When your baby is murdered...

Good grief

There is no such thing as good grief when your child is murdered...I know this from a mother's point of view.  A new point of view that is eerily the same in a father's point of view....what is it like to lose a child at 4 months old?  What does a father go through? How does he cope?

One journey

There is a father of three sons, one is in college and has his own apartment, the second son is in high school and will attend homecoming this weekend, the third son was murdered at four months old by the babysitter....

Has the babysitter been brought to justice? No and it has been 24 years --- 24 years... The father remains in pain. He is hyper-vigilant concerning his remaining sons. He is swathed in pain day and night and night and day. 
(See http://grief.com/the-five-stages/ The Five Stages of Grief)

Dad moves on

Six years ago, Dad re-married, he fell in love.
It lasted three years and he has been divorced for three years now and is not dating. His life revolves around his children...How will he cope when his only son who is still at home leaves for college in May 2014? He doesn't know. Did he really move on?

What Daddy knows for sure now

What has he learned? That death is a part of life but it is sometimes impossible not to resent it...Death is hard enough when it happens after 90 years of life and due to a prolonged incurable illness...however when it is at 4 months AND at the hands of a murderer there is a "different feeling"...

Dealing with time and resentment

This Dad does the following:

1. Get up in the morning.
2. Go to work.
3. Take care of chores.
4. Attend events concerning his son's activities.
5. Does not date.
6. Does not visit out of state family, except in the Summers.

This is a very dangerous situation...even if I do say so myself....

The process of grieving is normal and never heals, yet the rage one feels when a child is murdered is something else all together...

Following from www.grief.com:

• Here are some tips to help with the grieving process after a murder:
•  Those who have lost a loved one due to natural causes may not understand all the complexities of a loss from a murder.
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•  Murder has its own deeper level of denial and shock. The event is unbelievable, unexpected, tragic and a crime, all at once.
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•  You may feel anger longer and deeper than from other deaths. Find constructive ways to let your anger out. And give yourself lots of permission to be angry. A horrible injustice has been done to your loved one, family, friends and the world.
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•  Look for forgiveness on your time zone, not others. Forgiveness comes from within, not from a “should forgive” place. When friends tell you the stories of how a victim’s family found peace, just know they are in pain because they see you in pain.
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•  Grief after murder has many expressions; our grief is as unique as a finger print. Some may want to get involved in the legal case, some may not. Others may want to face the murderer, others may not.
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•  Know that not finding the murderer will often cause complex and unresolved grief. Of course it will be harder to find peace in a world where your loved one was killed and the murderer still walks free.
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•  Murder is especially horrifying because another person’s actions took an innocent life. The idea that the tragic loss of a loved one can be determined by another person’s decision is devastating. It can also be incomprehensible that it can be a random act. The perpetrator may not be known to the victim or vice versa. The shock of losing someone to murder takes hold immediately and leaves family members totally bewildered.
• 
  
• These are some thoughts I have seen in my work. My teachers have always been those who have dealt with loss directly. I invite anyone who has tips to share after a murder to please write to me at David@grief.com

If you are grieving for your loved one it means you have a heart....The Dad that I am writing about feels angry with himself that he could not protect his son...it is difficult for him to see that we are not the controllers of this life.

I learned this in labor and delivery, an experience a man can never know.  I wish him an epiphany:  the knowledge that he must go on so that when he meets back up with the soul that was his child for 4 months he can relay to that spirit how he lived the rest of his mortal existence with honor and true love.

"To the well organized mind, death is simply the beginning of a new adventure."  JK Rowling

There is something you must always remember. you are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think. ~ Winnie the Pooh

“When your fear touches someone’s pain, it becomes pity, when your love touches someone’s pain, it become compassion.”
― Stephen Levine

“If I can see pain in your eyes then share with me your tears. If I can see joy in your eyes then share with me your smile.”
― Santosh Kalwar

Anything that’s human is mentionable, and anything that is mentionable can be more manageable. When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary. The people we trust with that important talk can help us know that we are not alone.”
― Fred Rogers

"The reality is that we don't forget, move on, and have closure, but rather we honor, we remember, and incorporate our deceased children and siblings into our lives in a new way. In fact, keeping memories of your loved one alive in your mind and heart is an important part of your healing journey." ~ Harriet Schiff, author of The Bereaved Parent

We can endure much more than we think we can; all human experience testifies to that. All we need to do is learn not to be afraid of pain. Grit your teeth and let it hurt. Don't deny it, don't be overwhelmed by it. It will not last forever. One day, the pain will be gone and you will still be there. - Harold Kushner When All You've Ever Wanted Isn't Enough

What we have once enjoyed deeply we can never lose. All that we love deeply becomes a part of us. - Helen Keller

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When a person is born we rejoice, and when they're married we jubilate, but when they die we try to pretend nothing has happened.- Margaret Mead 

No one ever told me that grief felt so much like fear.- C.S. Lewis

She was no longer wresting with the grief, but could sit down with it as a lasting companion and make it a sharer in her thoughts. - George Eliot

Grief is not a disorder, a disease or a sign of weakness. It is an emotional, physical and spiritual necessity, the price you pay for love. The only cure for grief is to grieve. - Earl Grollman

Three things in human life are important: The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. And the third is to be kind." - Henry James 

One cannot get through life without pain...What we can do is choose how to use the pain life presents to us. - Bernie S. Siegel

Honest listening is one of the best medicines we can offer the dying and the bereaved. - Jean Cameron (dying of cancer)

You give yourself permission to grieve by recognizing the need for grieving. Grieving is the natural way of working through the loss of a love. Grieving is not weakness nor absence of faith. Grieving is as natural as crying when you are hurt, sleeping when you are tired or sneezing when your nose itches. It is nature's way of healing a broken heart. - Doug Manning 

For some moments in life there are no words. - David Seltzer, Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory

Those who have suffered understand suffering and therefore extend their hand.- Patti Smith

There is no grief like the grief that does not speak. -Henry Wordsworth

We can endure much more than we think we can; all human experience testifies to that. All we need to do is learn not to be afraid of pain. Grit your teeth and let it hurt. Don't deny it, don't be overwhelmed by it. It will not last forever. One day, the pain will be gone and you will still be there. -  Harold Kushner  When All You've Ever Wanted Isn't Enough 

A child can live with anything as long as he or she is told the truth and is allowed to share with loved ones the natural feelings people have when they are suffering.- Eda LeShan

When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares.   -Henri Nouwen 

Nothing that grieves us can be called little; by the external laws of proportion a child's loss of a doll and a king's loss of a crown are events of the same size.  Mark Twain, Which was the Dream? (1897) 

Guilt is perhaps the most painful companion to death.- Elisabeth Kubler-Ross

"Deposits of unfinished grief reside in more American hearts that I ever imagined. Until these pockets are opened and their contents aired openly, they block unimagined amounts of human growth and potential. They can give rise to bizarre and unexplained behavior which causes untold internal stress."  - Robert Kavanaugh

"Grieving is a journey that teaches us how to love in a new way now that our loved one is no longer with us. Consciously remembering those who have died is the key that opens the hearts, that allows us to love them in new ways." - Tom Attig, The Heart of Grief

 “Ah. I smiled. I'm not really here to keep you from freaking out. I'm here to be with you while you freak out, or grieve or laugh or suffer or sing. It is a ministry of presence. It is showing up with a loving heart.”
― Kate Braestrup, Here If You Need Me: A True Story

You all know that I have been sustained throughout my life by three saving graces - my family, my friends, and a faith in the power of resilience and hope. These graces have carried me through difficult times and they have brought more joy to the good times than I ever could have imagined.
~ Elizabeth Edwards

"He wept, and it felt as if the tears were cleansing him, as if his body needed to empty itself.”
― Lois Lowry

At some of the darkest moments in my life, some people I thought of as friends deserted me-some because they cared about me and it hurt them to see me in pain; others because I reminded them of their own vulnerability, and that was more than they could handle. But real friends overcame their discomfort and came to sit with me. If they had not words to make me feel better, they sat in silence (much better than saying, "You'll get over it," or "It's not so bad; others have it worse") and I loved them for it. - Harold Kushner, Living a Life that Matters 

"It is very easy to see the allure of alcohol to dull the pain and the temptation to punish myself for something that is not my fault. But he sobering truth is that if I step onto the path of self-destruction, I know I will never come back. " Bill Jenkins, What to Do When the Police Leave: A Guide to the First Days of Traumatic Loss

While grief is fresh, every attempt to divert only irritates. You must wait till it be digested, and then amusement will dissipate the remains of it. ~ Samuel Johnson

Give sorrow words; the grief that does not speak whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break. ~ William Shakespeare

Man, when he does not grieve, hardly exists. ~ Antonio Porchia, Voces, 1943, translated from Spanish by W.S. Merwin

Even hundredfold grief is divisible by love. ~ Terri Guillemets

Sorrow makes us all children again - destroys all differences of intellect. The wisest know nothing. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Memory is a way of holding onto the things you love, the things you are, the things you never want to lose. ~ From the television show The Wonder Years

If you're going through hell, keep going. ~ Winston Churchill

We acquire the strength we have overcome. ~ Ralph Waldo Emerson

Time is a physician that heals every grief. ~ Diphilus

The deep pain that is felt at the death of every friendly soul arises from the feeling that there is in every individual something which is inexpressible, peculiar to him alone, and is, therefore, absolutely and irretrievably lost. ~ Arthur Schopenhauer

There's a bit of magic in everything, and some loss to even things out. ~ Lou Reed, "Magic and Loss"

Courage is being afraid but going on anyhow. ~ Dan Rather

You can clutch the past so tightly to your chest that it leaves your arms too full to embrace the present. ~ Jan Glidewell

Earth has no sorrow that Heaven cannot heal. ~ Author Unknown

There are things that we don't want to happen but have to accept, things we don't want to know but have to learn, and people we can't live without but have to let go. ~ Author Unknown

If you suppress grief too much, it can well redouble. ~ Moliere

Loss is nothing else but change, and change is Nature's delight. ~ Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

In the night of death, hope sees a star, and listening love can hear the rustle of a wing. ~ Robert Ingersoll

Even if happiness forgets you a little bit, never completely forget about it. ~ Jacques Prévert

The sorrow which has no vent in tears may make other organs weep. ~ Henry Maudsley

Every evening I turn my worries over to God. He's going to be up all night anyway. ~ Mary C. Crowley

She was no longer wrestling with the grief, but could sit down with it as a lasting companion and make it a sharer in her thoughts. ~ George Eliot

While we are mourning the loss of our friend, others are rejoicing to meet him behind the veil. ~ John Taylor

As long as I can I will look at this world for both of us. As long as I can I will laugh with the birds, I will sing with the flowers, I will pray to the stars, for both of us. ~ Sascha,

“I measure every grief I meet with narrow, probing eyes - I wonder if it weighs like mine - or has an easier size.”
~ Emily Dickinson

"Courage can be just as infectious as fear."
~ Alice Miller, For Your Own Good

"Suicide is unspeakable, and to speak it is somehow to bring it into a human, imaginable sphere, even if only in the moment of speaking. The need to tell is both a need to tell oneself and a need to be heard.... Telling and being heard are the first steps toward reconnection." ~ Victoria Alexander, In the Wake of Suicide: Stories of the People Left Behind

 

"In the face of events that threaten to overwhelm our lives, storytelling gives us a way of reclaiming ourselves and reaffirming our connections with other people--those who listen to our stories and, by doing so, bear witness with us." ~ Victoria Alexander, In the Wake of Suicide: Stories of the People Left Behind 

 

 

"Courage is being afraid and going on the journey anyhow". -- John Wayne

 

"You can clutch the past so tightly to your chest that it leaves your arms too full to embrace the present." -- Jan Glidwell

"We must embrace pain and burn it as fuel for our journey". -- Kenji Miyazawa (1896-1933)

"The pain passes, but the beauty remains". --Pierre Auguste Renoir (1841-1919)

(Quotes found at:  http://www.griefspeaks.com/id112.html)

I am sure that we all go on! Sister Baby says it is so! ;->