my own life but he is gone now and it is time to move on.  The only way for me to heal is to take this as the first day of the rest of my life.  I would go insane if I sat down with all the pictures and memories.  I can’t do it.  I have a life to live and he would want me to live it.  We talked a lot about it.  I loved and enjoyed him while he was here and rejoice that he is no longer in pain.
Cremation was the answer for us.  It was what he wanted.  He told me the only thing he dreaded about dying was having six feet of dirt dumped on him.  I didn’t have to look at him in a coffin,   I don’t think my heart could have stood that.  There is no grave to go to and mourn.  There will be no mourning on rainy days.  Only precious memories and that is enough for me.
I went home with my daughter and stayed three weeks.  That gave me time to mourn and to try to get things in perspective.  Mourning doesn’t help the living and it cannot help the dead.  We have to think of it this way and I have just about accomplished that.  I know the Lord has more work for me to do so I will not let myself become incapacitated.  I am not sitting alone and grieving.  When I am alone I stay busy even if I do nothing but iron or clean closets.  Going to bed at night is a different story.
I know he would want me to go on.  He told me so.  He was a devout believer and he told me not to grieve when he was gone, that he knew without a doubt where he was going when he died.  And I believed him and am happy for him.

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