losing

You can have someone tell you all day how it felt to lose their father, their mother, their sibling, their friend, their pet, their child, their aunt, their love, their grandparent, their mentor. Whether lost to death or something a little less permanent, nobody can possibly understand in that moment, for that person, what the loss means to them.

I lost one of my brothers 4 weeks ago to death. He was never in great health anyway, but it was a shock and a surprise that knocked me off my feet — quite literally — when my mom called and choked the words out. I had never been as close to him as my other brothers, but it was still unbelievable to know that I would not touch him again or talk to him again in this life. He left behind a wife and 5 children, all of which are mourning in their own ways and losing a bit of childhood and life that so many are deprived of, but shouldn't be. I am seeing my father mourn the loss of a son, and my mother mourn the loss of a stepson, and I can never attempt to fix it or make it better.

Of course, about two weeks ago M and I thought we could give news that might make all of our family feel a little bit happier. We thought it might bring a little more joy to say that, though a life was lost recently, another would be coming to us in a matter of months.

That isn't something you think will bring sadness by sharing. Except when it isn't true a mere 8 days later.

Loss is so strange. Because, well, it turns out that you can lose something you never touched. Something you never held in your hands. Something you never got to see or talk to or watch. Not only can you lose it in a very real way, but you can mourn that loss. You can be overcome by the grief of losing that something you never touched or held or looked at, that was so very real and alive in you at one point.

A lost a brother whom I had touched and talked to and watched many a time. Then I lost a child that I have never laid eyes on, but that lived inside of me. Neither was easier or worse or better or harder than the other. Neither left less of a hole in a place in my life, in my heart, in my mind.

I don't have to take up some of my time or energy thinking about and worrying about and wondering about two different beings in my life that meant so much. That's the funny thing about loss: when they are gone you think about them and worry about them and wonder about them all the more. They are magnified. They are always there. The possibility of their lives in yours is suddenly that much more present in day-to-day thinking, and you wonder, "Would I have been thinking about them right now if they were here? What would they mean to me in this moment, if they were still here?"

It is a little strange to clump two such different parts of my life into one, after such permanence took them both away. They and their absence have changed everything about myself. The loss of my brother has made me that much more responsible and ever-aware of the beautiful pieces of himself that he left behind for me to keep loving. The loss of my child has changed the way I think about my future, myself and my relationship with M and God. Babies are born healthy every day, and yet the odds of getting one to this earth are so against so many people. I have complete faith that children will be in my life, but in some moments it feels like a far away dream meant for other people.

Loss makes you realize that so much can go wrong, but also that so much can go right. That things — more often than not — turn out the way they should, the way that makes our lives brighter. Loss is what finally turned me to writing again, after months of not doing it, not needing it, not caring enough. Loss changes everything, and everyone, and yet it makes you realize that so much doesn't have to change if we change ourselves first. We can learn the lessons loss teaches if we open our eyes; loss usually is just the easiest way to force human beings to see and know their weaknesses.

Loss has changed me. And that is okay.