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Another ones comes. Another one will pass.
I woke up this morning, as with every other morning, hating that I have to miss you.
It was 3 years ago that I last saw your face with a smile. While it still had life. As I was leaving for work early in the morning and you had just gotten home from working overnight. We texted on and off all day and then…
That was it.
Gone in an instant because of someone else’s carelessness. And now we all had had our lives turned upside down. You’ve lost out on a life you deserved and we’ve all lost out on that life with you.
I honestly am not sure how I have survived 3 years without you. How does a mother live without the child she created? I truly think it’s because I haven’t had any other choice. Your brother needed me here.
So I threw myself into making sure he survived. Threw myself into school to make you proud…and admittedly as a distraction from my mind. Not much interest in anything else, really. Little interest in socializing. Taking care of myself or my health. I could only focus on survival mode. I can only hope that I’ve made you proud.
I just miss you so much. I think every day about what you’d be like if you were still here. I’m sure you’d be just the same, of course, but just how you’d have grown with the added years of experience. We grow so much as humans between 19 and 22.
Would you have gotten that promotion they were training you for? Would you have stayed there or left? Would you still be living with me, causing me to still trip over your shoes all of the time and have to search for all of my dishes in your room or would have saved enough to moved out? I’d have let you stay as long as you needed. My goal as a parent has always been to help my kids get started on a better footing that I had when I started.
I miss your tangential stories. I miss your hugs. I miss your silly laugh. I miss the way your eyes sparkled. I miss your dimples and making you laugh when I’d poke them. I miss being silly and making you laugh so you’d call me weird. I miss your smile. I miss your voice.
I miss YOU.
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I miss you
I haven’t written in a long time. Not because you haven’t been on my mind. Quite the opposite really.
It’s been nonstop.
So many things you’re missing. I just had my graduation and I hate that you weren’t there.
Carter said it too. There was an empty seat next to him. He said that it made him think about how you should be in that seat.
You and your brother have been my motivation for finishing this program. I truly was shocked to find out that you were telling everyone that I was back in school. As a parent of an adult child, I guess you just don’t think about your kids being proud of you. You don’t think about them bragging to everyone about you. I didn’t know until you were gone. Maybe you were as proud of me as I was of you?
I could have taken a semester off after losing you. No one would have blamed me. But my mind was picturing you saying “Why the fuck would you do that?”
So instead, you have been my motivation. You and Carter both. Better myself so I can be better for the both of you. Give you better than I had. That is all I have ever wanted for you two.
I am sorry that I couldn’t protect you.
As a kid.
And that night.
It’s all I ever wanted.
It was my job and I failed.
But I promise that I will do everything I can to protect your baby brother. He misses you so much.
We both do.
I have a few weeks left until I am officially done with school.
I promise I will keep making you proud.
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730 days
It has been over 730 days since I have seen you.
Sometimes, I wonder why I still write so openly about my grief and my pain. Or share some of the photos that I have shared…personal…raw…
Whether it is on here…or my social media…
But just like in the beginning, sharing my words in writing helps me process what is happening in my mind. I still hate writing in a general sense, but my mind still has a hard time processing everything that has happened since I last saw you. And just simply the fact that you’re gone at all. I have had more than one person say that the words I have shared have helped them as well. So if it helps me and can also help even one other person, being raw and open about the pain of grief is worth it to me.
You have missed so much since you have been gone. Obviously, there is so much of your own life that you have missed. You’d be 21 now…almost 22. That is quite a difference in experience from 19. But you have missed so much in our lives too. Your niece has grown so much. And she is so much like your sister that it is hilarious if I am being honest. Your little sister graduated and is in college. Your other adult siblings are kicking ass at adulting. Your little brothers are growing like damn weeds. Carter has outgrown me and was just excited about that milestone as you were. I have kept pushing my way through school. You were proud that I went back to school and I couldn’t let my pain stop me. I kept going to make you proud. I only have 6 months left. I hope you’d be proud of me.
We went to your site yesterday. Left you flowers. Thought about you. Cried for you. Hugged each other.
A couple of us went back again last night. Shae and I waited until the exact time you were taken from us.
8:47pm
We each lit a candle for you and just sat. We cried for you. I hope you were able to feel us there with you.
I love you.
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it’s coming
I made myself keep moving today. I cleaned my entire house. Dusted everything. Kitchen. Bathrooms. Floors. Laundry. I felt the need to change my Christmas lights to solid purple. I was going to wait for Monday but I needed to do it now.
I hate cleaning. And I hate dusting. And I hate dusting even more now. I cried the first time I dusted Bryce’s shelves. Because it hit me that he’d been gone for long enough for dust to accumulate on his urn.
I almost cried again dusting today but I was too numb.
I can feel it.
The anxiety. Just like when it first happened.
Restless but yet no energy. Exhausted. Mentally drained. Brain fog. My body hurts. I feel it flaring my chronic pain.
I have to work the two days surrounding “the day” and I am dreading it. I know I will have to pull out my old mask. The one I wore two years ago to hide how I was really feeling. To hide the overwhelming anxiety I was feeling. The feeling like I was crawling out of my skin.
I would go to work and break down on my way there. Wear the mask at work. Take multiple bathroom breaks just to catch my breath. Feel so overstimulated all day at the noise and talking and acting and coworkers with too much energy and happiness. After work, I’d climb in my car and cry and feel like I’d need to just tear my skin off because it was crawling.
The anxiety was just too much.
In less than 48 hours, 2 years ago, it will be when I last saw him. I was leaving for work early in the morning as he was sitting in his car after a night shift. He was decompressing and the music was loud. I texted to tell him to turn it down so he wouldn’t piss off the neighbors because it was only 4:30am. I asked why he wasn’t going inside to sleep because it was cold outside. He said he was comfortable and just relaxing and he’d go inside in a few. Our cars were side by side. I still wish I’d have gotten out of my car to give him a hug. I told him I loved him and I left.
I didn’t see him again.
Not for a week until I saw him in an open coffin. Looking like my baby…but also not.
During that day, there was a text here and there.
Excitement when he texted about getting a free sweatshirt and a ham from work.
Then another later telling me that he was going to go on a ride with friends before Rory came over later that night.
That was the last time we spoke.
2 years.
For 2 years, I have continued to live.
I have worked. Slept. Bought a home. Taken care of his dog. Loved his friends. Continued to love his then girlfriend as my daughter, as she always will be. Gone to work. Continued with my masters program. Dated on and off and then now found my boyfriend. Make friends. Lost friends. Lost family. I have laughed. I have cried. I have lost weight. I have gained weight. I have disassociated. I have helped Carter through losing both his big brother and his dad in less than a year.
But I don’t know how.
How do I live without my baby boy?
Sometimes I feel like I can live despite the pain. Sometimes I just feel like collapsing. Sometimes I just cry. Sometimes I feel like I need to cry but the tears just don’t come. I’m just numb. I feel lost. I want to hear that goofy laugh. I need to hear him. I need him near me.
How am I supposed to outlive my child? How do I do this? I’ve been taking it one day at a time for almost two years and I still don’t know how to do it. It is literal pain in my chest that just doesn’t stop.
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i don’t want this
I don’t like the days that I feel angry. I don’t like the days that the anger mixes with heartbreak. Even now.
Almost 2 years later. Almost 23 months. 1 year, 10 months, and 25 days. 695 days.
695 days since I have heard his voice in person. Seen his smile. Heard his laugh. Had one of his hugs.
As another anniversary approaches, I feel myself changing again. Just like I have for each of the 2 birthdays he’s missed and the Thanksgivings and Christmases, and just like I did for the last anniversary.
I think that it’s possible that people don’t understand that we don’t just lose them once. We lost them that day. But we also lose them with every holiday that they miss…every birthday…every big event…every major milestone in our lives. Over and over again every single year.
Every morning, I wake up and remember that my Bryce is gone. Every day, I go through my day and it is in the back of my mind, even when you see me laughing and smiling. Every night, I go to sleep thinking about how much I miss him. I miss him plopping onto my bed and talking my ear off until my eyes glaze over about his grand plans for his life, even if those plans probably never would have worked. I miss him talking my ear off about whatever he was planning to do with his bike, even though I usually had zero idea what he was saying. I miss him talking to me about his plans with his truck. I miss him chatting with his brother. I miss laughing at him when he’d wake up in the afternoon after working all night and he’d walk into the kitchen with his hair all messy and eyes half open with a goofy look on his face because he was still half asleep. It always reminded me of when he was a baby and he was waking up from a nap.
I miss who I was 2 years ago. I miss the truly happy me. I miss the me with plans that included both of my boys. Seeing Bryce finish growing into adulthood, getting married, and having kids, I miss seeing Carter happy and unburdened with the grief of the loss of his brother. I miss the me that didn’t have to cut out family because I found out how completely unsupportive they were in the worst moments of my life just because they were uncomfortable with grief and my pain. I miss when driving down the far part of Bell Rd was just for the annoyance of heading towards Arrowhead and not because I’m heading to do one of my regular clean-ups of my son’s roadside memorials. I miss when my family photos included both of my children and not just me and Carter with a photo of my oldest child. I miss when I had shelves in the living room that just had happy photos instead of shelves with my son’s ashes and photos for his memory. I miss when we didn’t need a “Bryce wall” in our living room. I miss when I didn’t have to say that I refuse to ever work February 13 or December 23 for the rest of my life.
I want to introduce new people in my life to my son instead of just telling them about him and showing them photos and videos. I don’t want Carter to lose the memories of his brother, and I hate that some are probably already fading. I don’t want Bryce’s niece to know about her uncle instead of actually knowing him because she was so young when he passed and her memories fade. I don’t want the rest of his siblings to have their children after he’s gone so they learn about him instead of getting to be spoiled by him.
I don’t want to live the rest of my life with part of my heart missing.
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milestones lost
As time passes, I keep thinking of the parts of his life that he’s missing. The parts that were all missing.
I’m thinking of the grandbabies I won’t get to have. The shared grandparent experience I won’t get to have with his dad and step mom. Carter is almost 14 and maybe he will want kids someday when he grows up. Maybe he won’t. And I’ll still have my honorary granddaughter and any other honorary grandbabies from all of my chosen kids.
But I won’t have his. And he won’t get that experience. He wanted to get married. And he wanted to be a dad. Cute little Bryce babies with those dark, long lashes and big dimples. I’d have spoiled the fuck out of those babies too. Just like I do with my honorary granddaughter, C. I can’t help it. She’s so damn cute. And honestly, she kinda looks a little like Bryce. Her mom is his older half sister so she has enough of the features from that side of the features that are similar to the ones that he got from his dad that they actually look a little alike from when he was little.
We’re getting closer and closer to 2 years and I just don’t even want to think about it. I don’t want to think about how it’s been so long since I’ve seen him smile. Heard his silly laugh. Given him a big hug. I still have our text thread in my phone and it’s still pinned to the top where it was before. I can’t move it. I don’t want to move it. I don’t want to delete it.
I want my baby back. I want to celebrate his adult milestones with him just as I celebrated every one of his childhood ones.
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It doesn’t end
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Climbing Mountains
I was watching a tv show and two women were talking about loss.
“How did you survive?”
“I didn’t think I could. It seemed impossible. Like climbing a mountain that keeps on going. All the while, you’re carrying so much pain that you can barely move. And that pain is the pain of memory. Of loss. Let the physical loss hurt as much as it needs to. But also remember that every memory that you have is filled with love. It’ll be with you. You’ll feel it every day…because love never dies.”
20 months have passed now. I have a hard time understanding how it both feels like yesterday but also like so much time has passed. He has missed so much. So much of his life already that could have been enjoyed. Time with friends. Family. His girlfriend. We have missed so much with him. Where would he be now? He would be 21 now. Would he still be with the same company? They were training him for that promotion. Would he have actually gotten it and have continued to work his way up? Would he be engaged? Would he have moved out or would I still be rolling my eyes at all of the slamming of the garage door and hoarding of my dishes on his bedside table?
20 months and I am no longer having the same panic attacks at the loss but that doesn’t mean that every day isn’t still difficult. I think of him every moment of every day. Sometimes I smile and sometimes I am fighting back tears. Other times, there is no way to fight them. They just fall.
No matter how many months or years pass, I will always be climbing the mountain in that quote. I will always have the same pain, regardless of how good I get at carrying it. Or how well I get at hiding it. He is part of me. I created him. He was half me. Half his father. He had my eyes. My face. My goofy sense of humor. He will live within me as long as my heart beats. He will live within all of us who love him.
And I will continue to climb that mountain for as long as I have to…
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Can’t trust my gut anymore and other stupid triggers
It has been a while since I have written anything here. Over a month actually. Not necessarily because I am doing any better…but maybe more because I am doing better at carrying the pain? Or hiding it? Or both?
I used to trust my gut. I would just be able to tell if something felt right. Or if it felt wrong. That doesn’t mean that I always listened to it, especially in my younger years, but it was still there. But that one night in December 2022, I had no warning. I saw him that morning as I went to work and nothing felt off. I texted with him on and off through the day about various things. He was excited about a free ham that he was getting from work…because it was a HoneyBaked Ham and that boy could EAT. He probably could have eaten the entire fucking ham on his own if I am being honest. He was excited about the nice quality Suntec branded long sleeved shirt that they were giving them with the ham. Because free clothes. Awesome. He asked if I needed him to take Carter to his lesson because he would occasionally help take him when I was working. I said no because they were already out for Christmas break. It was only 2 days before Christmas. He said okay cool and that he was going to go hang with the boys and go for a ride for a while and then meet Rory back at our house later that night. As always, our conversation ended the same as it did every single time we ended a conversation when he was going to be going somewhere.
Be safe. Love you.
Love you too.
Those were our last words.
And my gut had no idea. Not one. For the first time in my life, I wasn’t ignoring a red flag. I wasn’t ignoring a gut feeling. I simply didn’t feel it. There wasn’t anything out of the ordinary.
So how can I trust my gut now? After all of these years of trusting it, how can I now trust it when it not only failed me this time but it failed my baby? I couldn’t stop it. I couldn’t warn him. It didn’t give me that gut feeling that something was wrong so I could stop him. It didn’t just hurt me. It hurt him. His other parents. His 8 siblings. His 2 best friends from the different periods of his life. His love. His massive groups of friends from both Tucson and here in Phoenix. Extended family on both sides. His niece. His future. The future for all of us. My gut has always helped me but this time it failed all of us. So how can I ever trust it again?
Even small shit like school is harder now. Some topics are harder to study. The unit in pathophysiology that related to traumatic brain injuries left me crying multiple times. Taking care of patients around his age is hard.
I am now in the final year of my program. This clinical rotation is in the ICU with an amazing physician. Today, we had to tell a mother that her daughter would likely not recover from her condition. Instead of showing any signs of clinical improvement, she has steadily decompensated and has gotten worse and worse. If she has any improvement, it would leave her highly debilitated and would likely take at least a year to reach that point, if ever. She can not move. Can not breathe on her own. Can not talk. Her body has shut down. As my preceptor and the neurologist were explaining the situation to her mother and 2 aunts, I was doing okay. Eventually I noticed that I was holding my necklace with Bryce’s ashes and was stroking his fingerprint engraving. Just feeling the ridges to stay calm. As the conversation progressed and her mother began to cry, I was struggling. By the time we were finished and they went back into the room after deciding to withdraw care, I separated from the physicians and walked quickly to the restroom. I barely made it before breaking down and just stayed in there and let it go.
Yes, this was drastically different. She had almost 30 years on Bryce. She was critically ill. But I was looking at a mother crying for her baby girl. Looking at a mother thinking about how she was going to have to plan a funeral. Think of final preparations. Think of how she can possibly live in a world without her child. Mothers aren’t supposed to outlive their children. It isn’t natural. I just wanted to hug her and tell her that I felt her pain.
I only wish that I’d have been able to say goodbye to my baby and be with him as he took his last breath so he didn’t have to be alone.
I am just grateful that my last words to him were that I loved him.
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grief isn’t rational
There are times that I will be driving and just letting my mind wander. Listening to music. Sometimes thinking. Sometimes trying NOT to think.
I’ll pass riders on the roads or highways. Sometimes alone…sometimes in pairs or groups. My mind immediately goes to him. Sometimes it even sees him in one of the riders. Maybe it’s the way they’re riding and it’s similar to his style. Maybe it’s their posture in the bike and I can tell that they’re also likely fairly tall by the way the back rounds like his did when he wasn’t sitting up straight. Sometimes it’s because the bike is a similar build or colors.
No matter the reason, my mind goes to him. Sometimes a wish. Sometimes a drop of my heart. Sometimes even a double take despite that being completely irrational.
Grief isn’t rational anyway.
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Grief is a B!tch 