Four years ago I woke up to a day so shattering that I cannot find a word to describe it. But I thought it was going to be an ordinary day.
Ordinary is a strange word to choose. We were living through what felt like a waking nightmare: no answers from doctors, Greg getting worse every day, medical devices not working, relentless physical pain that kept Greg awake all night, being stiff armed by our life-line to help and advice... oh, and a global pandemic that made normal life incredibly risky for immunosuppressed individuals like Greg.
It wasn't ordinary, but it was our ordinary: fear, frustration, worry, questions, trying our best to not freak out, trying to keep making Christmas memories and special moments for our young son. Ordinary because we still had each other. Our family of 3 was intact.
I picture our life that morning as a beautiful, precious handmade vase set high on a shelf. By midnight, the vase had fallen and shattered against the floor; smashed into tiny pieces that could never be put together again.
I don't often think of that day - the memories are too painful - but I've been thinking about little moments from it lately. It's hard to comprehend. The way it unfolded seems impossible. Before we could wrap our minds around what was happening, Greg was gone. Greg was home with Jesus. Greg was at rest with His Savior. And we sat in a pile of shards: the life we knew obliterated.
Here's what I know now, after 1,460 days without Greg, that I didn't know then:
You can survive the things you think will destroy you
Jesus meant it when he promised to never leave us or forsake us
There is no pit of despair so deep that God will not meet you there
If I could go back 4 years and do that day differently, I would. There are choices you make on "ordinary" days that you wouldn't make if you knew it was the last day you'd have on earth with the person you'd planned to spend the rest of your life with. But as my counselor has reminded me over and over again, God didn't see fit to give me that knowledge ahead of time. He knew it was the day He would call Greg home to Himself and, for reasons only He understands, left me in mystery, letting the day unfold and catch me off guard.
Maybe, like everything else in life, we couldn't handle knowing what was coming. Maybe it would've been to much to bear. Maybe the fear of what was to come would've kept me from being the wife Greg needed that day. Maybe.
Four years later, I don't have answers. I still don't understand what happened. Greg's brilliant doctor couldn't explain it when I met with him weeks later seeking answers.
God took Greg home. Maybe it's as simple as that.
"Your eyes say my unformed body; all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be." - Psalm 139:16
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