“But I keep waiting for the night. I close my eyes and hope you’ll find me sleeping. Cause in my dreams, we can spend a little time just talking. In my dreams, we are side by side just walking. Oh, the feelings that we used to know. The places we used to go are still there in my dreams. On the front crossbar of your bike, we can go anyplace, anywhere you like. In my dreams.”
“In My Dreams”, lyrics and vocals by James Morrison (2011)
Still Grieving Denny’s Loss 49 Years Later
Yesterday, April 20th marked the 49th anniversary of my brother Dennis’s passing. In many ways, it’s a harder concept for me to fully grasp today because his persona and memory has always been a huge part of who I am. As is our usual custom, my younger brother Matt and I met for Mass at Our Lady of Mount Carmel this morning, the parish we loved as brothers growing up. We then grabbed breakfast at The Daily Treat before heading over to George Washington Park where Dennis is buried in a plot that now includes my Mom and Dad. The ride over to the cemetery is always sentimental for us as we drive past the Ridgewood Lawns, our early childhood home; and, then Paramus Catholic High School where each of the three Kirnan boys excelled academically and were captains for the basketball team.
I am 66 years old now and far removed from that life changing day as a 17 year old junior in high school and I still see Denny as my beautiful 19 year old big brother, the best friend I ever had and who I can still see in my dreams only the dream is always the same dream and it always ends the same way. In the dream, I am practicing basketball in the Kirnan’s backyard court, a sport I was really good at largely because my brother taught me so well and was my biggest fan. As I make another long jump shot from beyond the 3-point line, I peer down the driveway of our house and I see him walking towards me as handsome as ever and he is waving at me. “My God”, I think, “Denny didn’t die, it was all just a bad dream”. “Denny’s back, he’s alive, he’s my big brother who is going to continue to show me the way forward like he always has”. He is going to take me for that first beer he had promised me the last time I had seen him on April 9, 1972 when he dropped me off for pole vault practice at Paramus Catholic. As he gets closer to me, I get even more excited – “Yes, Denny’s alive, he’s come home to see me”. And then, in an instant, I wake up and it’s just another bad dream and Denny is gone from view.
Finding the Meaning in Our Grief
I like to share this dream when we hold a Bereavement Group Meeting at St. Catharine-St. Margaret Parish in Spring Lake, NJ for those people who have suffered a loss and what I have learned in sharing it is how much that dream resonates with so many others grieving a loss. Grief is life changing in so many ways and it requires maybe the hardest internal work you’ll ever go through. Grief is not linear it works on different timelines but even if you are fortunate enough to work through each of the 5 Stages of Grief of anger, denial, bargaining, depression, and acceptance, the grief and that feeling of loss never really goes away. One of the world’s foremost authorities on grief — David Kessler — is the author of a new book “Finding Meaning: The Sixth Stage of Grief” and suggests that those who grieve a loss can ultimately find the meaning in their loss and transform that grief into a more hopeful and peaceful process. This concept of finding the meaning in your loss really resonates with me and is one of the major reasons why I was drawn to the coaching profession and in servicing others through Pastoral Care and Bereavement Ministry a few years ago because I truly believe that you can find the meaning in many of the losses we experience through life and not just the loss of a loved one.
During this past year, we have all been grieving the loss of more than 3 million souls worldwide but we have also become much more aware of so many other losses our families, our friends, and communities are experiencing living through a global pandemic such as the loss of our freedom and mobility, the loss of employment, the loss of a relationship, and all of those big moments in life that we’ve had to postpone like baptisms, weddings, graduations, etc. These other losses and postponements may not carry the same weight in our hearts as the loss of a loved one but we need to feel them and grieve them in order to move to a better place and hopefully find that “meaning” that Kessler speaks so eloquently about.
COVID-19 Reminds Us of Our Mortality
Perhaps because of COVID and now being a grandfather of two beautiful grandchildren who I hope to spend more time with in the months ahead, I’ve had the time to reflect on my Spiritual Compass and that clock called Mother Time that seems to be ticking faster than it ever has before. The clock reminds me of my innate vulnerability, my mortality, and where I currently stand in the Lord’s eye with respect to my salvation. I still feel that I have lots of things I want to do but less time to complete the mission and my physical body seems to be breaking down more frequently so I grieve in a general sense that I may not be able to complete all of the things I feel I am being driven to do by the Lord at this moment in my earthly journey.
A New Grief to Process of the Life I Will Never Have With My Brother
And then there’s this entirely new and different type of grief as it relates to my brother Dennis and it’s one that I didn’t see coming in this 49th year since God called him home. You see, I am now grieving the loss of Denny for the life I always wanted to share with him but now painfully acknowledge that I can never have with him. I have had to acknowledge that I will never be able to share with him any of my major life moments since that horrible day on April 20, 1972:
- He never got to see me play basketball again for my senior year of high school;
- He would never get to come and visit me in college and I would never get to visit him at Saint Joseph’s;
- He would never get to meet the love of my life Jean and she and him would never become the great friends I had always wanted them to be;
- He would never get to be my best man at my wedding and I would never get to be his best man at his wedding;
- He would never get to be the best Uncle to my three kids and I would never get an opportunity to be the best Uncle for his kids;
- We would never get to live close to each other and get together for weekends and family celebrations like Baptisms, Holy Communions, Confirmations, Weddings, Birthday parties, Graduations;
- We would never be able to take our families to Mets games together just as he and I used to do as kids taking the bus and subway to Shea Stadium;
- We would never get to vacation together with our families at the Jersey Shore just like I had been able to do with him and his best friend Jimmy Blanchfield as a kid growing up;
- We would never get to help each other out on all the home improvement projects we used to engage in as kids like painting the house, wallpapering with Mom, and doing the yard work with Dad;
- And, we would never get the chance to say goodbye to our Mom and Dad together as my other siblings Cathy, Matty, and Mary Claire were each able to do when they passed;
All of those things in my life that I had hoped to do with my big brother Dennis are the new losses I am more acutely aware of and that I still must grieve 49 years later and it still really hurts to know that my big brother and my best friend will never be with me again in this life.
And that’s where the faith journey comes in. You see I believe that unlike my bad dream that always ends the same way these past 49 years, I will see Denny again when I cross my own finish line. He will be waiting for me just like I have always been waiting for him. He will always be the best big brother and best friend I could ever have and I know that when I finish my race all of my grief will disappear and we will once again be together again playing basketball in our new backyard court called heaven.
Wishing my clients, fellow coaches, colleagues, and friends the gif of God’s inner peace as you grieve your own losses during this challenging time,
Dr. K
