Yesterday I had the unfortunate honour to attend the funeral of Sheyanne O'Donnell, a twelve year old girl who lost her battle with neuroblastoma earlier this week.  Although I never had the privilege to meet her in person, hearing the stories told by those who did, and loved her dearly, made it seem like I had.  The memories shared about her smile, laugh, sense of humour, and eyes that could brighten any room were touching and emotional moving to all in attendance, but for me, there was much more to it.  While this day was about Sheyanne and her family, part of me couldn't help but be brought back to memories of Darrel.  Sheyanne and Darrel both faced each new day for what it was...a new day.  Their far too brief lives had given them life experiences that forced them to have a certain wisdom and maturity beyond their years about the disease they fought against, yet they still longed for the joys of the childhood denied to them by cancer. By looking into their eyes, you could see conflicting reality of their situation, hope and despair, but always the dreams for a better tomorrow.

My thoughts were and are also with Sheyanne's family and friends.  I know all too well the pain, grief, and misplaced guilt they are no doubt coming to terms with.  Nothing you read can ever possibly prepare someone for dealing with the loss of their child.  Each grieving parent comes to terms with this loss in their own way, and in their own time.  There is no correct or better approach or timetable for them to take, and it may be awhile before Kevin and Rebecca figure out which is best for them, both as a couple, and as individuals. This is equally true for her sister, her extended family, and others who loved Sheyanne.  This is a journey that never really ends, as it continues to change and evolve over the days, months, and years that follow.  The loss, pain and "what ifs" will remain with them, never too far from the surface, but it will be countered by the love and memory of their daughter and sister, which will give them the strength to make it through the day, and all the days after that.

 
Rest in Peace Sheyanne

Sheyanne Shari O'Donnell

December 18, 2001 - February 17, 2014

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Below is a poem read at Sheyanne's Funeral:

The Bumble Bee Cannot Fly

According to laws
Of aerodynamics
The bumble bee cannot fly;

It's body is too
Heavy for its wings
And that's the simple
Reason why.

But the bumble bee
Doesn't know this fact,
And so it flies anyway
For all to see.

Remember this when you're
Losing faith or hope
God's proof that the impossible
Can be.

A.S. Waldrop

Home Burial
By Robert Frost

He saw her from the bottom of the stairs
Before she saw him. She was starting down,
Looking back over her shoulder at some fear.
She took a doubtful step and then undid it
To raise herself and look again. He spoke
Advancing toward her: ‘What is it you see
From up there always—for I want to know.’
She turned and sank upon her skirts at that,
And her face changed from terrified to dull.
He said to gain time: ‘What is it you see,’
Mounting until she cowered under him.
‘I will find out now—you must tell me, dear.’
She, in her place, refused him any help
With the least stiffening of her neck and silence.
She let him look, sure that he wouldn’t see,
Blind creature; and awhile he didn’t see.
But at last he murmured, ‘Oh,’ and again, ‘Oh.’

‘What is it—what?’ she said.

                                          ‘Just that I see.’

‘You don’t,’ she challenged. ‘Tell me what it is.’

‘The wonder is I didn’t see at once.
I never noticed it from here before.
I must be wonted to it—that’s the reason.
The little graveyard where my people are!
So small the window frames the whole of it.
Not so much larger than a bedroom, is it?
There are three stones of slate and one of marble,
Broad-shouldered little slabs there in the sunlight
On the sidehill. We haven’t to mind those.
But I understand: it is not the stones,
But the child’s mound—’

                             ‘Don’t, don’t, don’t, don’t,’ she cried.

She withdrew shrinking from beneath his arm
That rested on the banister, and slid downstairs;
And turned on him with such a daunting look,
He said twice over before he knew himself:
‘Can’t a man speak of his own child he’s lost?’

‘Not you! Oh, where’s my hat? Oh, I don’t need it!
I must get out of here. I must get air.
I don’t know rightly whether any man can.’

‘Amy! Don’t go to someone else this time.
Listen to me. I won’t come down the stairs.’
He sat and fixed his chin between his fists.
‘There’s something I should like to ask you, dear.’

‘You don’t know how to ask it.’

                                              ‘Help me, then.’

Her fingers moved the latch for all reply.

‘My words are nearly always an offense.
I don’t know how to speak of anything
So as to please you. But I might be taught
I should suppose. I can’t say I see how.
A man must partly give up being a man
With women-folk. We could have some arrangement
By which I’d bind myself to keep hands off
Anything special you’re a-mind to name.
Though I don’t like such things ’twixt those that love.
Two that don’t love can’t live together without them.
But two that do can’t live together with them.’
She moved the latch a little. ‘Don’t—don’t go.
Don’t carry it to someone else this time.
Tell me about it if it’s something human.
Let me into your grief. I’m not so much
Unlike other folks as your standing there
Apart would make me out. Give me my chance.
I do think, though, you overdo it a little.
What was it brought you up to think it the thing
To take your mother-loss of a first child
So inconsolably—in the face of love.
You’d think his memory might be satisfied—’

‘There you go sneering now!’

                                           ‘I’m not, I’m not!
You make me angry. I’ll come down to you.
God, what a woman! And it’s come to this,
A man can’t speak of his own child that’s dead.’

‘You can’t because you don't know how to speak.
If you had any feelings, you that dug
With your own hand—how could you?—his little grave;
I saw you from that very window there,
Making the gravel leap and leap in air,
Leap up, like that, like that, and land so lightly
And roll back down the mound beside the hole.
I thought, Who is that man? I didn’t know you.
And I crept down the stairs and up the stairs
To look again, and still your spade kept lifting.
Then you came in. I heard your rumbling voice
Out in the kitchen, and I don’t know why,
But I went near to see with my own eyes.
You could sit there with the stains on your shoes
Of the fresh earth from your own baby’s grave
And talk about your everyday concerns.
You had stood the spade up against the wall
Outside there in the entry, for I saw it.’

‘I shall laugh the worst laugh I ever laughed.
I’m cursed. God, if I don’t believe I’m cursed.’

‘I can repeat the very words you were saying:
“Three foggy mornings and one rainy day
Will rot the best birch fence a man can build.”
Think of it, talk like that at such a time!
What had how long it takes a birch to rot
To do with what was in the darkened parlor?
You couldn’t care! The nearest friends can go
With anyone to death, comes so far short
They might as well not try to go at all.
No, from the time when one is sick to death,
One is alone, and he dies more alone.
Friends make pretense of following to the grave,
But before one is in it, their minds are turned
And making the best of their way back to life
And living people, and things they understand.
But the world’s evil. I won’t have grief so
If I can change it. Oh, I won’t, I won’t!’

‘There, you have said it all and you feel better.
You won’t go now. You’re crying. Close the door.
The heart’s gone out of it: why keep it up.
Amy! There’s someone coming down the road!’

‘You—oh, you think the talk is all. I must go--
Somewhere out of this house. How can I make you—’

‘If—you—do!’ She was opening the door wider.
‘Where do you mean to go?  First tell me that.
I’ll follow and bring you back by force.  I will!—’


*************************

Below is the Summary and Commentary about this Frost poem I found on another site.  There are countless emotional complexities involved after losing a child, and the relationship between how the mother and the father cope with their loss is one of the most significant and difficult to explain and/or understand.  Unfortunately, I can relate all too well to these inter-personal dynamics.

*************************

Summary:

The poem presents a few moments of charged dialogue in a strained relationship between a rural husband and wife who have lost a child. The woman is distraught after catching sight of the child’s grave through the window—and more so when her husband doesn’t immediately recognize the cause of her distress. She tries to leave the house; he importunes her to stay, for once, and share her grief with him—to give him a chance. He doesn’t understand what it is he does that offends her or why she should grieve outwardly so long. She resents him deeply for his composure, what she sees as his hard-heartedness. She vents some of her anger and frustration, and he receives it, but the distance between them remains. She opens the door to leave, as he calls after her.

Commentary:

 “Home Burial” is one of Frost’s most overtly sad poems. There are at least two tragedies here: the death of a child, which antecedes the poem, and the collapse of a marriage, which the poem foreshadows. “Home Burial” is about grief and grieving, but most of all it seems to be about the breakdown and limits of communication.

The husband and the wife represent two very different ways of grieving. The wife’s grief infuses every part of her and does not wane with time. She has been compared to a female character in Frost’s A Masque of Mercy, of whom another character says, “She’s had some loss she can’t accept from God.” The wife remarks that most people make only pretense of following a loved one to the grave, when in truth their minds are “making the best of their way back to life
/ And living people, and things they understand.” She, however, will not accept this kind of grief, will not turn from the grave back to the world of living, for to do so is to accept the death. Instead she declares that “the world’s evil.”

The husband, on the other hand, has accepted the death. Time has passed, and he might be more likely now to say, “That’s the way of the world,” than, “The world’s evil.” He did grieve, but the outward indications of his grief were quite different from those of his wife. He threw himself into the horrible task of digging his child’s grave—into physical work. This action further associates the father with a “way-of-the-world” mentality, with the cycles that make up the farmer’s life, and with an organic view of life and death. The father did not leave the task of burial to someone else, instead, he physically dug into the earth and planted his child’s body in the soil.

One might say that any form of grief in which the bereaved stubbornly finds the world “evil” is not a very healthy one. One could also claim that the bereaved who never talks through his grief—who never speaks of it—is doing himself and others injury. But, again, the purpose of the poem isn’t really to determine the right way to grieve. Rather, it intends to portray a failure of
empathy and communication. Each person fails to appreciate the other’s grieving
process—fails to credit it, allow it, and have patience with it. And each fails to alter even slightly his or her own form of grief in order to accommodate the other.

Note how utterly the woman misunderstands the man’s actions. To her, the act of burying the child was one of supreme indifference, while to him it must have been one of supreme suffering—an attempt to convince himself, through physical labor, that this is the natural order of things; or an act of self-punishment, a penance befitting the horror of the loss; or simply a way of steeping himself in his grief, of forcing it into the muscles of his arms and back, of feeling it in the dirt on his clothes. Note, too, how the wife completely fails to grasp the meaning of her husband’s words: “ ‘Three foggy mornings and one rainy day / Will rot the best birch fence a man can build.’ ” Indisposed to see her husbands form of grieving as acceptable, she takes his words as literal, inappropriate comments on fence building. Yet they have everything to do with the little body in the darkened parlor. He is talking about death, about the futility of human effort, about fortune and misfortune, about the unfairness of fate and nature. 

And yet, the man is also partially to blame. If he had any understanding of how to communicate to her, he would not leave everything unspoken. He would make some concession to her needs and articulate a brief defense. “You misunderstand,” he might say. “When I said that, it was because that was the only way I could say anything at all about our loss.” Instead, he lets her
accusations float in the air, as if they were just hysteria and nonsense and not worth challenging. This displays a lack of empathy and a failure of communication as fatal as hers. When she describes his heartless act of grave digging, he says only, “I shall laugh the worst laugh I ever laughed. / I’m cursed. God, if I don’t believe I’m cursed.” This leaves her free to believe that he accepts her accusation, that the curse refers to his hard-heartedness and not the terrible irony of her misinterpretation. He uses irony where she requires clarity. She needs him to admit to agony, and he can grant her no more than veiled references to a substratum of unspoken grief. And in the face of her griefs obvious persistence, he makes a callous—or, at very least, extremely counterproductive—remark: “I do think, though, you overdo it a little.”

How important a role does gender play in this tragedy? Certainly it has some relevance. There are the husband’s futile, abortive physical threats, as if he could physically coerce her into sharing her grief—but these are impulses of desperation. And both husband and wife acknowledge that there are separate spheres of being and understanding. “Cant a man speak of his own child he’s lost?” asks the husband. “I don’t know rightly whether any man can,” she replies. A little later he laments, “A man must partly give up being a man / With womenfolk.” He sees his taciturnity and his inability to say the appropriate thing as a masculine trait, and she seems to agree. (Yet she sees his quiet grave digging as nearly inhuman.) Additionally, it is fairly standard to assume that more outward emotion is permitted of women than of men—the tragedy of this poem might then be seen as an exacerbation of a pervasive inequality. Yet one enduring stereotype of gender distinctions is the man’s inability to read between the lines, his failure to apprehend the emotions underlying the literal meaning of the woman’s words. In this poem, husband and wife fail equally in this manner. A woman, perhaps, might be less likely to dig a grave to vent her grief, but she is just as likely to react to death by withdrawal or by immersion in quotidian tasks. The reader witnesses the breakdown of a marriage (the burial of a home, expressed in the title’s double entendre), but more basically, this is a breakdown of human communication.

Partly, that breakdown is due to the inescapable limits of any communication. Much of the literature of the twentieth century stems from an acknowledgement of these limits, from attempts to grapple with them and, paradoxically, express them. A great deal of Frost’s poetry deals with an essential loneliness, which is linked to the limits of empathy and the sense that some things are simply inexpressible. What can one really say about the loss of one’s child? Can one adequately convey one’s grief on such an occasion? Is empathy—always a challenge—doomed to fail under such particular strain? 

We should note in passing—though it is not of merely passing importance—that Frost knew firsthand the experience of losing children. His firstborn son, Elliott, died of cholera at the age of three. Later, his infant daughter died. Two more of his children died fairly young, one by suicide.

Taken from:  http://www.sparknotes.com/poetry/frost/section4.rhtml

~ HOW DO WE HANDLE HOLIDAYS AND AT LEAST YOU STILL HAVE OTHER
CHILDREN ~
 
 DECEMBER 22, 2013 ~ SHERRY BLEVINS ~
IN MEMORY OF MY SON AND ALL OTHER CHILDREN AND GRANDCHILDREN GONE TOO SOON

~ YOU MAY SHARE THIS NOTE ~ LEAVE IT EXACTLY AS IT IS PLEASE ~

" HOW DO WE HANDLE HOLIDAYS AND AT LEAST YOU STILL HAVE OTHER CHILDREN.....?????"

I don't know which question makes me the maddest....but here goes.... How do we handle holidays? We really don't handle them well.....For you see, we put on a MASK so nobody knows what we are holding inside that is ripping our Hearts out.... For those that this is their Angel's first Christmas in Heaven.....they are broken....they hurt.....they are angry.....and there are so many more feelings that these Angel Parent's and Angel Grandparent's are experiencing on their Angel's First Christmas in Heaven.....I totally believe that at first we are all in a fog and stay that way in order to just get through the day and day's. Personally I can say that with time it does get easier, but it takes time to heal what can be healed.....There are so many steps we must take and even those that we take backwards have to be walked....

While so many people are happy and celebrating.....we are deciding what types of flowers to take to our Angel's grave for Christmas....perhaps a minature Christmas Tree.... As Christmas nears each of us will have an empty chair at the table....perhaps an empty stocking that will never be filled again....a hole in our heart that remains there forever....songs that we hear and burst into tears....the Christmas tree that some of us have still never been able to put back up....a special ornament or more that we hang in memory of our child or grandchild gone too soon....a Christmas photo in which we are reminded that part of us is missing in....Christmas lights that our child so enjoyed looking at....and many other things that we used to do but no longer
are able to do....these are some of the things that we have been cheated out of
when we lost our child....but what we do have is our memories....Our Child is,
Our Child was, and our Child will always be....So we have to learn to wear these
Ugly Shoes that only a Parent or Grandparent can understand.

At Least you Still Have Other Children!!! Where do people come up with something like that I ask? What does it matter how many children we have still here with us......we have still suffered the worse loss a person can imagine....Each of our Children are one in themselves.....A child or grandchild that has died cannot be replaced....But remember what each of us do have....We have memories that nobody or nothing can take away or change....Those memories make us know that our child was.....our child is....and our child will forever be a part of us....Nothing can change that....Would the NORMAL person as they are called give up one of their Children? I think not.....We had no choice in the matter and the other Children that we still have
here on earth....we thank God for them always....

I leave you all with this thought...Please understand that our
loss can or will never be replaced...You can't replace a child and it doesn't
matter how many other children you have....Each of them are
individuals....


 THE STEPPING STONES ~ AUTHOR UNKNOWN~ WHAT WE AS GRIEVING
PARENT'S AND GRANDPARENT'S GO THROUGH EACH AND EVERY DAY...


 ...Come, take my hand, the road is long...We must travel by stepping stones....No, you're not alone, I'll go with you...I know the road well, I've been there...Don't fear the darkness, I'll be there with you...We must take one step at a time...But remember we may have to stop awhile...It is a long way to the other side...And there may be obstacles.....We have many stones to cross....Some are bigger than others...Shock, denial and anger to start....Then comes guilt, despair and loneliness...It's a hard road to travel, but it must be done...It's the only way to reach the other side...Come, slip
your hand in mine...What? Oh, yes, it's strong, I've held so many hands like
yours...Yes, mine was one time small and weak like yours....Once, you see, I had
to take someone's hand in order to take the first step....Oops! You've stumbled;
go ahead and cry. ..Don't be ashamed; I understand....Let's wait here awhile and
get your breath....When you're stronger we'll go on, one step at a time,...There's no need to hurry....Say, it's nice to hear you laugh....Yes, I agree, The memories you shared are good....Look, we're halfway there now; I can see the other side....It looks so warm and sunny....Oh, have you noticed, we're nearing the last stone and you're standing alone? We've reached the other side. But wait, look back, someone is standing there....They are alone and want to cross the stepping stones.....I'd better go, they need my help...What? Are you sure? Why, yes, go ahead. ...I'll wait, you know the way, you've been there...Yes, I agree. It's your turn, my friend....To help someone else cross the stepping stone.

SHERRY BLEVINS
IN LOVING MEMORY OF MY SON
JAMES IRVIN  "J.D." SCROGGINS
FOREVER 23 

Awareness

By Samantha Bieno, diagnosed with Leukemia in August 2012 at age 20

There is something that I don’t understand, 
We see kids fighting cancer, 
yet no one lends a hand, 
we need to find the answer, 
If we want to see brighter days, 
we need to find the cure, 
if we want to move our world in positive ways 

The numbers 36/7 may mean nothing to you, 
but those numbers are the cold, hard truth, 
those are the numbers known by too few
Those are the numbers that take a child’s youth

7 kids die a day, 
36 are given the harsh news, 
that chemo and radiation are headed their way, 
a path that nobody wanted to choose

Thrown into a world of the unknown, 
quickly their tiny bodies filled with chemo, 
soon they become skin and bone, 
hoping to put smiles on their face with Finding Nemo

More hair falls out day by day, 
until their head is shiny and bald, 
the kids must get used to this new way, 
despite what mean names they are called

Somehow through all this hell, 
these kids are so brave, 
smiling like all is well, 
thankful for all the days that the Lord gave 

Would you want to watch your child cry in pain, 
begging for you to take the cancer away, 
would you want to watch poison run through their tiny veins, 
learn of all the possible developmental and physical delays 

The only way to change this fate, 
is to bring awareness, 
research is where we need to donate, 
to end all this unfairness. 

Each kid deserves a life, 
full of laughter and smiles, 
not have to deal with this horrible strife, 
and put on IV pole miles. 

Dedicated to every child fighting and those who have gained their wings far too early.

(Taken from The Truth 365 website)

Here "A Song for Kellen"
By Sheldon Aucoin
 
There's a night light in the hallway
in case he needs to see
There's a storybook laid out for him
his favorite one to read
There's an old man in the study
with a picture in his hand
of a young boy and his daddy
the two were best of friends
 
And he lies awake at night
afraid to dream
Afraid to go back to that day
when he lost everything
And he hears a voice beside him
softly say "Hey Dad!" How've you been?
 
He just smiles and he says to him
I'm still Here, I'm still Here
I'm still right where you left me.
 
As he watches in the shadows
He can hear his daddy pray
And he's asking why the good Lord
Had to take his boy away.
And if only for a moment
he could hold him once again
he would offer up his final breath
to be with his best friend.
 
So he slips away that night into a dream
that takes him to the day
when he had everything
And he hears a voice beside him
softly say "Hey Dad!" How've you been?
 
He just smiles and he says to him
Now I'm Here, Now I'm Here
Now I'm Here right with you.



  

Video Description:  A father loses his son at a very early age. He was just 7 years old. He
is devastated. His love for his son is so powerful that he creates an altered reality in which his son is still in the house. So he carries on his life as usual. Turning down his covers, getting his favorite story book out and turning on the night light in the hall way every night. He lives out the rest of his life like this until he becomes an old man. The boy`s love for his dad is so great that his spirit has stayed in the house to watch over his dad. One night the old man prays to God to have his son with him again, and that night the old man dies.
He is then reunited with his boy......This is a story about Eternal Love!!!

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"Here" was written a few years ago, but it now has become a song to honour and remember a local boy from the author's hometown.

Kellen Barry Surette:  February 8, 2006 - September 11, 2013

When Tomorrow Starts Without Me

When tomorrow starts without me, 
And I’m not there to see,
If the sun should rise and find your eyes...
All filled with tears for me;
I wish so much you wouldn’t cry
The way you did today,
While thinking of the many things,
We didn’t get to say.
 
I know how much you love me,
As much as I love you,
And each time you think of me,
I know you’ll miss me too;
But when tomorrow starts without me,
Please try to understand,
That an angel came and called my name,
And took me by the hand,
And said my place was ready,
In heaven far above
And that I’d have to leave behind
All those I dearly love. 

But as I turned to walk away,
A tear fell from my eye
For all my life, I’d always thought, 
I didn’t want to die.
I had so much to live for,
So much left yet to do,
It seemed almost impossible,
That I was leaving you.

I thought of all the yesterdays,
The good ones and the bad,
The thought of all the love we shared,
And all the fun we had.
If I could relive yesterday
Just even for a while,
I’d say good-bye and kiss you
And maybe see you smile.

But then I fully realized
That this could never be,
For emptiness and memories,
Would take the place of me.
And when I thought of worldly things
I might miss come tomorrow,
I thought of you, and when I did
My heart was filled with sorrow.

But when I walked through heaven’s gates
I felt so much at home
When God looked down and smiled at me,
From His great golden throne,
He said “This is eternity,
And all I’ve promised you. 

Today your life on earth is past
But here it starts anew.
I promise no tomorrow,
But today will always last,
And since each day’s the same way,
There’s no longing for the past.
You have been so faithful,
So trusting and so true.

Though there were times
You did some things
You knew you shouldn’t do.
But you have been forgiven
And now at last you’re free.
So won’t you come and take my hand
And share my life with me?”

So when tomorrow starts without me,
Don’t think we’re far apart,
For every time you think of me,
I’m right here, in your heart.

-David M. Romano

For all the Dads out there who will be missing their sons and/or daughters on Father's Day this coming weekend.

Taken from the Grieving Dads Project website: 

http://www.grievingdads.com/fathers-day-poem/


Dear Mr. Hallmark ….. One More Time

Hello there Mr. Hallmark man,
I wrote to you in May
To ask that words of love be shared
With my mom on Mother’s Day.

Just as there is no card for Mom
To let her know I care,
There is no card for my dad, too,
And I have so much to share.

It’s very hard for my loving dad
To know that I’m okay.
To protect me was his job, he feels,
So he thinks he failed some way.

Although I had to leave this world,
While still considered young,
There is no way he ever failed--
There’s no more he could have done.

My dad he tends to question
Those things he cannot see.
I always send him little signs
To say, “Hey, Dad, it’s me!”

I hear him crying in the car,
The shower hides his tears.
He feels he has to be so strong
For those he holds so dear.

My dad he often gets so mad
At what became of me.
He wants so much to understand,
He says, “How could this be?”

I somehow need to let him know,
Though impossible it seems--
For him to live and laugh again
Will fulfill so many dreams.

The card I need to send right now
To a dad as great as mine,
Will thank him for the love he gave
Throughout my brief lifetime.

He’s still the one that I call Dad,
Our bond’s forever strong,
‘Cuz even though he can’t see me,
Our love lives on and on.

Please help me find a way
To tell my dad that when
It comes his time to leave the earth
I’ll be waiting there for him.

And also, Mr. Hallmark man,
Please help him to believe,
That nothing will ever change the fact
That my dad he’ll always be.

Author Unknown