A Story of Addiction & Loss

Tag: mothers grief (Page 1 of 5)

Walking On Thin Ice


Matt,   It’s 5:21 on January 2nd.   Six years ago you were still alive.   I remember our conversation.   It was Saturday evening and you were on your way home to the sober home where you were staying in Boca Raton.  I remember looking at the clock it was 6:23.   We chatted about your day and promised to catch up again later that night.

That next call never came.  Little did I know that our conversations would never take place again.   We ended our conversation with our usual I love you thinking our future would be filled with many more talks.

As I write this letter I can feel my throat tighten and tears forming in my eyes.   I can feel the shock and disbelief wrapping itself around my heart.  It’s called muscle memory as the body never forgets trauma.

Tomorrow marks the sixth anniversary of your death.    Some days it feels like it’s been forever since I’ve heard your voice.    Other days it feels like yesterday.

The New Year is always tough for me.   This year it’s full of uncertainty and grief.   Sunday is the 3rd.   Your anniversary.  The weather will be rainy and bitter.   Mimicking my heart.   Monday l have my second CT scan checking to see if my cancer treatment has been successful.  I will be holding my breath and praying until I hear what I will be facing.   More down time or more treatment.

So I now mourn your death and my health.   I sometimes wonder if the cancer was caused by years of second guessing decisions made that led to your death.   Years of grieving and guilt for what might have been.   Years of wondering about If Heaven truly exists and if you are healed living in Paradise.   Years of wondering if I will ever see you again.   Wondering what death is like and if we will be together when my time comes.

I feel like I’m walking on ice.   On a frozen pond trying to get to the other side.   Some areas are solid and stable.   As I continue my journey I find areas that are cracking beneath my feet.   I can feel the frozen water seeping through my shoes as I wonder if I will make it to the other side before I fall through.

My journey since your death has been one I could have never prepared myself for.   Parents are never prepared to say goodbye to their children.   Parents are never prepared to hear they have cancer.

So I continue to pray that God has us both in his healing hands.   I pray you have found your peace that eluded you here on earth.  I pray your body and mind are free of the demons that followed you as you struggled.  I pray for his peace and healing as I struggle with losing you and losing the woman I used to be.

 

 

 

Time Does Not Ease The Power Of Grief

Matt,   tomorrow is Mother’s Day.   My 6th without you.   Even as I type these words my heart continues to disbelieve my reality.   I can feel those waves starting to change from swimmable to ones that will pull me under sucking the breath out of my lungs.   That familiar chest heaviness has been following me all day waiting behind every corner ready to pounce.

This year, my grief is multifaceted.   A blend of old and new.   Still having the power to bring me to my knees.   This is my first Mother’s Day without my mom, your grandmother.   Last year I struggled to find the appropriate card.   We weren’t best friends.   We were oil and water.  She was black and white and I am grey.   Mother’s Day changed after your death.

Before you died we went through the motions.  Both uncomfortable but playing the game by presenting a false front to friends and family.   After your death she abandoned me.   She wasn’t there to hold me as I screamed.   She disappeared from my life like that sailboat you see on the horizon floating further and further away until it’s no where to be found.

Most of our fights began when I questioned her behavior.   I just wanted to understand how she could walk away from her grieving daughter.   She died with her secrets untold.   I grieve the relationship we never had.   I grieve the life you should have had.   Her death, so unexpected just like yours.   I was foolish with both of you always thinking there would be another time to talk, to hash things out.   Your deaths hold  shocking similarities.   Sudden and so unexpected.

So now I once again fight to pick up my pieces.   To try to make it through a day to celebrate Mothers.   Realizing I no longer have to stress about finding that perfect card for her has churned up emotions I never thought I would feel.   Knowing there will be no card from you shatters my already scarred heart.

Time does nothing to lessen my grief.   Mother’s Day is bittersweet.   I will always be your mother.   I long to hear you voice.   To see you coming in the door with that smile lighting up my heart.   I long to step back in time and redo everything done when I foolishly thought there would always be more time to say what needed to be said.

I long to have a relationship with my mom.   One that was loving and natural.   I long to hear her say I love you.   I needed so badly for her to explain why she chose to ignore my grief and get on with her life.   I long to return to the past when you were both here and time was something we had plenty of.

Reality is harsh.   Tomorrow will be filled with loss.   I feel like I’m floating on a very small life raft in a very big churning ocean.   I know those waves are coming.   I remember their power to pull me under struggling to find dry land.   Tomorrow I will have no control over when or how they hit.   Memories will find me as tears will fall.   Life as I knew it is gone.   All I can do is hang on and wait for the seas to calm again.

 

 

Time Doesn’t Lessen Grief, Time Magnifies It

Matt,   There is a saying that time heals all wounds.  People tell you to give it time.  Time will help.  As if time has the magical power to help you forget that your child is gone.  As if they have a clue as to how it feels to walk around with half your heart missing.  All time has done for me is to deepen my already intense pain.  All time has done is rob me of the blessing of watching my sons grow old together. Time passes and I realize that I haven’t heard your voice or seen your handsome face for 5 years.

Time is not my friend.  Time has become a painful march of family birthdays and holiday celebrations that are no more.  Time deepens the grief as reality seeps in reminding me that this emptiness will be a part of my soul forever.  Weeks have turned to months.  Months to years.  Yet my grief refuses to loosen its grip on my soul.  Grief has taken over every cell of my body.  It pulses through my veins with every beat of my heart.  Breaking it again as I recognize that memories are all I have left of you.  Happy times when life was as it should be.  Family barbecues, laughter and love.  My two sons enjoying each other’s company as siblings do.

But time doesn’t have a clue.  It marches on and with each new day comes the pain of knowing there will be no phone call or visit today, tomorrow or forever.  Time is like that crack.   It starts small and barely noticeable until it transforms into an enormous undeniable rupture separating life into the before and after.

As time passes people forget.  Returning to their normal lives afraid that grief is catchy.  Friends disappearing into the sunset.  Running as far and as fast as they can.  As if I’m contagious.  Time is a great teacher.  It teaches you who gives a damn.

Time does nothing to lessen grief.  It does everything to magnify it.  I now understand those things I took for granted like having all the time in the world to say the things I wanted to say, to do the things we dreamed about doing were never under our control.  Time fools you into thinking you will always have more.

Time marches on and doesn’t care who it mows down as it marches.  It has no respect for the grieving heart.

The only thing I want to do with time is have it rewind.  Go back to the time when you lived.  I call it a do over.  A time when my heart was whole.  A time when life held joy and hope not pain and regret.

Before your death I wanted time to slow down.  I complained that time was going by too quickly.  Days and months were flying by.  I wanted time to give me more moments to enjoy life.  To allow the seasons to change slowly allowing the beauty of each one to linger longer.

Now time can’t move fast enough.  I want the holidays to fly away and be gone.  Birthdays too.  I want my head to spin and not have time to know my reality and the pain it continues to bring.

I was never afraid of getting older.  I take care of myself.  I’m physically active, not bad looking for a sixty something mom.  Aging didn’t really bother me.  Although it does feel like I was only thirty a few days ago.  I’m not high maintenance, never worried about a new wrinkle popping up as I’ve earned every one being the mother of two boys.  Now I want to close my eyes and be eighty.  I want to be closer to the time I will see you again.  I want to see your face and hear your voice.  I want to be able to hold you and tell you it’s ok.   Matt, you were a beautiful man with a terrible, misunderstood disease.  Prior to your death my time was spent keeping an eye on you.

Before your death time was of short supply.  Working and trying to keep you safe took every second of every day.  Now time is empty, standing still, endless.

Time has also taught me a life lesson.  I have no control over it and what it may bring.  We’ve all heard the saying “In Gods Time Not Ours”.  Now I finally get it.  Time does not belong to us.

The gift of time for me is a double edged sword.  Sharp and cutting one minute.  Peaceful and too quiet the next. I’m learning that time stops for no one.

For as long as I have left I will cherish those beautiful memories and wish I knew then what I know now.  I would have stayed longer and cherished our time sitting together by the sea.  I would have hugged more and argued less.  I would have fought harder to save you.

Living through time without you is hell.  I’ve read that “ Life isn’t a matter of milestones, but of moments.”

Until we meet again I will treasure the moments we’ve made in the time we had together.  Precious moments that time cannot erase 💜

Rogue Waves……

Matt,   You would think after 5 years, I would have a handle on my grief.   Maybe a small part of my heart started to believe the myth that time would soften the blow of your death.   Maybe to survive I had to think the pain would not always have the crushing power it did in those early days.   Perhaps to continue my journey on earth without you I had to live briefly the fantasy that society wants me to believe.

My reality is the polar opposite.   This grief continues to hit unexpectedly, but just as powerfully as it always has.   I call them rogue waves.   I thought that the passing of time would at least soften the edges of my grief.   Sadly, I’m finding those edges remain sharp.   Like jagged pieces of glass ready to rip my heart to shreds once again.

These waves continue to hit at unexpected times.   Days when I think I’ve got a shred of control over my emotions  I find quite the opposite.   I don’t know if it’s the stress of my cancer diagnosis or just the fact that I continue to rethink your struggle with addiction.   Perhaps I’ve got too much time on my hands now as I recover from back surgery and have had to put my advocacy work on the back burner.   I’m no longer physically capable of running to meetings or being your voice in Legislative Hall.   I’m no longer able to keep my mind busy with changing the broken system that took your life.   Time gives my mind the opportunity to relive it all over and over again.

My empathy for your pain is heightened.   I now get it.   Back surgery is no picnic and this recovery has tested my patience.   I think about how I just didn’t understand your pain.   It’s like any other situation.   Until you live it you can’t get it.

So now my insides churn like an unsettled sea.   I feel like I’m being turned inside out.   I want to lash out at people who think addiction was your choice.   Who think addiction is a moral flaw.  My anger rises to the surface when I least expect it.   Like those rogue waves it leaves me struggling to regain control.

I rethink your last days until I can think no more.   I want to physically hurt the man who dumped you off at a motel to die rather than doing the right thing by taking you to the ER or a detox center.   I want him to hurt physically and emotionally like your death has hurt me.   I want him rotting in jail with no hope of ever seeing the blue sky or hearing the birds sing.   I want him to die alone as much as I want you to be alive.

My grief is now multifaceted.   I grieve us both.   I grieve for what used to be.   I grieve the son you once were and the woman I once was.   I grieve for the future that could have been but now will never be.    I grieve the grandchildren my arms will never hold.   I grieve watching my boys grow old together.   I grieve the years we have lost, the future we will never share.

My grief and my anger walk hand and hand.  Dancing through my mind.   I am helpless to contain either when the reality of life hits with the power of those rogue waves knocking me off my feet  leaving me struggling to find the surface to catch my breath.   Grief is a powerful and never ending emotion.   It does not tell time.  It does not conform to societies perception that time softens the blow of death.

I’ve learned that my grief will last a lifetime.   As will my anger over your unnecessary, untimely death.   I’ve learned those waves are out there and will hit again and again.   I’ve learned that I am helpless when they hit and all I can do is ride them to the best of my ability.

Surviving my reality, your death and my cancer is a challenge.  Never did I see either coming.   I’ve learned life is fragile and full of unexpected events.   I’ve learned that grief is a part of who I am and will remain a part of my life until I cease to be……….

 

 

 

The Future That Was Never Meant To Be

Matt,   I’m having such a hard time believing that we are coming up on 50 months.   The 3rd of March marks another month added to the long list of the months that have passed since your death.   I find myself feeling guilty and anxious that I’ve not been able to follow that so called grief path.   Society continues to believe that grief comes with an expiration date.   I find this disturbing as it makes me feel like there really is something wrong with me.

I’m tired of trying to talk myself into feeling “better”.   Like I should be able to adjust to life without my youngest son like someone adjusts to a change in the weather.  As if enough time will ever pass to make me less vulnerable to those grief waves.

Those who have never experienced child loss have no idea how life altering and complicated our grief truly is.   I’ve seen the look on peoples faces when I tell your story and begin to choke up.   I’ve heard,  ‘Oh, I thought it just happened recently, not four years ago”.    As if a mother should put on the stiff upper lip as she speaks about her dead child.

I tell those who have never buried a child that this experience resembles childbirth.   One can tell you how it feels and what might be expected, but until you experience it on a personal level you will never come close to imagining how those contractions can take you to a place of excruciating pain almost unimaginable to the human mind.   The pain of child loss does the same.

As child birth comes with hopes and dreams for the future, child loss comes with the demolition of those dreams.   That’s the worst part of a parents grief.   Not only have we lost our child, we’ve also lost their future.   In losing that future we have lost a large part of ourselves.

That’s the biggest misconception society will never understand.   When a parent buries their child they bury so much more.    Child loss goes against what society deems as normal.   Children are supposed to bury their parents not the other way around.   That is the so called “norm” we are taught to believe from childhood.   I stressed about how you would survive after I died.   Never once did I think I would be the one struggling to survive after your death.

You will be forever 37.   Your future cut brutally short.   The dreams of what I desperately wanted for you died with you and left me struggling to accept that your future was never meant to be.   Those dreams of watching you take a bride.   Of receiving a call that your son or daughter had arrived.   Watching you experience fatherhood.   Or watching you grow old, get gray and still want to walk on the beach with your mom.

Child loss is like non other.   Parents like me remain unnamed.  We are not widows, nor are we orphans.   The English language has yet to identify a word to describe us.   Losing a child is absolutely undescribable.

The length of time after child loss makes no difference.   It’s new each day as parents wake and reality hits.   Our brains and bodies have the grueling task of moving into the future as we leave a part of our hearts behind.

 

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