Today I was triggered. It doesn’t
happen often; most days, weeks, months, I go about my everyday life and go to work
and love my kids and husband and talk with my friends and survive every day by
focusing on the positives in my life. But today, in the most unlikely of
places, I was confronted with a story about a little girl and her dad who were
hit by a car; the little girl is currently in PICU with some pretty significant
injuries. And in an instant, it sent me straight back to walking into a
hospital on what should have been an everyday kind of day getting ready to face
the most life-changing and traumatic event of my life.
The strange thing about grief is
that even when you think it’s gone, when you think you’ve overcome it and dealt
with it and accepted it, it rains over you with such intensity that you feel
like you are unchanged from the moment you acquired it. You immediately feel
the unbearable weight that comes along with it and the panicked thoughts of a
mind hoping to make it disappear. Luckily, it’s a momentary paralysis. You regain
your strength, your toughness, your breath more quickly as time goes on, but
every time it happens, it’s still shocking the power it holds over you.
I know the grief will always be
there, just as Weston’s memory will be too; to lose the grief would mean that
Weston’s memory would have to go as well, so grief is the price you pay. Weston and his story have given me more
strength than I ever thought possible, more courage to stand up for what I believe
in, and more focus on the beautiful pieces of life. Just as there are
situations that trigger me right back into the trauma, there are also many that
heal my heart. Seeing the kindness of others, of strangers, when a person is in
need, when a person is sitting in PICU with their baby and people rally around
them to provide strength when they have none and guidance when they feel lost
is a beautiful thing, it’s a comforting thing, and I’m grateful that I was
triggered enough to notice it.
