Author: lcgivens

lcgivens https://givensonlinefamily.wordpress.com
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Join the club.

Do you remember when you were in high school or college and you wanted to join a club or some organization? Clubs are a fun way to mingle with other people that share the same interests. If you are interested in a club, you can apply and be invited to join. Or maybe a friend recommends the club to you and you join due to their recommendation. Either way, joining a club or organization is meant to be fun and engaging or a way to spend time with people who have your same ideas.

Yesterday, I learned of a church friend who has joined my club. You would think that would be fun and exciting and that we are anxiously waiting to get together. Yet, this club that she has now joined with me; we did not want to join. This club was not recommended to us by a friends. I do share a common interest with these woman, but I really don’t want to. I have zero desire to add any more “new members.” In fact when I learned that she was joining, I cried for a long time. Honestly, her joining the club, made me face some pretty strong emotions that I have kept at bay for a while now. So I do not rejoice in her joining us, nor am I happy to have another member. “Mothers of children who have died by suicide” should not be a club that exists!

Cherries

The actual cherry is such a simple fruit and pretty much availble at all stores, yet I had zero experience with eating cherries until 9 years ago. Of course I have had the jarred cherry in a drink or on a sundae, but never the fresh on the stem cherry. Our visit to Ukraine in 2012 was my first “encounter” with cherries. Toliy and Ivan loved them! They would pick them straight from the trees and eat them. They would also add extra to their pockets for later.

Once we were all back in the states, I really wanted to buy foods for them that they loved and were hopefully “comfort foods.” I learned quickly that you can not always find fresh cherries in NC. When they were in stock I would buy one bag and tell the boys that they had to ration the bag out; you can’t eat the whole bag at once. I would find cherry pits all over the house, it made me crazy! Eat the cherry and put the cherry pit in the trash. Toliy never lost his love for cherries. It was probably one of his favorite foods and something that no one else in the house eats, so it was easy for him to feel that he could ration out the cherries because he was the only one eating them.

So where is this thought leading to? Well two weeks ago I was in Publix and we were totally out of fruit in the house. I pick up watermelon, pineapple and grapes. I turn to walk down the other aisle and there is a big display of cherries. By total natural tendency I pick up the cherries and put them in my cart only to realize, within seconds, that I have no one to buy them for. I quietly place the cherries back in their place on the display and walk away. Moments like these catch me off guard, on any day and at any time.

Our world changed forever….

I can not figure out why I replay the airport scene so much, when in reality May 8th is the day that our lives changed forever.

6:34am the dogs are barking and I think I heard a knock on the front door, but why on earth at 6:34am? I jump out of bed, the alarm is set to go off at 7:00am and I am annoyed to have lost the last few sacred minutes of sleep. I ask Matt if we were expecting workers at the house this morning? A loud knocking at the door again. I walk down the hallway to the front door and see that there are 2 army soldiers at our door. I walk back to the bedroom, tell Matt that there are two Army men at our door and we both immediately assume that Toliy has done something to get himself in trouble in the Army. I continue pulling on clothes, pulling my hair back. Matt makes it the door and as he is opening the door we both greet the two men. They introduce themselves, I can not for the life of me remember their names, but as I look back on that day I now realize that the one person was definitely introduced as Chaplain blah, blah, blah……It never dawned on me why there would be a priest at my door telling me that my son had gotten himself in trouble with the Army. We invite them into the kitchen. Turn on lights along the way. Both men stand by our stove. Matt stands across from them and I stay in the doorway self conscience of the fact that I should have put on a bra. While I am stressing over no bra, one man says words that we have to ask him to repeat to us three times, because there is no way what he is saying is real. “Mr. and Mrs. Givens, last night at 8:31pm Private Anatoliy Givens was pronounced dead in his barracks room by self inflicted hanging.” What? Again he says, “Mr. and Mrs. Givens, last night at 8:31pm Private Anatoliy Givens was pronounced dead in his barracks room by self inflicted hanging.” Oh my God, stop repeating those words! What did he just say? I reach up and grab the molding of the doorway because I have nothing else to grab on to and I know that I can not remain standing. It is the strangest feeling that I have ever felt. I wasn’t going to pass out, I wanted to, but I knew I couldn’t physically keep standing. I started to lower myself to the floor, Matt grabbed me and I literally had noises come out of me that I have never heard before. Crying, yelling – I dont even know? It was almost as if it took time for the words to register, like we were in slow motion speed. It hits me immediately, a priest, of course, its just like the movies, they show up to tell you that your loved one has died! I feel so stupid and unprepared. Clearly the Army doesn’t send two men to your door at 6:30 in the morning to tell you that your son is in trouble for some reason! Matt is crying, I’m crying, and I remember thinking that we need to be more quiet b/c the boys are still sleeping. The boys! I can not even imagine them hearing this conversation. I immediately start to reign in my emotions. The boys can not wake up and see us like this. The one man asks us to sit down at the kitchen table to sign some paperwork. I have no idea what we signed. I don’t know what they told us. I know that the priest asked to say a prayer for us. We all prayed. They said someone would be in contact with us today and tomorrow. They left. All of that happened by 7:05am. As the men were walking out, the boys were getting up. I went in to the bathroom to clean myself up, put on a bra and try to look a little normal for the upcoming conversation with our boys. We told the boys that they weren’t going to school and that we were going to have a family meeting after breakfast. Really what Matt and I wanted was time. Time to make coffee. Time to think about what just happened. Time to collect our thoughts about how to tell our boys that their brother, who they all adored, had died last night and also he died by suicide. There is nothing in life that prepares you for this conversation. Matt and I made coffee, poured ourselves a cup. The boys ate breakfast. We all met in the family room. In the next few moments their lives changed forever. Alex ran out the back door to the trampoline where he sat and cried. William was curled up on the floor crying and very shortly in my lap. Ryan sat here saying, “wait I don’t understand? Toliy is dead?” Yes, Ryan. “How?” I wanted to spare them all of the details, but Matt said “Toliy hung himself in his room.” I knew they would find out but at that moment I was more stressed that they knew how he died versus just the fact that he was dead? Grief does crazy things to your thoughts. I remember all of us walking off in different directions. I wound up in our sitting room, just staring out our back door, totally lost with what to do? I literally could not think of the next step. Matt was already saying that we needed to start calling people and I asked him to just please wait. Just give me an hour to sit here with the news and keep it to myself. Almost as if, if we don’t share the news then it won’t be real. But the news was very real and very shocking and the days ahead would prove to be the hardest that I have ever endured as a person, mother and wife.

How did I get here?

This is my first post and all I want to write about is a day that I constantly replay in my mind. I need to get the thoughts on paper, so then maybe the thoughts will be freed from my mind.

May 15, 2018: I am standing on the tarmac at the airport and I have no idea how I got here? I am mentally retracing my steps and wondering what on earth is going on, why can’t I picture how I physically got to this space? Did we really just walk through the entire airport and I have blanked it out? Over the last 7 days, there have been a lot of things that I want to blank out on, but for now I will stay focused on the facts: fact one, my son is coming home on a Southwest airplane from Nashville. Focus on the facts and less emotion and I will make it through this day. I am standing and staring at sandals on my feet that I wish I had not worn as I watch the clouds rolling in. Please let his plane get in before the storms!

As I look around me, I see the most important people in my life all standing around awkwardly and making small talk conversation. I hate small talk. My son, Ryan, is talking about the weather. My son, Alex, is talking about the jobs of the airport people all around us. My son, Ivan, is trying to sneak a cigarette with his girlfriend (that I literally just met an hour ago). The airport personnel quickly put a stop to the smoking, which in hind sight makes sense. My husband, father in law and Greg, our priest and dear friend, are all chatting about something and I have no desire to engage in the talk. My youngest son William is standing right next to me, holding my hand, my arm, anything just to touch me. I don’t want to be touched. I don’t want to talk. I just want my son’s plane to land.

The airport personnel comes over to me and hands me an umbrella. The storms are rolling in quickly. The plane has just landed and is taxing to our spot. As the plane pulls up to our spot, the clouds open up and drop pouring rain. I think about how perfect the setting is right now, as if the clouds are weeping for me because I have yet to open my floodgates. I focus on my shoes again, dumb choice, the shoes will be ruined. As much as I prepared myself mentally for this day, 1pm, May 15th, 2018, leave for airport, plane arrives around 3:00ish, nothing in my life has ever prepared me to receive my son’s casket off of this plane. Toliy is finally home.

The casket is moved out of the luggage area of the plane by a conveyor belt. The rain is pouring down. Seeing his casket has made it “real” for me and I cry hard and heavy and force my feet to move towards our son. Matt is videoing the military guard and their presentation as Toliy’s casket is lowered down to the tarmac. I remember thinking, why on earth are you videoing this? I have no desire to ever see this moment in my life again. Matt holds on to me and as we walk to the casket I know he is holding me up and also securing himself. I have no idea how we got to this point in our life. I place my hand on Toliy’s flag draped casket and all I can think of is why? why are you here like this? what did I miss? and selfishly I wonder, how could you do this to us? Our son Ryan was frozen in grief and simply could not move towards the casket. Ryan had shed not one tear in the last week and we were all worried about when his floodgates would open. Today was his day. Ryan’s tears were uncontrollable and you could see him trying to reign in the crying, but nothing prepares a 17 year old for his best friend and brother to be in a casket coming off of an airplane. Ivan would not come forward to the casket either. I had to walk over and take him by the arm to encourage him towards the casket. Our son Ivan has seen more in his 22 years than I care to think about. I know that today is one of the hardest days yet for him. And I know that the days to come will be even harder, but for now I am focusing on this hour of the day. Perhaps the hardest part was seeing our son Alex trying to “hug” the casket. Alex literally laid on the casket and just cried. It seemed like Alex was there forever and I remember thinking, maybe I should move Alex along and get us all out of the rain, but again there were no rules or etiquette that I was taught about this day. So we all waited. Greg stood over Alex with an umbrella and we waited.

We had all received Toliy home in our own way. I was ready to be back in the van and headed home. I was thinking how tired I am of crying. I was physically exhausted, emotionally exhausted and I needed out of this airport. What I truly wanted was to hop right on the next plane going anywhere and just fly away! I took Matt’s hand, put an arm around Alex and as we turned around to walk back in to the airport I look up to the airport windows to see a sea of faces all staring back at us with their phones out recording my family’s worst moments. I immediately do not like those people. We then got the pleasure to walk back into the airport, in the middle of those same people that were just videoing us and I think to myself “how dare you invade something so personal to me and my family.” This was our day to receive Toliy home, our family’s moment, our family’s grief, not yours. My thoughts quickly switch to escape and I think that I can not walk fast enough to get out of this place. I ask Greg where they are taking Toliy. “To the funeral home”, he says. “You can spend time with him in the chapel if you wish when we get back.” Hell no! I want to go home and retreat to my back porch in private. Maybe, just maybe I can temporarily forget about these last few hours.

As we wait for the van to pick us up, I can see that Matt has reached his point too. He is struggling, pacing, getting easily frustrated. The van pulls up and I grab the Yeti that I had with me in the van for the ride over to the airport. I hand it to him and say take this in your van with you back to the funeral home. “I don’t need water right now Lisa.” “I know Matt, take a sip!” The Yeti is half of a mixed drink that is now watered down but welcome relief to Matt to help take the miserable edge off of our life just for a few minutes.

Hours earlier my friend had shown up in the parking lot of the funeral home where we were all meeting to drive to the airport. She wasn’t going to the airport with us, we needed that to be family and she understood. So when I saw her I was a little surprised. She said I just wanted to give you a hug and give you this – a Yeti cup, for your ride to the airport. I looked at her questioningly and she said take a sip. Over the last year I have realized that sometimes in this messy life of ours you just need people to show up unexpectedly for no reason!