Their House Feels Different Now | Faith, Grief & God's Mercy

Mom and Dad's house feels different now.

The hospital bed is gone. Everything has been moved back into place. For months, things had been shifted around to make room for what we needed after Dad came home from the hospital in May.

Now the house looks more like it did before.

Except Dad isn't there.

I am just really, really sad.

There are probably prettier words I could use to describe grief. I could say I'm melancholy. I could say I'm exhausted. Both are true. My husband looked at me last night and told me I looked exhausted.

I am.

But mostly, I'm just really sad.

I keep seeing Dad in his coffin. I touched his arm, and he was so cold.

I don't want that to be the picture my mind holds onto because there are so many other pictures of him I want to remember.

Dad sitting on the porch with his coffee.

Dad looking at the weather map.

Dad checking Life360 and keeping tabs on all of us.

"Bethy just left home."

"Chelle's home from work."

Who is going to give us those reports now?

Dad loved his garden. He taught Beth so much about gardening, and hers has flourished because of it. He loved playing Rook.

He sweat when he ate. Ha Ha.

He had the best laugh. A big ole belly laugh.

He was always singing when we were growing up. He loved "The Old Ship of Zion."

And Dad knew his Bible.

He once said he'd read it cover to cover "five or six times." He could quote Scripture in his sleep.

He was the best dad.

And that's part of why this hurts so badly.

I've had two dads in my lifetime, and they both died young.

My biological dad died when I was in my early twenties from a self-inflicted gunshot wound and I loved him with every ounce of my being. Dad came into my life when I was sixteen, and he loved me and my two sisters as though we were his own flesh and blood. There was never an asterisk beside that love. We were his girls.

He called me "Chelle."

I realized after he died that I don't have a voicemail from him.

I wish I did.

I wish I could push a button and hear him say "Chelle" one more time.

Cancer took his familiar voice before it took him, and that makes the absence of a recording hurt even more.

But I do have something else.

Sunday night, I told Dad, "I love you."

He told me, "I love you."

Then he grabbed my hand and kissed it.

I didn't know how precious that moment was about to become.

By the next night, he was gone.

Monday to Monday.

I still can't believe that part.

At Dad's last oncology appointment, we learned his decision to not do any further treatments. Dad asked how much time he might have, and we were told maybe a month or two.

We didn't get a month or two.

We got one week.

And somehow, in the middle of how terribly painful that is, I can also call it mercy.

Because one of the prayers we prayed over and over was that God would not let Dad suffer.

Those last days were hard.

There were nights when nobody really slept. We were constantly trying to keep Dad comfortable and safe, trying to figure out what he needed, watching his body become weaker while he was still trying so hard.

I think it took Dad a while to fully grasp how heavy the situation was.

And I think he fought so hard because he wanted more time with all of us.

We wanted more time with him too.

That's the part of grief I can't make fair.

My husband's dad lived until he was pushing ninety. I've had two dads, and both of mine died young.

That doesn't seem fair.

I can believe God is good and still say that.

I can trust Him and still wish the story had been different.

Because I have seen God's hand in this journey.

Over and over again.

When Dad first came home from the hospital, we suddenly had to figure out things we had never thought about before. One of them was simply how we were going to get his wheelchair in and out of the house.

I anonymously posted pictures of my parents' back deck in a Facebook group and asked for suggestions.

Within minutes, people were answering.

Again and again, people mentioned The Roll Call Foundation, an organization that helps veterans (and non-veterans) by providing metal wheelchair ramps through donations and volunteers.

So I called.

When I dialed the number it didn't even ring, went straight to voicemail. I left a message thinking I wouldn't hear anything. Later that evening, around 7:30, I received a call from an unknown number. I almost didn't answer it. But I did.

It was Don from Roll Call.

He had seen the pictures of my parents' deck and told me he estimated we would need about 30 feet of ramp. He never had that much because people never needed that much nor was that a normal donation he typically received. 

But he was getting ready to pick up sixty feet of ramp.

Sixty.

When we needed thirty.

We knew.

God.

Don came over the next day to look at everything in person. As we talked, we discovered that he lives in the neighborhood right beside my parents. He knew their street.

Then he started telling me about his years in the service and mentioned Zoeller Pump in connection with the work he'd done.

My brother works for Zoeller Pump.

Of course he does.

Within days, Dad had his ramp.

They needed volunteers to install it, so my brother-in-law and uncle helped. Both are veterans themselves. And now they've made themselves available to help with other ramp installs for Roll Call.

But the connections didn't stop there.

Don told us Roll Call had outgrown its previous location. He had found a building that was perfect for what they needed but didn't know how he was going to cover the rent.

Then he started receiving his social security check. It was the exact amount he needed to make the new payment.

And the building Roll Call moved into?

My aunt's boss had just moved out of it.

You can call all of those things coincidences if you want.

I can't.

I see God's hand.

I see it throughout this entire journey.

That doesn't mean I have the answers I want.

I don't.

We found out that what started as aches and pains was cancer. There are things you look back on and wish could have been addressed differently or sooner. The oncologist even told us it was something that might have been treatable early on.

But by the time we knew what we were dealing with, it was too late.

That is hard to sit with.

There are questions I don't have answers to.

But there is one answer I keep coming back to.

Dad didn't suffer for months after that final appointment.

Monday to Monday.

One week.

And it was merciful.

I'm almost in awe when I think about how quickly God carried Dad through that final valley.

I'm not saying that because it makes losing him easier.

It doesn't.

My heart is broken.

I worry about Momma. I worry about my brother and my three sisters, my nieces and nephews and my own children.

My brother Trav gave a beautiful eulogy at Dad's funeral. My niece Sarena sang "Goodness of God" without a hiccup. God had His hand on them both yesterday morning. I prayed for it. We all did.

Momma has wondered what happens now to some of the relationships Dad connected. Part of me wonders too.

There are so many things death changes that nobody tells you to prepare for.

Even the silly things.

For years, we've called my brother "the Golden Child." Every Christmas, the sisters would get Trav some ridiculous gift commemorating his Golden Child status, and Dad thought it was hilarious.

Do we still do it?

Will is still be funny?

I don't know.

That's grief too, I think.

It isn't only missing someone.

It's looking at all the ordinary pieces of your life and realizing that their absence has changed those too.

Who's checking the weather?

Who's watching Life 360?

Who's telling us who's home?

Who will sit on the porch?

Who will tend that garden?

Who will sing those old songs?

Who will laugh that big belly laugh?

I don't know yet what grief is going to look like for me.

Right now, it looks like tears.

A lot of them.

It looks like exhaustion.

It looks like not being able to sleep.

It looks like walking into Mom's house and seeing everything put back where it belongs and wishing desperately that one thing wasn't missing.

It looks like seeing Dad in that coffin when I close my eyes and wanting instead to remember the warm hand that held mine the night before he died.

It looks like me wishing I could hear him call me "Chelle."

It looks like being incredibly thankful that I got to have him and incredibly angry that I didn't get to keep him longer.

And it looks like trusting God while my heart hurts.

Maybe that's what walking through a valley actually is.

Not pretending it doesn't hurt.

Not having an answer for every why.

Just knowing we aren't walking it alone.

God carried us when Dad came home.

He carried us through appointments and bad news.

He sent people with ramps and people willing to build them.

He carried us through sleepless nights.

He carried Dad.

And now He is carrying the rest of us.

I don't know how long this part of the journey will hurt like this.

I suspect grief doesn't operate on a very convenient schedule.

But I know Dad knew the God I am trusting with him now.

The man read his Bible cover to cover five or six times. Scripture poured out of him. He sang about the Old Ship of Zion.

And during that final week, after hearing he might have a month or two, Dad remembered another man in Scripture who was ill and nearing life's end.

Hezekiah.

"God gave Hezekiah fifteen more years," Dad said.

Dad wanted his fifteen years.

I wanted them for him too.

God didn't answer that prayer the way we wanted.

But He heard every prayer asking for Dad to not suffer and linger.

Monday to Monday.

There is so much about that week I don't understand.

But I can see mercy in it.

I can see God's hand.

And even here - in this terrible, painful valley where I miss my dad more than I know how to say - I still believe in the Goodness of God.

Oh, how I love our Heavenly Father.

I love Him in the answered prayers and in the ones I wish He had answered differently. I love Him for every place I can look back and see His hand. I love Him for carrying Dad, and I love Him for carrying all of us now. 

So I'll keep walking through this valley with tears in my eyes, missing Dad every step of the way - holding tightly to the God I love and knowing He is holding even tighter to me.

From somewhere in the valley,

Kimmy 🤍