Month: September 2018

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Why?

This could not be a more appropriate question right now. Why? Why Kai? I asked him this almost every day in the last years. Why are you so sad? Why are you so hateful? Why do you want to die? Why, why, why? I really could go on and on. 

Kai, I think, really hated being in this life. He was absolutely miserable. Mostly because of his ODD. He didn’t want to abide by any rules or adult supervision. He wanted to pierce his lip, no, him and a friend did it anyway. Things didn’t work out so well and it lasted an hour or so. He smoked weed to self medicate, no, did it anyway, had cops search his rig and bedroom for all kinds of stuff, never found anything, sneaky little bugger. If we said no, he went and lied or did what ever it took to do it anyway. He was always willing to suffer the consequences rather than ask permission or do the right thing. Kai only knew what he wanted at that very moment in time and did just that. This resulted in us fighting all the time and making him and us miserable.

Kai struggled through school. We had him tested as a Senior and he had the math skills of a 6th grader. Shame on us!! I felt like the worst parent, he really struggled with math comprehension. Lucky for us we are a small enough of a school he could get the special attention of certain school officials to help him get graduated. Our school principal and guidance councilor were especially helpful. They were there for many of our ups and downs, mostly downs. They say it takes a village to raise a family, we had an amazing village. When Kai passed we had so much love and support it blew us away. 

“You will be fine mom,” “Everything will be better after a while mom.” I will always repeat him saying this to me. It would hit me so hard, as I begged him to stop saying he wants to die. I haven’t mentioned how many attempts he made to end his life. Four. Why? Because he was so unhappy and miserable and in his mental state he couldn’t see any other way out of his misery than to end his life. That’s why.

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I am a survivor!

I have always thought of myself as a survivor of my life choices. I think most people can look back and think “wow, I can’t believe I survived my childhood and teenage years!” Mostly due to the fact that we made some pretty daring and stupid choices. I think the choices were mainly due to being bored and lack of brains. But of course back then I had the world by the tail and I knew exactly what I was doing the whole time and no one could tell my I was wrong, oh heck no. 

When Kai passed away I completely blamed myself for years. I was being punished for all the bad things I did in my life. I really did feel that way. And it took quite a while with my therapist to convince me otherwise. I still have the tiniest feelings tucked way back in my storage shed that I dig out, blow off the dust, and tell myself if I was a better person this wouldn’t have happened. Then I put the lid back on and tuck it away again. You know, the “if I would haves” and the “I should haves” haunt me every now and then. I know, that changes nothing. I just recently read something that really made me think and I wish I could remember where I read it but it made me realize, wow, that is so true! “There is a reason the rear view mirror is so small and the windshield is so big. Things in the past are so small and insignificant and the future is huge and vast and waiting for you, just keep going forward.” 

I envy those that have faith in God and that all things are for a reason. I’m not a religious person at all but I like the idea that my son is in heaven with his aunt and all the others I love that are gone, they are surrounding him and looking down on his family and protecting us. I like the idea there is a higher power that people look to for guidance and help and that it hopefully helps people make good decisions or go the right direction. No matter what label you put on that higher power, Catholic, Buddhism, Nazarene, or Mother Nature, if it makes people be good people I think it’s great. 

Kai was right, I am healing, I am moving on, and I am doing OK. I don’t want to be, but I am. Like I said before, I never wanted to quit crying over my loss and never wanted the awful feeling in my gut to go away because that meant exactly that, the new normal was happening and I didn’t want to accept it. I will revisit my grief once in a while, on purpose or by accident it floats back to me, I cry, then I pack it away and move on with my new normal. We just had our first family pictures done that won’t have Kai in them. I thought I was ready for it after 5 years but nope, I had to get a good cry out first then I threw my shoulders back and grabbed some tissues and put on my best smile for the new normal family pictures. 

I survived. I survived the day of his passing, I survived his funeral I survived his graduation without him, I survived the last 5 years without him, and I will survive the next years without him. Damn you Kai I don’t want to be a survivor! And I hate my new normal. But worst of all I don’t want you to be right.

But I’m a survivor.