All That God Built

On love and loss and unexpected sorrows that open windows of grace

The house that Dan built. He took this photo after our July 4 family gathering this year.

I spent a few days earlier this week feeling inexplicably just a little bit… I don’t know… lost? Anxious? Sad?

“What’s wrong with me?” I wondered as I sat for a few quiet moments in the church during adoration. “Why do I feel like this?” But I was too busy to wait around for an answer.

I’m preparing for a work trip next week and watching grandkids here and there. We’re trying to make the most of our brief New Hampshire summer with trips to the beach and lake outings in our boat. College kids have been home and out-of-state big kids have been visiting with babies. Oh my goodness, the babies! And I'm helping our youngest son, Danny, get ready before he leaves for college in a few weeks. I’ve been gathering medical records, uploading forms, and making lists of items he’ll need for his dorm room.

And it was there, right in the middle of typing the words “bath mat” into the notes app on my phone, that it hit me. Like a thousand bricks, it hit me. Like a lifetime of love and loss and learning to let go, it hit me.

IT’S BECAUSE HE’S LEAVING.

There it was. The sudden and obvious answer to my whispered prayer earlier that morning. A stark truth. I covered my face with my hands, and I sobbed. I cried for several minutes. Then I wiped my face, blew my nose, went out the front door, walked barefoot through our field, and I cried some more.

He’s leaving.

You can’t outsmart yourself. I’ve been processing Danny’s leaving even while keeping myself too busy to think about it.

“It’s going to be great!” I’ve been telling anyone who asked about our impending “empty nest” status these past few months.

And it is going to be great. Dan and I love our time together. In many ways, it feels like we’re just getting started on the “golden age” of our marriage. There’s security, experience, wisdom, familiarity, and comfort in addition to the deep and abiding love that’s been our foundation from the beginning.

It’s nice to have a little more quiet, a little more space, and a little more freedom than we had during the wild years of raising eight kids together in this house.

But we raised eight kids together in this house.

That’s the hard part. That’s what makes empty bunk beds and left-behind baseball cleats stab you in the heart. That’s what makes the memory of a toddler who used to run to bring me “wish flowers” not just sweet, but bitter too. Bittersweet.

I know this is good. I know this is right. We raise them to grow, to go, to become who God made them to be. I’ve done this before—seven times, in fact. But this is the last time. The end of something that has defined and consumed me for more than half my life.

So yes, I’ll cry barefoot in the field and probably again when we drive away from his dorm. But I’ll also smile. I’ll give thanks. I’ll stand beside Dan and marvel at all that we’ve lived, all that God built, and all that still lies ahead.

This ache in my chest? It’s just love. It’s the cost of a heart stretched wide open. And I wouldn’t trade that for anything.

So here’s to the next chapter—with its quiet mornings, grown-up conversations, and room to rediscover who we are now in a house full of echoes.

It’s not the end. It’s a different beginning. And I’m going to meet it with open hands and a grateful heart. 🤍