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 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.
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.
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.
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.
17 months. It has now been SEVENTEEN FUCKING MONTHS.
How is that possible? I am still trying to understand that one. My brain literally doesn’t process it. Or can’t process it. I am not sure which. I do know that I don’t like it. Just more time that he has missed. I have missed another Mother’s Day with him. So has his bonus mom. I know that she struggled that day just as much as I did. Any issues that we may have had in the early years post divorce from Bryce’s dad were already resolved long before we lost him but losing him has only made us closer. We talk often. We send each other birthday wishes. We send each other Mother’s Day wishes and flowers. The same applies with my ex-husband. The friendship that we started with back in the day when we first met has returned but now only strengthened with years of knowing each other, making a beautiful boy together, and then us losing that boy. We have all even vacationed together and have stayed over at each other’s homes when needed.
With the newfound closeness and family I have acquired with them came a new closeness with their kids. Of course, I have known them their entire lives, but not to this degree. They’re my kids now, too. We jokingly call me bonus mom, just like she is a bonus mom to Carter. One of those kids just celebrated a massive milestone. She graduated high school. It is obviously a massive celebration but even with celebration, we are all reminded that Bryce should be here to participate. In all of the photos of her with various friends and family, there should be one with her big brother too. They grew up together. When their parents married, Bryce was only 5 and she was barely out of diapers. Oddly enough, they even slightly resembled each other. Her day shouldn’t have had to be marred with the feeling of loss. I am glad that I was be able to be there with her but if I could have had him there in my place, I would have done so without a second of hesitation.
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While this may seem like a sudden change in topic, it is actually connected. On the recent visit for the graduation, the parents were speaking late that night before everyone separated for bed. I knew that we all had our struggles with grief but I am not sure that I was aware that our struggles were as similar as they are. I was speaking recently with Bryce’s girlfriend about how we both had a bizarre brain fog/amnesia from the “after” that seemed to last roughly 6 or so months. Not that we don’t remember anything, of course, but just that what we DO remember is sporadic. I won’t share her specifics because it isn’t my place. But I can share mine. My memories of that night are broken. I remember pieces but not everything. I remember his dad and bonus mom on the phone. Their reactions. Hearing the kids try to come into the room and then sending them out at first and then later them letting them in and hearing the kids reactions. I remember the words of the officer but not his face. I remember falling on the ground in the middle of Bell Rd. It was ice cold. It was very cold that night. I vaguely remember an officer helping me up and sitting me in his car to stay warm. I don’t remember driving home. I don’t remember much from the first week. I remember too much from the funeral. And that first 6 months is a bit of a blur. I remember spending a lot of time with Rory. We tried to distract ourselves. Lunches. Relaxing and watching movies. I spent a lot of time with Shae. I tried hard to focus on school and work but I didn’t do well. I struggled to help focus on Carter. I had panic attacks. Cried a lot. I was even called into my boss’s office because patients were noticing that I was off. My work was slipping. The night we all spoke after graduation, I realized that us parents were more similar than I realized and his dad had very similar reactions to mine. I won’t share everything from their story, because like Rory, it isn’t my story to share. But they don’t remember their reactions. Only the reactions of their kids and my reaction over the phone. I don’t remember screaming. But they say that I screamed. Loud. Pained. Primal. I don’t know why I don’t remember.
I have only recently, 17 months later, realized that my memory issues are not just the “after”, but also a little from “the before”. It hit me when I was looking for a movie to watch on Prime and thought that I hadn’t seen it. I started it and then realized that I had but I have no memory of watching it or who I saw it with. I found it strange but then just stopped to think about how my memory is spotty on other things from before too. Not that I completely forgot them but did they happen here or here? Was this with this person or this person? Did I do this or did I do that? Did I do this at this time or that time? I thought I was going crazy for a bit. Maybe it’s just me? I mean, I literally have pieces of my childhood, even teenaged years, that I can’t remember detail on so it’s probably just me, right? But then I asked others. They have the same experience from at least the couple of months before. What the fuck is that about? I have no idea and I don’t completely understand it.
I know time passes. As parents, we see it every day. When they’re little, we say that we can’t wait for them to sleep through the night. Then we can’t wait until they are potty trained. Until they are past puberty. Past the talking back phases.
Once they’re grown, we miss the old days.
We never think that there will someday be a time when we will miss them altogether. Not because we simply don’t see them, although that happens too, but because they’re gone. They have been taken from us, whether by illness or addiction or by an accident caused by the actions of another.
It is now a couple of days shy of 16 months since I last spoke to my baby. Since I last truly saw his face. Every second has been a new piercing stab into my heart. Every day that I wake up and he isn’t here just breaks my heart over again. I am still unsure if I am grateful or upset that I don’t remember my dreams. Do I wish he could visit me in my dreams or would it just hurt me even worse?
As time passes, it sometimes hurts to see those his age living their lives. I am seeing them grow in their careers. Graduate college. Get engaged. Make pregnancy announcements.
I love them and I am glad for them. I am glad that their parents are getting these experiences. Truly I am. But I can’t help but hurt too. Not because they don’t deserve these experiences because they all absolutely do!
But because Bryce deserved them, too. Because I deserved them. Because his dad deserved them. His stepmom deserved them. And Rory deserved them.
He’d be 21 now.
We deserved to experience him having the 2 birthdays he’s missed.
We deserved to experience him having the 2 Christmases he’s missed.
We deserved to experience him having the promotion he was training for and missed.
We deserved to experience he and Rory having the life they had planned.
Grief is a B!tch 