Two Year Mark

Tomorrow will mark two years since my baby boy left this earthly world.  I thought I would blog my feelings out today, because I'm certain I won't have it in me tomorrow to do so.  I don't know if because I was so sick this time last year I didn't feel the impact as much or what, but this year seems to be so much harder.  I hate it!  I hate feeling like such a huge part of me is missing and I will never be able to get that back.  The sad part is that I don't believe that will ever change as long as I am breathing.
I'm truly blessed, however.  I have family and friends that love me and I know they want to do something so badly to help or make me feel better, but honestly, there isn't anything anyone can do.  I love that they love me like they do and I can't imagine getting through this world let alone losing Chad without them, but there truly isn't anything anyone can do.  As a wise man says, "it is what it is".  He is right, it really is just what it is and I know over time I will eventually find a way to cope better, but today is certainly not that day.

I was sharing some stories with Tebo last night about Christmas lights and how Chad and I attempted to put up colored lights on our tree one year and the moment we hung them and turned them on we both said they had to go!  We were always straight white lights only and we thought we would just give it a go, but it was an epic fail for us.  I looked at him that day and said, this is even without ornaments can you imagine how busy this tree would look after adding those?  He said, oh mom, this is terrible.  We removed the lights and threw them in the trash and immediately put our white ones up.  I was glad we got that out of our system quick.  He was never just crazy about a Christmas tree and all the decorations once he got out of basically his toddler years so it was just me providing the decorations and the tree for him, but finally when he was in high school he said he could really care less about all that.  You have to laugh, because I always dreaded the mess it made, but I did it every year because I was afraid he would be crushed without it and all the time he felt like I did. HA!  It was actually kind of funny (I guess), but when he enlisted and he wasn't able to be home for Christmas I just could not bring myself to put up a tree.  We rarely had Tebo's kids during Christmas so they weren't being cheated by us not putting one up, but when Chad could be home we put both trees up.  It's funny how even after knowing he could care less about it, I felt the need to do it.  :)  I guess that's what parents do.

I miss our daily phone calls and I miss not being able to call and tell him something funny or about something cool I either I saw or just got or teasing him about what he was getting for Christmas just to find out he already had it figured out.  I miss that.  I miss kissing him on his little head every chance I got just to hear him say "mom" and then grin.  I miss the calls for advice or when he would call scared or worried about something and me talking him down just to hear the calmness rush over him before we would hang up the phone.  Having 22 years of those little things is just hard to have ripped away so suddenly.

I know there are many people that were in Chad's life that will be missing him a little more this weekend and my heart goes out to them all and if I could take on their sorrow for them I would do it in a heartbeat.  I know I can't, but I wish I could.  I barely know how to handle my grief so I certainly don't know how I could help them, but I would certainly give it my best shot.

You know, I could sit at home and cry all day, or scream, or call my sister (who unfortunately know first hand the grief of losing a child), or talk to Tebo or my parents, or talk to my other sisters or bothers, or talk to a therapist, but truthfully all I want to do is be alone with my thoughts and work in my house.  I struggle with verbalizing how I feel or sharing my thoughts and sadness out loud, but seem to do better if I just stay to myself and work through the sadness and write my feelings down.  There are so many others (especially my family) that are hurting right along side me so the last thing I would want to do is burden them with my grief (although I know they would be right there for me in a second).  Besides, what do I say?  I talk about Chad all the time in my every day conversations and I'm always up for hearing stories about him and welcome those, but for me to try and share my grief outside myself seems not only uncomfortable, but just awkward.  I can't explain it, but it just doesn't feel natural to me. 

Two years tomorrow just seems still so unreal to me... Maybe it always will.

Baby Chad with his curls

Got to love that Mountain Dew t-shirt

Still love that sad ball cap...

I love this boy!

His favorite TN shirt

In Afghanistan

Radio Operator... In Afghanistan

;(  Should not be!

Road Rage Doesn't Pay

So Monday at lunch I ran out to pick up Tebo's birthday present.  As I was in the store I started getting the shakes so I knew I couldn't wait until I got back to the office to eat so I decided to pull into the closest place and that was Chick-Fil-A.  I was already in the far right lane when suddenly this women came over from the far left lane and cut me off.  I hit my break so she didn't take the front end off my car and let her in front of me.  Of course as I'm telling Tebo about this his first question was, "did you lay on the horn"?  I said, no, I was frustrated on the inside, but I didn't do anything to let her know I was frustrated.
Well, wouldn't you know she was heading right to Chick-Fil-A with me and I was right behind her the whole time.  I was a little irritated, but I decided to not think about that and start thinking about what I needed to do when I returned to the office so I just patiently waited for my turn.  When I got to the window to pick up my food the man told me that the lady in front of me bought my lunch.  See, had I gotten all bent out of shape and honked my horn or given some type of gesture, I would have had to pay for my own lunch.  :) 
Road rage does not pay anyway, because you truly do not know that the person causing you to be so angry while driving hadn't just been given some terrible news.  Remember that during the holiday season and understand that most drivers aren't out to get you or piss you off.  They merely may not have seen you due to just about anything and it could be very important.  If you do accidentally cut someone off and get the chance to make it up like this lady did, I hope you do.  Now I need to pay it forward for someone so I can hopefully keep this trend going.  Happy driving people! 

If I listened to them...

If I listened to people around me and the opinion of acquaintances I would be frustrated, maybe even angry, but lucky for me I don't listen to them.  So here are some of the things I've either heard, over-heard, been told, or felt regarding a decision my husband and I are trying to make right now in regards to selling our home and purchasing another.
First if you don't know our story I will give you a quick recap.  We got married in 2005 and Chad (my only son) was a senior in high school so we bought a house that would allow us to keep him as close to his school district, but also get us in a location we really liked.  It was the first house Tebo and I would share together and Chad was sharing this with us at the same time.  This was the house we celebrated Chad's high school graduation, his enlistment to the USMC, his deployment to Iraq, his wedding and reception, his pre-deployment leave to Afghanistan, the house we had to hear that faithful doorbell ring when we lost him, and the house we have tried to rebuild our "new normal" in.  There are memories, there are little things that Chad placed in that house that I have not been able to bring myself to move.  This is the house we shared when Tebo's son came to live with us and both his daughters live(d) with us.  There are memories there.  It's the house where we have an amazing set of neighbors that not only were there for us when we lost Chad, but who also put a memorial stone at the entrance, we had someone give us a tree (our Chad tree) and plant it in the front yard (and I certainly can't take that with us), and Home Depot donated and installed an American flag at our entrance for him.  So you can see, this isn't an easy decision for us, but it's one that we feel is time to make and for more reasons than just wanting a different house.
So see, moving out of this house and into another house (regardless what house we end up with) will be a very difficult move to say the very least. 
Not only do we love our house (despite missing a few things we would like to have), but we have connections throughout that house and neighborhood that make this choice a tough one to say the very least.
Sadly, I actually have people I've come in contact with that have made me feel like they were a bit jealous or that we were being silly for looking at new/larger homes when we are basically empty-nesters.  To start with, I don't owe anyone an explanation (I get that), but I feel I need to write this for me so that I don't end up saying something ugly to someone over it, because it is certainly not worth that for sure.  There have been those that are excited and some that don't have a feeling either way, and there are some that just say negative things.
Well, Tebo and I have determined that IF we are able to sell our current home for what we need to sell it for that it would be better financially to purchase another home that has what we are looking for rather than add on to this current home.  Even the banker and realtor have told us the same thing so we decided to drop the process of refinancing our current home and list it for sale and begin looking for a different home.  We started out staying basically in the same area we are in now and we just weren't finding exactly what we wanted so we extended our search.  We have narrowed down our search to a possible three homes, but no decision has been made yet and won't be until we have an offer on our current home.
During this process I was having a lot of anxiety and allowed myself to feel a lot of this anxiety just because I felt I was getting the "vibe" from others that we shouldn't do this or why are we doing this that I began to doubt myself.  Then, I remembered the bat.  Chad placed that bat behind his closet door the day we moved into that house and through Trevor and now Tia no one has touched the bat.  Now I will have to move the bat if we move and that was (for whatever reason) bothering me so badly.  Tebo recognized that I was struggling and he offered me to pick out Chad's room and no matter what that would always remain Chad's room.  I can't explain it, but that small gesture gave me some peace and I've been more at ease about this process.  Does it still scare me, you bet!  However, now, I feel like rather than leaving my memories of Chad in that house we will be taking them with us and creating new ones in a different way.
We are very fortunate (Tebo and I) to have good jobs that allow us to have the home we have today, but we have worked very hard to achieve that and we were very lucky to have purchased in this neighborhood, because it is very desirable and very well maintained so we truly made a great investment.  Now we are ready to buy our "forever" home and since we have no plans to ever sell and buy again we want to make sure it's as close to perfect as we can get.  There will be a day when our kids will start having babies and we want to have a home large enough to share with them and when/if we have everyone at the house at one time we have room for everyone and not feel cramped up with a small living space. 
I know it looks to some that we don't really need that much room and our house is perfect and all that stuff (trust me I've heard it), but for us to be in our "forever" home, this is not the one.  We have changed direction from the start and now are looking at having at least an acre or so and thinking about the floor plan that will suite us for many years to come.  I don't really feel all that excited about this move, but I do feel anxious in a good way to get this change made and start a "normal" routine and hopefully anyone who feels like the ways I have described above will better understand where we are coming from.  If not, then I hope they find peace any way they possibly can. 
I know for me and my house, we can't worry about that kind of stuff or it would not only keep us from moving forward, but it will also allow too much negativity into our lives and no one needs that.



Our current home with our Chad tree...



Struggling ;(

Well, Tebo and I are embarking on another "new" chapter in our life.  I won't lie, I'm struggling in ways I really can't even put into words.  We are in the process of potentially selling our current home and buying another one.  The things that have tripped me up have nothing to do with the house itself or the neighbors or neighborhood, it's a bat.  You read that correctly, a bat.  Let me explain.
Since Chad was about 4 years old he has always placed a bat either behind his bedroom door or behind his closet door.  All he ever said to me about it was it was for protection.  :)  Well, when Trevor moved into Chad's room while Chad was in boot camp I wouldn't let him remove the bat.  He never asked questions why, he just agreed to leave it there.  When Tia moved into Chad's room we had basically the same conversation, but she (being a girl) asked and I told her the history behind it and she was more than gracious enough to leave the bat there.  Well, now we are potentially moving and that bat has to be moved.  I didn't even have to explain to Tebo, he just somehow knew I was struggling.  He so sweetly told me he thought we needed to have a Chad room.  He said you can put his bat behind the door and whatever else you feel needs to be in that room and that can just be your Chad room.  I have to say, that has helped tremendously, but for some reason I am really having a hard time and it is actually pissing me off, because I really have no reason for this to be so hard.  My anxiety is really very silly when I take a step back and look at the big picture, but none the less, I'm struggling. 
I actually feel like my struggle is keeping me from truly opening my heart and mind for a new house.  I hate feeling like this, but I also hate feeling like we are in limbo and that's exactly what it feels like right now.
We have people pretty interested in our house so we need to be prepared in the event we sell ours quickly and I'm not there yet. 
If you are reading this, all I need are a few extra prayers.  I know I will get through this bump in the road and things will work out just as they are suppose to, but right now it feels terribly out of control and very uneasy and I just need to get a little peace and relax. 

Fall is in the air

This time of year is tough regardless and has been since December 1, 2010 and I imagine it always will be, but today I went to the cemetery at lunch and couldn't help but miss the stories that would have been.  It use to drive me crazy that my youngest sister, Stacy, and Chad would fight/compete to get the most fish when fishing and honestly, they acted more like brother and sister than aunt and nephew.  I won't lie, I would give anything to listen to them fight right now, but it wouldn't be over fishing right now.  They would be fighting/competing over deer!  I never really thought I would have that sentence with my sister in it, but it's true.  She has allowed her redneck/country blood show more this year than past.  It's actually kind of funny, but again, I would give anything to hear them arguing over spots or who was going to get the first deer or who gets the biggest.
As I was at the cemetery today I realized that I was so impatient for the grass to finally grow in around his headstone and be pretty that I forgot with all that grass there was no way for me to see the deer tracks at his spot like we did last year.  It made me tear up, because I know hunting would be the biggest thing on his mind right now as he would be a civilian right now. 
Tebo and I participated in a Veteran's celebration at Chad's best friend's wife's nursing school on Monday and Clint came.  He was running a few minutes late, because just as Billy left he shot a deer and he had to track it so he would know where to go once the ceremony was over.  When he left he grabbed Chad picture from their wedding that Emily had placed next to our table and he asked her if she wanted it in her car or his truck.  I said you might as well take him with you, because you helped him your fair share dragging a deer out of the woods.  He laughed and said you are right so he took Chad right along with him to bring his deer out of the woods. 
This time of year is tough.  It always will be, but I will do my best to always find a way to bring him into my day and have a smile as I think of the storeis that would be right now.
Momma misses her baby boy more than words could ever express and I hope it never gets easier to do so... that would just be terribly sad.

Heavy Sad Heart

As we prepare to attend and participate in different Veteran's Day celebrations I can't help but feel like it's a little bitter sweet.  I'm so thankful to all our men and women in uniform and the daily sacrifices (physical, emotional, and mental) they give each and every day past, present, and future.  Some suffer in silence and others not so silent.  Then I think of not only myself and my family, but other families of the fallen heroes that aren't here to be recognized for their ultimate sacrifice.  All I can do is pray they would know how appreciated they are for laying their lives down for all of us.
It's sad as well, because there are still people in this world that actually believe our Marines/Soldiers deserve to die.  I can't tell you how many times I've seen emails or posts stating that very comment.  I also can't tell you the rage and hurt I feel when I see or hear something like that when my son is one of those fallen heroes.  These ignorant people will get what they deserve in the end and I refuse to allow them the satisfaction of wasting any of my time or energy being angry with them.  Like it is said all too often, you can't fix stupid.
I do have a heavy heart.  I miss my son and even more than that my heart is heavy for his brothers in arms.  I know they have a heavy heart especially this time of year.  Not only is this time of year Veteran's Day, but we are coming up on December 1st (the anniversary of Chad's death).  They have so much to endure on a daily basis with all they have had to witness and experience overseas in a war zone so please remember these young men and women not only this weekend, but every day. 
They aren't asking or wanting a hand out, but they deserve to be appreciated every day. 
If you are a Veteran or a spouse or family member of one or of those still serving, thank you for your sacrifices and commitment to serve and protect.  We love and appreciate you all!

Just another one of those days...

Today is just another one of those days when I can't shake the sadness.  I feel like I do a pretty decent job most days of keeping my emotions intact, but a nightmare woke me up at 1:30 this morning and I guess it set the mood for the day. :(
If you have not heard this song by Lee Brice yet, you should listen to it when you can http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5E6JT89BS0.  I picture Chad's best friend from school singing this and what is so funny is that is exactly how you might see his truck (except it would have a Go USMC instead of Army) down to the dirty Braves hat and empty Gatoraide bottle and Skoal can...
I find many ways to sooth my heart when I have one of these days.  It might be listening to music that describes him or go to the cemetery for some quiet time.  If I'm at home it might be playing the country music station while I sit on the deck and I just sit quietly and either cry or just think and remember.  It might be screaming to the top of my lungs (if I'm home alone) and cry.  Sometimes it's doing base boards and just cleaning until I can't clean anymore and other times I just sit quietly or text his buddies to feel a little closer to him.
I don't know what is the best way to sooth this broken heart of mine, but I guess there are worst things I could do.
Nothing really works, but it does give me an outlet to cope at the moment and I guess that's what grieving is all about.
This song truly describes how I feel with the exception I may not come back http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=55GAUgjpDQA (If Heaven wasn't so Far Away).
I'm struggling for the 2nd season this year watching TN Vols play football without wishing I could call or text Chad play by play. 
I always knew Chad was a special person and had a huge heart, but hearing what a great friend he was to all his friends and how loyal he always was and how he still chose the right way when no one was looking makes me feel so proud!  He really was a good boy/young man.  He loved with all his heart and I love that about him.
How do you cope with grief (if you are unfortunate enough to have to cope with it)?  What gets you through the tougher days?  Do you have someone you talk to on bad days or do you just blog or deal with it on your own?  Share your coping methods and see if it helps someone else who might be having a hard time if you feel comfortable sharing.