Category Archives: Family

May 13, 2013 · 11:08 am

Temporary Sting.

DSC_0005Saturday morning [the day that Ian graduated] began with a jolt as the phone on my bedside table began to buzz at 7:30 AM. It felt like it didn’t stop all morning-messages and phone calls from sweet friends that were praying for my family poured in all day. Offering to attend the ceremony. Offering to bring wine later.

We walked on to NC State’s campus, and everywhere we turned happy families were taking proud pictures with their grinning, red-gowned graduates. The joy in the air was palpable—and we didn’t belong. As we walked across the brick sidewalk, I remembered Ian. I remembered driving him to work at his coffee shop the summer that we both lived at home and shared a car. He would often ask to pick up breakfast on the way, and would happily munch on his egg mcmuffin as I lectured him on the perils of fast food for twenty minutes. [I’m a big sister. It’s what we do.] I remembered Stephen and I making him Mexican food at Stephen’s campus apartment, right after I moved home from Senegal. I remembered visiting the dorm room he’d hastily cleaned up right before I arrived, and seeing a gargantuan pile of easy mac spilling out from beneath his rumpled bed.

I remembered Ian’s other accomplishments that we’d celebrated as a family. His first, fumbling piano recital. Little hands struggled to find the right keys and an exceedingly proud face beamed from the piano bench. I remembered sitting in the front row as he and his curly hair starred in Oklahoma, and each girl in the audience swooned. I thought about every play, a cappella concert, musical, soccer game, and tae-kwon-do meet. My family had always been on the front row for each kid’s accomplishment, whatever it was—and now, we were slowly walking towards Ian’s last.

I found myself in the front row once again, as administrators sat my family right in front of the graduates. A thousand curious eyes bored into the backs of our heads as Ian’s story was explained. Mom walked to the stage to receive his diploma, and the audience rose to give him a standing ovation. As if they were wide-eyed children with their noses pressed to the window looking at a terrible accident from the safety of their own cars—everybody in the room gratefully thinking how awful. I’m so glad that’s not me. I would have been thinking the same thing had roles been reversed. We then clapped as everyone else’s Ian walked across the stage one by one.

I left as quickly as I could. Ben and Michelle had insisted on coming [and true love is sitting through ANY graduation—but especially this one], and they took me to grab lunch and go to Saturday night church. We sang a song called “Come Behold the Wondrous Mystery” and I cried because the idea that God sent his son to die for me can never again be glazed over or trite after you’ve watched your parent’s son die. I cried thinking about heaven, grateful that Ian is there and longing to join him. I cried because death has been defeated, and the sting is only temporary. I cried because that temporary sting throbs with a dull roar and aches in every piece of me.

The gospel matters. When curly hair falls softly onto the kitchen floor, it matters that you have been loved with an everlasting love. When white blood cells flicker and falter and fade, it matters that you have been relentlessly pursued by the God of the Universe. When your hold your little brother’s swollen hand as he dies three days before your wedding, it matters that God is before all things, and in him all things hold together.

It matters that the sting is temporary

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May 10, 2013 · 11:08 am

Deeper Still.

With Ian at his high school graduation four years ago.

With Ian at his high school graduation four years ago.

Today is a good day. Today, Mom, Dad, Stephen, Emily and I pile into a car to meet my extended family in South Carolina to watch my twin baby cousins graduate from high school.

At least, they were babies yesterday. They just love it when I remind them of that.

I ADORE my family, and I’m thrilled to get to celebrate with them.

The thing is, it’s the first time that my family has been able to all travel in a five passenger car…well, in a long, long time. And I just can’t stand the fact that we’ll fit.

Tomorrow won’t be a good day. Tomorrow, I will attend NC State’s graduation ceremony. I’ll watch thousands of bright-eyed college students in red caps and gowns eagerly walk across a stage to receive the diplomas that they’ve worked so hard for. They’ll flip their tassels and throw their caps in the air and boldly step into a waiting world to make a splash.

Ian was supposed to be with them. He was so excited to graduate.

But my little brother won’t walk across the stage tomorrow. There is no red gown for him. There will be no over-the-top graduation party, no first “real” job—he’ll never even get to hold the diploma that he worked so hard for. Instead, tomorrow amidst the pomp and circumstance, I will watch the dean hand Ian’s diploma to my Mom and Dad.

Can I be honest? I think it sucks. It’s sad and it sucks and I hate it and I miss my little brother.

I think a lot about grief lately. Corrie Ten Boom once remarked that, “ There is no pit so deep that God’s love is not deeper still.”  Deeper still. The thing that nobody tells you about loss is that the initial loss of losing your little brother is only the beginning. There will be relentless waves of loss for the rest of your life that beat and overwhelm until hope seems like nothing more than a morphine-induced hallucination. Eleven groomsmen where twelve should have stood. A graduation gown that will go unworn. Twenty-two birthday candles on a July day that will not be blown out. Five in a family of six driving to South Carolina.

There are always new depths to grief-each heart-wrenching discovery met with an impossibly exhausted cry of not this too! Please, no more. No more.  But unyielding waves of loss will crash over and over again for the rest of our lives, each one a suffocating reminder that all is not as it should be. And it won’t be okay until heaven.

The promise, though, is not that it will be okay. [Because goodness, it isn’t.] The promise is that in Christ, there is always, always hope for the hopeless and new mercy for each new wave. And for each new wave that crashes, each new depth of grief discovered, there is a love that is deeper still.

Today, I am thankful for the promise of  ”deeper still”.

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May 3, 2013 · 1:14 pm

Happy Halloween!

JCP_4017 bwSo, I totally lied.

Kellan did NOT leave on his business trip yesterday—instead, after weeks of bending the truth and trying desperately not to spill the proverbial beans, my sneaky husband flew to Maryland last night to surprise his sweet Mom for Mother’s day.

Which would have been precious and perfect if we’d ONLY GOTTEN THE DATE RIGHT. Imagine our utter astonishment this morning when we learned that Mother’s day is, in fact, NEXT Sunday instead of this weekend.

What year is it? What country am I in? And why did none of you tell me this? I thought we were friends. Here I was all “What about Cinco de Mayo!?”, when apparently there was really nothing to worry about at all. The margaritas are safe! [Of course, approximately 84% of the time when my Mother and I say we’re “out running errands”, we’re really out drinking margaritas so chances are my margaritas would have been safe either way. Please don’t tell her I told.]

It was a sweet attempt—both of us flying home to be with our Mamas. Unfortunately, I believe we did more harm than good as both Mothers are now left pondering where on earth they went wrong raising two adult children that have no grasp whatsoever on the socially-accepted calendar. But it’s too late to apologize, and can’t be helped now. Like using WiFi at Starbucks, they’re going to have to celebrate on OUR terms.

Besides, we’ll be busy passing out candy for Halloween next weekend.JCP_2624 bw

I am thankful for my Mother-in-law for a myriad of reasons, and here are three:

  1. I hear that most girls have to pretend to like their mother-in-laws. I have a wretched poker face, so this would have been a disaster of apocalyptic proportions. Thank heavens, mine happens to be the kindest person that I’ve ever met. Period.
  2. She is my saving grace on family game night. The Dickens are a competitive lot, friends—so family game night is NO JOKE. Unfortunately, I have this unhealthy propensity to burst into tears if I think someone is angry with me during a game of Monopoly. TAKE PARK PLACE I DON’T WANT IT ANYMORE!! I’m not going to lie, I think every single marital problem that Kellan and I have can be traced back to one fateful game of Settlers of Catan. Though come to think of it, battling another couple in Wii bowling didn’t help a thing. Baby, I need you to TRY. I AM TRYING!!! Thankfully, Gina approaches game night with the same “Why can’t we just be FRIENDS!?” giggly attitude that I do. In fact, we often team up together, and the first time she helped me cheat I almost peed myself laughing. [Never fear—our underhanded tactics have yet to win us a thing. We pose approximately zero threat to our competitive compatriots.]
  3. She’s a dark horse. Is Gina the sweetest person I’ve ever met? Hands down. But she’s also one of the funniest! I’d divulge details if I COULD, but let’s just say a conversation that she, Keri and I had about my bachelorette party STILL makes me laugh out loud every time the story dances across my mind.

Happy Mother’s day, Moms. Whenever on earth it is.

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May 1, 2013 · 5:36 pm

Towards the Sound of Guns.

DSC_0135The other day, I picked up Kellan’s copy of “It Happened on the Way to War”, and began to read. Authored by a marine, he references over and over again the idea that “marines move towards the sound of guns.”

Towards the sound of guns. I’ve mulled it over and played with it in my mind—this idea of running towards what most people sprint away from. It has arrested and engaged my attention largely because I feel like moving towards the sound of guns is precisely what so many people did with my family while Ian lay dying in the hospital.

So often, my parents and I would look at each other gratefully in the wake of someone’s extravagant kindness and exclaim, “I NEVER would have thought of that!” Whether we’re just a special brand of insensitive or simply complete and utter dolts was never determined. What we do know is that the way that we care for people in the heat of battle will never be the same again, thanks to the sweet lessons that we learned from the friends that loved us so well.

This blog comes from a fellow learner. The following are five helpful things that I’ve been taught over the past couple of months—things that might prove to be helpful to you as you step into the messy sea of humanity outside of your front door, and put flesh and bones on who Christ is and what He came to do

1. Move towards the sound of guns. If you remember nothing else, please remember this. I was most grateful for the people in my life that ran “towards the sound of guns”. People that did it understanding that there would be nothing comfortable or safe about walking onto the oncology floor or into the ICU—and that it would only get worse as I burst into tears or ranted or numbly refused to say more than four words to anyone. [It was always a crapshoot.] These were the people that showed up. I think about the first week of Ian’s diagnosis, when his organs began to shut down and he landed himself in the ICU for the first time. [That punk always had a flair for the dramatic.] My apartment was a five minute drive from UNC Hospital, and I’d convinced my bleary-eyed parents to get some sleep with the promise that I would be by his bed the second that the nurses let visitors back onto the floor. There was very little light in that dreary, gray room, and every day sobbing people filled the halls as someone else died. Ian had an angry-looking tube protruding from his pale neck as a dialysis machine filtered his blood, and he could barely move his hand or flutter his eyes. It was the worst place to be.

 For me, initially it was always hardest to walk into the hospital. Whether it was into the oncology wing, or into the ICU, there was a curious emotional rush that came with actually stepping foot into the building. That early morning as I steeled myself to go sit with Ian in the ICU alone, my roommate Ashley grabbed my arm and told me that she was going with me.

She was in grad school with ZERO time to spare, and I vehemently insisted that she shouldn’t come. But seven AM found Ashley lugging a cooler of snacks and my computer into theDSC_0148 ICU, arm in arm with me. Both of us in sunshine yellow gowns, blue gloves and hair nets, she sat there all morning, praying with me, reading to Ian with me, and simply not letting me be alone. I was so grateful.

I think about Amy, who showed up the night we were told that Ian would probably die—three impossibly long weeks before his actual death. I texted her asking her to pray, and seconds later my phone lit up. “I’m on my way”. Ignoring my stubborn insistence that she didn’t need to come, half an hour later she found me crumpled over a chair in the waiting room, sobbing. She threw her arms around me and sobbed too.

I think about Michelle, who as Ian lay dying in the final days of his life, would watch over him with me as my parents occasionally escaped for an hour or two to debrief. We’d each hold one of his hands, and we’d sing to him, pray over him, chat with him and tease him as the steady rush of the ventilator hummed in a dark room.

Each of those women ran towards the sound of guns. Now, there were days during those last three weeks in the ICU that I refused to step outside to see anyone. There were days that I asked people to stay away, and I sincerely meant it. There were days that I knew friends were sitting at a neighboring Starbucks or parked in the critical care waiting room “just in case I needed them”, and I never even said hello. I STILL have a thousand unanswered texts and emails from friends [we’ll get to those in a moment]. People ran towards me with no expectations placed on how I would respond. They were simply there. [And the night I decided after a week and a half of not leaving the ICU that I couldn't go on without a piece of Tia Maria cake from the Twisted Fork, Ben was ready and waiting to load me into his car.]

 2.      Release your expectations. My Facebook messages and emails are STILL backed up with hundreds of notes. Over the course of Ian’s illness, I began to pick up my phone less and less until I never picked it up at all unless I absolutely had to. During those last three weeks that Ian was in the hospital, I NEVER responded to a text unless it was DSC_0216imperative. Don’t misunderstand me—it was life-giving every time I heard from someone. Sitting beside Ian’s bed, I listened to every voice mail  read every text and email [often out loud to him!], and opened every card. I was so grateful to the people that consistently reminded me that we were not alone. I simply did not have the emotional capacity to respond. And that was okay.

 3. If you want to help, there are almost always practical things you can do. I think about the night Ian was diagnosed. Danielle ran home to grab the bedding and pillows off of her bed, so that my Dad wouldn’t be cold and [extra] uncomfortable as he slept beside Ian’s hospital bed. I think about Jess and Ben, who made an enormous dinner [healthy, and in disposable containers! Make it your mantra.] and delivered it with hugs and a card. I think about Haley giving me a hundred dollar bill to pay for parking in a card that reminded me that I was not alone. I think about Gretchen and her chicken pie and caramel latte, Heather and two pieces of cheesecake, Amy and two dozen cupcakes, and a thousand other meals. The people that not only said “let me know how I can help”, but “I’m bringing food, what time should I come?”.

If someone’s world is falling apart, they often haven’t the foggiest idea as to what they need. “What can I do for you?” will garner exhausted, blank stares. “Call me if there’s anything you need” will leave your phone silent. Move towards the sound of guns. While Ian was sick, people:

  1. Showed up at my parent’s house with groceries.
  2. Landscaped their yard without ever asking.
  3. Coordinated dropping off/picking up my little sister from ballet.
  4. Cleaned their house.
  5. Texted INFORMING [not asking] that they were bringing dinner to the ICU. [Man can only survive on hospital chili for so long!]
  6. Texted, emailed, wrote cards and called with no expectation of a response. And said as much. Hallelujah.

 4. Offer an escape. I think about Danielle sitting with me in the waiting room and insisting that we watch an entire episode of New Girl and just LAUGH. [And let me tell you, that show is HI-LARious!] I think about Jess, Haley, Gretchen, Ashley, Hartley, Michelle and Danielle showing up at the door of the ICU with a bottle of white wine, glasses, and binders of notes as they planned my wedding and I drank. I think about the friend that snuck wine coolers in to my Mom. [I’m telling you, if you don’t need a drink in the ICU, …well, you’re probably a Baptist.] The point here is, sometimes your friend will need to cry. Sometimes she’ll need to laugh hysterically about the fact that ANOTHER person just died in the room next door. [True story. The vicious cocktail of grief and no sleep makes it difficult to muster appropriate emotional reactions.] Sometimes she’ll need to be really angry, sometimes she’ll need a distraction, sometimes she’ll need you to just stay away because she has zero emotional energy left, even for you. Loving someone in the midst of the darkest time of her life is an art, not a science—but love always implies some sort of action.

5. Pray. I remember walking into the waiting room and seeing Hartley and Michelle on their knees, begging God to heal my little brother. I remember friends that wouldn’t leave without praying with me. I remember texts, emails and voice mails voicing prayers that reminded me that even when my exhausted heart ran out of words, thousands of people were storming the gates of heaven on my behalf. On Ian’s behalf.  [It was the only way I fell asleep, many nights.] Get loud. Let them know you’re with them. Pray like it’s YOUR little brother dying in the bed in room 17. Remind them of hope-of mercies that are new every single morning. Scream with them that it SUCKS, and insist with them that Jesus is good no matter what.

There are caveats to this, and I’ll talk about those another time. The examples that I’ve given are a simply drop in the ocean of kindness that was lavished upon my family during [and after!] Ian’s five-month bout with cancer. We are indescribably grateful for the multitude of you that loved us so well in the midst of the battle.

What have you found to be helpful as you’ve cared for people?

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February 28, 2013 · 6:33 am

A Time to Dance.

DSC_0117It’s impossible for me to think about dancing without thinking about Ian.

When we were little, my Mom and Dad used to have us kids [at the time, just Ian, Stephen and I] clean up the kitchen after dinner. This inevitably took worlds more time than would have otherwise been necessary, because somewhere between clearing and rinsing, one of us would begin to sing. Before anyone knew what had happened, we were busting out three part harmonies and singing our little hearts out, dancing around the kitchen with reckless abandon. We watched a lot of old musicals growing up [Singing in the Rain was a favorite], and I think we just thought treating the kitchen as a stage was entirely normal. I remember one of our favorite songs to sing:

Heaven is a wonderful place

Filled with His glory and grace

I want to see my Savior’s face,

Because Heaven is a wonderful place.

It was the first song we ever learned a three part harmony to, and we couldn’t sing it enough because we thought that we were straight-up-awesome. Lest I mislead you to believe that we were particularly spiritual children, I ought to confess that if we’d learned “Apple Bottom Jeans” first, that probably would have been our song of choice. But it happened to be a song about heaven.

I remember the day that I learned how to swing dance. I came home and immediately made Ian and Stephen dance with me in the kitchen for hours—Ian was mesmerized. IMG_1672My brothers loved knowing that they could flip their big sister around-and everybody knows that it’s better to drop your sister head first onto the tile floor instead of a middle school honey that you’re trying to impress. [And let’s be real—Ian was always trying to impress middle school honeys.]

Dancing quickly became one of Ian’s very favorite things to do. We spent many high school afternoons dancing in the kitchen as I would teach him new turns and flips that I’d learned. When he hit college, the student surpassed the teacher as he went on to participate in competitive ballroom dancing. He loved it-in fact, he had excitedly promised to teach my Dad and I how to waltz for my wedding.

Ian never got to teach Dad and I our dance. He’d roll his eyes if he knew that Dad and I watched a YouTube tutorial in the kitchen a couple of days ago, and then promptly decided that we could simply wing it. I wish more than anything that he could have been there to teach us, or that Ian and I could have had the dance he promised me at my wedding. He was so excited for March 2nd.

The past months and weeks have been full of mourning for my family. We mourned the loss of Ian’s health with an abrupt cancer diagnosis. I mourned that night as I rushed to the hospital with the large pizza he’d asked for, barely able to read the words “Cancer Hospital” on the doors through frightened tears. Barely able to believe them.  I mourned the nights that I spent wandering the hospital halls with Ian as he got his exercise—the kid who literally would run circles around me on runs together had trouble shuffling along for more than a couple of minutes. [I would do DSC_0447lunges as he walked—telling him that he wasn’t challenging me enough. :)] We mourned when we had to settle for a fake Christmas tree at Christmastime because he was too sick to have a real one in the house. We mourned the loss of his curly “white-man-fro” the day that we shaved his hair off in the same kitchen we used to dance in. For the past several weeks, we have mourned-[is there a stronger word?]- as his body deteriorated more than I ever thought possible—and the boy that used to pick me up and do curls with me became the boy that could barely squeeze my hand. I have been overwhelmed by suffocating, numbing grief as I spent too many hours to count sitting by his bed, holding his hand in room 17 of the ICU. “ Ian, I’m here. Ashley’s here. I love you so much. You’re doing a good job, buddy. You look great! We’ve got this. I love you so much. I’m so proud of you.” Over. And over. And over again.

I prayed for him. I sang to him. I read him emails from sweet friends. I played a twenty second clip of his acappella group singing “Lean on Me” to him at least a thousand times—holding my phone up against his ear to make sure that he heard.

You may not have ever known my brother [and oh, I wish you could have!], but he’s never been a “mourning” kind of kid. In fact, I’ve never known someone so full of life-always moving, always singing, always joking and telling Emily’s dog how much he hated him and banging out new songs on the piano and complaining about girls and dancing. He looked like he might burst at any second from pent up energy and joy!

If I could change this, I would. If I could bring my little brother back, I would—I’ve never pictured my wedding day or the rest of my life without him. I still can’t. Poor kid,IMG_1431 I don’t know how many times I made him play “wedding” when we were little—it’s certainly a scene he would have been very familiar with. But somehow, in all of His goodness and sovereignty, God chose to take Ian home. I hate it. I don’t want it. I don’t understand it. All I know is that God never changes-even when white blood cells and lungs do. When eyelashes are gone and breath is labored, God is still good. When skin is pale and the only sound you hear is the steady rush of a ventilator in a dark room, God is still good.  When hands can no longer be squeezed, when you realize that your kids will never grow up knowing Uncle Ian, when you get home from the hospital and walk into his room just to try and smell him—God is not doing what we want Him to, but God is good even then. He is incapable of being anything else.

I don’t know much. I just know that the first day I got to see Ian in the ICU, I cried over his broken body and begged God to let me switch with him. I fervently meant every word—if you’re a big sister, you understand. You protect. You take the hit. I begged God to let me climb into that ICU bed—stick the vent down my throat instead! He’s too little. I can do it.

I begged, and very distinctly heard Jesus say, “Ashley, I already switched places with Ian.”

While I mourn the fact that my baby brother is gone, I know that God loves him with an intensity that I could never match. I know Ian’s having a BALL right now—there are no tears for him! [And vain thing that he was, I’m sure he’s excited to have his hair back.] And I know with absolute certainty what Ian would say if he could talk to me right now. He’d cock his curly head to the side, raise a sarcastic eyebrow at me, grin, and tell me to go dance like I meant it. Yesterday was the worst day of my whole life—but it was the BEST day of Ian’s. He got to go home.

DSC_0035And so I choose to celebrate. I celebrate every minute of the 21 years and 187 days that I got to be his big sister. I celebrate his life. I celebrate the beautiful truth that Ian knew Jesus, and is in heaven right now—and I get to tackle hug him the second that Jesus takes me home.

Ian loved me, and he loved Kellan. Two days before he was rushed to the ICU, we sat around making a list of all of the things he wanted to do after he’d beaten Bessie. [Something he never questioned would happen.] The very first thing out of his mouth was, “I want to come visit you and Kellan and go see a Broadway show in NY.” The very last time that he smiled was when my Mom told him that Kellan and I had just picked out our wedding bands. March 2nd is not a time for mourning—Ian would HATE that, and that would not be an accurate picture of what March 2nd signifies. God has done something beautiful in bringing Kellan and I together, and Ian was a part of it. He would want us to celebrate. And celebrate, we shall.

If you’re coming to our wedding on Saturday, you may think it’s ill timed. You may feel odd, but as my Dad mentioned to me just last night, we believe that God timed this exactly how he wanted it. We are devastated and overjoyed all at the same time—and what a sweet thing to have so many people that have loved us and prayed for us through this roller coaster ride come together over the next couple of days! You are the people that have walked with Kellan and I through our relationship, and through cancer. You will walk us through the coming months and years-and words cannot describe how grateful we are for you. We’re excited to see you. We’re excited to dance with you!

Baby brother, I miss you so much it hurts. I will every single day for the rest of my life—every single time I sit down at the piano or watch Singing in the Rain or go dancing or do anything at all. I’m so glad that you don’t hurt any more—that you have your curly hair back, and that you get to watch everything happen as Kellan and I promise each other for better or for worse.  There is so, so much joy in that—and I know you share it. Dance in heaven while we’re dancing down here—I just can’t wait to dance with you again. :) I love you forever.

There is a time to mourn and a time to dance. -Ecclesiastes 3:4

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