My beloved Warren, the journey will continue until the end of time

Grief has lingered with me because without it, its absence shuts down almost every other emotion. It defines how I interact with family and friends, how I laugh, how I cry, how I go about my day, how I perform the tasks I have to do, how I live. My entire being has been buried in grief for so long, I have almost lost any semblance of who I am. It is the heavy chain that I live with and carry every day. It is the constant companion that guides my actions and emotions. Since it is now part of my soul and my very being, Grief and I have learned to tolerate each other while we walk down the same road of life as wary and not so welcome friends.  

The journey I chose to deal with my grief was to pour my heart out through writing. As I look back through all that I've written, I realize just how therapeutic this exercise has been for me. The anger, hurt, devastation, fright, grief, feelings of tremendous loss - of the love, comfort, protection, happiness that I had known - had to go somewhere or my soul would have shriveled up until there was nothing of me left. 

I have written so many posts chronicling first, our journey and then my journey, through the horrendous turn of events that took my beloved Warren from me and our sons. And through it all, I realized that we were never taught how to cope with sorrow when it comes. It feels like fear and I have learned to push it deep within my soul, so far deep that it only pops up every once in a while.

I am still filled with despair but I also am filled with the gratefulness of having had my cherished Warren in my life with his gentleness, his abiding love, his joy of living, his infectious laughter. 

I'm so happy to know that I had his love for the 51 years we were married and the 4 years before, from the time we met.  There is no past tense here. He was and still is the love of my life and I will love him to the end of forever.

To Ethan and Abbott, Dad has left you a legacy of love, kindness, caring and laughter which, I'm happy to see, defines who you are. I see and hear Dad in everything you do which gives me enormous pride and joy. 

And to My Darling Warren, I feel your loss so acutely, still.  I continue to hurt and my broken heart will never heal but that must be a sign that my love for you still lives.  I am so thankful for all the years we got to walk together, you and I, sharing love and laughter, every minute of every day. For as long as I live, you will be packed tightly within my heart and soul, for I found comfort in your embrace, love in your heart and home in your eyes and arms. And I am so grateful for the thousands of wonderful memories that bring you back to me as I keep reaching back for yesterday.

So, here's to the memories of a life beautifully lived, a love story so extraordinary that it continues to live on and that what mattered most is that I had you and you had me.

Copyright © 2024. Reisa Sterling Miller. All Rights Reserved.

A sort of Epilogue, Maybe...or Not

I have written sixty-four previous blog posts since August 31, 2016 about my beloved Warren, our journey through one of  the most wretched experiences humans can endure and the gut-wrenching sadness that accompanied my soul and still, even now, rides alongside me as a never-ending companion.

It has been said that "time heals all wounds" but that isn't really true. Some wounds never heal but they change with time from a wide open, blood and tear-gushing, anguish-filled mental laceration to a barely tolerable white flag cease fire.

Being left with the beautiful, sweet, loving memories isn't always enough. And just because he died doesn't mean that my love has somehow subsided. My love for him is just as strong now as it always has been. My heart always raced when he came into view and it still does when my eyes fall on one of the many photos of him I have around our home. Whenever I see his handsome smiling face, I smile, too.

Every day, as I continue to live my life, I feel his influence, his presence in an ethereal way. One of the things I miss most is his all-encompassing embrace. He was a hugger filling me with warmth, comfort and love when encircled by his arms. I have always thought of our fifty-five year love affair (51 of them married) as being so incredibly wonderful, literally one in a million, blessed with the best.

His life has not really ended for me. It's just a new way I'm teaching myself to look at it.

In all the posts that have appeared before, I have poured out my heart, kicking and screaming, crying and laughing, filled with sorrow and heartache and the most beautiful memories....revealing a road I never thought I would have to follow.

And while I think I have written just about all there is to write about my Beloved Warren, this may not really be an epilogue. He is always on my mind, always in my heart, always walking beside me, always a large part of who I am. I am not me, singular, but part of an extraordinary duo, now concentrated in the actions I take and the decisions I make, guided by our compatibility and love. I don't know if I will continue to post about this journey I'm still on but if something (or someone) nudges me to take to these Warren pages again, I will return and add however many encores about him that still flow out of my heart.

Oh, but I remember that time when ........🤗🤗🤗

Copyright © 2019 Reisa  Sterling Miller. All Rights Reserved.