Mid-Life Crisis

When I think of grief, I think of death.  Max's death ripped me off the path I was walking in life and dropped me on a completely different road.  One I never knew about and never wanted to walk.

In truth, grief does not just apply to a death.  Along with death, there are the many, MANY secondary losses.  Those things I wonder 'what might have been', 'what should have been', 'I was robbed of', 'the WORLD was robbed of'.  Wesley is the only child I had the privilege to watch get married.  I grieve that Trinity will never get to be a 'McCutcheon'.  Wesley was the only child that entered college.  Max was two weeks from it when he was killed.  And my holidays look very different now than when Max was alive.  There is always an empty space.

Other losses have occurred in the McCutcheon household.  Maybe not as a direct result of Max's death, but loss is loss, and they are grieved in the same way a death is.  I closed my business, 'The Clutter Cutter'.  I lost being connected nationally with other organizers when I dropped my NAPO membership.  My support system group known as "Babe Chicks" has undergone many changes.  Each lady has experienced change, both good and bad, drifting in or out of the group.  One of our members, Jeanie, was killed in a freak accident.  Todd is no longer a part of the beloved "David Holland Band", ending a 12 year run with them.  Add to the heap of things to grieve.

I've had many other deaths that stack just before or anytime after Max.  His death will always be the undercurrent of how I grieve anything.  Somehow, any death just opens that wounded place in my heart and soul that Max's death gave me.  Some gone far too early, some gone after a long and fulfilling life, ALL missed and grieved in their own way.  And each death that adds to the stack just makes grief heavier and more complicated.

Both sets of our parents growing older, having all the challenges and illnesses that come from aging, and a long-time friend doing the same.  Gary was diagnosed with inoperable lung cancer just a few weeks ago, and Dee Dee is living her last days with cancer.  I grieve the years we have with these loved ones grows short.

Todd & I have an empty nest.  We both miss the soccer games, the boy scout events, the band concerts, the noise of boys clomping up or down the stairs, the fun of getting to know and love their friends, the smell of Axe body spray that would permeate the bathroom/hallway as they exited the shower, the dirty pj pants on the floor of the bathroom, the epic family game days ... and the list goes on.  We just miss having our boys under our roof.

So where does that leave me?  In the normal stage of 'mid-life crisis' and asking the question 'what now'?  This stage is supposed to be a struggle.  Have you heard the story of the butterfly?  A man spent hours watching a butterfly struggling to emerge from its cocoon. It managed to make a small hole, but its body was too large to get through it. After a long struggle, it appeared to be exhausted and remained absolutely still. The man decided to help the butterfly and, with a pair of scissors, he cut open the cocoon, thus releasing the butterfly. However, the butterfly’s body was very small and wrinkled and its wings were all crumpled.The man continued to watch, hoping that, at any moment, the butterfly would open its wings and fly away. Nothing happened; in fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its brief life dragging around its shrunken body and shriveled wings, incapable of flight.  What the man – out of kindness and his eagerness to help – had failed to understand was that the tight cocoon and the efforts that the butterfly had to make in order to squeeze out of that tiny hole were Nature’s way of training the butterfly and of strengthening its wings.

 

I have some wonderful things to look forward to in my future.  I have a new daughter-in-law that adds happiness to every day, and with whom I will share many holidays.  I get to see Wesley be a Godly man and husband. I have the joy of watching Max & Wesley's friends grow and succeed in what they are doing now.  I am blessed with loyal old friends and some new friends.   And Todd & I are happy in our relationship with each other.  I get to spend the rest of our days together loving him.

I have other things that I can *hope* for in my future.  Trying new things, traveling, grandchildren, and being available to be used by God in new ways.

And things that are in my future that will absolutely be there.  I know that I will see my loved ones again someday, upon my own death.  My hope in Jesus assures me of this.  And I will always remember those I've loved and lost.  

I question what I should do with my time now.  And I am walking through the door marked "I don't know".  I am struggling in my cocoon, knowing that I will be a butterfly with strong wings going forward.