The death of a child....

I've never done this. I mean really try to write down the kind of pain losing a child really is. I always just say, "When people say it is the worst pain, they are right', but that doesn't really speak to how it feels inside of me at all. It just lets others know that it is too painful to talk about or share.

I'm not sure I can even share it now, but for some reason the loss was triggered this morning with a news story. It doesn't matter what the story was [well it does to the people it was about, but not to what I'm writing], it made me cry.

I made me cry remembering back to when he was alive, and then remembering he is gone. What my life with him was like then, and what it is like now without him. Yes, that is all about "Me", but you see there is no "him" to think about really. No child to worry about, tend to, nurture, or discipline... Nothing to smile about as he takes each step of his journey in life. Nothing. There is nothing. That is the whole point.

Life is so fragile, and we all take it for granted. We all assume that we'll be here tomorrow and the next day. Oh we accept death as a natural part of life, but we don't really accept that it could be tomorrow. It's "someday", not tomorrow. We all do that.

Anyway, back to "Me"...

Back then, I was like anyone else, with a few differences. I was energetic, and enthusiastic about life. I got upset at the normal stuff, and ranted and raved about nonsense such as, "He didn't call me". I can remember that being quite a drama. I had a lover who didn't call. Life was so simple back then. God how I wish to return to that simplicity. Regardless of how juvenile it really was, there was an innocence to it that I wish I still had.

Back then, I cooked dinner, did the laundry, and looked forward to the next day, week, year, decade. I had plans for my future and his. I had a vision. I had hope.

Back then, I believed in 'life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" as if it were some entitlement.

Back then I cursed men and their foolishness as if the "battle of the sexes" were the only conflict in town. I was cuntish, and oh so sure that I knew who I was.

Back then bitching about a 5% raise was the drama for the month, and if I couldn't buy those new shoes I'd just die. I knew I would just die. And why didn't he call, he said he would?

Back then I was arrogant and full of myself.

Back then I was still living in the bubble I created called "My Life". It was safe, secure, and it was MINE. In my arrogance, I thought what was mine, could never really be taken away. That happened to other people. People who didn't take responsibility, or learn from mistakes, or care, or see, or do.. it wasn't ever going to be me. Not ever!

Back then I was young.

Now I am old.

I am so aware of all the empty spaces in me. How much I have really been changed. How far I have fallen from that youthful [and yes dramatic] young woman who ripped through life as if it were her own kingdom.

There are big holes in me now. These aren't the holes of loneliness or despair, or even failure. They are the holes left when a part of your soul is ripped from you. It never heals really, it just leaves a gaping hole.

Oh you learn to live with the hole, the same way you learn to live with a scar or a limp. You learn to move on in life. You wake up, get out of bed, go through your routine, and sometimes, sometimes you can even forget there is a big hole inside.

Then you hear a news item or see a TV program, and you don't just remember the hole, you FEEL it. It feels just as raw as it ever did with one notable exception, it feels even bigger and deeper somehow.  I hate it, and love it all at the same time. I hate the pain, but I love how close I feel to him in the pain. I can still feel him, see him, and touch him in my pain.

Somehow that makes the pain endurable.

No word for....

I'm closing down an old blog, and came across this post from 2009.  It's just too good not to park over here.

*******2009

So, I find I have a renewed interest in watching ER this year. It is the last year of the series and they are having old cast members do cameo roles. Sort of a walk down memory lane. This last Thursday there was an episdoe featuring Anthony Edwards [old cast mate] and Angela Bassett [new cast mate] about the loss of her son.

There was one scene where Bassett is talking, and she says [paraphrase]... When you lose your parents you're called an Orphan. When you lose a spouse you're called a Widow or a Widower. But there is no word when a parent loses a child.

It made me really stop and think. It was such a simple statement and yet so profound. There is no word for it. Maybe it is just so terrible that no one ever thought to make a word for it. Maybe the thought of it alone made linguists run screaming from the room, and so, no word exists. I wonder if it exists in other languages or cultures. I wonder.

There was another scene where the Bassett character is talking with her husband. She says [paraphrased again] that she tried to look at what she had left. That she loved him. That she knew there was a lot of life left to live... BUT, she could to let go of her child. Let go of the hope that she would hold him again one day. It was the way she delivered the lines. Her countenance was filled with the sadness of her loss. Her character seldom smiles. She is serious all the time. She lives with the death of her child and there is no word to describe what that is. I was amazed at how good the acting was, but more amazed that the writers knew how to write a scene like that. It was scary accurate.

I related to those scenes a lot. Not the sentiment, but the demeanor. I do not hang on to the hope that I will hold him again one day, although the most common memory I have is one where he runs up to me and jumps up into my arms. It's not that I want to hold on. It's not that I don't want to live what is left of my reasonably good life. I do. But something happened that changed me the day he died. I became serious. Life became serious. Maybe life became too real for me. I don't know.

It's not hanging on to anything in particular -- at least it isn't for me. What it is, is, that I have been changed because of his death. Changed in ways that I can't undo. Whatever direction my life would have taken had he lived, has been forever altered. Whatever I would have been had he lived has been altered as well. I cannot change that.

I am a parent that has lost her only child. And, I find it incredibly sad that there is no word to describe what I am now.