Many bereaved parents have a huge struggle, dealing with their child’s belongings.
I certainly did. It took me months to even be able to vacuum or dust my child’s room.
And it took me years to bring myself to dispose of his clothes.
Many things of our son’s, I still keep and treasure, eight years after losing him.
I wonder if others have a similar struggle with ‘mementoes’. Heather.
29 September, 2008 at 10:25 pm
I am so sorry about your son. How old was he? What was his name? How did he die?
My beloved’s name was Katie, she was 19 when she died of complications from leukemia on September 5, 2001. Because she had special treatments in a far-away hospital, K’s wake occurred on September 11, 2001. Yes, 9/11, day of. I remember seeing people come into the funeral home looking shell-shocked. Their world was upside-down and full of fear and sadness – here were people I could relate to, peering out from my shocked fog.
Belongings – K’s room never changed, the drawer in the kitchen that was her junk drawer never changed. I refused to move her Tivo sandals from beside the outside door. Her winter coats hang in the foyer with the ski lift ticket on the parka. My husband likes to call it a shrine – but I like to open the drawers and look in the closet, to feel all of her life and what she was interested in flooding back to me. I like to feel all of her clothes all around me in the closet. I hope for any personal scent, any small smell of her at all, but that’s gone now.
We are moving to the house that my Mum left me, a cute cape. My first instinct is re-create K’s room up in one of the spare bedrooms. Then my mind says that this is an opportunity to make a change. And do what with all my darling’s things? The thought that there might be a finger print of hers drives me crazy…I’m going to give that away? I’ve taken many pictures of the details of K’s room with my digital camera, so the memory is there. The camera idea is the first thing that allowed me to consider making a change in the 1st place.
Have you any ideas? How are you doing? Do you have strong attachments to your son’s belonging?
Thanks for listening, sylvia
9 October, 2008 at 11:11 pm
Dear Sylvia,
Thanks for your comment. My heart goes out to you as I have experienced so much the same as you, with regards to Rowen’s belongings. I kept Ro’s room the same for a long time, but gradually, one tiny drawer at a time, did allow things to change. Yes, there is still a lot in his room that I can’t part with. (Even his bin full of rubbish that HE put there!) I still imagine his smell in his pillow, even though it would have to be my imagination by now! I found it helped me to take the photos and then even if it’s cleaned up, I’ll have them to look at and remember. Another thing that helped, was to collect every record I could of Rowen’s, and put it into a huge lever-arch folder in order of date. I call this his Life book, and it has everything from young pre-school drawings etc, right up to his most recent school reports etc.
It will be such a huge change to be in a different house. I’d love to know how you end up dealing with that, and leaving behind at the ‘other’ house, such precious things as finger-prints! Yes! A big decision.
Warm regards, Heather