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Dogs are amazing

This title might seem odd, and it probably is.   What do dogs have to do with grief? I know I have blogged before about how our animals grieve the loss of our children, of their "boy" or of their "girl".  I have blogged about how we grieve the loss of our children's pets after the loss of our child. We grieve this because it is usually the last remaining living connection we have with our young children. DJ was only 13 at the time of his death and did not have children of his own as a living connection to him. When his dog passed away years later it sucked, it sucked completely and utterly.   Today I am reviewing my blogs. I plan to create an online workshop to help those with the loss of their child.  It is taking me a long time to review and organize my blogs from years ago because 1. There are so many of them 2. I want to organize them with a small summary in a ledger sheet to make writing the online workshop sheets easier 3. Reading them to do this summ...
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GRIEF IS SNEAKY

I am sitting in front of my computer screen wanting to write a blog about surviving the loss of a child.  About my son DJ who was amazing and fun and full of goofiness and laughter and smiles.  I am wanting to write something but I don't know what to write and then it occurred to me- I am losing memories of my boy and that breaks my heart. It has been almost 18 years since DJ passed away.  I realize that time takes a toll on memories but I am looking around my house and DJ was never in this house so there are no memories of him here.  Our dogs do not know him, he never sat at this kitchen table and had dinner, he never slept in this home.   This grieves my heart today.  This is throwing me into a tailspin.  I didn't plan to have grief hit me today, I didn't plan on missing DJ so much today because I don't see him here.  I didn't plan on being sad today. Grief can be sneaky, it can come at you from nowhere and "getcha". Like a bad game of tag....
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Food changes too after the death of a child

I went to lunch with a friend today.  I ordered a granola, and yogurt mixture with bananas, berries, and nuts.  It was super good and yummy and made me happy.  I choose foods that make me happy. This might seem just fine and normal but I want to share why this is my new normal since DJ passed away. After DJ passed I decided I was going to eat what I wanted and not what was expected of me at restaurants.  I chose chocolate pie and grits at a Village Inn, I ate the fudge with the nuts without the ice cream because in reality, who wants the ice cream anyway? It's just a pathway to get fudge and nuts- I didn't want or need the middleman anymore.   I don't do this as often anymore.  But why did I do it after DJ passed away? I did it because I was honoring DJ when I ate my food.   He loved chocolate, he hoarded chocolate in his bedroom. I had to hide chocolate chips in the vegetable drawer of my refrigerator otherwise he would eat them and then I c...
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A BELATED THANK YOU

       My husband and I got invited to a skateboard gala this week.  It was a complete random chance of an event- a complete coincidence at a Lululemon store that got us to this event...   I DON'T BELIEVE IN COINCIDENCES- I BELIEVE IN GOD INCIDENCES.       We were out shopping and ran into an employee among the 15 other employees working  who was a skateboarder.  M y husband struck up a conversation with him and he told us in only 6 days there was going to be a skateboard gala event in our town- he gave us the website information and contact information on the spot to get tickets and get in touch with the organizer of the event.  We had no plans for that evening and got tickets just before they sold out.   This gala was to honor the skateboard community, fundraise, and support a growing community of like-minded people.   We could never have done this 10 years ago, or maybe even 3 years ago.  ...
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Apparently I am supposed to start blogging again...

     This morning I woke up at 4 a.m., let the dogs outside, poured a cup of coffee, and opened up my computer to start my day.  What popped up on my screen surprised me.  It was the last post I had written for Flowers on a Child's Grave Now What? blog.  I haven't been on it in years.  I didn't even know how to get back on it if I had wanted to.  It all feels a little otherworldly directed if you ask me- as if DJ is saying- "Hello! Get back to it, you can do it!"  from the other side!     Let me reintroduce myself a bit- my name is Lisa Epperson, I have been married 34 years, and have two adult children- a beautiful daughter, an amazing son, and our son DJ watching his family from heaven. DJ was  13 years old and wanted to be a professional skateboarder. He wore his helmet when he was learning new tricks, but he wasn't on the day of the accident.  He was hanging out with his best friends, went down a hill that I had told...
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My apologies to the bereaved parents out there!

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 I haven't posted on my blog in a long time.  My original blog Flowers on a Child's Grave got taken over my computer spiders and I cannot retrieve.  I can see the posts that I did off my Facebook page but I no longer can add to it.   DJ's death anniversary date is coming up and knowing that caused a stirring in me to look at my Facebook page and my old blogs.  What I didn't see before was that people had been responding to me and I never responded back.  Bereaved parents reached out to me and got silence.  I didn't realize they were responding back and now I feel horrible.  If you have every responded to me, please let me apologize.  I am sure at the time, my grief was a part of why I never responded- grief steals your memory, your concentration and life skills.  Also, after I would write a blog I often never looked back at it.  The blogs were ways for me to get the "poison out" and I never looked back. Bereaved, know that you ...
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