Austin's Blog

Someone said the other day that Gabe would almost be two-and-a-half years old by now if he was still here. It struck me because I stopped counting his age at 366 days old—how long he was entrusted to us. I’m not certain how aging and time works in Heaven. Will he be a fully grown person when we meet him again or will we parent him because he will be a baby when we arrive? Who knows? Only God. All we know is we were blessed with those 366 days. We think about him especially at holidays, when Addie hits different milestones, when we are around children his age, and when we are with family.

People ask (less often, of course) how our grief is these days. It isn’t as raw, wild, and looming as it once was. There’s still a dull ache we carry each day. There will always be a Gabe-sized hole within our hearts. Grief changes over time though it does not go away.

Pat Schwiebert argues, “Grief is like the stages of love: first falling in love and being totally preoccupied by your new love, then becoming comfortable as you begin to trust that your love will always be with you. In grief, as when you first fall in love, your heart longs to be with the person who’s died. Your desire to touch him or her is overwhelming. Most other parts of your life seem unimportant in comparison. Then slowly, normal life begins to creep back in and you find that your grief no longer demands the high maintenance that it first required. You will have created a special space in your heart where you can carry this departed loved one with you at all times, even as you go about other things. Death ends a lifetime, but not a relationship.”

My mother and father-in-law purchased a paver in Gabe’s honor at the While We’re Waiting retreat center in Hot Springs, Arkansas. We will return there in June to see it for the first time as we attend the retreat again as helper parents. The paver is a sweet reminder that Gabe was a gift, one we did not earn, merit, or deserve. The dates pain me but I know there’s more to his life even now than that little dash between his birth and heaven day. The most important thing about Gabe is not that he died but that he truly lived and lives even now. There is so much more to him than his premature (from an earthly standpoint) death. There was a lot of life and love between those dates. There’s a lot of both even now.

Eternity is long, wide, and unending and the longest chapter with Gabe is in the future. Kevin Carson writes, “Think about the life of your child as a chapter in your life. The chapter with your child in it, depending upon many different life circumstances, has a particular length to it. There were chapters in your life before your child. There will be chapters in your earthly life without your child. But the longest chapter of your life —with your child included— awaits. The longest chapter is yet to be written, but is guaranteed.” 1 Corinthians 2:9 says, “…no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man imagined, what God has prepared for those who love him.” What a glorious reality! These are the long days of winter of waiting and watching until we see Gabe again, but we know the best is yet to come.