MY SON 1/20/2003

Sometimes a child is born, 
and life starts out unfair.
A body filled with sickness, 
and nobody home to care.


But God is always watching, 
and caring for his child.
For the little ones you see, 
He doesn't take things mild.


He sent the child to a home, 
and planted love inside.
Slowly he seemed to find a way,
for his feelings not to hide.


Healing happened slowly, 
but surely did take place.
For inside wounds are far more sad,
and calls for God's good grace.


                                                By: Regina Holsted
                  

The Canvas of Life 8/4/2004

 I look upon the canvas of life, what do I see?
 I see but a small fragment of color, but He sees the picture that WILL be.
 Every stage of life brings more color to the creation,
 Good times, bad times and struggles too, blend together to make more hues.
 Then one day my canvas will be complete,
 I'll stand before GOD with my picture of life.
 Will he see JESUS, the living CHRIST?
                                                                     BY: REGINA HOLSTED

CF 1/19/2003

I watch him struggle for his breath, 
each night when he lays down.
His lungs are needing yet more air, 
I can tell by just the sound.


I ask the Father up above, 
for the faith I need.
I want my healing Father
to touch my adopted seed.


To fill him with God's Power,
and use him in year's ahead.
But there are no guarentees,
He might take him home instead.


                                         by:    Regina Holsted

Cemented Together

   For so long Christopher and I were cemented together by circumstances and yet over time these circumstances formed a friendship stronger than I have ever experienced. As a mother, I loved him but the friendship was of a rare quality, it was a treasure that many seek for their entire life and never find and one that I will miss forever. The things, which at times left me exhausted and weighted down, now in their absence I feel lost, alone, and frightened without. Our lives rotated around medical issues all the time, we use to long for a day without any medical drama. WOW, I didn't know what I was wishing for and how I want my medical world back, not for Chris but for mom. He is perfect now, sitting in heaven with baby Noah, it is I who is lonely without my best friend and grandson. Now I am left cemented to a lifeless body who no longer needs me and I cry!

Revised version of the definition of GRIEF

    Grief is defined by Webster as a deep and poignant distress caused by bereavement. Definition number two states a cause of such suffering or an unfortunate outcome. I find all these meanings to fall way short of what I am feeling so perhaps I am searching for the meaning to the wrong word. MOURNING.....maybe this is what is going on inside of me. Webster says to mourn is feel or express grief or sorrow or to show the customary signs of grief for a death. Customary signs of death doesn't make any sense to me, these are just words and nothing else. 
   What I feel does not fall under any one of these attempts of word play used by whomever it is that decides on what to write as a definition in a dictionary. Rather, a more appropriate definition could only come from a mother who cries and longs for her son or daughter, for she truly knows what to grieve or to mourn means. So a revised version of the meaning of both words, according to an authorized momma, is in order so it seems.
   Grief is when you wake yourself from a deep sleep sobbing so hard the bed shakes. Grief is the knot that has taken up residence in your throat, which at any moment can break out into a flood of tears, only to be pushed back down to once again create that constant choking feeling that makes any and all conversation hard. Maybe grief is when your mind is like a recorded DVD and somebody else has the controls. The show within your mind goes to the last couple of weeks of your child's life and plays OVER and OVER and OVER, never stopping, never allowing you to breath, never allowing the knot in your throat to go away. I think this would better describe the word grieve. 
   To mourn and to grieve, I am unsure of the difference. Perhaps the rise of panic inside of me while I sit through the midnight hours in his room looking at his clothes I have carefully placed on his bed and knowing that he will never wear them again, maybe that is to mourn. Maybe listening to "his" kind of music and for the first time liking it as tears stream down my face, perhaps that is what mourn means. We had our songs that we sang together, each of us had our own parts as we danced liked idiots and sang real loud with the windows down in HOUSTON. Who will sing HIS part now .........and I mourn!!!!
   I think about Webster's choice of wording, "Customary signs of grief" and I am appalled because there is no pattern to follow on how to grieve or mourn. There is no wrong or right way to go through this nightmare, no set time length that it will take. All I know is that I hate what I feel, and although I know this to be untrue, I can't imagine anyone understanding what I feel or am going through. I lost my son, my best friend, and my job all on the same day, the day he drew his last breathe!!
   I watch as everyone carries on with their life and I feel lost and trapped.  My world was Christopher and his illness, doing whatever it took to keep him alive. What do I do now? It is so much more than just a sadness, for I am LOST! THIS DEFINES GRIEF AND MOURNING.........WEBSTER DOES NOT!