Month: November 2023

It All Shook

May 18, 2016.

David Glasser, my son, a Phoenix Police Officer, was killed in the line of duty on that day.

And everything in my world shook.

You cannot imagine what that feels like until it happens to you.  And it wasn’t just my life – the tsunami of his death hit everyone who was close to Davey. My two grandchildren’s world exploded.  My daughter-in-law’s world crashed. My daughter’s world flipped upside down as all of her dreams and plans with her big brother crumbled.

My husband’s world shattered into tiny pieces.  Davey was his best friend and my husband’s father had just passed away 10 days before Davey was killed.  Too much. How do we deal with this much loss in such a short time?

Davey’s close friend’s and squad member’s worlds spiraled in various directions as each person felt the blow of Davey’s death.

The world shook.  It twisted.  It filled with unimaginable grief.  It emptied of joy and light.

I needed something solid to hold onto while everything around me smashed and rocked.  And I found the one thing that didn’t shatter, didn’t tilt, didn’t explode.  He was right beside me and he was Rock Solid – my Father God.  Always there, always loving us, always caring for me.

God has been with us every step of the way as we have each had to pick our way through the devastation Davey’s death had on our lives.  I am completely convinced that God is good and nothing that has happened to me changes that.

As my world gradually stopped shaking, I realized I was in this new place, a new reality.  My head recognizes this place and knows I have to keep moving forward. 

My heart is still regularly tugged back to a time when Davey was here, making me laugh and filling my life with his special kind of love. My husband and I just spent 10 days in the Phoenix area making new memories with Davey’s two children, having fun with old friends and making new friends. I had to stop my heart from focusing on how empty Phoenix feels without Davey in it. It’s hard. It hurts. People and places just kept touching the broken parts of my heart, the parts that will remain like that until I go to my forever home. So many precious memories of a different time.

The time before my whole world shook.

Miss you, Davey.

Love you.

On By Judy GlasserIn When the Worst HappensLeave a comment

Forever 34

It’s been it’s a struggle to move forward from May 18, 2016.  That’s the day my world blew up.  It’s a day that is etched into my mind by grief and pain – the day my son, David Glasser, who was a Phoenix Police Officer, was killed in the line of duty.

I am blessed with a great group of family, friends and my Blue Family.  I’m learning how to live with only memories of Davey.

It’s not easy.

It doesn’t feel right.

The empty hole in my life is very evident.

But I have no other choice.

I thank God for no regrets and a ton of great memories.

Davey’s birthday is today, November 19th.  He would have been 41 years-old.  We had so much fun on his birthday every year!  His 20th birthday landed on a home Cardinals game – the early years of the Cardinals.  We all had a blast tailgating.  Beer pong was still an approved activity then so there were lots of ping pong balls flying everywhere.  Good times!

November 19th is right before Thanksgiving so it always felt like Davey’s birthday extended into the holiday. He often had an ASU vs UofA  Football Watch party the day after Thanksgiving if the big rivalry game was being not being played in town. If the game was in town he was usually tailgating somewhere close to the stadium.  Davey loved ASU and he loved the rivalry.  He graduated from ASU along with most of our family except we have one Wildcat…..and he loved to razz her about it …constantly 🙂

asu

Everybody would come to Davey’s football parties and we would have a great time laughing and playing all day.  Cornhole.  Washers.  Watching the game.  Drinking some Coors Light.  

 It’s hard now.  We miss him.  We miss his laugh and his joking and his big smile of delight when he was surrounded by his friends and family.

davey-square

It’s been over 7 years since I’ve seen his smile in person. I have a re-occurring dream where I see Davey at a distance and I keep following him around trying to talk to him – trying to get him to smile at me. But I can never get close enough.

In my dream Davey looks just like he did in 2016.

My four special grand darlings are all growing taller and are physically changing a lot as they grown up. The rest of us are growing older with more gray hair and wrinkles and age spots.

But Davey will stay forever 34…..

Miss you, Davey.

Love you.

On By Judy GlasserIn When the Worst Happens2 Comments

When the Answer is No

I asked.

I begged.

The night after my son, David Glasser, a Phoenix Police Officer, was shot and was laying in a hospital bed attached to machines while his brain waves gradually disappeared, I felt a level of hopelessness that I had never experienced before.  The pain of the reality of what was happening continued to escalate as each hour passed through that long, dark night.

I was desperate to see God move – he needed to do something.  So I went down to the hospital chapel all by myself, I walked up to the altar and laid face down on the cold tile.   And I begged God for a miracle.

It was becoming increasingly obvious that Davey needed a big miracle. So I begged.  I have no idea how long I laid there, pleading with God.

At this same time, my husband, Dave, was walking up and down the crowded hallway outside of Davey’s hospital room, asking everyone to pray for a miracle.

There were also three waiting rooms downstairs in the hospital filled with people – many of them praying with us, asking for a miracle.

Every hospital hallway I walked down was filled with people – most of them praying with us, asking for a miracle.

I texted my closest friends and asked them to pray with us for a miracle.

In my mind, I see all of those prayers combining into a huge hand reaching up out of the roof of the hospital, stretching up to heaven, asking our God who holds life and death in his hands to reach down and touch Davey.

We asked.

We begged.

A few hours later we received our answer.

And the answer was no.

No more smiles and jokes from Davey.

No more fun and games with Davey.

No to watching my grandchildren grow up with their father’s arms around them.

No to watching Davey live out his goals and dreams.

So many no’s.

There’s a reason why we all listened to Hilary Scott sing “Thy Will” at Davey’s funeral.  Because we asked for a miracle for Davey and God said no.  He has a different plan than we do.

Every day I am reminded that God has a very different plan than mine.  Standing on the rock of God’s love and trusting that he has many great tomorrows waiting for me, I move forward….

– not happy about having to live the rest of my life here on earth without Davey.

– not understanding why I have to travel this path.

I move forward, taking my broken heart with me.  I listen and watch as God reveals his plan, one step at a time.

And one of those steps forward has been the David Glasser Foundation which is all about supporting opportunities for our Law Enforcement officer volunteers who are involved in youth sports and Shop with a Cop to show how much they care about kids and their families.  People – and especially the next generation –  need to understand that Police Officers are the good guys, here to help and sincerely caring that families have safe neighborhoods to live in.  The foundation with Davey’s name on it has become part of the solution to improve the health of communities in the Phoenix Metropolitan area.

Another step forward has been the book I published on Amazon earlier this year, “Then I Looked Up: Losing a Child, Finding His Legacy of Love’ This is the story of Davey’s life and death as well as my journey to find hope and purpose again after losing a child. I have talked with hundreds of people this year who loved the book and shared with me how it positively changed their perspective on losses they have experienced. 

Are these our miracles?

Miss you, Davey.

Love you.

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You’ll Get Through This

On By Judy GlasserIn When the Worst Happens4 Comments

No, I won’t.

One of the many things people have said to me since the death of my son, David Glasser, is ‘you’ll get through this’. Davey was a Phoenix Police Officer who was killed in the line of duty on May 18, 2016.

Not long ago, I was talking with a friend who said, “It’s great that you had God walking beside you to help you get through this.” The first part of that comment is very true- God has been awesome – he is my Rock and Comforter. But the last words in that statement are not correct. I replied, “I have realized that I’m not ‘getting through’ this.”

I have figured out that we don’t ‘get through’ the death of one of our children. There is no ‘other side’ of this situation where we breathe a sigh of relief because we are ‘through’ it.

When our child dies, we never move out of it. We have to move forward but we take our broken hearts with us. We live in it. Every day.

Why is this so different from when my mother and father passed away?

I know what it is. I always knew that there would be a time in my life when my parents would pass away. I expected that I would live a portion of my life without my parents.

Not so with Davey.

Davey is supposed to be here, right now. He was supposed to be making my husband and me smile as we grow old. He should be filling our calendars with the next fun thing. Making jokes. Surrounding himself with friends and family – helping everyone have a good time.

There were times in Davey’s life where I felt like his social director. I would be organizing and helping with details in the background while Davey was the front man – gathering people together and having a great time with them. He always appreciated my help and I loved seeing him living life to the full. He was such a great person to be around.

I know you feel like this if you have lost a child – I should have gone first. That’s the right order. What happened is not the right order. And the pain of this reality does not go away. I’m not going to ‘get over’ this because the fact that he is gone from this earth when he should be here is not going to change.

The hole he left doesn’t get smaller, it actually gets bigger as he misses more Mother’s Days, Father’s days, birthdays and more Christmases.

Davey was a huge family man. He was always a part of what was going on. He flew to Maryland for his sister’s graduation with her masters degree, he flew to Pennsylvania several times to spend time with his last living grandmother and grandfather. He flew to Denver when his sister moved there to check out her new place. He kept track of his dad and I, making sure we were taken care of. If something was happening with our family, he was right in the middle of it.

All of that was lost the day a bullet took his life. Wiped away. It isn’t happening, it’s not going to happen, it will never happen again.

So, no….

I’m not going to ‘get through’ this.

Miss you, Davey.

Love you.