Crying Myself Awake

 "You are one of the most spectacular women I have ever encountered in my life.I love you with all my heart and I've come to realize that. I want to thank you for everything you have done for me. You have made so many sacrifices for me. I am so grateful and blessed to have a mother like you. One of the most important things I've learned here is patience. It applies to everything. To life, to relationships, to love and even finding your 'personal legend'.  

Excerpt from a letter from Brandon when he was at Open Sky, July 2008

It happens only occasionally, but since Brandon died there are nights that I am awaken by the wetness of my own tears leaving salt tracks across my face. The tears are big and heavy. Perhaps it's an overflow valve of sorts. As the rest of me lies silently sleeping these big heavy tears escape from the valves and race away from the sadness that squeezed them out of my subconscious and released them into reality. I don't think they like reality anymore than I do. They race toward the pillow hoping to be reabsorbed into the softness of the cotton. I appreciate the pain the tears feel and wish my own comfort could be found in simply lying my head on the pillow and being held by it's soft cotton and goose down.

It happened this morning sometime between four and five in the morning. How do I know this? Because it wasn't until four that Jason came home. This is part of Jason's journey through grief. There is no right or wrong, which is part of the challenge, each of us must author our personal Owner's Manual. Jason's way is to stay away for as long as he can, both physically and emotionally. He has been a passenger watching his brothers struggle, fall, climb get back up, stand tall and mature into strong young men. This time however, he must learn to use his own compass to map.

The tears that escape at night and wake me up while leaving tell-tale tracks of salt across my face are escorted by my dreams of Brandon.  I try so hard to stay asleep and hang on to hearing his voice, feeling him hug me and seeing his beautiful smiling face. Once I have lost my grip on sleep and the tears pull me back from the love I feel in these dreamy moments, I lay in bed and force myself to remember each and every detail. What Brandon was wearing, where we were, what he said, how tall and strong he always is in my dreams. He is always happy and, except for one dream, we always hold each other. Each time I repeat to him how much I love him and miss him, over and over again until I feel I must really being saying out loud into the silence of my room. I truly believe he is with me in these dreams, the love I feel when I press myself into his chest isn't something I've ever felt before. The love is bright and radiant and has a sharpness to it. In these dreams my heart physically hurts in the same way it did the day I found out he died. Growing pains I tell myself... If my heart wasn't broken I couldn't feel the undetectable stitching, stapling, strapping, gluing and duct taping of the small pieces coming back together.  I also want to believe it's Brandon's way of reallocating strength and love to me so that I can make it through another day.  So that I can continue to rebuild my broken heart into one with huge expansion joints that enable me to love deeper for those in my life that deserve it most.

p.s.Yes, Jason got a stern talking to this morning and I woke him up at 10:00 to babysit Sam while I ran. Sam, who is working at potty-training, took it upon himself to flush his diaper (and shirt) down the toilet and pee on the couch while Jason was cleaning the bathroom. I think that is punishment enough!