When you have loved someone so much and so deeply for so long and suddenly, life’s journey ends for them, your life’s journey from that point on immediately becomes a journey of grief, devastation, mourning, confusion and, at first, feeling like you just can’t go on.

Then, over time, you have moments of healing that begin in between the feelings of the deepest pain you have ever felt.   The pit of pain as I call it.  And those moments stretch, little by little, they last a bit longer with time, and you slowly find that you don’t fall as often deeply into that pit.  And that you can recover a bit easier from those torrent of tears that push through your doors of defense to your heart.  You are learning how to pull all the broken pieces back in and close the door.

That’s what the journey of coping is all about. – pulling together those scattered pieces of your shattered heart and closing the door as you learn how to find composure and, ultimately, to find peace in your soul.

Life becomes like an elastic.  You take 2 steps forward and 6 back.  Then 6 steps forward and 2 back. And then you get longer and longer stretches of non-tears and constant pain.  Each of these “elastic” stages becomes a routine part of your day.

Life as I knew it forever changed 11 months on this day.  Some talk about life eventually morphing into a “new normal”.  So what does this “new normal” look like?   When does it start?

Right now, my “new normal”  changes all the time, day to day, so it’s not something I can define.  Maybe you don’t define it – it defines you. With time.

Spending time today with God and with Kait and wishing she were here By My Side.