In the beginning of 2010, when my former husband and I decided to separate, we translated the situation to our sons by saying our family was transforming and that everything changes. I didn’t know at the time that by the end of the year, my father -- the "papa" whom my boys adored -- would die and we would be forced to again speak of change and transformation.
Only this time, there was no way to avoid another word: loss.
This is a word we brushed over during our separation. The loss of our nuclear family was noted, but not dwelled on. But the loss of my father was too great to ignore. After all, this is the guy who picked up the teenage me and my friends from hospitals and dark houses and asked one question: "Are you OK?" The man who took my vehicle-obsessed sons on an Amtrak train just to watch planes at the airport.
This was not a loss to gloss over.
At first, I tried to sweeten up the Story Of Death for my sons, just 7 and 8. I attempted euphemistic yammer about life’s seasons, but like your kids, mine are too stinkin’ smart. They knew my dad was dead, that he wasn’t coming back -- just like the hamsters named Lavender and Lavender Two -- and that it sucks.
So we ducked into grief’s dark corner and sat there, cross legged, for a while. I’m not sure for how long, but eventually, calming little fireflies blinked around our sad hearts and we all started sleeping through the night again.
Then, the boys drew pictures with neon markers of super sad faces, wrote letters with unpunctuated sentences like "I wish you could come back to the earth" and spoke openly of their thoughts and feelings, even at the discomfort of others. My younger son called my mom on the phone and said, "Papa is dead. He is in the ground, in a grave. And even if we dug him up, it would not be Papa. And it would be gross."
My 7-year-old tapped into what every person who suffers loss and experiences grief says: "it comes in waves." He asked me why it is that he feels fine for a long time and then suddenly, feels very sad right in the middle of, say, building a Lego robot. I told him it was his brain’s way of giving him "happy breaks" between the bouts of sadness, and that he should take these little breaks and enjoy them.
"Like a vacation?" he asked.
Two months have passed and yesterday, my son asked if we could visit my father’s grave. I said sure and that I had not been there since the funeral. I think we will go this weekend, on Sunday. My son said he has a few things to tell my father. I really wonder what they are.
Molly Snyder started writing and publishing her work at the age 10, when her community newspaper printed her poem, "The Unicorn.” Since then, she's expanded beyond the subject of mythical creatures and written in many different mediums but, nearest and dearest to her heart, thousands of articles for OnMilwaukee.
Molly is a regular contributor to FOX6 News and numerous radio stations as well as the co-host of "Dandelions: A Podcast For Women.” She's received five Milwaukee Press Club Awards, served as the Pfister Narrator and is the Wisconsin State Fair’s Celebrity Cream Puff Eating Champion of 2019.
