Shauna Matheson - marking another anniversary of her passing

Shauna Mary Catherine Matheson February 13, 1983 – June 7, 1997 

It’s 24 years today that we lost our teenage daughter Shauna in a car accident.  

As our way of trying to keep her memory alive, each year on this date we publish an in memoriam. It’s hard to believe we have now been doing this for nearly a quarter of a century.   

When I think back over that time I can’t help but notice how much has stayed the same, and how much has changed.  

The lilacs off the end of our deck are in full bloom. As always they signal spring but also they remind us that the anniversary of her death has come around again. That is something that never changes. 

Grief though, is something that does. I read somewhere “Grief is a journey that never completely ends. The scenery changes, and the terrain becomes easier, but there is no point of arrival.” But that’s okay. We’re good with that. 

In the earlier years of writing these in memoriams, the focus was always on our grief because our heartbreak was so raw. We still and will always miss her dearly, but our grief isn’t so much our focus any longer. So even these remembrances have changed. 

One thing that hasn’t changed is our visits to her grave on special occasions like her birthday and Christmas. We would write personal messages on a helium balloon and let it go, watching it rise to the heavens and we’d somehow take a bit of comfort from that.  

One thing that has changed about those visits though is that we will no longer release a balloon. We know better now. We know that while it goes out of sight into the sky, it will land somewhere – in the woods, in a field, or in a waterway, where it could very well cause harm to some creature.  The thought of that and knowing that that is absolutely the last thing Shauna would want means we will never do that again. The thought that her love of animals continues to influence our choices 24 years later brings a smile.  

So some things change and some don’t. Such is life. 

But one thing that will never change is the hole that remains in our hearts, because all these years later we still miss her more than we can express. 

Sadly missed, always remembered, forever loved,

Dad, Mom, Quentin, Richard, Alex and Coleen