Easter weekend is again upon us. It’s hard to believe that three years have passed since the World went into hibernation and our lives were forever changed by Covid-19. As is often my practice during the season of Lent, I fasted on Ash Wednesday and have chosen to abstain from many of the toxic things I regularly put into in my body for the last six weeks.
Since I was a kid I have been “giving up” deserts/sweets for the Lenten season. This year, a much more expansive approach was in order, having exaggerated some of my unhealthy lifestyle habits since Covid showed up. For the past six weeks I have focused on sleep, meditation, hydration and exercise. I have chosen to expel sugary products, alcohol, meat and most animal products from my daily intake.
I have chosen to walk this path with my partner and we are starting to chat about what Easter Sunday holds for us. What will we eat? What will we drink? What will we do to maintain a healthier balance with these habits that we enjoy, but in excess are harmful to these magnificent bodies of ours? Now that we are in the home stretch, it’s fun to think about all the goodies that will be back on the menu as of Sunday, April 9th. For me that will certainly include a Reese’s peanut butter egg, and a glass of robust red wine with Easter dinner.
Intentional practices of discipline aside, there are some strong spiritual currents that run through my life around this time of year. It is a time of deep reflection. It’s a process of letting go of the Winter season and scanning the landscape for signs of new life. This part of of the country is overflowing with nature’s promise to deliver warmer temperatures, softer breezes, and bountiful blossoms of life’s expressions bursting out of Mother Earth. It’s a time of year when what’s happening in my heart, and what’s happening all around me are totally in sync.
So while I look forward to indulging in some of my unhealthy habits, for me this weekend is actually about seeds sprouting. It’s about rising out of the gray, dampened, hardened ground and watching all the seeds that have patiently waited through Winter’s edge to seek the sunlight and rise.
For me, this weekend is about hope. It’s about the kind of hope that evolves out of devastation, barren landscape, frozen ground and apathy. It’s the promise of what is possible if we can hold on through the storms and freezing temperatures long enough to allow new life to burst through the ashes that are left behind by our broken hearts.
I can’t talk about Easter without talking about my Son Emmanuel. In 2002 my partner Ernest and I made the impossible decision to move forward with an early delivery of our Son, because prenatal tests were repeatedly telling us that his body was in duress and not forming in such a way that his life could be sustained by his body.
After losing our Daughter Alexis in 1997 to bone marrow disease, we were struggling at that time to get our then three year old Zachary into a healthy and stable state. He was affected by the same disease as his Sister had been. When we received the repeated results and confirmations that our Son in utero was failing to thrive, we made the unthinkable choice to set his tiny spirit free.
I remember feeling like I could not ask another little one to brave the world in a broken body solely because my deepest desire as a human was to have life be born and thrive through me. So I checked myself into the hospital with the support of my medical team, partner and family and waited for Emmanuel to be born.
What followed was perhaps the most agonizing week of my life. My own medical status was rocky and at times my family wondered if I would even survive. I was not allowed to eat or drink for six full days as my body continuously rejected the pharmacological efforts to induce labor.
And then on day six, Emmanuel drew his first breath, and a short time later drew his last. Hours later, when they started to wheel me out of the room where Emmanuel had finally been born and died, I remember putting my hand on the doorstop and saying “Wait, I can’t.” I was petrified of leaving that room and continuing a life that wouldn’t include our precious Son. And with good reason.
Learning to live after Emmanuel’s birth and death would be far different from any pain I’d ever experienced, including the loss of our Daughter Alexis. And only recently, 21 years later am I able to truly understand that there was no shame in the decision to set his spirit free. I know deeply, that it was actually the most courageous thing I could have done given the circumstances, and that I do not need to hide this part of my life because I have already worn out people’s compassion with my Daughter dying.
Strange isn’t it? I literally felt like I couldn’t share Emmanuel’s place in my life because I had already exhausted what I perceived to be a limited supply of compassion from others. I felt I’d already drained that unconditional love my with one child dying and another one with complex medical and intellectual complications. It was as if I felt there was only so much sympathy to go around, and I’d well worn through what was available to me. If you have even a sense of how isolating and shameful this was for me, YOU are the reason I am opening up today.
There is no limit on the rising geyser of love and compassion that others are capable of sharing, no matter how many tragedies have befallen us. We are not bad luck. We are not destined for suffering. We are not faulty and we are not alone. It is only in sharing our experiences and letting others embrace our pain along with us, that we can start to heal.
And all of this time later, I am no longer brought to my knees with pain, shame and regret that I wasn’t “tough enough” to try and see Emmanuel through his full gestation. When people ask me about my children I openly share that we lost two baby children. I give them, and myself the respect we deserve for having the courage to go so far in our pursuit of having a family that I nearly lost my own life. I do not hide. I do not shiver in deafening silence, wishing I could have been different or done something else.
I simply look outside and notice the cherry blossoms which always bloom around this time of year. With each floating petal I remember with reverence our Son Emmanuel and how tender and tiny he was. I comfort myself by thinking about the circles and cycles of life. And when I see the new buds of flowers reaching strongly through the Earth to again reach the sunshine that nourishes us all, I know that I am reaching too. I am stretching and looking for the light. In a sense, we are all just seeds, trying to become the fullest expression of life that is potentially alive in all of us.
So if on the Third Day, Jesus Christ truly rose again, it wouldn’t surprise me one bit. It is only through death that new life can be born. And although we don’t get to choose what our time in human bodies exactly looks like, we do get to decide whether we embrace and nurture the seeds of life with in us, or keep them underground for fear that they are faulty, too much or just plain wrong.
On this Easter weekend, no matter what religious faith you may practice if any, let’s all take a deep breath and give thanks for the macro and microcosms that are our live’s, our children’s lives and the life of this majestic Planet. You may not think they are connected. But if you take off your shoes and walk in the cool, newly formed grass and breathe in the air that has been cleansed by the trees for us, you might be tempted to change your mind.
Peace and Blessings to all for a safe, healthy and connected experience of resurrection and what that means to each of us individually. Let us be reminded of the circle of life and remember that all of life’s expressions are are included therein. May we feel a sense of belonging, and bask in the blossoming of seeds that have been planted. We are not so different from those Spring buds reaching for the sky.
Additional posts surrounding the life and death of Emmanuel are linked below:
- When the Candle Burns Out (4/6/21)
- Emmanuel (4/6/22)