A Time To Remember

The past couple weeks have been very tough to get through. There's been a lot of reminders of Jason, and a lot of reminders that Jason is no longer here. I blogged earlier about several dates this month: September 18th would've been Jason's 40th birthday. To celebrate, his friends and I got together for the weekend to laugh, cry, and remember. September 27th, Jason was remembered by his friends and cohorts at the Lone Star Ride Fighting AIDS. Jason was a big part of this event for years, and it showed. Everyone was in tears as they retired his crew number. His bike was also used as the "riderless bike" which proved to be an unbelievably emotional moment in the ceremony. And finally, tonight, September 30th, I took part in a city-wide memorial event to remember those lost at the hands of lymphoma. I posted my speech in a previous blog. The event was beautiful, and those of us who helped organize it were blown away at the attendance, stories, and love that surrounded us. It truly was a special evening.

I wrote in an earlier entry that I was not looking forward to September and I just wanted to get through it. Well, tomorrow is October 1st. It's officially the end of September, and I made it through. There were a lot of moments when I didn't want to get out of bed. There were a lot of moments when I just wanted to cry. In fact, there were several moments when I did cry...one time in particular I broke down sobbing at my desk at work. Talk about embarrassing.

My therapist - who I've been working with since Jason was first diagnosed - believes that grief isn't as black and white as those 5 stages we all learn about in school. She believes that grief is a continuous process that circles around...making loop after loop after loop. At the onset, the grief circle is quite compact and tight...intense. But, as time goes on, while you still may be hitting those ups and downs, they're farther from the compact and tight center - therefore less intense. It makes sense. This month was hard. There were a lot of milestones, and they were hard to get through, but they weren't unbearable. I suppose that means my grief has jumped to an outer circle.

So, now it's onward and upward to October. I'm entering one of the busiest seasons for work, and I suppose that's a good thing. It'll certainly keep me occupied. We've also got the Light the Night Walk to look forward to. TEAM JASON is still the #1 Friends and Family fundraising team for the Dallas walk. This week, we hit the $7,000 mark and we're continuing to get donations. I've also got a pretty big auction on ebay that'll be ending next Tuesday that I hope will bring in several hundred more $$. I think Jason would be extremely impressed by all the money we've been able to raise. Seriously. SEVEN THOUSAND DOLLARS! That's a lotta dough!

So for now, I say goodbye to September. Hello October. And to Jason, I love you, and I miss you every single day. Come see me in my dreams soon.

Until next time--
Stuart