Critical Junctures - Navigating the loss of a child
Finding peace in life after the loss of a child. Celebrating the time you had with your beloved child. Discussing all the family, friends and people that provide support to parents that have lost a child. Interviews and conversations about loss of a child, dealing with the emotions, relationships, financial, and more. Interviews with parents that are several years removed from the loss providing insight and guidance to help navigate the pain and emotion of the loss of a child.
The loss of a child creates an enduring grief for a parent. The parents sharing stories on this podcast deal with that grief forever. They share their stories of how they manage that grief and how the grief, at times, can still overwhelm them. Managing grief is a journey. There is no easy fix or way to avoid it but there are lessons from others that can help manage the grief.
Critical Junctures - Navigating the loss of a child
Official Opening Podcast of Critical Junctures from my Son's Grave Site
Welcome to the Critical Junctures Podcast. This podcast is for parents who have lost a child and are navigating the loss of that child. Today is our first official release of the podcast and website. This is the five-year anniversary. Of my son's passing. A few days before my son's passing, he looked at me and asked the question, Dad, did my life really matter?
And as a father, you look and go, you can't imagine how much your life mattered to the people that you touched. It reminds me of a message we heard at church from a guest speaker who came and talked about the brevity of life, the brevity of life, the brevity of life. They told a story about visiting a grave site of his ancestors who laid a foundation for his grandparents and his parents and his children and his future grandchildren.
Every person in life has an impact on someone else. Sometimes those lives are cut short, and their impact is for a lesser amount of time, but no less impact.
I am doing this initial podcast from the grave sites of both my father and my son. My father's passing was very difficult for me. He had been involved in every aspect of my life. Every major event that I had, he was there for it. But that's the natural progression, children bury parents. It shouldn't be the parents bury children, but the reality of life is that does happen, and it happens more often than we'd like to believe. There's a number of stories that we're going to be sharing on the podcast of parents who have lost children.
They've lost them through accidents. They've lost them through drug overdoses. They've lost them through medical conditions, through cancer, similar to, to Richy's. They've lost them to suicide. They've lost them in war, lost them to criminal acts where they were murdered. All of those losses are incredibly traumatic, but the grief is a similar grief shared by all parents who have lost a child. Losing a child does not make a difference if you're wealthy, poor, middle class, if you have the greatest job in the world, or if you don't have a job, it doesn't matter. Economic status, it doesn't matter. All of the fortunate things or unfortunate things that have happened in a life, when that death comes to a child, it's a grief that's enduring that every parent goes through.
My hope in this podcast is that we can share. Through the stories and shared experiences of others who have gone through it, ways that help you understand that you're not alone in it. A lot of times, death of a child is very isolating. When the child's lost, there's a lot of people there that are supporting you. They're there for comfort. They're there to celebrate the life with you and share in your emotion and, support. But the loss of a child goes on, and a year from now, five years from now, can be very isolating and lonely. There are parents that are 20 years removed from the loss of a child, still struggle to talk about it. Don't want anyone to ask. It's not about not remembering their child, but that pain is still so powerful in their life that it can be overwhelming. Theirs’s other parents you'll see that have taken that grief and turned it into missions. Missions to eradicate pediatric cancer, missions to eliminate fentanyl coming into the country, missions to stop violence before it can happen. Ones that can stop drugs from being shared in our communities that take lives. So, all of these stories are each person's unique journey and each parent's unique journey. But the common thread for all of us is that grief never goes away.
This week in our neighborhood, I saw celebrations of both high school and college graduations. There have been babies born, weddings happen, anniversary celebrations, even events that you remember for a long time with great, just positive memories. Indiana University getting to play my beloved Notre Dame
Welcome to the Critical Junctures Podcast. This podcast is for parents who have lost a child and are navigating the loss of that child. Today is our first official release of the podcast and website. This is the five-year anniversary. Of my son's passing. A few days before my son's passing, he looked at me and asked the question, Dad, did my life really matter?
And as a father, you look and go, you can't imagine how much your life mattered to the people that you touched. It reminds me of a message we heard at church from a guest speaker who came and talked about the brevity of life, the brevity of life, the brevity of life. They told a story about visiting a grave site of his ancestors who laid a foundation for his grandparents and his parents and his children and his future grandchildren.
Every person in life has an impact on someone else. Sometimes those lives are cut short, and their impact is for a lesser amount of time, but no less impact.
I am doing this initial podcast from the grave sites of both my father and my son. My father's passing was very difficult for me. He had been involved in every aspect of my life. Every major event that I had, he was there for it. But that's the natural progression, children bury parents. It shouldn't be the parents bury children, but the reality of life is that does happen, and it happens more often than we'd like to believe. There's a number of stories that we're going to be sharing on the podcast of parents who have lost children.
They've lost them through accidents. They've lost them through drug overdoses. They've lost them through medical conditions, through cancer, similar to, to Richy's. They've lost them to suicide. They've lost them in war, lost them to criminal acts where they were murdered. All of those losses are incredibly traumatic, but the grief is a similar grief shared by all parents who have lost a child. Losing a child does not make a difference if you're wealthy, poor, middle class, if you have the greatest job in the world, or if you don't have a job, it doesn't matter. Economic status, it doesn't matter. All of the fortunate things or unfortunate things that have happened in a life, when that death comes to a child, it's a grief that's enduring that every parent goes through.
My hope in this podcast is that we can share. Through the stories and shared experiences of others who have gone through it, ways that help you understand that you're not alone in it. A lot of times, death of a child is very isolating. When the child's lost, there's a lot of people there that are supporting you. They're there for comfort. They're there to celebrate the life with you and share in your emotion and, support. But the loss of a child goes on, and a year from now, five years from now, can be very isolating and lonely. There are parents that are 20 years removed from the loss of a child, still struggle to talk about it. Don't want anyone to ask. It's not about not remembering their child, but that pain is still so powerful in their life that it can be overwhelming. Theirs’s other parents you'll see that have taken that grief and turned it into missions. Missions to eradicate pediatric cancer, missions to eliminate fentanyl coming into the country, missions to stop violence before it can happen. Ones that can stop drugs from being shared in our communities that take lives. So, all of these stories are each person's unique journey and each parent's unique journey. But the common thread for all of us is that grief never goes away.
This week in our neighborhood, I saw celebrations of both high school and college graduations. There have been babies born, weddings happen, anniversary celebrations, even events that you remember for a long time with great, just positive memories. Indiana University getting to play my beloved Notre Dame for a playoff game. Basketball games, sporting events, events that happen in the world, they can take you back and give you a memory that's just very positive.
One of the challenges with loss of a child is that that grief can also take you back to that pain in an instant. One of the things we've really tried to do is learn how to celebrate the time we had with Richy even though the grief is still very real and hurts. Yesterday we had a party for a couple of the grandkids celebrating the end of the school year and them moving to the next grades. Richy couldn't be a part of that, but we all had a discussion about Richy, and he was there with us in spirit. And though we never really can touch him again and that we can be with him in person. His indominable spirit lives with us, and I'm sure many of you that have lost a child, the pain is for us. The pain resides with us. But there are ways and there is hope of ways that you can manage that grief and really turn it into something that is very positive about your child. You'll still have the grief. It never goes away. It's how you manage it. So today I thought it was appropriate to do this initial kickoff podcast at Richy's grave site. Where his physical body is buried, but we know his spiritual body, his soul, his spirit, it still lives with us and it's in a different place. So, I hope you'll come along on this journey with us. We have a number of speakers lined up that speak to all ranges of this loss and sharing their stories.
The very first one coming next week is, is a unique perspective. It's from a dear friend of ours who was with us through Richy's journey. Lost their son in an instant, he was a spectacular young man. No indication of the condition in his body that took his life, and you're going to hear from a unique perspective and that his father is a psychiatrist. His mother's a pediatrician, and no way they could have known that this was going to happen.
And their story is, like a number of other ones that you'll hear that are coming that have lost children to cancer, lost children to drug abuse, lost children in an accident, lost children to murders, lost children in war. All of us share that same grief again, the purpose of this podcast is to help those, going through this from perspective of parents that are several years or more removed from the loss and being able to look back in time. And know that you go through that grieving process, but how you can change the dynamic of how you feel about the actual loss? We hope their stories will be inspirational and their stories will give you hope that no matter what happened, you can't change the loss of that child.
What you can change is how you live. We're going have some people share that have incredible gifts of giving their time, empathy. Being there for you in ways you didn't even know that they were there and supporting you. There are so many people that are there at the time of a loss, and I have to admit, I'm one of them. I would be there when the loss happened, but it's very challenging a few years down the road to think of someone and go, let me just give him a call. Let me just take him at dinner. Let's just have a night out. Let's be there for how you doing spiritually? How are you doing mentally to stay that engaged with it?
So, we're going to have some people come on that have those incredible gifts. And I would say that if you feel isolated and alone, there are people you can reach out to. For us, we have pastors, we have dear friends, and we have family people that are there always for you. There are some people that have not had the fortune of having those kind of close relationships, but having grown up with grandparents who were ministers with being surrounded by a lot of people of faith, there are groups and there are people that are out there. That if you reach out to them, they'll pray with you. They'll call and check on you. They'll be there for you. And again, the hope of our podcast is to give you some hope that there's a future that you can fully honor your child, feel the grief, and yet experience all of the great and beautiful things that God created in this lifetime.
Would appreciate you sharing this podcast with others, especially someone you know that's going through this. The more we can get it out to help others, our hope is that it will provide a sense of relief or a sense of hope for those that may be isolated or maybe have just a grief that is incredibly overwhelming.
Thank you for listening. We do intend to release a podcast dropping them every Sunday, and I think you'll be inspired by some of the stories that you hear. Thank you.
Critical-Junctures.com
