Member-only story
Grieving Our Son
When loss is a burden you can’t carry alone
My husband combed my hair with his fingers. Long and grey it hangs past my shoulders. Curls fight their way down my head gathering dominance as they travel. I swore I would never be an old woman with the hair I now carry with joy and confidence. I’m not sure when my mind made that transition to acceptance. But here I am.
That night I took a shower and washed my hair. Grief streamed from me along with the warm water that cascaded downward. After stepping out and wrapping myself in a towel, I realized I had forgotten to bring a comb or brush. Unruly at the best of times my hair needed to be subdued when it was wet otherwise it became a tangled mess.
We were staying in a suite near our daughter’s home where we had that day arrived to help her leave what had become an unhappy marriage.
It was only eight days since we had received the news that our son had died by suicide. I had spoken to him a few weeks before. I had no idea he might be feeling that way; he gave no indication. When the police officer arrived to tell me I was beyond shocked.
Broken, fragile, and barely functioning we stuck to our commitment to our daughter to help her and her three children move into a new and much smaller home. She had no one else. We had to be there for her.
