One Year

December 23rd was one year.

How is that possible? One whole year since I last saw him living and breathing. Since I last heard him laugh and joke and saw him smile. Since I thought about how he could be such a pain in the ass but he was MY pain in the ass and I loved him like crazy. I don’t understand how a year can pass so quickly to where it feels just like yesterday but also feel like time has moved so slowly.

I waited a little bit to write this because it has been hard to process. It is a shitty anniversary to have and I have hated to think about it. I was thankful to spend time with family remembering him together. We were able to escape town for a few days to do things he’d have enjoyed and went to the beach at sunset on the 23rd to remember him.

It has been a mix of emotions this past year. I have learned so much about grief and about who truly cares for us. I have learned that grief, as I say here, is a bitch. The “stages of grief” aren’t a linear process. You can go through them in order, out of order, one may take days or weeks, or you may cycle through every one in a single day. This isn’t my first experience with grief. I lost my mom in 2016 and that was hard…but it was unexpectedly expected. Her health wasn’t the best so while it wasn’t necessarily expected, I also wasn’t 100% surprised that her body finally gave out. It was hard and there have been so many times in the last almost 8 years that I have wished that I could talk to her. But this…this is different. This is like nothing I could have *ever* imagined. Parents aren’t supposed to outlive their children. Healthy 19 year olds aren’t supposed to have their lives cut short.

I have learned over the last year that your blood family isn’t always the best support. My sisters should have been one of my biggest supports but one was “too busy” to check on me only a month after losing my child and the other felt the need to selfishly compare her issues to mine. I haven’t spoken to either of them in almost 9 months. I have a stepmother who never even acknowledged my loss to me despite the fact that my father spent a week here before the funeral. Cutting out toxic family members saved the little bit of sanity I had. When you’re already struggling to survive a difficult situation, dealing with family drama only makes it worse and cutting it out can be a lifesaver.

Another lifesaver? Having an amazing best friend who is more like a sister. Being able to be friends with your son’s father again like you were before you ever started dating when you were both younger, being able to be friends with his wife, being able to be close to their kids who are siblings to your son, being close to your son’s big sister and be one of many grandmas to her daughter. Having amazing cousins who message and text periodically to check on you, say they love you, or send you sayings that they think would be helpful for you. Still being close to your son’s girlfriend and being able to spend the year celebrating her healing but also understanding each other’s pain when we have bad days. Having your son’s friends still love to share their exciting news with you or ask mom advice.

I don’t know if I will ever feel relief from the trauma. Both the trauma of losing my son and the trauma of the memories of that night. I don’t think the second year without him will be any easier than the first. His birthday is coming soon. He would be turning 21 and I know he’d have had fun with that. I can’t imagine that it will ever get any easier. There will always be a birthday, a mothers day, a holiday, a celebration without him, an anniversary.

What I do know is that I have survived. Even though there have been many times that I wasn’t sure if I would…and other times that I didn’t really feel like I wanted to. If I survived the first year, I think I can make it through the second one…even though I still hate that I have to.