Month of death – with the hope of fruits.

My grandmother is the woman standing up in the red shirt. ❤

I know I know.. “Month of death” It sounds morbid, but that is what this month has been for me, for us, for my family. It’s interesting how life works, we’re all born into this world and we all eventually die. Some of us are scared of dying and the possible suffering we might endure. [I assure you we are stronger than you think.] Some of us are not scared, and gladly welcome whatever life throws at us, even if that means we leave this earth too soon. 

I have been away from the blog world a little bit because well, death. First my grandmother passed away, she lived a great life. She lived well into her 80’s and while she did suffer for 11 years, she had a great life. I was so grateful to see her suffering end. It was and is sad to know she is no longer earth side and I will no longer be able to see her, but her memories and spirit live within me. It is especially sad for my grandfather who knows no other life without my grandmother, his wife. They were married 65 years. Can you imagine, 65 years with someone? He stayed right by her side all 11 years of her sickness, and that is admirable. We can all aspire to be the lover, caregiver, supporter, and faithful husband he was. 

At my grandmother’s funeral, there was no eulogy, there were no personal words spoken about her. Everything spoken was from people who didn’t know her. Personally, I felt this was a disservice to the beautiful life my grandmother lived. So, I wrote one. The next blog post will be my grandmother’s eulogy that she didn’t get to have. While it continues with the death theme, it is a little more light and airy. I hope you enjoy it. My grandmother was a fun lady. She had her weaknesses, but don’t we all?

Two weeks later, my father in law passed away suddenly, and unexpectedly (kind of). I will say this is VERY fresh and still very much an open wound for the family so I won’t go into too much detail about everything. However, what I will discuss is the perspective of a spouse supporting and loving through the death of a parent. My husband’s father was diagnosed with an aggressive cancer, and died a few short days later. It was tragic and unexpected for him to leave us so soon. 

While my father in law and I had our differences, I respected him. He was the father to my husband. He cared for me because he knew how deeply I love his son, and he loved his son (my husband) with his whole heart. He was so proud of everything his son had accomplished, and so am I. We had that in common. He cared for his family so deeply, all he ever wanted was to be in the presence of those he cared about. Regardless of your relationship with the person, when they are such a big part of your life (father to my husband, grandfather to my children) you experience some kind of pain and sadness. I am sad for my children, they will never know him, they will have minimal memories with him, and we cannot get that back. My husband will go on for the rest of his life without his father around to help him walk through life’s challenges, and that especially makes me sad.

Death leaves us with a void, with a hole, feeling sad and sometimes even alone. Throughout this month I have really been trying to think about the fruits that come from death. From my grandmother’s death, I was able to reconnect with so many cousins, aunts, uncles, and even meet my godmother for the first time in my adult life. I know my grandmother was smiling down on all of this. I am making it my personal goal to not lose touch with this family I have had the privilege to reconnect with. My husband’s family has been able to reconnect in a different way as well. For that I am truly thankful, and I hope it continues to grow for them. They need each other in the healing process. 

Grief is a process folks. There is no start and stop. There is only a path, a road, a trail, that you continue to go down, and each passing minute, hour, day, week, month, year gets easier. 

This is a part of life. How do we turn it into fruits?

Xo, jessica

Family+expectations = disaster

You know, sometimes I don’t like what summer social media has to offer. Everyone is on a family vacation making memories and doing things together. Whether they really love each other or are fighting every second of the day, I will never know because on social media they look like they are having the time of their life. Growing up, my family never took big vacations. I have grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, and we never all planned a beach trip or any trip for that matter all together. My immediate family [when we were all together] would take family vacations to Disney World, the beach, mountains, etc. Those were always so fun because well.. we didn’t really have a choice but to like each other and to be together. I have so many fun memories of some of our [immediate] family vacations we took. 

So, what I’m saying is if it weren’t for social media I wouldn’t know any better. I wouldn’t know that people took vacations with their extended family. I wouldn’t have FOMO, I wouldn’t care. But I do. But it’s not just about going on vacations and making memories, it’s about holidays, it’s about weekend getaways when a fun opportunity comes about.. it’s all of those things. I want to rent a house on the beach and under one roof have all of my family. I would also like for everyone to always get along and have fun — sounds pretty lofty huh? HA. 

What if I just focused on fun memories for myself and my children? Vacations are not what it is all about. Most of my childhood memories are not from vacations. They are from my day to day life in my house playing with the neighbor kids, playing with my sister, and school.. lots of memories are from school. 

Stop setting yourself up for failure. When you set unrealistic expectations you will always be let down. You will always feel anxiety, you will always feel disappointed. Instead, say out loud, “Isn’t it so awesome they are enjoying their family on a vacation?” or “Isn’t it so awesome that they have the same tradition for Christmas every year?” When you waste time doting on someone else’s traditions/vacations/family gatherings etc, you waste time away from your own opportunity to create a memory. So go create a memory.

When I was growing up my grandmother and grandfather would host Thanksgiving at their house, every year! It was kind of a big occasion for them mainly because their anniversary was around that time, but also they loved Thanksgiving and having everyone at their house enjoying a meal together. It was about 30-40 people from my dad’s side of the family under one roof. This was the one time each year that I would get to see that side of my family. It was pure chaos with kids running around, food all across the table, the doorbell ringing nonstop with more family arriving, music blaring, alcohol flowing, loud Spanish speaking, laughing, and just pure JOY… you know the Cuban’s like to do it up! This is one of my best memories as a kid. Also probably why I love Thanksgiving so much! I will never live up to this kind of party hype with family, but man I can only try. [If social media were around when these Thanksgiving celebrations happened, you would definitely have FOMO! :)]

My family will never have a family reunion, my family will never go to a beach house for a week, they will never go on a cruise, or really do anything together because that’s just not who my family is and that’s ok. My family visits when they can, and they are there for my kids birthday party, holiday celebrations, horseback riding lessons, swim lessons, and day to day fun. Don’t set you or your family up for failure, it’s not healthy for you or for anyone else. Focus on what you can control. 

Enjoy your family beach week! 

xo, Jessica