Conflicted feelings about attending holiday memorial service

Well, I did it last night. After much wavering, I called to RSVP for a Christmas candlelight memorial service this Sunday sponsored by Compassionate Friends, a national organization for parents who have lost a child.
I have been so conflicted about attending. On one hand, I want to go. They print a program with your child's name. Then you go up and light a candle when his name is called and you get to take home an ornament with his name on it. It sounds really beautiful. And I really want to do this in memory of our son. But I am also dreading it too. I know I will be bawling my eyes out the entire time. I attended one Compassionate Friends meeting about six weeks after David died and truthfully, it was a little too intense. All those people there who have lost a child! How sad! I cried very hard there too.
It has been 8 months since David died and for the past week or so, I have been doing OK (maybe because we have been traveling and also I am ignoring the holidays completely). No intense waves of grief. I am afraid that this service will stir things up again. So I ask myself, why am I going? I have no idea.
But I have committed myself now. No way will I not attend as the idea of not being there when David's name is called...no one there to light a candle in his name...is too painful to imagine.

FYI: this Sunday is Compassionate Friends Worldwide Candle Lighting. Starting at 7 pm, family and friends can light a candle in memory of a child who has died. CF has chapters around the world and the goal is that as candles burn down in one time zone, they will be lit in another so candles will be burning a full 24 hours in memory of our children on Dec. 9.

Hope everyone is doing OK.
Connie
Mother of David
2/28/77-4/14/12