These are excerpts from an article in the Compassionate Friends newsletter called "Normal For Me".

Normal for me is trying to decide what to take to the cemetery for Christmas, birthday, Valentine's Day, & Easter.

Normal is also barely being able to think of Jesus dying on the cross because of what it did to His mother.

Normal is sitting at the computer crying, sharing with chat buddies how you feel since your child died.

NORMAL is feeling like you know how to act and are more comfortable with a funeral than a wedding or a birthday party. Yet, feeling a stab of pain in your heart when you smell the flowers, see that casket & all the crying people.

(I LOVE this one! I thought that no one understood how I've felt these past 2 1/2 years!!!) NORMAL is feeling like you can't sit another minute without getting up and screaming because you just don't like to sit through church anymore; yet feeling like you have more faith and belief in God than you've ever had before.(side note: I did begin going back to church 4 weeks ago. LESSON TO LEARN: in the economy of grief, the statement should not be "it's BEEN 2 1/2 years, for heaven's sake, so (insert action desired by friends)....". In the economy of grief the statement is "It's ONLY BEEN 2 1/2 years.....". This all takes WAY longer than most people want to be patient with a grieving person!

NORMAL is going to bed feeling like your kids who are alive got cheated out of happy cheerful parents and instead got stuck with sober, cautious people.

When newly grieved:

NORMAL is being impatient with everything but someone stricken with grief over the loss of their child.

NORMAL is being too tired to care if you paid the bills, cleaned the house, did laundry, or bought groceries.

NORMAL is not sleeping well because a thousand "what ifs" and "why didn't I"'s go through your head constantly. (as well as how the death happened, the hospital time, and the funeral)

And still true even now:

NORMAL is not being able to rest until you get the phone call that your living child has arrived safely at their destination.

NORMAL is disliking jokes about death & funerals; and bodies being referred to as cadavers, because you know they are someone's loved one's precious body.

NORMAL is your heart sinking when you see something your child loved, but he is not here to enjoy it.

NORMAL is wondering each year how to honor your child on his birthday.

NORMAL is telling the occurrence of the death as if it were a commonplace activity, and then gasping with horror at how awful it sounds...........and realizing it has become a part of our "normal", our life's story.

NORMAL is learning something new and knowing that your child would have been proud of you.

NORMAL is seeing your child's friends graduate, get married, have children..............while happy for them, it is heartbreaking, and you can't help but be envious.

NORMAL is watching your living child visit the grave, be without a sibling........and hurting that they have to live with this.

NORMAL is having sadness lurking behind every happy event in our lives, because he isn't here.

NORMAL is a punch in the stomach to see a boy built like him, dressed like him, walking down the street.

NORMAL is hiding all the things that have become normal, so that everyone around you will think you are "normal".