"You Can Rest Now"

 This is the post I never wanted to write. I wanted to write a happy ending to this story, but I guess we don't always get those, do we? As Christians, we eventually get a happy ending, as we know we will meet our loved ones again, since they are resting in Christ.
 Right now, it's hard to take much solace in that, as my heart still aches for my wife. Tomorrow would have been one year since she was diagnosed. It took 364 days for that horrible disease, cancer, to take my beloved from a vibrant young mother to being home with our Savior.
 Today, I was thinking that only last week she was still sitting in the living room with us, and getting around to a certain extent. Two weeks ago, she was even out at our little get-together in the garage.

 Tonight, I go to sleep in an empty bed. A bed that my wife and best friend was in only hours ago. Tonight, I had to explain to my kids that mommy was dead and in heaven. I had to explain that she gets to be an angel now.

 Today, Robin had so much pain. Cancer is a horrible, horrible disease. I realized that before this, I had no real idea what "In Sickness and In Health" meant. It is the good days, and the bad days. It is nursing colds, and dealing with soul achingly terrible days of disease.

 But now, she is at rest. We, who are left behind are poorer by her loss, and heaven is richer for taking her.

 I think I cried most of my tears while she was sick, especially in this last week. I can't describe how hard it is to see the person you talked to every day for almost 12 years lose their ability to talk to you. It broke my heart listen to her try to tell me she loved me. But I knew.

 When Pastor  Harry finished praying, she said "Amen." And She told us all she loved us. I still don't think I ever had enough time to tell her how much I loved her. I don't think I would have even if we both lived into our seventies.

 It's still sinking in, though, even though I have been preparing for it for a while now, or Robin has been preparing me for it. It's hard to wrap your mind and heart around the fact that someone you loved with every ounce of your being isn't there anymore.

 I don't think the Robin shaped hole it my heart will be filled, though, maybe time will get some of the edge off.

 I think the thing I have been struggling with through all of this is what good could possibly come of Robin's fight with cancer, and now her death. Then today, I have gotten a taste of how many people her story has affected. Maybe that is the good? If only one or two lives were touched by our suffering, then it would really give me some solace.

 My real solace now comes from knowing that Robin is resting. Her pain is gone. She has her hair back, she has all her body back. She is free of scars. She is free of cancer.

 The cancer destroyed her body, but it couldn't touch her soul.

 And some how, it's fitting it was on the Marine Corps birthday. Maybe it was just so all my brothers and sisters who have gone before would welcome her dressed in their Blues. "Welcome to Heavenly Battalion Ma'am, you did your time in the trenches, enjoy your R&R."

 Rest now honey. You earned it. We got it from here.


 I love you so much.

                                           Robin Lynne Harris Hrinda 1/21/81- 11/10/11
                                           Beloved wife, mother, daughter, sister. She was a massage
                                           Therapist, a super mommy, a Marine Wife and my best damn friend.

                                            Every Day was a Blessing.

The Darkest Day

I meant to be asleep.
I really did. I got my shower and shaved well over an hour ago.
The kids have been in bed for hours now.
And Robin has been sleeping. It sounds like decent sleep from what I can tell.

 I wasn't going to post tonight. I was drained. I have nothing left right now. I wanted sleep.
But I knelt down to pray. Moved by the fervent cries and prayers and pleading of my daughter
to have her mommy stay. Moved by the simple, pure faith of a child, knowing that God has the
power to heal. Knowing that even the most horrible disease has no power in His kingdom, because He
can deal with that, I knelt down to pray.

 For all reason, I should have no faith left. I have been crying and praying for one thing, healing, a cure for my wife for almost a year now. This has been the worst year of my life. This has been the worst week of that year. We put our dog down a few days ago, and then two nights later our momma cat came back after getting in a tangle with something she probably should not have tangled with. (She is doing better though) But now, today, we have been dealing with the very reality of Robin passing on.

 Today, she took a turn for the worse. The pain worsened again, and she just wasn't doing well. I found that out after I had taken the kids to a wonderful morning at the park. It's amazing how a few minutes can change everything. I spent the day in tears, sobbing over my sick and dying wife. Then Meghan came home and we broke the news to her.

 The tears flowed. How can you explain to a child that God might decide not to heal their mother? How can you explain to a child, that for all their faith, for all their simple belief, their fervent knowledge that God can; He might decide not to. How?

 So I spent the past few hours on my knees, a broken man. Spirit broken, mind broken, heart broken. Broken before God, praying that He can validate the faith of my innocent daughter.

 She is a child, praying for her mother to live. To live to watch her grow. To tell her how pretty she is in her first prom dress. To be there and watch her graduate. To be there when she gets married. To be there and to watch her live.

 If God's great heart cannot be moved by the simple prayer of a child for her mother to live, then what hope do the rest of us have? Is there a prayer more pure and innocent than that? The simple purity in that puts all these words I have typed to shame.

 I am nothing. Everyone has talked about what a good father, and husband, and what a good example I have been through all this. The thing is, it isn't me. As far as husbands go, I'm mediocre at best, the same with being a father. As far as an example, I'm pretty sure I'm a terrible one. I've spent so many many days being angry, and doubting, and bringing everyone around me down. Whatever light everyone has been seeing in me through all of this is not from me.

 Somehow, I have been reflecting God. The peace that God gives us, and our sincere faith has been shining out through me. I may be a terrible mirror, broken, covered in graffiti; but God's light shines brighter. All peace is not me, it's Him.

 And that is what brought me to my knees tonight. Meghan's prayer for her mother to stay around. God told us that if we had the faith of a mustard seed, we could move mountains. He said by our faith, we are healed. I know that usually applies to spiritual healing, but I believe also to our worthless bodies. Meghan has the faith of a child. I have the faith of a father. My heart was broken listening to her, as I believe God's heart breaks listening to all of us.

 But He can. He has changed His mind before because of the prayers of His children. He notes us more than the leaves and the sparrows. He hears the pure and heartfelt prayer of the child.

 At this point, if Robin pulls through and stays with us on Earth, there is no other thing that it could be besides a miracle. Medicine has failed, her body is in the process of failing. But God still can heal. He has the power to do this, and it isn't even a stretch for him. It is a word, or a thought. It is turning His eye upon Robin.

 So I prayed. And prayed. And then I knew I should sit down and proclaim. I'm not praying in the town square so everyone can hear my pretty words. I was praying on a living room floor that I probably should have vacuumed first. I have praying that God would hear my daughter's prayer.

 Her's was so much better than mine.

 There is nothing left. Anything that comes out of this is of God. I am just a fool behind a keyboard. And if all my faith is for nothing, than I am truly a man with nothing.

A Cynic's Prayer

 This title was a little bit more prosey than I have tended to be in this blog, but it reflects how I've been feeling lately. Robin has been recovering pretty well from her hip replacement, at least until yesterday. Her other leg started hurting a lot, and now we have to wonder if the other tumor has grown to the point where it is causing problems in that leg too. I hope not.

 This brings us back around to the title. My only prayers lately have been: "Please God, heal Robin, and take away her pain." I don't think it's too much to ask, really. I'm not praying for wealth, or wisdom, or for my enemies to be defeated. I just want my wife to be well again. I want for us to be able to concentrate on getting ready for Meg starting middle school. I want to concentrate on Logan starting pre-school. I don't want to keep going over the scenario where I tell the kids that Mommy isn't coming home because she is with Jesus now.

 God I don't have it in me to do that. If it wasn't for the kids, I'd suck start a pistol at this point in my life. I just want Robin to ,at the very least, not be in pain anymore. Gone are the prayers of a job I truly enjoy, owning our own home, having any type of things... We are purely in survival mode. I am only praying for my wife not to die.

 I feel the worst for my mother-in-law and for my oldest daughter. For my mother in law, she is dealing with the one bright side in this for us. It isn't happening to one of our kids. For her, it's just that. Robin is her daughter, her baby, no matter what age she is.
 For Meg, my heart breaks because no soon-to-be fifth grade should have to deal with this. Her life should be decorating her locker, dealing with mean middle school girls and finding out that some boys are cute. Waking up wondering if mommy feels good enough to make her breakfast isn't part of the deal.

 I keep waking up every morning hoping one of two things: This is a dream, or I just didn't wake. The second one is purely selfish, because I am getting to the end of my rope. I realize the second one is me just raging, because I know I have to be here for my children, no matter what. Should it come to having to have a talk with them, I will find the reserves inside myself and do it, because they need me around. I don't want to, but life is a long string of doing things we don't want to do. It's duty, plain and simple.

I just pray it doesn't come to that.

 I keep praying. Even though it has become the definition of insanity right now: "Doing something over and over and expecting different results." I guess that is where sanity crosses over into faith, however tenuous it might be.

 Dear God,
 Take me instead of my wife. I am damaged goods anyway. My children need a mother more anyway. Mothers are the ones who really make things better. Mothers are the ones who kiss away boo-boos. Mother is the name for God on the lips and hearts of children. If you have decided you have to take one of us, because you, in you mysterious an unknowable ways, have to kill one of my children's parents, than take me. Heal my wife. I'm really trying not to be mad at you, but you have been kind of a dick lately. You have brought a lot of support our way through the love of others who have empathy to what we are going through. You have placed the burden on the hearts of many people to reach out to us. A lot of people are praying, right now, for you to heal Robin. What's the deal. I accept that sometimes you say no, because you have to. But that's bullshit, you're God. You said no to a lot of other prayers before. All I wan't is for my wife to pull through. you already took her boobs, her uterus her hip and left her with a patchwork of scars. It makes her more beautiful to me because her strength shines through, but damn you for the pain. I accept what is. Sometimes, Buddhists were onto something. I accept what is, where we are, and that you have some kind of plan. But please heal Robin. And if you can't do that, than take me in her place.
                                                                                                                -Amen

Ten years

 Where did ten years go? I am sitting here sipping bourbon and water watching Robin wrap Meg's birthday presents, and I wonder where the last ten years went.

 Ten years ago we were sitting at the Community Hospital of Monterey Peninsula, lovingly referred to as CHOMP, waiting for Meghan to come into our life. I was a 23 year old Lance Corporal in the Marines, and Robin was my 20 year old wife. We were young and clueless, and had no idea how much this 7 lb, 15 oz. ball of blonde mischief was going to change our life.

 Cue 4 years of sleepless nights, tending a sick kid from time to time, and generally trying to figure out how to be parents on the fly. Some times we did alright, other times we could have done much better, but we were learning as we went. Eventually she learned to talk, learned to sleep in her own bed, and somewhere along the line she grew into a beautiful, hard-headed young woman.

 Eventually we'll figure out what we are doing.

 Now I'm a 33 year old veteran, working in the Federal Prison system, something I never thought I would be doing, and Robin is 30 and fighting cancer, which we also never expected. We have three beautiful children now, including the aforementioned middle-schooler. I couldn't imagine life without them.

 And you know, I wouldn't change a thing. Except for maybe the cancer.