A Little Help Here

You know how they say it's easy to give others advice than it is to take your own?

I woke up out of a dead sleep at 5 am this morning and realized what I need to do to get through the holiday gatherings.  Well, two things actually.  Since they are things I suggest on my job ALL the time, I don't know why I didn't think of them sooner.

Whenever a child is struggling with an activity they find overwhelming in our program, we often suggest giving them a helper job.  It gets them out of the fray if they are feeling overstimulated by all the noise and traffic.  It gives them a focus and a purpose.  They feel successful because they have accomplished the transition, just in a slightly different fashion than the rest of the class.  And that is ok.

I need a helper job!  I can't keep going to these holiday gatherings, trying to get through it the same way everyone else does.  My needs are different now.

My helper job will be to take pictures.

I got this idea, I think, from my planner/art community who has had me trying something called "December Daily" this month.  The premise is to write, take pictures, and draw about every day in December in an effort to appreciate all the joy the admittedly stressful and busy season brings.  This has been a good assignment for me.  I have a devil of a time finding joy this time of year.  It didn't go so well at first as my journal was chock full of my sad-face girls and pictures of the cemetery, which is honest and ok, but made me think a little harder about fitting Jake into the frame.

Gradually, as the month bore on, I included a memory that made me smile in public out of nowhere about holidays past with the babies.  I took some pics with friends.  I baked cookies with my son. It all went into my December Daily.  As I flipped back through my pages,it started to look not so scary and sort of nice, actually.   Conscious Discipline is onto something: you will get more of what you focus on.

That's where the brilliant part of my helper job comes in- not only will it be a distraction, it will keep me looking at the good things life still has to offer.  The coolest part is at the end of the gathering, I will have treasures of my parents and sisters to keep forever.  Until you've lost a piece of your heart, you may never know just how valuable those pictures can be.  I do.  I really, really do.

So part two of my little behavior plan here will be to pull the positives from the experience.

Stay tuned; we shall see how this goes.

Movie Review

Ok, so can we talk a minute about Will Smith's new movie Collateral Beauty?  I feel I must.  (Obviously, spoiler alert here).


I don't expect a lot from movies about child loss because they usually take either a "God needed another angel" route (ahem, Miracles from Heaven) or show the mother in question handling herself with grace and strength beyond those mere mortals possess (please, pour that on, I love to feel less than).  But I remain curious each time and hopeful that someone will get it marginally right.

So a couple of inconsistencies with the movie that were hit-you-over-the-head obvious:

No one who is that depressed has that clean of a house without the benefit of professional cleaning.

I wanted to know more about the child who had died other than she liked to spin around in circles with her Dad.

Acceptance does not flip the switch to happiness.  Most of the movie centered around the father not being able to say his daughter's name or cause of death.  At the end, when he accomplished this through many tears (and perhaps the best scene of the movie), the next frame showed him smiling and frolicking through the park with his ex-wife.

I've accepted for some time Cory's death and have been able to speak to individuals and groups of people about it and it has not once sent me frolicking through nature with a happy-but-not-too-happy smile on my face.  To accept your child's death is not to like it and does not stop the constant gnawing pain.  It is as Will stated to Time, "a jail sentence".

So let's talk about the ex-wife.  Will's character turned out to be one of the 79%- the 79% of couples who divorce after losing a child.  To state this in the movie only made me, someone hanging out in  21% land by the barest skin of my teeth, wonder just what the cause was?  Did Will not say their child's name enough?  Did he refuse to talk about her?  Did he in a careless moment  throw out twenty years of Christmas ornaments, including every single one the child had ever made?  There's a scenario I'd love to see played out on the big screen.

Let's also talk about how the co-workers schemed together to create footage of Will's character talking to people who would be digitally removed to prove he was incompetent to make business decisions.  This one was unbelievable.  How could Hollywood stoop so low as to make symptoms of Schizophrenia into a game and way for someone to profit?  As someone who has watched someone I love more than myself struggle to know what is real and what is not, I shudder at the insensitivity and stupidity of this plot line.  Shame on you, Hollywood.  Shame, shame, shame.

So then that brings me to the only redeeming line in the whole thing, which took place as Will argued with Death on the subway, "...it's all a bunch of intellectual bullshit, man, cause she's not here to hold my fucking hand!"

Honesty, I spy you.

Target Black Ops

So the last Christmas shopping season with Cory alive, Jacob was nine and Cory was eighteen.  We bundled up and went to sharpen up their Christmas wish list at Target.  Basically, we walked the aisles together and I took mental notes as to which sweater or which scarf made Cory's eyes light up and which toy Jake had a hard time setting back down on the shelf.

As always, they each asked me to buy them a little something pre-holiday and I had to say no.  Cory pouted beautifully as I forced her to set the fox face purse back on the hook and the fox ears hat back on the shelf.  Jake changed his plea to popcorn, and it was there that I got a terribly, awfully good idea.  Almost everything Jake had pointed out was on sale, but one never knew how long the supplies would hold out or when the sales would end, and for Cory, there were only two fox face purses and one fox ears hat in the joint.  There I was right there, cash in hand.  What was a Momma to do?  I got Jake engrossed in Pokemon cards and took Cory to the side for a little strategic planning.  Grinning impishly, thinking only we were putting one over on the younger brother, while also ensuring his Christmas dreams came true, Cory agreed to make him go look at girly stuff for a few minutes with her, with the promise to follow up with a tour of the tech department while I pled a fake case of gastrointestinal upset and headed off in the general direction of the restroom.  I grabbed her hand for one final reminder...we must stay out of each other's designated areas as we could NOT run into each other or all would be lost.  There could be no sightings!

"You can count on me, Mom.  I got you, girl!"  she said.  I winked at her once, and then doubled over with pretend cramps, which didn't alarm Jake too much, as IBS has always been an unwelcome, but frequent interloper in my life.

I staggered off towards the "restroom", looking behind my shoulder once to make sure their backs were turned.  In a manner reminiscent of Beat the Clock on the Price is Right, I quite literally ran to the carts.  Cory and Jake safely headed toward the Junior department, I went in the opposite direction towards the toys.  Within about two minutes, I had thrown every toy on his wish list (many, many Star Wars action figures, several Lego sets, and a handful of HexBugs) in the cart.  I added a couple of Nerf guns and ammo for good measure and my boy was set.  Jake was done.  It was the fastest Christmas shopping I'd ever done in my life, even better than Black Friday.

It was time for the ninja part.  Feeling like I was wearing a sign that said, "Hey, kids, look over here!", I rolled steathily towards the accessories department.  I parked the cart at the place where jewelry joins the little girls department and peeked around the corner.  No kids in sight.  Head down, I ran over the foxes display and scooped up Cory's loot.  I snuck around the endcap and searched the entrance of the junior department for the kids.  It had been exactly five minutes.  Was that long enough?  Had they moved onto the tech department?  I had to get to the sweaters without them seeing me.

I ran back to my cart before it was commandeered, and decided to make a break for it.  Using big displays as camouflage, I entered the danger zone.  I grabbed up the knit goods, darting glances all around as I went.  This was like laser tag, but shopping.  Not able to finish all of Cory's shopping at one place, I nonetheless had a few items I knew she wanted badly.  It was time to hit the checkout before I got busted.

Of course, the lines were long.  There I was with a cart piled high with their treasures, feeling incredibly exposed and checking my watch.  How long would Jake remain entertained by electronics?  Normally, the case would be until Cory and I physically pulled him away, but who knows on this particular day?  I've never been a very lucky person.

Just when I thought I'd spied the shape of Cory's head bobbing around the corner, causing my heart to jump into my throat, a service counter clerk called out, "I'm open if you want to come to the service counter!"

YEEESSSS!

I shot forward like my life depended on it and looked furtively behind me while she scanned all my items.  A few hundred dollars later, I was racing towards the exit with bags and bags of contraband.  I plowed through the parking lot like a manic, popped the trunk, and got rid of the evidence as fast as I could.  I shoved my cart into a cart corral and ran for the door.

Once inside, I headed at what I hoped looked like a leisurely place towards electronics, when who should come sauntering towards me but my babies.

"We're all done looking, Mom.  Are you feeling better?"  Cory asked.

I broke into a guilty grin.  "I am."

Jake looked from one of us to the other and then launched comfortably into the virtues of the latest tech gadget, oblivious to all.  Cory and I exchanged a look that said, "Mission accomplished.  We rule the world.  We can do anything together."

This is Christmas shopping used to be like.  They were the best times of my life.

















Istag

Five Christmases

I had to get a sticky note out the other day and write the years down before I could believe it:  2012, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2016.  I counted the dates again.  Yes, it was true; this will be the fifth Christmas since Cory died.

If you're looking for some progress, check out the last word of the previous sentence.  I didn't say "since the accident" or since Cory "passed away".  I said died.  Cory died.  She no longer lives.  She is not coming back.  Acceptance.  Dig it.

Stunned, I sat with those five Christmases ticked off on my fingers and searched myself for any conscious memories of how they were spent.  On the first one, I seem to remember my friend, Nicole, stopping by and bringing me scrap booking supplies which launched my first healthy coping skill to navigate this whole mess.  She does not, to this day, know the magnitude of that particular gift.  She put into my hands the ability to survive.

On the last one, my victory was showing my face, however briefly, at the family Christmas Day dinner.  You know that saying about the most important thing in life being to show up?  Yeah, I may have adopted that a bit literally.

 As for the others?  I have the vaguest recollection of my dear mother bending over my bed and touching my hair, having stopped by with a plate of food and because she could not bear to pass the holiday without laying eyes on every one of her children.  For the most part, those Christmases are black holes of suffering in my mind, a bit hazy due to the meds that helped me get through them.  But I did get through them.  I lived through them and got up the next day to try again.  So there's that.

But the question is begged, then, what sort of Christmas did I provide for my remaining child?  I had to ask Dr. Z about this today because this exact topic had been brought to my attention recently.  The person who spoke to me about trying a little harder to be festive during the holidays, for Jacob's sake, is the single person whose opinion matters most to me.  Of course, this observation was meant to push me a little further, to get me to the next level, and was perhaps born of a desire to see a glimpse of the pre-Cory's-death Nick (which I'm sorry to say no longer exists).  I, being plagued with anxiety and depression these last few weeks, took it as a "you've been a bad Mom" statement.  Of course, this was never said, it's just the way my guilt-ridden, sleep-deprived mind interpreted it.

Dr Z, ever clever and on his game, said immediately, "Well, let's get away from the good-bad labels, shall we?  Are any of the children you support in your job bad?  No, there are no bad children- there are only children who struggle.  Of course, you are not a bad Mom, but you are a Mom, who quite rightfully, has struggled these last few years.  Yes?"

Tears streamed down my face.  He reads my heart, this man.

"Let me tell you what I see first and then let me take a guess at what the true message was to be from this loved one whose opinion means all to you."  He stopped here with palms up, waiting for permission to go on.  I nodded.

"I see a mom who has kept her son safe, who has given him love, and who has modeled for him how to grieve with honesty, even if it isn't the model of grief that society around her supports.  I see someone who doesn't force her son to take steps in grief that he isn't comfortable with because she knows exactly how intrusive that feels and how counterproductive it can be."

Tears.

"I suspect the message was that time with your loved ones here on Earth is all too short and incredibly precious. Do you think maybe that was it?"

I nodded, accepting the kleenex box he passed to me.  Idly, I wondered how many boxes of kleenex he goes through in a week.

"Before you can join in these holiday celebrations and rituals, and be truly present and engaged, we've got to find a way to move the focus from the very real anguish of Cory not being here now to how grateful we are for the time she was here...and what she brought to us all...as a fighter, a champion, an artist, a friend.  It is not an easy trick, this shifting of perspective.  It will happen on no one's timeline but your own.  And you are doing better every year."

"Should I do be doing more for Jacob?"  I had to ask because once you've unintentionally sent one of your children to her death, you will never again hold your head high, confident in your parenting skills.  Every move is second-guessed from there on out.  It sucks to no longer trust your own judgment.

"No, you are doing all the right things for Jacob."  he dismissed, with a little wave of his hand.  "But  for you...I ask, what would it be like for you to bring up one of her ornaments that she made you as a little girl from the basement and hang it on your little tree?"

My face must've shown my explicit horror at this homework assignment from hell, because he smiled gently with all the charm he possessed and held up a single finger.  "One.  Just one...a little one."

Only because he was the man whose comfort I sought frantically the morning after the accident...only because he sat silent with me, my journal open on the table between us during my first visit with him....  only because he helped my daughter to see herself as strong and competent...only because he led her out of the darkness...

did I reluctantly give my consent, "I will try."

And for him.  I will.
 Dr. Z has a way of making you want to be the best possible version of yourself.  No wonder he has always reminded Cory and I of my father.

Cut Short

"The hardest part is letting go of your dreams."  And her dreams.

After Thanksgiving, I spent hours holed up in bed binge watching the new Gilmore Girls, A Year in the Life, that had just been released to Netflix.  I had my reservations about watching it at all because it was our show, and I haven't been able to watch a single re-run since she died.  My hesitation was that Rory, the daughter, would show up engaged, married, pregnant, or any combination of the aforementioned.
But I thought, what the hell, and watched it anyway.  Spoiler alert, stop reading if you don't want to know what happened.

The last four words were:

"Mom."

"Yeah?"

"I'm pregnant."

I think my next words were the f-bomb dropped four times in a row, loudly, and with genuine fury.  I may have pounded my fist on my bedspread.
Yes, I was truly angry about this fictitious character's ability to bring forth life.

Is this logical?  Probably not.  But neither is grief.

People who have commented on the ending of this show talked about the parallel of Rory telling Lorelai she was an unwed mother-to-be when Lorelai had been unwed when she carried Rory and then raised her alone.  In whatever way you want to look at it, the story had come full circle.

My full circle was to have my daughter die at 19, which was the same age I was when I gave birth to her.

Am I saying I wanted Cory to be pregnant and unmarried?  Well, not preferably, because I know how hard it is to do, even with the best parents in the world behind me.  But would it have been the worst thing?  No, not at all.  The worst thing is to have no chance at all to feel life grow within you, whether or no that life was conceived within the more socially acceptable bounds of matrimony.  The worst thing is to never have the chance to give birth to the person who would be your soulmate and make you a better person.

So then, obviously, someday becoming a mother was one of my dreams for her.

What were some of hers?  I've relayed a lot of them here from conversations we had, but this past week, I found some black and white evidence from Cory's own words.

While cleaning through my desk, I stumbled upon a copy of Cory's Individualized Education Plan.  Because of her age (she was 17),she was able to provide input to her evaluation team.  They asked her specific questions about her future goals and recorded exactly what she said.

Adult Living:  Corinne wants to live with her mother.  She truly never wants to move out.

Career/Employment:  Corinne wants to become a mental health/disabilities coordinator like her mom or go into some line of social work.

Community Participation:  Corinne wants to remain involved in her church.  She would like to volunteer for school programs.

Post-Secondary Education/Training:  Corinne would like to go to Kellogg Community College for 2 years and then transfer to Western Michigan University.

Those were her dreams.  She asked for so little, and deserved so much more that what she received.  I sobbed over this, and it disturbed my sleep for the entire week.

My sweet girl just wanted to feel safe, help people, and learn.

I knew this already.  But to see it written out from Cory's own words.  Oh, my heart.

A Place at the Table

So let's go over this again...
if you're wondering whether or not to bring up the Mom's dead child at a holiday dinner...

it's always a DO.

It's not going to catch the mother by surprise.  She is well aware her child is dead.  She gets no peace from this constant thought.  It is always there.

It's not going to upset her or make her sad.  She is already upset.  She is already sad.  It will, however, hurt her deeply to have no mention made of her absent child  while festivities go on as if she never existed in the first place.

These gatherings that celebrate family and togetherness when togetherness for you and your loved one is an impossibility....they are hell to go to and hell to sit through.  Am I clear?  I am living in hell every day I spend walking around this earth with my heart in the ground in the first place.  That is my baseline.   And then, you want me to come to a place where everyone is gathered, alive, and eat food, smiling and laughing while I am hurting so badly I cannot think straight?   And Cory is never mentioned?

 Instead of looking at an empty space at the counter or a chair that sits unused...could we make a space for my Cory-Girl?  Can we please set out a plate for her?  Her favorite pink cup that she always had to use every Sunday dinner?  Can we light a candle and set out a framed photograph of her?

Save her a space in our family.  Include her.  Make it impossible to NOT talk about her.  Somebody get up the balls to say what Cory liked best to eat or something funny she said once.  Somebody please say you wish she was here!  Are we thankful only for ones left that can belly up to the table and smile into our faces or are we thankful for the ones who can no longer do that, but deserve to be remembered, all the same.  Come on, people, I know you have some Cory stories in there somewhere.

Does it always have to be me inserting her into conversation?   If I'm the one who always brings her name to the table, well...I was the one accused of "wallowing" in my grief, wasn't I?

Thanksgiving this year was rotten.  It went like this:

Saw Mom and Dad.  Good.
Had a plate of food.  Nice.
Everyone was jolly and smiling, happy and joking.
No one said her name.  Not once.
It was a lot of pressure to look normal when I felt anything but.
Ate my food.  Got more ham.  Cut the first slice of pumpkin pie.  Shoveled it in.
Ran away from all those happy faces and sat on the couch with my knees up to my chin, taking refuge in a carb induced nap
Kissed my parents' dear faces.
Ran like hell.
Spent the next two days in bed, heartbroken, jealous, and angry by turns.

Here's the deal.  If Cory's not gonna be there...in some form...I'm not coming.  We are a package deal.

She's worth mentioning.

Countdown to Turkey Dinner

I'm trying like crazy to distract myself.
Because as another bereaved mother stated today, "It does not get easier with time, as so many people have said".
So these last few days moving towards the big family gathering, I've been cooking big meals, trying new recipes, immersing myself in news, politics, music, art...I've been logging too many hours on Netflix, Youtube, "pretend" internet shopping (where you fill the cart with all your wanties, but never actually pull the trigger).  I've been painting, collaging, drawing, and writing up a storm...anything to fend off this inevitable jealousy, that is so real and so thick. Picture me, camped out in Starbucks for hours, hunched over a pile of paper and leather notebooks, with a heap of art supplies spread out in a semi-circle around me.   I'm trying to be a good person, and rise above, but in the end I sink back, exhausted.  I'm just a mom who wants her girl.

It does not get easier with time. The loss of Cory still fills my world.  Some days, it's buried under routine and busyness, but it's always there, just under the surface, and some days -like today- it's the loudest voice in my head.

And so here comes the stupid holiday that magnifies this loss, as if it's not big enough already.  I want to hide, but I know I have to go to be with my parents and part of me wants to, I love them so much.  The hard part will be to see everyone else who is alive and flourishing...there will be job talk and house talk and wedding talk...maybe future grand baby talk.  Each conversation about another child's steps through life will feel like such a blow to my flesh and Cory's face will rise up...what would she look like now?  What would she be doing?  What would her plans be?

The unfairness of it all rises up and with it,brings the anger and rage.  I'll smile tightly in all the right places.  I'll banter because I'm pretty good at that, but it will be killing me inside.  My mom's incredible dressing that we all fight over, especially the crispy corner pieces, will sit in my stomach like a rock.

"The hardest part is letting go of your dreams."
Yes, and watching others get theirs.  Where are my girl's engagement pics?  Where is her handsome young man who is kind and funny?  Where is her little diamond to wink in the sunlight when she talks with her hands while sharing a funny story?  Where is her cramped kitchen with the hilly linoleum floor?   Where is the joy she should be experiencing to never have to say goodbye again at the end of the night?

The dress?  Sure, she should have that.  Walking her down the aisle?  I have dreams about it to this day, certainly, but marriages fail...
so I grieve for her just that feeling alone.
Where is her shot to put herself all in with another person?  Where is her "no one else will do" big love of her life, even if it's not one to stand the test of time?  Where is that for her?  Why did she get cheated out of that experience?
I'm not completely selfish, I don't just grieve the experiences I don't get to have, I think all the time about the ones she didn't get to have.

It's a lot to swallow.

Brain Stem and Limbic System Collide

I've been thinking a lot lately about Cory's service, and about how Bob flew up here to see her:
 "It's Bob, devastated by the news, on my way to BC."

I was frozen.  Didn't respond.  Couldn't respond. Brain stem.

 How do you text someone to explain that  you inadvertently, but most certainly, sent your mutual child to her death? Would he agree that it was indeed my fault?

So instead, I held the phone, reading and rereading that single line in the backseat of the car, unable to stop shaking, finally allowing myself to be led by the arm into a florist to pick out gobs and gobs of flowers to put on top of my child's casket.  It was the beginning of several surreal experiences. They all had capital letters:  The Selection of the Flowers.  The Choosing of the Casket.  Deciding on a Cemetery.  The Securing of the Plot.  Dressing Your Dead Child.  Viewing Your Child's Corpse.  The list went on and on, each thing more horrifying than the last.  Brain Stem.
 I have the vaguest recollection of demanding roses and firmly overriding Tim's suggestion that everything be pink.  There was a little table or a desk that we gathered around, some woman, my Mom, and my sisters. I remember my knees shaking hard enough to move the table above them. There was a big album to choose from like when you plan a wedding.  I remember feeling like I was floating above my body.  I fought the urge to vomit the entire time I sat there.  Walking out of that store was sweet relief.

By the time Bob got here, I had decided he'd forfeited his right to be there when he told Cory she was crazy and when he told me I could keep my schizophrenic kid.  Yes, I would keep her and I would put her to bed this last time without him just like every year of her childhood. Just like every single year-the sweet smell of her baby scalp, her chubby toddler body, her sturdy little girl body, her gawky pre-teen, long, lanky frame, her young adult body that sometimes shook with tears when the voices were particularly scary and demanding.  "Hold me, Mommy, I'm scared."  Limbic system.  Where were you for this girl?  You show up NOW?
 Was it the right thing to do?  It sure felt like the right thing, but I was quite out of my mind, so I'm not really sure. Protecting her seemed paramount, probably even more so since I had failed to do so when it counted most.  I had all those times he'd hurt her and disappointed her pulled up in my mind ("I lived without you for ten years and I can live without you for ten more") and anyone who had hurt her like that...well, they were not welcome.  Limbic system.

So now, when I look back, I can see I made that decision with my emotions and I start to feel responsible.  But then, I remember that his actions towards Cory happened, regardless of how I felt about them.  Those actions were not my fault, so I cannot be held entirely to blame.  Stand up fathers who treat their children well, who provide for them, who love and care for them their entire lives are seldom turned away from their children's funerals.  You just don't see it much.

 I don't feel good about my decision.
But somehow, I bet Bob doesn't feel too great about his decisions, either.
 It was what it was.  I have to live with my decision of not allowing him to come to the funeral just as he has to live with failing Cory her entire life.  I hope for his sake and his son's that he's doing better by his boy than he did by my girl.

The Good Fight

My approach to the holiday season over the last four years has been "Hell, no, I won't go!".  The only thing missing was a strongly worded sign with a catchy slogan to express my disapproval and objection to the holidays going on without my girl- something I could heft around while marching around my parents' neighborhood, actively making my voice heard. #notwithoutmygirl

It struck me when I woke up one morning this weekend that opting out of family holiday functions has been a protest to Cory's death entirely.  Part of it has been avoidance to the task-it is damn hard work to be around a bunch of joyous people who can touch and hug their children at will.  Underneath the fog of anxiety meds, I would gaze across the room at her empty chair, my eyes would fall on one of my nieces, nephews, or one of my sisters and I would feel the jealousy just swallow me up, covering any kind or decent part of me and turning me into somehow I'm not proud to be.   I'd listen to the casual chatter and laughter, all the while trying my best to figure out how they got to be over there while I was over here in hell.  Cue the guilt, with suicidal thoughts soon to follow.  But underneath it all was the simple fact that I didn't want to acknowledge that she was really gone.

What I figured out pretty quickly was that if I didn't put myself at that table, eating dressing and faking small talk, I could ignore what was happening entirely.  Denial, we meet again.  And again.  And just when I think we've parted ways forever...we might hit each other up just to see how the other has been.  Hey, stranger.  Long time, no see.

The longer I put off coming to or being full present (i.e. not bombed out of my mind on anxiety medication) at holiday events, the longer I could refuse to accept my new reality.  It was more time that I could preserve the past as it was when Cory was here.  And let me tell you, that felt markedly better than sitting there watching the happy families bantering away while my heart shriveled in my chest.  I could be safe in my bed.  If I took enough meds, I could sleep through the whole damn thing.  If had to show up, they'd get my body only, I'd medicate myself right out of the experience.  I'm here, can't say I'm not...but it hurts too much, so I'm not really here. Are you happy now?

It worked quite well for me, so what's the problem?  One problem is the time I gave up with my parents.  I know that someday, all too soon, I will be wishing for five more minutes with them, just five.  And by the time I'm wishing for it, it will be an impossibility.  Losing Cory has taught me that.  It would be a shame to lose the lesson.  What else is her senseless death worth, if not that?

The second problem is that I'm giving up the chance to make new memories with Jacob.  This is his childhood, his adolescence, and his upbringing, too.  He does not deserve to be short-changed.  He is important.  He is worthy.  And even though, our holidays, I suspect, have changed forever and will always have a somber cast to them until he goes off and starts holiday traditions with a family of his own- creating a safe circle in which all participants are alive- they are still special days to share...together.  Watching his face, making him smile, hearing him laugh...these are the things that make living,despite the pain, worth it.  I don't want to sacrifice those moments because it's easier.

So, I'm gonna try to show up for Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners, and...wait for it...  I will try not to be bombed out of my mind. 

Christmas Eve is still open for debate.  I may not make that.  But at least I'm starting to think that at some point I probably should.

Power Nap

Today, while napping, I had my favorite dream- the one in which she's home running around fine and they buried someone else in her box.  I could feel her solid weight as she jumped into my lap and I could breathe her in as I kept asking her if she could believe the whole thing had been a mistake.  Pure joy.  Pure delight.  Utter and sheer relief.  The world was a safe place once again.

I wish I could touch her hair and hold her that close again.  The dream was so vivid and shot my senses fuller than any illegal drug ever could.  Somewhere, even while asleep, my subconscious knew the truth because the paranoia set in, wondering when this sweet respite would come to an end, which it did all too soon.

Oh my, the feeling of her in my arms one more time.  People just don't know if they haven't experienced it.

Here I Am

The question right there at the scene of the accident was, "What have I done?"
By the time her body was prepared and she was lying on that satin pillow, it was, "How did we get here?"
After the shock wore off, it was dully, stolidly, "What is the point?"  My heart was put right into that dark hole in the ground with her.  Let me die.
So much anger followed...anger at the driver, at the paramedics, at the people whose children still lived.  Most of all, there was anger at myself.  And so often, searing hot rage at the people who refused to let me give up, who refused to let me get down in a dark hole in the ground right beside her, in the plot now set aside for my body...that someday, she will never have be there alone, in the dark, again.

Grudgingly, over the last year, I've admitted that continuing to live is the right thing to do.  I seldom entertain thoughts of suicide anymore.  My lens has finally widened enough from the trauma to see Jake in my world- my responsibility to him, but also the joy he brings me every single day.  One thing about losing a child...you no longer take for granted the magic of watching your child breathe and move.  I won't squander that magic.  I won't.

"Let me die."  is basically what I said over and over again for the first three years after Cory's death, sometimes lightly, sometimes bitterly, and all too often with a dangerously flat and practical tone.  It seemed so obviously to be the only way out.  It was not that I was weak or a coward or did not love my family and friends; it was that I could not see a future out of the immense pain that enveloped me every day, and I was tired, so tired.

Here are the people who refused to let me hurt myself, who refused to let me give up, who saw value in me when I no longer saw it in myself, who shook sense into me, who sat uncomfortable, but steady, while I sobbed, screamed, and ranted:  Mom, Dad, Angie, Anna, Nicole, Kim, Bud.  Still others:  Tammy, Roz, Jessica, Susan, Tim, even Jake.

It has been a living hell figuring out how to stay alive without her here.  it has been damn near impossible to manage the guilt that I still cannot fully shake.  But if I had died when I wanted to some two days after her death or any time since then, I wouldn't know the person Jake is today.  I wouldn't be here, standing eye to eye with an incredibly kind, compassionate, smart, funny, and decent young man.  I would not know him.  And that would be another tragedy, one that I actually could have avoided.  Just as I at one time couldn't imagine every living without my Cory Girl, I don't want to imagine not knowing my boy.

Jake and I may not share all the same interests and we can't wear matching outfits (the one time I tried, he gave me the look and I went to go change), but make no mistake, he is my boy.  I am shaping him every day, listening to all the things that are important to him both big and small, asking him his opinion all the time, challenging his thinking, teaching him anything worthwhile I can think to pass along, in hopes that he will grow up to be a good man, a kind man...a good husband and an even better father.

As long as you're alive, Jacob Norman Mansfield, here I am.

Cooking With Pinot Noir

Funny how nostalgia hits late at night over something as silly as a meal you haven't prepared in years.  All at once you find yourself sad for reasons you don't fully understand.

Guilty By Survival

So when you travel for work, you have a lot of time in the car to think.  What I figured out today  is why I hate my birthday so much since Cory died.  Obviously, you're a bit less apt to break out the balloons and streamers when your kid is dead and in the ground; that party spirit just isn't there anymore, at least it isn't for me.  But I think it's more than that.

I turned 43 a few days ago.  I didn't want a special dinner or a cake.  I just wanted to sneak it past with as little fanfare as possible.  Why?  Survivor guilt, of course.  What right do I have to live to be 43 when Cory died at 19.  Nineteen.  I was nineteen when I had her for Pete's sake.  How do I deserve to keep going when she didn't get to?

If Cory had been the one to live, she might've met a man who would love her and care for her, create some stability, be her anchor- show her that some men can be trusted and depended on.  She may have made much better choices for herself than I have and ended up with a healthy, kind, patient man who would be content to sit on a porch swing, holding her hand and watching the corn grow.   She may have had a career that challenged her and made her feel like she was contributing something to the world.  She may have had children and actually kept them alive.  She should've had twenty four more years to do all of that or none of it, but something, anything, just to be here breathing, loving and being loved- she deserved that.

And she would've had that if...
I had went to the stupid store myself.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know:   I "couldn't possibly have foreseen what would happen and made the best possible decision at the time with the information available".  That's what I'm supposed to think and say.  But it doesn't really wash- not in my heart. One different decision on my part could've given her an education, a career, a marriage, a family.  One split second decision could've given her those twenty four years.
 "Hey, Cory, keep an eye on your brother, I'm running to the store for chili powder."

These thoughts run through my mind a lot.  My birthday just makes the fact that I put my life before my child's public knowledge.  Cause here I am another year.  And here she isn't.  Hey look everyone, I killed my kid and lived to tell about it.

I can't believe I fucked it all up in the end.  But I did.  Man, did I ever.

Call Me Maybe

This grief is a sneaky thing.  And, I've found, it often plays dirty, kicking you when you are low.  If I'm stressed or physically not feeling well, chances are, a grief attack will happen, just like it did tonight.

I've been fighting one of those awful early fall head colds all work week, downing sinus tabs, lugging a box of the good kleenex with me on my commute, and forcing myself to go in when I'd much rather be in bed in a ball under the covers with a hot cup of tea on the nightstand.  Today I was able to sleep in and then just lounge around, nursing my symptoms.  I made it through the day okay, distracting myself with Jake, Netflix, and the cuddling company of my dog, Winston.  I decided despite all the rest I'd gotten through the day, turning in early was a good idea, because Monday morning will be here all too soon.

Just as I laid my head down on the pillow, Grief barged right into my settling-down-for-the-night thoughts.  Hey, do you remember how Cory used to call you all the time when you were at work?

Yeah, I sure do.  She'd call to let me know she was home from school.  Then later on when she was being home-based, she'd usually call a couple of times on any given day.  She'd call to let me know Jake was home safe.  She'd call sometimes to ask a question or just say she loved me.  Sometimes she called because she was scared, or she wouldn't come right out and say she was scared, but I could tell she must be because she was obviously anxious and needed to know exactly when I'd be home.

I got so caught up recalling all these different variations that I could hear her voice in my mind, and that's when the tears started rolling down my cheeks.  About that time Depression with all its self-loathing and guilt piped up with this:  Remember that one time you had to tell her to make sure not to call too much when you were at work because you might get in trouble.  Now she'll never call you again.  You will never hear her voice ever again.

Panic sets in.  I will never hear her voice again.  And did I hurt her feelings when I told her to call me only if it was really important?  Did I make her feel unwanted?  Did she die thinking I didn't love her as much as she needed to be loved?  What kind of mother was I?

Grief attack.  Nick down.

More Growing Pains

So Jake is now five foot five, which is one inch taller than Cory was.  It boggles the mind.  I guess it would have been a little funny anyways if she were still here to see him standing taller than her, the same way I feel to be eye to eye with him.  How in the world did that happen? 

 But with her gone, it feels less funny and more sad.  It feels like a time warp, in which your oldest child who'd grown to her fullest height stopped existing before she could see her brother catch up to her or possibly even pass her up.  In a moment, your youngest child becomes your oldest living child, which never feels right, and feels more and more wrong the older he gets and the closer he gets to the age she was when she died.  How can this be?  What strange, horrible new world is this?

And you don't get to be amazed together to see the little baby Jacob who'd really belonged to you both since day one change into a young man right before your eyes. It's not the same when you can't share it with that little mother hen who loved him so dearly...when you can't say, oh my God, Cory, do you remember when he... and.... and...?

And while she was as tall as she'd ever be, you don't get to see her face subtly aging, her stance become a bit more confident, her mannerisms remaining  wholeheartedly Cory-Girl yet beginning to resemble those of a twenty-something young woman instead of a teen.

It will never feel right to live in a world without her.  Nothing that brings joy, even watching my second child grow, remains untainted by the gnawing pain of her absence.  

I still hate my Cory-less world.

A Little Rant, A Little Rave

And the thoughts come fast, fast, fast...same as ever, they never change- "How did this happen?  What did I do wrong?"

While Jake is taking a post-dinner nap, having told me all about his fifth day of high school, I am free to root through pics of Cory and cry silently without making him worry for me.  I stopped to see her twice today- once on the way to work and once on the way home, and I still...STILL...can't reconcile my beautiful girl with that place in the ground.  That second time, on the way home, I had to kneel in front of her and just beg her forgiveness.  I'm so sorry, Cory!  I'm so sorry!!  I should've gone to the store.  I depended on you too much.  It was my responsibility.

See?  Lots of other people still have their girls.  I screwed it all up.

It isn't fair!  And while I can forgive the people who did her wrong while she was alive, I find I'm still not a big enough person to forgive the one who took her life...although that apology has never been offered and probably never will be.  Sometimes you don't get that apology that you think you rightfully deserve.  And you have to move on, anyway.

What is "I'm sorry" after all?  It means nothing.  It changes nothing, really.  Sometimes people say it to get their way.  Sometimes people say it to appease other people.  Sometimes it's a blatant lie.  What I know from my experience in an abusive relationship is that "I'm sorry" is useless and meaningless.  The only time someone is ever really sorry for their actions is when they make the effort not to repeat them...over and over again...and this, of course, would come after owning the shit they did in the first place.

Forgiving someone who hasn't apologized is supposed to bring you peace and lighten your burden.  In many cases, I agree.  I have forgiven Bob for so much for both me and my girl.  But to forgive the driver?  That's somewhere I'm not yet.  To forgive myself?  Somedays I can get there.

Just not today.  Today I feel like a piece of crap who can't even get in front of the person I need to see to tell her if I had it all to do over again, I'd never make the same mistake twice.

You mad?

Yeah, I'm still mad.  But it takes over less often.

I used to be so angry all the time that I felt sick.  Now I do okay most of the time, except when triggered.

I took Jake to freshman orientation at the high school a few days ago, and that was really difficult.  I expected to feel sad and see her around corners- what I didn't expect was to get so angry I could barely see to drive home.  I started thinking about how she started there in ninth grade, just an average girl, braces and skinny, tiny and beautiful, and how the mental illness descended on her, wreaking so much havoc.  I looked around at all those bright, shiny faces just starting out on their high school careers and felt enraged that Cory didn't get to have her time.  She wanted to be at school with her friends.  She wanted to be learning.  She deserved the best years of her life.  She didn't ask for voices or hallucinations, crippling depression, anxiety, or delusions.  Why did such a sweet girl get such a raw deal?  Why my girl?

And the kicker, of course, being that she finally stabilized and was doing remarkably well, only to be hit by a lady who wasn't watching where she was going on her drive home from work.

I went home that night from Central, tears burning, and sort of folded in on myself, having went to a viewing that day that was not only at the same funeral home but also in the same room Cory's casket had once stood.  I loved being strong enough to be there for my friend the way she was there for me, but it was not easy to do.  That being said, I'm so glad I did it.  We help each other as best we can.  That's what we are here for.

The anger that night at Cory's missed youth, stolen by mental illness, burned hot and quick.  The next day, it had dissipated, and I was as okay as I ever am these days.

I can smile at babies now.  I don't hate parents who have live children, although I do sometimes envy them to a covetous degree.  I watch mothers and daughters together now with a desperate ache, but no real hatred.

Then the other day, I had to do CPR and First Aide training at my work place.  You wanna talk triggers?  Oh buddy.  The lingo alone, "non-responsive, no heart beat, not breathing, bleeding that will not stop" completely undid me.   Then there were the videos that outline all the steps to helping save someone's life.  They are so clean cut and so logical...nothing like what I saw on the side of the road.  Not even close.

The whole time all I could think about was being on the scene...what she looked like, my confusion at why nothing was done to help her.  Images of her body popped up as certain words were said "depressed skull"..."bluish tinge"...others.   I kept seeing them cutting her shirt open over and over and over again.  I could feel that same mad fluttering of hope and rush of relief as I realized that meant they were getting the paddles.  She would be ok.  But of course, they didn't get the paddles and she would never be ok again.  It was obvious to everyone but me that she was dead.

So I cried silently.  I stayed through the training.  And afterwards, I found a  friend that I could vent to for a few minutes.  All I really needed was get the poison out to another mother who would understand what crap it was that my girl never even got a shot.  Just what kinda crap was that?  Logically, I can understand now.  I get it.  Nothing could be done.  But in my heart, where my girl lives and breathes forever, there will never be understanding. Never.

 I will always question why nothing was done.  I will always question why she couldn't be spared while others are... if you buy into the whole higher power thing.   Some days I will seethe with the injustice of it all, but at least not every day.  Not anymore.

Progess, not perfection.

The Yes Woman

One of the hardest parts of raising a remaining child after the death of a child is being able to tell them no.  About anything.  I'm not kidding.  I know it sounds ridiculous, but I promise you it's true.

In the beginning, it's the shock.  You don't even notice if your child just had 3 pops in a row, nothing for dinner, and candy before bed.  If you do notice, you're not sure where the pop and candy even came from, aren't sure what the steps are to making a meal, and frankly, who the hell cares?

It goes on this way for some time.  Many, many meals come from a drive-thru window.  Bedtimes are a ridiculous thought since no one is sleeping normally and the entire household has been thrown into unimaginable, dark chaos.

Your child seeks you as his shelter and you provide it, as best you can, most of the time only dully aware that he is even next to you at all.  You are still seeing your girl on the road.  You are still on the road running to her.  You will be there for at least eighteen months.

After the shock, it's a long dark tunnel that spans years.  All any of us could do was survive.  One foot in front of the other, or better, one knee in front of the other as we crawled.  Who cared if your child cleaned his room, ate his veggies, and washed behind his ears?  Once one of your children has waltzed out the door with a smile and never returned, all the small stuff just ceases to matter.

All that good parenting you did before you came upon your child splayed on the road?  It fades away.  Instead you ruminate over the time you disappointed her by saying "No, you can't buy two purses today.  You have to pick one.", You wince thinking of the times you were grouchy with her because you were tired or she was difficult.  You find yourself second-guessing the times you wouldn't let her date the wrong boy whose red flags were a mile long.  Shouldn't I have let her have any small happiness her heart desired, even if she may have gotten terribly hurt in the process?

See, cause if all those "good decisions" came to a bloody, broken end, what's the point, anyways?  That's what you will think for a long time because you are hurt and angry and broken yourself.  You will also be stingy with your love for a little while just because you can't bear to think of loving this next child just as much as you loved the first only to have him snatched away from you at a second's notice, and put into a box, too.

Finally, after way too long, you give your love freely because your other child is worth it and being a coward is no way to live.

But you still don't want him to be denied any small pleasure that you can by any stretch of the imagination afford, because what if you were to say no and he died at school the next day?  What if he got hit by a car walking home from the bus stop? You'd have to carry that with you for the rest of your days, and with the don't-breathe-on-me-at-the-movies and keep-your-hair-out-of-your-soup thoughts already in there, there's just not much room left.  You also tend to do almost everything for him because it feels good to take care of him when you can no longer do anything for his sister.

But then, suddenly one day, it occurs to you.  What if he doesn't  die?  What if he lives and has been given anything he wanted and was never told no only as an insurance policy against your parental regret?  What if he grows used to having everything done for him and not contributing to the household or world around him?  What kind of man would he be?

This is why I am beginning to say no sometimes and let my teenage son be disappointed.  This is why I am beginning to make him wait for things that he really wants.

I catch myself sometimes wavering and wanting to sayyes to whatever he asks for because it is true, he could die tomorrow- look what happened to Cory.

But then I remember that being a good mom isn't about preparing them to get everything they want right away in case they die.  It's about raising a child into a young adult who can handle being told no, who can wait for things they really want, who starts to look at the decisions they are making, and the consequences of their actions.   Those are life skills, not death skills.  I can only go forward thinking Jake will live.  He may not, but in the meantime, I'm filling his toolbox with the things he needs to know if he does.

Retail Therapy

Fall fashion used to be my favorite thing in the world.  I could easily go without buying a single spring or summer item if it meant I completely indulge when the cozy sweaters, bright tights, and boots hit the stores.  Dresses, tights, and boots have long been my favorite outfit in the world to wear.  With a Dooney tossed over my forearm to balance myself while walking in those heels,  I was a force to be reckoned with from late August till the snow flew.  Man, those were the days.

After Cory died, I spent about a year keeping up the facade.  Once I returned to work, I returned to fashion as a distraction.  Maybe I thought if I continued to look put together, I would act put together...kinda the way Cory used to hold herself so tightly together until she was home in her safest place.  Or maybe I thought if I preserved the way I presented myself to others, nothing would change. Preserving things is the most important task when your child dies.

I also shopped with wild abandon.  The first foray to a store after she was buried was with my oldest and dearest friend, Nicole, who took me to Kohl's.  I remember walking around in a daze, touching things Cory would like and feeling my chest cave in.  I did not like being there in a place we'd been so many times without her, and yet I couldn't leave.  So instead, I just piled everything I thought she might like into one of their little black carts and hauled all that shit up to the register.  Swipe.

Since going out places was so difficult, I started shopping online instead.  Within months, I had so many clothes, I was running out of room to store them.  But it kept me busy.  If there's one thing I can do, it's build an outfit.

All that fell flat eventually.  No matter how cute of an outfit I managed to come up with, I couldn't show it to  Cory and I couldn't let her borrow it.  In the end, the clothes stayed in my drawers, and I started to show up to work mismatched, wrinkled, and frankly, a little smelly.  I stopped wearing makeup and the only thing I did to my hair most of the time was stuff a hat over it.

Since Cory died, I've gotten my hair cut just often enough to avoid being called out on it at work, but nothing special.  No highlights.  No lowlights.  No faceframing layers.  My hair couldn't even remember its last acquaintance with deep conditioner.

So, I got my hair done a couple of days ago.  I've decided when I get Jake's school clothes, I'll get a couple things for my work wardrobe, too.  I've put myself on a strict behavior plan to wear heels to work at least twice a week.  We'll see how this goes.

The last time I was at Macy's, I wandered through the handbags out of sheer habit, and after I'd fondled a few, I saw one Cory would've went bananas over.  It was leather, caramel colored, and sort of a slouchy bohemian saddlebag kinda thing but with some hardware and studs to glam it up.  I opened it up and looked inside, imagining all her things resting inside and being carried around by a beautiful, funny, silly young woman who could walk and talk, laugh and cry because she was alive and existed in the same world as me, above ground.  I desperately wanted to take it home with me, but I reluctantly set it back on the shelf, ever so gently, not only because it cost two hundred dollars, but because  the one thing I learned with all that shopping is that buying things only made me feel better for moments at a time, and no object, no matter how desirable, could fill the gaping hole in my heart.  She is not coming back and  I've had to learn how to cope with that in a way that doesn't keep me in debt up to my eyeballs.

The Chow Wagon and Other Things That Make Me Sob

My husband, Tim texted me the other day to tell me he was thinking of Cory, and remembering how when she was a little girl, she'd decided to start her own small business.  She bought dog treats, repackaged them with fancy names and stickers and resold them to family and friends out of her plastic Little Tikes knock off, aptly named The Chow Wagon.  "Remember how mad she was when we went to the mall in Kalamazoo and saw The Barkery?  Someone had totally ripped off her business plan!"  Yes, indeed, she was furious.

I see that little girl, so full of life and ideas, and wonder what it would have been like to know back then that she had only ten or eleven years left...to see it all, do it all, say it all?   Would I have raised her any differently?  Treated her differently? What would it have been like to have known the clock was ticking to an early death?

 I can see her on the first day of school, each year, standing for her required photo in the dining room, new back pack hiked up on her narrow shoulders and it's almost too much to bear. Back to school time holds so many triggers.  No more new beginnings for my girl. Eff you and your tears of the time passing and your child being in such and such grade.  Be happy your child is standing before you passing the time at all.  You are lucky, so, so lucky.  I hope you never know how lucky.

Tim somehow only talks about the good times, and smiles when he says her name. I have no idea how he does it unless it's because he never knew the new baby smell of the top of her head or watched her take her first steps.   I try to remember her with joy and purpose, but I usually end up tearing up, sobbing in mid-story, and at times of high stress, become completely consumed by my memories of the road.  They invade my workday, my drive home, and my sleep.  I don't want to remember her that way, but I cannot seem to escape it.

And when I remember the good times?  It's not the gentle comfort thing Dr. Z always promises.  Instead, it pushes that panic button in the center of my chest that screams, "You will never see her again!!!!  You will never see her again!!!  CORY!!!  I'm talking about CORY!!!"  Terror.  Sheer terror envelops me, a thick, black fog, and first I think I will die from the pain, and then slowly it dawns on me that I won't.  Somehow that's the worst thing of all.

Paperwork

I'm finally getting around to some much needed de-cluttering.  I spend an evening last week sorting through the horrid landing ground of a small shelving unit in my dining room.   Everything on it should've been filed away or thrown away sometime in the last four years, but the shock and trauma of Cory's death, followed by debilitating depression prevailed. Go through papers?  I struggled to pay bills and cook meals.  But since those things have been going better lately, I finally faced the stacks.

I had to stop two or three times during the process, and slip away to watch something funny on youtube or joke with Jake.  In those stacks were the following items, each a horror to stumble across:  the police report of the accident, the receipt for Cory's plot at the cemetery, the detailed funeral bill, the quote for her monument, including the many e-mails back and forth with the designer about frost lines and installation, and something I'd never laid eyes on before...her death certificate.  Looking at that single piece of paper challenged every bit of progress I've made in the seven months.  I wanted to run away, straight out my back door and into the street, but I didn't.  I wanted to go gulp down a handful of Ativan, but surprising, even to me, I didn't.  I went to the safe haven of my room, took some deep breaths, distracted myself, and came back.

Not gonna lie to you- I harbored some of the same crazy thoughts as I did so...coming back and back and back again to the police report to the driver's name and address.  Whenever anyone kindly tells me I'm strong to have survived losing my child, I think maybe the strong part comes in when I resist the urge to go hunt that woman down.

And finally at the very bottom of the last shelf were a couple of non-official papers that wrung my heart until it dripped.  One was an I.O.U.  typewritten declaring that Cory Mansfield owed Jacob Mansfield owed three dollars, due at the end of March, with a dollar per week interest charges to be incurred with late payment.  They had both signed it.  I just bawled.

What could be worse?
 I found a spiral bound single subject notebook covered with Cory's careful print that listed all the plans for her nineteenth birthday party, had just months before the accident.  I smiled as I sobbed to see she started out with a list of over fifty guests:  childhood friends, current friends, church members, past and current teachers, and family.  I'm sure I quite crushed her bubble when I said the budget would require cutting it down to her closest handful of friends.  When told that, she decided on an American Girl doll tea party.  A few pages farther, I found a few different outfits down to tights and shoes that her doll might wear and various hairstyles.  In the end, she'd realized not everyone she had invited owned an American Girl doll, and subsequently switched the theme to a Twilight party.

She asked for little.  She wanted to include everyone.  As I scanned over the list again, I was pretty sure everyone she'd originally set out to invite to the celebration had ended up coming to her funeral,..absolutely no consolation.  Did I screw up again?  Should I have found a way to throw a huge blowout for her nineteenth birthday?  I sure wish I had, considering it was the last birthday party she would ever had and the last chance to be surrounded by all those people she cared about.  Amazing on how time produces all sorts of new things to feel guilty about and the pot of regret just grows and stews.

That was all I could handle in one setting and the shelves were empty.  The next day I looked at the wooden bench under the dining room windows that had become Cory's locker.  I lifted it, glimpsed a peek at all her school supplies, folders, and notebooks, and shut it back with a bang.  Nope.  Not going there.  Not ready.

Instead I cleared away some of miscellaneous items that keep collecting on the top.  Once those were gone, I stood and looked at her pink purse, not moved since the day she walked out my back door.  I looked at it for a really long time, walking over and peeking down inside, jerking my eyes away as if my retinas were burn right out if I lingered too long.  I tried to go through it once or twice since the accident, and fled in horror each time.  This day was no different.  Eventually I called Jake in and asked him what he thought...should it stay right where it was?  Should we move it?  If so, where?  I explained I didn't want, couldn't bear, actually, the thought of "putting her away".  He nodded silently.  We discussed at length how we felt ready to try to make our environment more orderly but we don't want her to be, in any way, not present in our everyday lives.  The "carry in your heart" stuff is lovely and all, but I'm a concrete sorta person- I need an object I can touch.  I need to lay my hands on the fact that she was here, that she was mine.  So in the end, we agreed on this:  we'd take her dozen scarves or so off the nearby coat tree, move them to her room, and hang her pink purse on the coat tree instead.

Feeling most disloyal, I picked it up and moved it approximately one foot from its original resting place.  I waited to see what I felt after it was done and watched Jake's face carefully.  "She's ok with that, Mom."  he said.  Jake, who never cries...who I don't remember seeing cry much since the funeral at all, teared up and hugged me hard.  How appropriate that this small but significant decision belong to us two and that we have equal say.  She had lived with us and shared our lives more closely than she shared any one else's.  We'd had a front seat to the best times and the worst times, some more scary than anything that should ever happen to a child, a teenager, or an adult.  She was ours. Our Cory Girl.

I looked over at her purse hung on the coat tree and decided it was ok.  Of course, I realize I just did that hoarder's trick of moving stuff from one space to another without really getting rid of anything, but maybe that's ok, too. Maybe in this case, any movement is more important than the distance travelled.

Lay Me Down

We buried Cory four years ago today.

I've felt some relief having had her death day pass six days ago.  Some of the weight slipped off my chest.  Then I opened my Facebook today and a flood of memories popped up, one on them reminding me that it is the eleventh of July and just what significance that date will always hold for me.  I don't count it down like I do the day of her death.  It somehow always takes me by surprise.  

They say you don't remember days, you remember moments.  But buddy, I remember so much of this particular day, so many moments- 

I couldn't sleep a single wink the night before...how do you sleep the night before you bury your child?  Tim ran around the house that morning a nervous wreck, practicing his speech and asking me over and over again how old was Cory when we met...was she four?  Four, right?  Jacob in his shirt and tie, looking so small lost, his eyes eating up his face. One of the most painful moments of my life:  watching them shut the lid of her casket.  How did this happen?  How did we get here?  Feeling outside my body at the cemetery as I watched my nephews carrying her casket from the hearse to the grave site.  The final words, of which I remember none, that were spoken, nor who said them, only the fierce panic as the clock counted down the minutes until they would put my baby down there in the dark.  Feeling disassociated again at the funeral luncheon as people around me ate and talked and laughed quietly. Food being pressed on me that I refused. Our snap decision to have sparklers outside the luncheon for everyone because she had died on the fifth and our fourth had been busy, and we'd neglected to get sparklers for the kids...I held onto a sparkler someone handed me, realizing maybe for the very first time that this was real and not a nightmare.  I held onto that sparkler feeling like I might just fall off the face of the earth; my pain was too great and my mind couldn't cope. At one point everything around me faded away, everyone seemed to disappear and the volume of the world turned down low enough for me to hear the blood pumping in my ears.   I 'm still here, still alive, while she's not.  How is that fair?  Setting my alarm to nap an hour when we got home and getting right back up to go check on her at the cemetery.  Going there and seeing her plot filled in with fresh dirt...it bent my body over with the brutal truth of it all.  That turned earth was just too honest.  But still my mind tried to reject the blatant evidence..  I remember wanting to shush everyone who stood beside me.  I was listening for her.  Maybe this had all been some horrible mistake.

Mostly when I first woke up this morning, I relived this day in a five minute reel in my head.  The feelings were as genuine as the day they first happened, and as my mom would say,  the tears just rolled.  I'll go on about my day now, and take comfort in Jake and my dog.  I'll do my chores and make dinner.  I'll smile and laugh because it's ok to be sad, but it's ok to be happy, too.  What I remember  most about this day every time it comes around, what is undeniable, is that the eleventh of July, 2012, is the day so much color was taken out of my world.  Putting it back?  It's a crap job, there's never enough to get it completely restored, and I can't do it alone.  Good thing I have family and friends to help, and I just do the best I can.

My Hypocrisy

So look...

I got really frustrated with Jacob yesterday...sweet, mild-mannered, easy-going Jacob.  I know.  I can't believe it, either.  He has to be the most compliant fourteen year old out there.

We'll take the sexist PMS thing right off the table.  Maybe we'll replace it with the fact that this particular week of the year I am pretty much an unpredictable grab bag of strong emotions.

What happened?

Well, Jake and I went to grab some dinner at Subway the other night.  I have been trying to go grocery shopping for about five days now.  How do you try, but fail, at something so simple as going grocery shopping?  It's the same as anything else, you procrastinate.  With Cory's death date looming, the last things in the free world that I want to be doing are grocery shopping and/or cooking dinner since these activities prompted the errand that put her in harm's way.

I made a joke the other day to my sister about it:  I'm just gonna embrace it and eat my way through the fifth of July, one restaurant at a time.  Where else can I run to?  Italy is not in the budget this year.  So even though it's not very affordable and not particularly healthy,  Jake and I have been eating out night after night after night, always with my weak promise to hit the store the next day and make enchiladas for dinner at home like a good mother.
  There are worse ways to cope, trust me.

So back to Subway.  I was halfway through having my sandwich made when I realized the handsome young man preparing it was Cory's friend's little brother.  I can't believe I didn't recognize him at first, but his hair was tied back and he looks like a young man now and not a boy.  Sure enough, when I glanced down at the hands preparing my food, there was a purple Cory bracelet around one wrist.  She is not forgotten.

This one single act massaged some salve onto my bleeding heart, and I felt better for the first time in days...the last time being when I noticed that my nephew had worn his Cory bracelet in his wedding pictures.  She is not forgotten.

And while I sometimes think perusing Facebook just makes me feel worse...a playground of all the happy people with their weddings and babies, the posts and pictures from Cory's friends have started to pop up.  She is not forgotten.

But back to Jake and Subway- I asked Jake once again why he doesn't wear Cory's bracelet.  He shrugged at first, then said, "They're too big."  If you haven't seen Jake lately, he's as tall as I am.  Maybe the bracelet was too big four years ago, but I doubted it to be true now.  I took one off my wrist and had him try it on.  He humored me, demonstrating how it fell down over his hand if his arm hung down slack.  I showed him how mine did the the same exact thing; we are a slim-wrist people.  He handed it back to me, saying maybe he would wear it later.

"Is it because it's purple?  Are you afraid people will say it's girly?"  I pressed.

"Maybe."  he answered.  I answered this with a canned speech about gender-bias and then laid out all the examples of strong males in his life who wear the purple proudly.

He listened, but didn't respond, and certainly didn't ask for a bracelet.

So that hole in my heart just got bigger.  When I feel like Cory isn't being being seen, I go into fight mode.  I pointed out that I didn't think the nice young man at the counter even knew Cory very well, but her death and her life had obviously touched him.  "You were her brother, Jake.  So what if someone asks what the purple bracelet is for?  It will give you a chance to say her name and tell them about her.  Don't you want to do that?"

As he does in almost all conflicts of opinion, Jake went silent.  His message was clear.  No, he didn't want to say her name, and he didn't want to talk about her.

Since I struggle so deeply to understand this, I just went ahead and made things worse by saying, "Jacob, if things were reversed, if you had died, and Cory were here, don't you think she'd wear your bracelet?"

Monstrous, I know.

I am the first one to call shit on someone telling me how to grieve.  The ones who tell me to move on, move forward, do this do that, stop dwelling...what do I say to them?  You have no right.  You have no idea what you would do if it happened to you.  So obviously I'm a complete hypocrite, because I can't make that stick when it comes to someone else.

And Jake's not the only one.  I don't understand why Tim doesn't go to the cemetery unless I prompt it.  It used to hurt me deeply that Cory's biological father didn't post pictures and memories of her often on Facebook.  To me, it looked like his life just went on, with little interruption.  To this day, I don't know if he's been to her grave, at all.  One of Cory's cousins hasn't been either, to my knowledge, and it remains a steady, raw ache.  See her.  Acknowledge her.  

Like it or not, the way our culture handles grief has shaped my views.  I fight many of them, but some remain. Pay your respects.

But is that any better than the "be strong", "move on", "stoic in public, crying is for private" crap I abhor?

I don't like it, and I will always be hurt for her- when people don't speak of her, show outward signs of their grief, show up to her grave,,, but it's really not my place to dictate.  How would I like it if someone told me I had to go to the cemetery every day or else that meant I didn't love her?  I held myself steady to that expectation for months after the accident and it nearly burnt me out.  When the crisis worker told me that I should stop going so often, that it meant nothing about my love for her or my ability to mother, that was freeing.  Going there every day to her final resting place would surely have driven me to suicide years ago.

For me, I hate going to the cemetery, but I could never not go.  There is an undeniable pull to visit the place where her precious bones lay.  There is little comfort in running my hands over the letters of her name, in letting my tears wet the grass above where she lies, in kissing her monument when I leave-it will never measure to kissing her face, not even the cold marble it had become the last time I saw her -, but all the same, I couldn't imagine not doing those things.

But maybe Jacob can't imagine being asked about his sister in math class and having to trot out the horrific story, becoming teary and vulnerable in front of  his peers.  That doesn't mean he doesn't love her and miss her deeply.  The bracelet?  It's a lovely gesture, and it makes my heart smile every time I see someone wearing one.  But Jacob?  He has nothing to prove.

The Death-Versary

And so it almost here again- the death-versary.  The dread begins with the first truly hot day of the season and ends not the day of her death, but maybe by September?

Every single failure, guilt, and horror are trotted out for my perusal.

Hey, remember how the night before she died, you told her to stop breathing on you at the movies?  

Yeah.  I did that.  I told her to stop breathing on me at The Amazing Spiderman, and not even twenty four hours later, she would never breathe again.

I can't believe you scolded her for eating with her hair in her soup at Panera's...that was the last meal she ever ate.  How could you?

Yeah, I did that, too.

Hey, don't forget how when you got home from the movies that night, you holed yourself up in your room to work on your paper for class, and probably made her feel like she wasn't as important as your grade point average.  Good job there, dumb ass.

All the rest are darting images and feelings...none in order, all that cut and hit and knock me flat:

The casket lid being closed...running down the road, slap-thud-slap-thud..."Love you, bye!" ...I killed her...I killed my baby...that's it, then, it's over, can I be done now?...please don't let this be real...why aren't they doing anything?  where are the freaking paddles? ...her name is on the board, people are coming to see her BODY because she's DEAD...does it matter where we put her?  does it matter, it's all just a hole in the ground!!...God doesn't exist, he wasn't there...her shoes were still tied...how fast do you have to be going to embed your vehicle's paint on...things...?..."You sure you don't mind, Cory, it's awfully hot out there?"

Lost

Jake and I have been rewatching Lost on Netflix these last couple of weeks- at least two episodes before bedtime, sometimes three.  Cory, Jake, and I watched the entire series together years ago, Jake being the brains of the operation as we all struggled to follow the plot, but in all actuality he was only eight or nine at the time, so for him, it's like a brand new show...he has forgotten all but the major characters and basic premise.  Me, though?  I remember most of it, and especially what it was like to watch it cuddled up on the couch with Cory on one side and Jake on the other, one of us always  called out for hogging the blanket.

We did Lost Pizza Night for the first couple of seasons, and I'd make homemade pizza.  We'd eat in front of the tv (shameful, I know, but quite delightful, really).  Then we went through the phase of baking cookies or brownies.  There was always something to share.

I remember how fun, if slightly awkward, it was for Cory and I to find ourselves lusting over Sawyer and Sayid with equal enthusiasm.  She used to say that whenever Sawyer entered a scene, I would thrust my chest out involuntarily.  Maybe I did.  She spent her fair share of time fanning herself at the sight of Sayid's burning gaze, so we were pretty even.

 I didn't experience anything like it with my mother until we went to Italy together years later and helplessly drooled over all those beautiful men.  Also, Mom has quite the crush on Liam Neilson, which I don't share, but quite enjoy watching.  It is so cute.

Invariably, I'll find myself crying while watching an episode of Lost with Jake because I can so clearly remember what it felt like when she was here and we were all together, our bodies in a line, shoulder to shoulder, everyone warm and alive... when the only danger was make-believe on the screen and our circle of safety was still intact.

  I haven't quite figured out how to remember her without it tearing me apart.  I wish I had a magic sieve so all the happy moments could float right to the top and  all the pain of her not being here would retreat down the drain. I wonder if that ever happens.  I kind of doubt it.  I think you can't have one without the other.  They are seamless, unavoidable partners.

To love and to remember her- it comes at a cost.  So if I seem to be embracing my suffering- as some have accused me of- I can only say, I won't move on without her.  I will never leave her behind.  And if it hurts to do so...so be it.  She's worth it.

If anyone figures out a better way- you know, a way to time travel, a cure for PTSD, or happens to invent that magic sieve, let me know.  I'd be all over it.

Duck Duck Goose

 I saw a little girl at Pizza Hut tonight that reminded me so much of Cory at that age, it completely unnerved me.  She didn't really look like her, you understand; she behaved like her.  I smile a little now to report the two or three year old with the whispy Pebbles ponytail that I saw was quick on the move, listening to none of her parents' scoldings as she made for the kitchen with a certain determined flair.  Her mother pulled her back as she marched her way past the register, and I could see her wide eyed expression as she was toted back to the table (with a modest swat on her plump little fanny):  not fazed in the least.  She waited a couple of minutes- perhaps for her parents to catch their breaths- before giving it another go.  

Have I mentioned that Cory quite knew her own mind from a young age?

The first date I went on with my husband was dinner at the local Chinese restaurant.  Cory went with us, and spent the majority of the meal under the table quacking like a duck.  This bothered me very little, as I found her very entertaining, but I fully expected to never hear from Tim again.  He already didn't strike me as a kid kinda guy, and Cory was not the seen-and-not-heard type of child.  

So I stalker-watched this little girl at Pizza Hut and restrained myself from going over to the family's table to tell them that although this little lady might be a wee bit challenging at times, she was also full of life in a way a merely quiet, fully-compliant-at-all-times child would never be.  I wanted to tell them to take it easy on her because it wouldn't matter in ten years that she needed to sit under the table instead of at it, because she would eventually learn to do it, and while she did, she would probably make them shriek with laughter until their sides hurt.  In short, she would be their delight, as Cory was mine.  

How do you measure grief?  Can it be measured?  Sure it can.  How much of your heart did she occupy when she was here?  That's how empty it will be when she's gone.  How many of the dark corners of your soul did she set alight with her eyes, her voice, her laugh?  If there were many...if it was all of them...well, my friend, you are screwed.  I've always been an all or nothing sort of girl, so yeah, there's that.

I spent the rest of dinner thinking about this one certain toy Cory had when she was a toddler.  It was a washer and dryer combo from KayBee toy store at the mall, which was kind of a big deal as most of her toys came from the Dollar Store except for what Santa brought once a year.  I remember worrying she didn't have enough doll clothes to do a proper load, and how I raided the kitchen drawers for dishrags to fill the gap.  But in the end, she wanted to wash her baby dolls.  Maybe some of her pretend kitchen food...a chicken leg here, an ear of corn there.  She was content as could be.  I can see her now, all chubby cheeks and stubby pony tail, laboriously stuffing that washing machine with babies until the door would barely shut, opening it up now and again to stuff in an errant limb.  

She knew exactly what she wanted to do, and how to do it.  

She always did.

Managing Expectations

Tonight, I caught myself in one of those situations that was absurd, yet completely typical.

Crying while remembering Cory?  I do it all the time.  Sometimes I start crying and then get caught up in something else...my phone beeps or the dog barks to be let in or Jake calls my name.  Tonight, all three happened, and I was well into putting Winston into his safety harness with Jake, playing ventriloquist in my most convincing seven month old puppy voice before I felt the tears were still on my face, having grown cold there.

Jake didn't notice, and I rather suspect that I've cried so much since the death of his sister, he considers it my baseline behavior.  What struck me was that I could be engaged with Jake, quite properly, but still aching so much that the tears came and continued, whether I was aware of them or not.

That is what it is to bury your child.  I get dressed and pour juice and pay bills and do laundry and drive and feed pets and joke with my son.  I work and sleep and argue with my husband.  I watch movies and laugh and read and draw.  I do it all while watching that wretched sheet float down over her body.  I do it all while watching them lower her coffin into the ground.  It's not the easiest multi-tasking, let me tell you.  But I do it.  I hate it.  But I do it.

Moving forward is staying alive.  Full stop.

Mail Call

Cory loved Frida Kahlo, as do I.   I browsed the internet tonight just to look at some of her paintings, ended up on Amazon looking at book collections of the famous artist, and finally, much to my indignation, discovered there are not only such things as Frida Kahlo stickers out there, but there are also Frida Kahlo paper dolls.  What the hell?  Does all the cool stuff come out after 2012 or what, people?

This too-late-to-do-my-Cory-Girl-any-good discovery came on the heels of getting yet another piece of mail addressed to her out of my mailbox today.  Punch in the stomach, one and two.

The mail to my dead child I can't stop, even when I notify the senders.  The stickers and dolls?  They will be waiting in the mailbox to comfort the next possible blow in 7-10 business days.  Thank you, Amazon.

Coping

The pain doesn't go away.  It doesn't get smaller.

Instead the way I cope with it has changed a bit.

One Ativan instead of seven.  Or twelve.

I'm not wiping out my car while under the influence of my anti-anxiety meds; I just don't leave my house very much.

I don't shop to distract myself.  I read or binge-watch on Netflix.  Put me in any other world, any other situation but this one.

I don't buy every art supply under the sun; I just rarely make art anymore.

It's cheaper, maybe even healthier at times, but only effective until I pull my head out of the current book or finish up the last episode of the show I'm currently hooked on.  Caught up on Grey's Anatomy.  All done with Orange is the New Black till Season Four.  Racing to the end of House of Cards.

Then what?  Well, then I remember that she's still dead...that Jacob is fourteen and lost to his computer games and that my husband would rather sleep fourteen hours a day than do anything else in the world.

I am alone.  I am still. There is way too much time to think.
 I'm not wrecked on prescription meds and I'm not racking up debt, but I am wracked with guilt.  If only I had went to the store myself.  She would live.

But I didn't, and she died.  The line between those two facts is only too easy to draw.  Is it so surprising that some days I just want to shut it all down?

Play It Again

There are always more tears.  Always more.

Sometimes you may think you've learned to control your grief, and that's when it sneaks up on your from behind and puts a sack over your head, drags you off some remote country road, and bends you over something right there in the dirt before leaving you for dead.

Anything can bring it on.

Sirens and uniformed officers work well for me.

The whole distraction thing only goes so far.  Be a S.T.A.R. Take a deep breath.  In the moment, it works fairly well.  Then two days later, while innocently flipping through pictures, you are suddenly bent at the waist sobbing until you can't breathe and start to dry heave.

She is gone. Really gone.  No more Cory Girl.

I want to die.

It's been the only solution that offers even a glimmer of hope.  That's the really dangerous thing about suicidal thoughts- they are inviting, they are always available, they always come back for you.  They never leave you completely alone.  An end to pain.  An end to the milestones she missed.  An end to watching the apparently more deserving folks soak that all in.

Gonna burn in hell anyway since I don't believe in God anymore.  Or wait, I guess there'll be no hell to burn in, will there?  I haven't quite got my post-Cory's-death belief system worked out yet.  Agnostic?  Athiest?  Beats the hell out of me.

I am weary.  I am tired of trying to be ok when I'm not.  I'm tired of being a failure at everything I do now that she's gone.  I'm tired of hurting all the time.  ALL the goddamn time, because even the happy moments are overshadowed by her absence.  This whole deeper joy thing the grief books promise is a load of horseshit.  I promise you.  I do not feel deeper joy because I have lost someone who meant everything to me.  I am not living more fully because of my new found relationship with death.

I'm tired of being the complainer.  But I won't lie either.  It doesn't get easier.  It doesn't soften.  And the worst part is so few people understand what I mean.  Even the people who love me most and try their hardest don't really understand what it means to lose your child.

 I realized this fully a few days ago when my mother recalled the day she watched her first daughter to be married back out of her driveway for the last time...the heartbreak, the tears, the very real sorrow.  She was devastated.  And I'm sure she was.  But like...take that and multiply it by a million and you might be in the neighborhood of what it feels like to see your child's coffin lowered into the ground.  Maybe.

And this isn't their fault that they don't understand.   It just is what is.  And so you find yourself alienated from most everyone you know...feeling alone in a familiar crowd, when you aren't busy feeling sick with jealousy, envy, and anger.

Am I supposed to be more empathetic because of my loss?  I think I am, but most of the time I can't help myself from following up every person's problem with "yeah, but at least your child isn't dead" in my head.  If I can stop myself from saying it aloud, that's a good day.   Bet I make a great friend right about now.

Hobby Lobby

If Michael's arts and crafts store is my place, then Hobby Lobby was Cory's.  So sometimes when I am missing her unbearably, I go there just to walk through the aisles and remember her.  I went there yesterday.

I could see the ghost of her next to me in front of the candy colored tubes of acrylic paint...excited to be buying art supplies, eyes bright with possibilities.  If I remember correctly, they used to run about four bucks a pop, so I'll tell her to pick out five.  Five were never enough, and maybe because I didn't make art at that time, I didn't realize how difficult a task it was to narrow down all those glorious colors to a mere handful.  Why didn't I buy her a cartful?  What kind of mother was I?

The tears begin, and through them, I spy a few of her favorite colors, touch them, needing some type of confirmation that yes, she did once exist, yes, we did come here together all the time, laughing and talking.  Think of the good times...cherish those memories.  Isn't that the trite advice given by people who aren't in this situation, safe to dole out stupid one liners that they will never fully understand?  It's such crap because placing yourself back there often burns even more.  Never again?  Never???

Then you begin to beat yourself up for stupid shit like not buying your child two hundred dollars worth of acrylic paint at a time.  I was furious with myself about this.  How could I have limited her creativity?  Limited her experience?  Especially considering that she only had a short time to develop as an artist.  There were only so many trips to Hobby Lobby in her future.  There was only so much time left to paint.  Only so many canvases left to fill.

Speaking of canvases, I turned the corner and wandered towards that aisle.  I took one peek down there and fled in shame.  She'd always wanted a truly gigantic canvas and I'd dragged my feet, letting her practice first on a great succession of 8 x 10s, 11 x 14s, even 16 x 20s...but never took the plunge on that cover-the-wall-behind-your-couch-fully sized canvas.  Now it's too late.  No dainty earrings for her and no wall encompassing paintings.  Failed her.

I escaped into an aisle of scrapbook stickers, and let me just share that those can be pretty damn depressing.  You wouldn't really figure stickers to prompt sorrow, but they are milestone heavy:  graduation, wedding, baby, family vacations.  It's enough to make a bereaved mother want to just lay down and give up.

There really aren't a lot of scrap booking/art journaling materials out there to honor grief, the passing a loved one, or any type of sad occasion.  This is why I was so ridiculously excited to come across some Day of the Dead stickers at an expo with my friend a few weeks ago.  Finally, someone has acknowledged that my loved one died.

Of course, that's pretty much the only item I've ever seen of the sort, so I will continue to take my sad selfies and draw my "grief girls" as an artist friend of mine calls my drawings.  Someone needs to illustrate this experience- why should only the happy occasions get playtime? I struggle to feel it at all.

Finally, after walking past the sketching pencils and feeling my heart sort of turn in on itself, as I remembered a certain Christmas that consisted of art supplies and squeals of joy, I could take no more.  Having gained no real comfort in walking the aisles-,just reminders of what I'd lost, I made for the door.

On the way out, I stopped at a display of journals, and paused, my eyes having landed on a little girl style of journal with a cat on the front and a feathered pen.  I picked it up and transported myself back in time to Limited Too at the Kalamazoo mall with a eight or nine year old Cory Girl.  There was a nightgown/diary set, pale yellow background with a popcorn print.  She had to have it, and I couldn't have been more delighted to give it to her.  She was adorable in that little spaghetti strapped popcorn nightgown, and I can still see her blonde head bent studiously over the popcorn diary (which had a matching pen and was, indeed, scratch and sniff).  My heart leapt in my chest to see her recording her thoughts and impressions so seriously...she likes to write, she's going to be a writer just like me!

That memory while I stood in the aisle of Hobby Lobby with that stupid cat journal in my hands was so crisp and so clear.  She was close enough to touch...and completely unreachable.  Someone might as well punch their way through my chest cavity, grab up my heart, and pull it right out of my body.

I put the journal down, tears still streaming, and ran to my car in the parking lot where I could sob in private.

Four years in July.  This is still my day to day life.  It hasn't gotten better.  It hasn't gotten easier.  The people who say it will?  Full of crap.