Dedicated To:
My Mother, Rachel Victoria Schweickhardt: 1952/01/31-2011/09/25.
I am because of you.
The month of September holds much significance in my life.
Allow me to be brutally honest; It was not always my favourite time of the year. I have experienced too much agony in this particular month over the years.
I dreaded it every year as from 2011.
Things, however, took a turn for the better, in 2014 when I gave birth to my son in the month of September, exactly 3 years after I laid my mother to rest.
He was due on the day she passed away 3 years later, but he decided to pop two weeks before his due date.
God knows what we need, when we need it.
In September 2012, a year after my mother’s passing, depression and grief got the better of me and I attempted my hand at my own life.
And as if all of this was not enough, I lost the love of my life in September too.
Thus, September to me is synonymous to so much pain, and I always wish it would just come and go. Now, 5 years later I plan cartoon themed parties in September and we go clean my mother’s grave together. (Me and my son) and he loves those visits as he would remind me of it.
It can only be God.
El Shaddai.
Thank you God. For lifting me up and out of the dungeons of darkness and showing me the light.
Our family was visited by the death angel a while ago.
Someone who my son was very fond of passed away. My son has this huge personality and that personality loves family, the whole extended part of it too. We definitely do not have that in common.
I had to break the news to my son and I knew it was going to be a tough conversation. Any conversation with a 4 year old is a tough conversation.
Trying to compose myself of all the very familiar feelings death brings, I eventually told him after a day or two. The conversation was extremely challenging. My son is extremely challenging. He got that all from me, I confess.
He ended up wanting to know, if he can go visit this particular person in heaven. I gulped for air. I said unfortunately no, and like any other 4year old, he wanted to know, why not. I gulped for air again, close to panting now. I kept quiet, I later gave him a reason but he insisted, when we do our evening devotion, we need to pray and ask Jesus to give our car super powers so that we can quickly fly to heaven, visit this person and his granny (my mother) and then come back again, because he misses them too much. ‘’Uit die mond van n suigeling.’’
He looked at me with his big brown eyes and said: heaven is in the sky Mamma; at that point, my eyes shot full of tears. And as much as I tried explaining to him that visiting heaven is not that easy, it is just not like any other trip we took, it is permanent, he was not phased.
I also told him that our loved ones who have left the earth before us, are always in our hearts and around us, we do not need to visit them, we just need to close our eyes and feel them. Did I tell you that his granny passed on 3 years already when he was born, but he speaks of her as if he knew her for years? His first words he could say was her name, someone he never met. I was always baffled by that.
I thought to myself, to this chap it is not rocket science, we get in the car and pray and ask for super powers, fly to heaven and go have tea. If only it was that simple, my boy to visit and come back, but it is not and hopefully one day, you will understand much better. Special people get to see heaven, we are not yet worthy.
I am thankful for the childlike faith and innocence he has shown me.
One day, he will realize that we carry a little piece of heaven within us wherever we go.
And one day, he will also know that they are having a ball up there, whilst we are gulping for air, merely existing and pining for them.
‘’I am sorry this world could not keep you safe, may your journey home be a soft and peaceful one’’ – Rupi Kaur
xoxo
‘’Curvy Scorpio’’
