We spent the weekend feeling the roller coaster of emotions I assume most families felt after hearing about the horrible school shooting in Sandy Hook, Connecticut. Friday, Andrew came home visibly shaken. I felt numb all day. But Friday night it hit me. I was lying in bed, trying to fall asleep, but every time I closed my eyes, all I could see were the grief-stricken faces of the victims’ parents. I thought about what I was doing that morning, at the very moment this horrific event was happening. I was getting the boys ready for school. I was sending them out there into the world, barely hugging them good-bye, because it was just another day. What if that were the last time I had seen them? I closed my eyes and all I could think was what are they doing now? They won’t be sleeping for days… I lay awake until well past 1 am and had vivid dreams until I woke up sad and scared.
Senseless acts like these make me want to gather up my family and run for the hills. I want to keep them safe and away from all danger and hurt. And it dawned on me; becoming a mother has made me open and vulnerable. There are three pieces of my heart completely exposed and separate from me… I cannot keep them with me, nor should I. Such is the conundrum of parenthood.
I don’t know the answer to these horrific events that seem to be occurring more frequently (are they, or am I just more aware of them now?), but my heart goes out to everyone who lost a child, friend, sister, brother, or parent during this tragedy. I will also never understand (despite people’s attempts to help me understand) the attraction people have to keeping weapons in their homes. Why does it seem like there are guns everywhere now?! There. I said it. And though I have much more to say on the topic, I will keep it at that.
There were a lot more hugs around here as we attempted to keep things normal for our boys who are too young to comprehend what had happened. Some day they will be old enough to understand, to be afraid and confused. But for now, they are so innocent. So we did what we had planned to do this weekend: visit Santa, share loaves of homemade chocolate chip pumpkin bread with neighbors, and play lots of music together.
How are you holding up during this rough event? Those of you with older children, how do you broach this impossible topic? I have no idea what I would say if our boys were older and had questions…
Sending love and appreciation to all of our readers and their families.
That Santa looks so legit! Glad you guys got out and had some fun.
Oh man. There was a grey cloud hovering all weekend as I thought about what those parents and families must be going through. I felt physically sick after hearing the news on Friday… Alice peacefully sleeping in her crib, I wanted to run in and scoop her up in my arms, never letting her go. I linked an interesting article about all of these shootings and what could possibly be the catalyst. You should read it. We (meaning the news media) talk and talk and dissect and ruminate and talk some more… giving these shooters and the event so much attention… imagine if you are sick-minded and depressed and angry at the world and suicidal with a “I’ll show them” mentality. Case in point… over the weekend a college kid here in MA was arrested for saying he planned to go to a movie theater and do a mass shooting…. I wonder where he got that idea?!
So terrible. XO.
It’s such a hard thing to talk about with kids. My oldest are 11 and 9, so we thought it was important that they learned about this tragedy from us. I think you talk about it differently with each child. I have one who is already aware and afraid of “bad guys.” So with her I was very careful to point out how many “good guys” helped to save lives there. With my son I was able to talk more about what he could do now, to make a difference or help out. For him, it’s best to have something for to be able to do.
I hope someday when we have many more resources and information about mental health in this country, these things will happen less and less often. (Notice I’m saying ‘when’ not ‘if.’ Optimism, in action.)
Darling pictures with Santa! Your boys are just adorable. I agree, it’s been a tense few days here, too, thinking about the families of the children. I can’t help but put myself in their shoes, and it’s nearly impossible to just imagine it. Can’t begin to understand the pain they are feeling. I dread any day when I would have to explain this to my children.
Such sweet pictures, and wow did they do a good job with Santa.
Yes, this tragedy really has shaken me too, and I think it is amplified by the fact that these were young kids and I am now a parent. I do have a lot of anger about gun control and how we treat mental illness. Then when I saw that father, who had lost his little girl, rise above it all in a way that was unimaginable to me, my anger (however justified) felt ugly somehow. I do think there needs to be big changes, and I am hopeful something positive will come out of this nightmare. And yes, I am so grateful that I don’t have to explain any of this to Wyatt. I don’t know how I could.
Love these photos – and no one was crying on Santa’s lap – amazing!
My heart has been hurting and sad since learning about the horrible news. It’s almost too much to comprehend. Thankfully my boys are much too young to be aware of it – for now, I will carry all the awareness. Although it feels like too much.
xo
cortnie
I think you did just the right things this weekend, Lauren. I was on my way to pick up Callum from school when I heard the news. It was early because he has semester exams this week, so I was in the car at an unusual time. All I could think was that I was heading to school where I knew my son was safe just as those terrified mothers and fathers were tearing in a panic toward their own child’s school. Horrifying. We talked to our son about what happened. He’s 13 and very involved in current events, but also we wanted him to hear these things from us, so that we could talk about school safety and the wonderful things that are floating around facebook, like that from Mr. Rogers about looking for the helpers. My sweet boy comforted me a lot. I’m lucky, I think, that my son is of an age of greater wisdom and logic. Explaining to kids younger would be much more difficult, I think. And yes, I could go on! Email me, if you’d like, and I’ll forward you the message that the headmaster at Callum’s school sent us Sunday night. It was very moving and helpful. Good work, Mama.
Having taught Kindergarten for three years before I had my baby, I immediately thought about the teachers and their classrooms. They were probably getting ready to do some fun activities for the holidays. The teachers had probably been staying up late each night getting the supplies ready for the little ornaments they’d have the kids make or the card they’d help them write. It just breaks my heart to think of them never finishing their projects, never seeing their parents again. Their sweet little lives are over before they even had a chance to begin….ugh…crying now…my heart is just totally crushed for everyone affected. The only peace I find with the whole situation is the hope that something good, some kind of change will come of this…better mental health care and more responsible gun laws. And the realization that our time is limited and that I’ll never take my life or my blessings for granted again!
It’s really weird to go through this with a kid who can understand some of what happened. I say “some” because I don’t even understand what happened really, and I don’t think anyone does. We are not watching the news. We never do anyway because it’s all fear and doom, but we’re making an extra effort to turn NPR off when the kids are in the car and only listen to music, and to just focus on our lives right now.
We have explained the basics, but I am not giving any details to Julian unless he asks. It’s a scary enough situation without him having to know every minute detail of what the media is posting.
I’m feeling a lot of frustration right now with people posting all over facebook about how guns are not the problem. I just don’t understand how people can defend the idea that semi-automatic weapons are safe for private citizens after what just unfolded. That their right to own a weapon could be more important than the greater safety of our society.
What you said about our children being parts of ourselves out in the world is so true, and it reminded me of this beautiful poem (pasted below – hopefully not copyright infringement!) We can’t keep them with us, but we have to keep them safe. How?
Right now I’m reading The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver, and it’s about a missionary family in Africa in 1959-onward. The story narrates so many dangers to the children (snakebite, alligators, malaria, etc.) at that time. As we build towns and cities and roads and public sanitation and we no longer have to worry about alligators and blood-borne illnesses, you would think that we’d be safer. But have we just replaced one kind of danger with another? Have car accidents and gun violence become the new predators and viruses of humankind?
Not to be a downer or pessimistic. I don’t feel pessimistic, just contemplative. And hoping we can make some real legislation/mental health programs to get these systemic problems fixed.
The Human Line
by Ellen Bass
After I had carried her those nine months,
those two hundred and eighty-four days, each
with its sheaf of hours, each hour fanned out
onto minutes, into seconds, as though time had been
sliced thin as onionskin—
After I’d hauled this cache of cells as it swept
through a kind of rough evolution, devising
arm buds and sex buds
and the buds for twenty milk teeth—
And then birthed her, my cervix cranked open,
a rusty hinge. And the pain—
what a tree might feel when lightning splits it
and the two halves fall away—
Then I realized—I’m not proud
to admit this is what it took—that everyone
was lugged in the sack of a woman’s body,
a woman stretched past reason
or slit with a steel scalpel.
Even if she left that baby right there
without counting the pearly toes, thinking
the miniature knuckles, even if she didn’t
look into the face, neutral as Buddha,
before thirst even. If she was drugged
or relieved and the baby whisked away, still
she gave this child every intricate bone of both feet,
the hollow vertebrae, tiny liver,
lungs that fill with air for the first time
and begin, without a lesson,
bringing this world in and releasing it.
Did Mary feel this when the angel came to her
holding his useless lily? Not in the surfeit
of gilt frame where she’s poised,
serene, but those few where the artist knew,
had seen women already crushed, bowed.
I was standing in the long hospital corridor
when the knowledge entered me.
I didn’t want it. It was grief—
extending back through time
and reaching into the future, all these babies,
all these mothers with their hearts
beating outside their bodies. And now
I was one of them, lashed to the human line.
You have managed to give my feelings and thoughts words. I still am at a loss.
Your boys are beautiful. I love them all standing on chairs in the kitchen.