Author Archives: christiansredballoon

My name is Cara Martinisi. I am mother to three boys and a wife to my high school sweetheart. Up until three and a half years ago, I lived a mainly charmed life. I married the first boy I fell in love with, had three easy pregnancies and three healthy boys. Family and friends were plentiful and amazing. There were bumps in the road, like with anyone else. For the most part, though, I had lived my life with everything falling neatly into place. This all changed after living 35 years in this manner. On July 3rd 2014, our house got struck by lightening. It was a scary experience, which resulted in a fire. Our entire family escaped the fire safely. Our home needed to be gutted and rebuilt, but we realized just how blessed we were to all be safe and sound. Fast forward exactly eight weeks later, to the end of the summer, August 28th. Our entire world was changed in a matter of minutes. We were living in a rental home, where a freak accident occurred. The supporting pole in the garage was not secure. It fell on my six year old son, Christian. My then three year old son and I witnessed the entire scene. This has irrevocably changed who I am as a person in every way. I am now a bereaved mother. It may be one of my titles, but not my identity. My family will never be the same. We are left to move on, while we are not whole. The trauma, shock and pain resonates daily, in one way or another. My mission, now, is to help others who have joined this undesirable club. My mission is to carry on my son’s message, which was kindness. My mission, now, is to make a new normal. I hope you get some inspiration from my posts, whether you are a bereaved parent or not. Grieving a child teaches you lessons that one can never learn in any other way. As always, love to heaven...

Resurrection

Okay, so I know I mentioned this before but, with Easter upon us the concept of resurrection is floating around in my mind again. When Christian passed away, I actually prayed to God repeatedly that he would be resurrected. It was so incredibly unbelievable to me that I lost a child. This wasn’t supposed to happen to me. It wasn’t the life I had thought about or planned! If something so terrible could happen, then something unexpectedly positive could happen. In the twisted logic of a grieving mother, this meant that resurrection was possible. If child loss had become a part of my journey, then so could resurrection.

I was desperate. Anything to bring my boy back. You see, after losing him there was no way I could go on. Unfortunately, I knew people who had lost children prior to me. As everyone does, I thought, “I don’t know how they do it. I could never go on”. That belief was even stronger than the one that said, “This could never happen to me”. Surviving child loss was not something I would be capable of. I was sure of that. Those early days were, and still are, a complete blur. The years have passed and there are still days that remain a blur. Some days I don’t know how I am going on, living, and he isn’t. Yet, here I am, three and a half years later, still alive, a survivor of chid loss.

In the early days after the accident all I know is I ate, drank, tried to sleep and existed. Thankfully, there were plenty of people around to help take care of my children, my husband and myself. Our family, also stricken with shock and grief, found ways to help and take care of us. Friends were constantly calling, texting and stopping by. Community members who we knew and didn’t know, donated money and made meals for us through the New Year. The level of support was amazing. As a Catholic, my faith wavered greatly, other than my belief that my son may be resurrected! I can vividly remember my sister saying, “I believe these people are God. God is in the faces and hearts of these people right here”. Looking back, I see truth in that. At the time, there was no God to me because my son had been taken from me. Everything I once believed in was shaken. I was forced to find a reason to go on, something to live for.

My other two boys are my reason. They are my motivation and reason to continue. They need me and don’t deserve to lose their mother too. Their brother was not resurrected from the dead, but in a sense their mother was. After surviving a death of who I was, a new me was resurrected as a different mother. My resurrection was out of necessity. In order to go on, my beliefs had to change. In order to go on everything had to change. The glasses through which I saw my life and the world needed to be completely different. For me, this means daily work on my mind, body and soul. This was not part of who I was in the past. It is integral to who I am today. Surviving child loss also means reminding myself every day of my reason to go on. To all those survivors out there, survivors of anything, keep remembering your reason to survive. Love to heaven…

Electric Energy

If you have read the “about me” section you know that my story started with our house being struck by lightening, which ignited a fire. It obviously was not the source of my trauma, but it certainly adds a twist to my life story! As a result, our house was gutted and rebuilt. All peanuts compared to losing my beautiful son.

When our home was finally rebuilt, and we moved back in, we made some changes. One of those being where my youngest son would reside. He used to have the room closest to us, but with changes made to the layout upstairs, that no longer made sense. SO, we gave him Christian’s room. We consciously chose a fresh, green paint color which symbolized change. It was hard, but so important to fill the room with life again.

Nicky, our youngest, has filled the room with an enthusiastic, intense energy! Similar, yet different, than Christian’s. There is no doubt Christian has a hand in some of the mischief that occurs in that room. Nicky can hold his own in the mischief department too, though. Within those four walls Christian’s spirit is extremely present. The light in that room is the only one in the house that consistently flickers. We even had the electrician double check the connection to make sure everything looked good. I will often enter the room, flick on the light and it will start to blink. Sometimes this happens more frequently than others. Whenever the light does this, I say, “Hi, Christian”.

We don’t need the light flickering to feel Christian’s energy in our home. It is nice though. These signs and means of communication make me so happy. Yet, at the same time, so mad. Light communication is not how I want to be hearing from my son! Either way, I will take it, making the best of a sad thing. Our energy will never be parted. Love never dies; this I know for sure! Love to heaven…

Tethered Happiness

In my last post I wrote about the need to “jump in puddles” and find happiness in this journey. The point I did not address was the guilt that sometimes accompanies that happiness. As a mother to children who exist on Earth, and in heaven, it is quite tricky in more ways than one. This is especially true when it comes to my own happiness. It is easy for me to foster as much happiness as I can for my living children. They deserve it. When it comes to me, however, there is always something pulling me back. How can I experience joy when I am not able to be with all of my children?

All of my joyful experiences are tethered to the shadow of sadness that will never disappear. I can remember saying to my therapist after Christian passed away, “The possibility of having the best day of my life is done”. The craziest things go through your mind when you experience trauma. (I also begged God to resurrect Christian! Needless to say, it did not happen.) My therapist’s answer to my “best day realization” was, you will have another best day of this part of your life. You have a new normal now.

I’m sure some of you have heard the saying, “joy exists alongside the pain”. It does. There is no other way to experience joy as a grieving mother. The guilt is what I am left to contend with. It is impossible for me to ever go a day without thinking about my son. It is also impossible for me to never experience joy again. I promised myself that if I was going to continue this life after losing him, then I would live it. Life for me includes joy and sadness together. Knowing this in my brain does not prevent the guilt from surfacing in my heart. When I do feel that guilt bubble up however, I picture my son. He had the biggest, brightest, most loving smile. He hated to see others sad. That is why, in my heart, I know that I deserve to experience happiness. In honor of him I will make sure I experience happiness. That shadow of sadness will always be there. There will always be a piece of my heart missing. For the happiness he no longer experiences on Earth, I will be grateful for the chances I continue to have. Love to heaven…

Making Our Own Spring

Here I sit, in my favorite room of my house, cultivating my piece of peace. I am staring at my beautiful pitcher full of tulips, the soft shade of pink fading to blush. The vibrant green stems, reminding me of Spring. Outside, all around me, snow is falling madly from the sky. It feels like the Universe is saying, “We are not in the clear yet.” March is when we begin to think of Spring. We all relax a little. Conversations are peppered with the question, “Do you really think we will have more snow? Even if we do, it should melt quickly.”

No one can control the weather. We learn that so early on in our lives. I can remember one Fourth of July we were set to throw a large party. We always have a get together on the Fourth because it is my mother in law’s birthday. We were expecting a larger crowd than usual that year. Our house was a charming three bedroom home, but it could not accommodate this crowd. As rain poured down all around us, we had a great time, despite the weather. We made our own fun.

Our boys, now five and seven, still love when it rains. They find the joy in something that could ruin their playtime. Instead of being upset that it is not optimal weather to ride bikes in, they put on their rain boots and jump in puddles. This is very much a metaphor for my own life. My family and I have suffered a tragic event that could keep us from ever finding joy again. It would be so easy to take that path and dwell on the negative. My husband and I made a pact, however, that we would not do that. We promised that we would do everything in our power to find those puddles and allow out boys to jump in them. We even promised that we would jump with them.

It’s so easy to allow sadness and anxiety to run your life, in any case. I always say, “We all have something”. Everyone has experienced tough times. Some are more extenuating than others. We have suffered a nightmare. It is not always easy to be present and make new memories. If we don’t though, all we are left with is sadness. It wouldn’t be fair to our two beautiful boys who have already had more sadness in their few years than some people have in their whole lives. And so each day, we jump in the puddles. Sometimes we make a bigger splash than others, and sometimes those puddles include sadness. As long as we continue to fulfill our pact, our living boys will be able to experience happiness alongside sadness. As always, love to heaven…

Caring For An Angel

Each time I hear about a family who experiences child loss, my central nervous system is sent into a bit of a panic. It takes time, and the tools I have learned, to right myself again. It is like reliving those initial days of shock and pain all over again. Parents who outlive their child are given a torture sentence, in a sense. The torture softens over time, but never goes away.

I can remember the first time it snowed after we lost Christian. Panic immediately set in. It wasn’t logical, but neither is child loss. I panicked because he was going to be cold. Who would take care of him? Who would remind him to put a hat on? As a mother that was my job! I also panicked the first time I realized I would never care for him again when he had a fever. He needed me to soothe him and put cool wash clothes on his head! This sounds strange, I know, but coming to these realizations made losing him so real. It was more than I could handle.

Finding a way to take care of my angel, Christian, has become part of my healing journey. It is clear that I will never take care of him in the ways I once did. It will never be in the ways I imagined I would. He will never talk to me about sports, his friends or girls. I will never plan his graduation party, welcome his wife into the family or meet his child. Just as our future has been changed forever, so have the ways in which I take care of him. My care for him is now shaped by who he was here, on Earth. Christian had a message to deliver and a job to do while he was here. He delivered the most beautiful message; one of kindness. He was kind to all and truly did have the biggest heart. His light shone as soon as he entered a room.

My heart breaks for the things I will never do with my son again. Yet, through the cracks of my broken heart, I can feel his light shine. It guides me to what I can do for him. It is my job now, as his mom, to make sure his light still shines and never goes dim. His message will still be delivered by me, his mother. His kindness will live on in me, and my family. It will spread to those around us. My pain will never be gone. My heart will never be mended completely, but it will still beat on. It will still beat on with his light and love tucked inside forever. Love to heaven…

Healing Potions From An Angel

IMG_0764Sometimes it is so evident that Christian’s energy is here, that it is palpable. I woke up this morning to my two boys playing with their science kit. When I say science kit, this includes water, goggles and food coloring. They assured me that Daddy said it was okay. (Daddy denied this!)

Mixing food coloring, potions and concoction making, as we used to call it, were some of Christian’s favorite activities. Just for your knowledge; potions are liquid and concoctions include spices and possibly food! This is not the first time my younger boys have played with the science kit, and I am sure it’s not the last. It is the first time that they fully set it up themselves, surely with the help of Christian’s energy. Watching them play this morning reminds me that he will never leave us. He lives on in all of us, always.  Love to heaven…

The End of An Era

Books, places, kids shows, movies, songs and even school projects all hold so many memories for me. All three of my boys attend/attended the same preschool and elementary school. Preschool routines are especially familiar to me. Since 2010 I have had a child in preschool. That’s eight years of sharing lunches at home, library visits, board games after school and TV time together. Of course things have changed over the years. Christian’s routine always included an after school nap. Anthony’s did for a while, and Nicky’s never really did. It’s the nature of three children! Nevertheless, the time spent with my preschoolers was, and is, so precious.

Just yesterday I needed to make an appointment for six months in the future. This brought us to September. Naturally, I made the appointment in the morning. That has been my routine as a mom of a preschooler. We always need to make the most of those free morning hours! When the receptionist asked me if 11:15 would work, I began to ask for an earlier appointment. With a child in preschool, my free time usually ended around 11:30. It was in that moment that reality came crashing down around me. I was no longer “tied down” to that schedule. Audibly, I gasped and accepted a strange look from the receptionist. I filled her in on the fact that 11:15 would be perfect because I had no little person depending on me to pick him up anymore. My heart sank. It has been more than 24 hours and I still cannot shake the feeling. It comes as no surprise that my youngest will be in Kindergarten next near. It also does not come as a surprise that it will be a huge adjustment for me.

Most moms have similar feelings when their youngest spreads their wings and flies off to Kindergarten. For me, my feelings are slightly more complicated, or at least I think they are. This is all I know. My youngest child going off to Kindergarten means I will no longer be a mother to a child who is actively living the same routine as my angel lived most of his life. Christian spent half of his life in preschool, maybe a little more. His preschool routine determined what I did the rest of the day. He was the oldest and so his routine truly dictated the rest of our routines. There will be no more midday visits to the park, unexpected pizza lunches just because, or midday Disney shows playing in the background.

With my youngest son finishing his last year in preschool, it is easy to make active comparisons between my angel’s life and my living children because he experienced many of the same things. I am painfully aware that once my youngest son completes Kindergarten, these similarities will no longer exist. The sadness, fear and anxiety that this leaves me feeling is daunting. I know it will be okay. My two younger sons will make their own experiences and memories, This is part of moving forward. It is why I fight so hard every day. My children deserve the same love and involvement from me that my angel had. It’s painful to recognize that my youngest son is getting close to surpassing my angel in age. Will memories still be as easy to recall? Will they be as relevant since my living children are not experiencing them anymore? Will he leave others’ minds and memories? It’s scary. Unfortunately, only time will tell. I know that I will never forget him or our beautiful memories. I also know what I need to do to move forward, with my family’s well being in mind. As I have learned these past three years, this is all I can control. Love to heaven always…