And now a word from my son ....................................................

Michael Wyatt VanWoert age 15 

I had to get off social media today, I  was checking up on how a friend's fur baby and how another high school friends parent was in status updates and was bombarded by the crap of hate . Outright hate, hate in slights , hate in "jokes" . My son wanted better for his life and this world . He is dead and the haters hate on. I am disgusted and it hurts more that my light went and this vile exists. So in his words , paper I saved from Mike  then age 17 about discrimination. written by my dyslexic child who I  was told had the comprehension of a 5h grader. Why because no one ever spent time with him in education or what his voice was. 1.3 GPA to 3.8 GPA. Suck it schools in North Dakota. There is no wit today no lesson but hey if my kid could figure out kindness maybe we can all take a page from his book. In the end Michael found his voice!

Mike's paper 

Discrimination can take many different forms: verbal, physical or even cyber. No matter how it comes by, it is still discrimination. Discrimination is an action to make a group of people, race or ethnicity stand out, to make fun of or make them feel out of place. Discrimination makes people feel unwanted. Sometimes people are not always aware they are discriminating because of a joke or a story or the past.  I have been a victim of many of these forms, but the one that hurt the most is in the physical form. Knowing discrimination is hurtful, I won’t put up with it anymore; I put my foot down and say stop to discrimination.

            My example of discrimination comes in a physical way. It was when I came out as gay. When I came out of the closet, I was scared out of my mind. I was the only person I knew that was gay. I came out then wished everyone would forget about it because of all the hate and shame I felt. Some of the people I thought were close friends, unfriended and forgot about me. My foster parents threw me out the night I came out. After all this happened, I was labeled a freak and random people I did not know tried to make fun of me and get in fights. Once even a restaurant would not let me in because of my sexual preference.

            After all the hate and discrimination, I became very depressed. I found out that I was the only person to have my back. I had no friends, I was disowned by my bio  family and I got moved around in foster care just because they thought there was something wrong with me. I was abandoned by everyone I looked up to and cared about. I became antisocial and I feared people. I knew how it would end, with getting kicked out and my life flipped on its head just because I was gay. But even with all the discrimination that happened to me, I became a better person. I found my true  family and my moms. They loved and accepted me without condition. I found that I am here for anyone and I surround myself with a variety of people from different sexual orientations to different religions and races. I do not just accept diversity but celebrate it. I try to be supportive in that I know the hard time people may feel when labeled as different.

            I do not allow discrimination on my watch and I do not allow discrimination in my friend group. Making jokes about race or that someone is slow is not a joke. I knew a group of people who would say things to me and it caused pain. I know it causes pain to others. If I hear folks making “jokes” at others I try to stop it no matter who is saying it. I will get my point across to them because it is not ok to say things like that. Discriminating is a thing people do to make themselves feel good, however I do not allow that around me at all. The fact is that almost everyone has been discriminated against and they know how it feels with the pain behind simple words. We need to make it stop; if we come together as a group of people, we can stop discrimination. We can help people that are struggling with the problem on a daily basis. 

How to go under but not drown

 My loves Ty and Michael VanWoert, North Dakota 2013( Mike reaching in for a random snuggle on the plains) Day 4 of Forever Family

Its been a few rough weeks , there is no way to say this well. Last night though as he does , my child lets me know that while his world has expanded  to the universe , he sees that ours collapses without any warning. In my sleep he was driving and I kept reaching over and rubbing his neck , stroking his hair. He pulled away slightly in that moment I knew it was less a dream and more of the slight flick where the veil between how we both now exist  is lifted . I told him I would keep touching his hair as long as I needed and he knew why, he smiled and just drove. These pieces of his essence gifted to me are why I have not yet drowned.

Some folks notice I do not talk about mom and dad very often . Its not for lack of grief but the compounded interest of too many losses too quickly. This time last year I was flying home from Chicago on a broken leg, that later formed a blood clot and a torn ACL. On September 16th , I received my last phone call from my father, saying how he was feeling better but thought he was  getting a cold from the chemo. 3 days after that call still in a cast I  flew back out to Florida as my dad was no longer conscious.One September 28th 2015, I watched my father take one last breath and leave this world and it felt like me forever. My brother who lived with them and had watched the cancer journey broke with his heart. The next hour and a half was me following my brother down empty hallways , keeping the security guards and nurses from calling the cops or hurting him. Mercifully, I do not think he remembers just how deep that moment was for him. I cannot get it out of my mind. Crushing quickly around a hospital also will crack the plaster in your cast , cause a pinched nerve and do permanent damage to a few toes by the way.

The next few weeks were about mom , getting her through, getting her moved to CA to be closer us. Listening to her at night when she thought we were asleep , telling him how much she loved him and missed him. She aged and on December 21st 2015 , she laid down for a nap and never woke up. She wanted I believe to be with him. I never thought there could be more pain than losing my parents so close together. Then June10th 2016 happened, and our child left too. 

The first time I thought of all of these losses as a whole was a few weeks after Michael had died. The stillness in the house was like breathing through a warm, wet blanket. Just as heavy and smothering as imagined. I went to our local public pool , where cacophony of sound hurls itself off tile walls never letting you know if you are in a place of joy or listening to the inane roar of inmates in some chlorine filled asylum. Usually Michael was with me, playing , racing or my handsome kid attracting flirting girls while I just shake my head  think " oh sweeties if you only knew". The first night in North Dakota, family now of three we all played in the pool until we were freezing and oh so very happy. The first time he met his aunt was the beach. water was a healing place for us.

So being alone when Ty was at work was new and my new reality . And I began to plod through the water, power walking in the shallow and doing a slow willful wounded butterfly when feet no longer felt  tile. And  like the water around me and the acrid chemical smell assaulting me, my memories had no where else to go but out. Past the kids with water wings and happy moms and old men with googles , I just kept repeating the laps of the damned. And after about 2 hours in , I realized not only was my will but the literal strength in my body gone.  Beyond blue and waterlogged , my whole being was numb and very very tired. Smack in the deep end, I was hit with the possibility that I was so exhausted I might drown. Anyone who has every experienced a deep loss can understand what happened next. To be be honest at that moment drowning did not seem so bad. I was choking emotionally on the loss of my mobility, my parents, my child, my heart , my future. To lay down in the pale grey blue water and  caress the rough tile bottom to escape did not seem so terrifying , not in comparison to the pain that was unraveling every thread of who I was.

I wish to say here is where I had a great epiphany or decided to live for my partner, my  son , myself. That I had a moment of god like intervention or an angel pulling me out of it. That I cared. But I cannot because there was in that that moment nothing , nothing but the reality of what was happening in my life , the never ending sorrow and the soul crushing pain.In my mind , if I was suppose to be on the bottom of the pool, I would have been already. So I paddled myself to the side of the pool and hung on the ladder for about 10 minutes until I knew I could pull myself out . I went into the sauna and sobbed as the chlorine and toxicity of my losses just oozed out like some weird science experiment. I did not feel better, I did not heal anything that day but I learned the pain only felt like it would kill me , it will be a million slow painful deaths until I see my son again , but they won't take me. I do not want to stand in the face of this, make peace with it , or accept it . I do not have to , but I am able to stand, for now that is enough .

There is this whole metaphor around grieving about riding the waves in the ocean. They come you learn how to ride them etc etc. I like it , I get it . But for me there is one more piece. When you experience any great loss , you will go under , maybe many times. If you panic, fight your feelings , gasps for answers like air: you will become disorientated, paralyzed  and you will drown in yourself . When you go under, don't fight it. Sit on the sand of that ocean or tile of that emotional pool. Know where up is , take in the sensations, don't panic, feel . Its incredibly terrifying to feel loss, panic, fear , they all make you want to fight for the wrongs reasons . Just take it in , let it become one with you like underwater how you hear your own heartbeat, feel its wounds, tell it you still love it even though its not really working well .
Trust that those around you will keep you from drowning and when your ready come back up for air.

Our kiddo you are so very loved , every day 

Lady Gaga Bubble Dress and being FIERCE

Mike VanWoert aka drag name Patrice

One of the most amazing gifts I never expected was how you grow as a person as you watch your child become an adult. I get it, we adopted our child at 16 and in some ways that is a big deal . For us though Mike was part of stars, our lives, our path. Even before we knew one another or knew we needed him. And we did need him. As a family, no longer a couple we became more dynamic, more powerful, more cohesive and healthier as a unit and individuals.We pushed each other for the best within our selves, those really gritty parts and those gooey nuggets of love and compassion. When you lose your child you lose that true voice that encourages you to look at things in new ways, expand your thoughts, identify fears and their validity in your life.Those best and most stubborn parts of them illuminate those places in you sometimes hidden, ready for light and review.  If you are raising a happy health adult , you too are expanding the fibers of yourself. That push from Michael to see the world without fear and hate, to own your pride, to move in a way of true joy : that is what I will miss the most about my son's approach to life. Eyes wide open, so you never miss a beat.

Each family does it different, for us MIchael's life in care was bleak and limited and without some basic life experiences. I wish to say that is an anomaly but it is the reality of children in care today as a larger group. to "make America great again " lets start with our kids. But we are not. We will reap what we sow from our apathy. So when Mike came into our life we created boundaries that were non negotiable even as a young adult in our home. Be where you say you are, stay put if you cant drive, we fix family issues  and hurts and move on no matter how hard, we eat dinner together , cell phones are not more important than people and we get through your schooling and healing as a team.Few more things in there but that was the consistent message. In that parameter, as long as in the boundaries, kiddo could explore life and himself. If it was safe, we wanted him to have as many new experiences as possible. And he shared what he learned about life in those frames. Some of it we agreed with, some not, as a family though we all learned about each other and ourselves.

My sweet child if you knew him had many, many "outfits".  From the giraffe onesie , to his button down  bow tie, to hip surfer boy with tutu, his looks went from GQ to little boy playing dress up. I think that inner child, little Michael so hurt and so closeted for so long always blossomed in Mike's clothes.Some days he dressed just for fun and he pulled it off . That was Mike , colorful, boisterous, handsome and playful.

As his mom I never had much to say about his clothes. Twice in our life I had discussions about an outfit not as do not wear it but when to wear it. FYI giraffe onesie not really work attire :). But I learned a lot about myself from Michael's clothes. One that I wish I had half the balls my kid did in confidence and the other how I had to let go of my fears about how others reacted to him. 2 years ago Mike came to me asking if he could get a pair of boots: girl boots with heels. Not for clubbing but for school. For as gender equity and non conformist I thought I was about gender , I told him I had to think about it. Yep for everyone who calls me a crazy, liberal, crunchy, bleeding heart either to my face or behind my back,, yep as mom I needed a minute. About 3 days later I told him Ok . He asked me why I need to think about it and here is where the growth in me showed. I really did not care if my son wore black boots with chunky heel , my wife ( now husband) had never worn any female clothes since I had known them. Some boots why a big deal? I had to confront my fear. I grew up in the post Stonewall Riot, Act Up age. I grew up when gay men were dying of AIDs and no one cared but our community .When hate crimes were rampant. And now in our world we are circling back , this protection of our own means fearing the different , new and old hate crimes coming in. I never wanted to be Matthew Shepard's mother, with the image of my dying child pistol whipped on fence because he was gay. I also knew I would never have it in my soul to forgive the way Judy Shepard did, she is more  complete in her humanity than I could ever be. Bottom line my fear is girl boots in everyday life could make my son unsafe,

I had to sit back and remember before us, the gay bashing my child endured and how he survived it and now thrived despite the narrow minded bigots thrown in his path . They did not break him or shame him. He became happy,loved and amazing  while they stayed unhappy , small minded and petty. Love does win. Also we were very clear having a gay teen : you never ever start trouble . However we were equally clear that if another kid was gonna " hurt the fag ' , you finish it .My kid was strong, very strong and if the lesson was the "fag" wiped the floor with your pathetic ass , we were ok with it. He knew when to be careful and knew that walking with confidence minimized a lot of crap. Why would I deny my kid happiness because of my fear. And I let him get the boots and he loved them and now mom has a kick ass pair of boots I will wear in his memory and smile. Just to be clear fag is not acceptable lingo ever, but I acknowledge when folks try to use this to hurt us and we take that word back with power.

When Mike turned 18, he got serious about the art of drag. If you are not familiar with the art of and legacy of drag through the centuries and the world, do some research. Its fascinating. His 18th birthday after the family party with pizza and friends, he was going out dancing with friends in the lady gaga bubble dress. Much like Scarlett O'hara  and Maria in the Sound of Music he stalked craft stores for days buying clear bubble ornaments. Armed with a hot glue gun, he created. And no this is not how I envisioned my son's 18th. But it was so Mike , dancing the night away , in the bubble he created. My kid knew who he was and embraced both his male and female energies without apology , We loved him for it, so  many did too. So when he told me he was learning to perform drag , the mom afraid of what others might think about girl boots, had grown some too . I told him be the best drag queen you can . the kind people look at and go "DAMN " as in damn he is fierce  not   "daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn " as in  damn that queen looks rough.  My kids sport was drag not baseball or football and so drag mama not soccer mama so be it . My son's style of drag is much like Portland's own Darcelle, not to pass but camp , kitsch and fun. He loved entertaining and making folks smile.He loved being the big burly guy with the rad tattoos who could put on a dress and still kill it and draw people in. Proud mom moment he could also drop into death drops and full splits.

In the quiet now of our house ,  I hurt when I cannot feel the pulsing and electric life source that was my son. I have complete recall of it and memory but the force of it diminished without him.  I wonder what lessons we will learn from his death ? How we grow and how the heck am I coming out of this stronger if right now I am shards of glass in a big painful ocean?What lessons will change me with is death that do not involve  hurt, loss , tears  and anger? The lessons and growth from my son were of expansion and enlightenment, in my loss its hard to not feel like they are now flights of fancy never coming back. My son is/ was Fierce as in DAMN ! fierce.  I hope one day he sees me from that other side and knows i am back to fierce and not just rough.

Thank you my child  for always being you , never buckling under  and knowing the power of your confidence. May that be the gift I figure out how to accept from you.

Dad and I miss you love, everyday

Finding the best while living through the worst...and pie

Its funny we talk about our kids in food terms so often. Its starts with the bun in the oven analogy, the apple of our eye, the icing on the cake , the best thing since sliced bread. Maybe because food is survival and your child is the continuation of your line, maybe its because there's an intimacy in sharing food and family. Maybe we are all just hungry from keeping up with our kids, who knows but today as I struggle some of these analogies fit.

My son was never a bun in my oven, he was my take and bake. I think that is the best part of parenting , taking something so raw , putting time and attention into it, moving it to a delicious and complete end. That pie in the sky and here is where the mental images stop being cute......

When people talk pie , everyone gets excited about the crust. You made that yourself, it's so flakey , so perfect , so crinkled ( ok I don't make crust) so perfectly browned. We get hyper focused on this thing which is fairly bland, crumbles and burns easily and without filing just is meh. We do that with ourselves as humans: hyper focused on the crust . How rich, what color, what  it dates, how it looks. We give a lot of pass to a great looking "crust" that package they sell us. We spend so much time making that perfect crust. But its what fills us that makes us great. What ingredients go into creating our core. Our crust could be flawless but our filling racist, misogynistic, homophobic, elitist, or just unkind. We are not buying into the whole pie, the person. And that is so sad to me.

My son was a pre made crust. Ingredients unknown, put in a state of frozen for years, rolled out , torn in places, strong in others. But his filings, came from a wealth of ingredients deep within him , quality, purity and true. Not perfect, but real. My son knew to hold doors, help folks with packages, seat an elder in a walker and get them a plate, hug a homeless vet because compassion outweighed "perceived germs"  We supported his recipe but these things all came from him, his spots where he believed compassion mattered more..
His playfulness was a lightness, his concerns and worries about his life and his place in it deep and complex.He was a gift meant to share, with family and friends. While he had his worries, cracks in the crust so you will,: he saw his whole self ,what filled him, gave him joy as abundant. He wanted to share that. At his service so many friends and family shared how at 19 he would just walk with friends male or female, family members too , hand in hand,arms linked. Why people miss my son is the comfort he gave to them in happiness and sadness. My son had people skills that most adults strive for, its hard to live without his infectious joy.

Why I struggle today is the world right now wants crust. There is so much hate, fear , ignorance just swirling around us . I know at times I am guilty of it , we all are. But people are taking pleasure in this crust , enjoying making each other feel uncomfortable, unworthy unloved. We hurt and judge others cause we can't deal with our own filings. My son at his core believed no one was any better than anyone.  Your gender, your color, your religion, your politics, your looks , your money , your demons; none of that mattered to kiddo. If you had a spark of joy or good within you , he gravitated to it , put up with or rolled his eyes at the rest . But he wanted all our gooey good centers. He wanted peace with his world and the bigger picture. He may have debated but respected others views even when they baffled him. He was part of the small percent of new thinkers on this planet , that had the power to pull us all out of this oven of hate before the burn is too deep and permanent. And that is where my anger and bias right now lie. There are so many negative, hate filled folks running amok  and they live. My peaceful warrior does not. It shatters my faith that good people are supported and protected. It rips at me , I struggle. So much evil that could leave this world but instead love and light go. Off the menu . without him the choices for me narrow and sorrow. I struggle to take his core and absorb it because my wall of sadness and loss and anger is still thick . For him natural , for me a learning curve. Right now a new recipe of absorbing this grief while adding in elements of my child to make me a better person, to be a tribute as his parent to the man my son was becoming. So my pie in the sky angel , I will work on the recipe.

I love you Michael, I miss you Michael. I 'm trying I promise

Do I ever indulge in what if ....

Michael Wyatt VanWoert , Age 5

The biggest challenge of losing your child is having faith. Me and God are not seeing eye to eye right now, I know that is OK , part of the process. Those days after Mike died , my heart felt frozen. I truly believed everyone could see my heart accepting rivers of blue icy, cold and pulsing and my heart icing over and withering. Two religious thoughts,old memories ran in my head on a crazy loop. The first the prayer of St Francis because my son was my channel of my peace. The other "my Lord, my God why have you abandoned me"? That one is pretty self explanatory.

So many things that led to my son were not random acts but I believe paths for him to come to us. Too many perfect timings that created our family. Even in our darkest moment, when Mike passed he was protected. A family member was the 911 call taker on his call. They got Pastor Todd, a friend of some family members out to the family and  then our family to Ty and I. If I believe there are no accidents in the world , but paths  then I have to accept there is a plan of why our love was taken just as he started to live. I am not succeeding right now in that acceptance. I am not going quietly into that night, like diamonds I do not rise. This is the hard part of grief. God is loving and protecting my child right now, and my parents. I however cannot fathom how he is holding me in any love or comfort , just small mercies.

Because kiddo came to us as teen, many people ask me if I ever wondered what it would be like to have him as a baby. When we adopted him , the answer was no. I was not yet the person I needed to be to be his mom then . I let others raise my kiddo until I found him and they did a crappy job , but once home it was home , he was my child . he always was my child.

Now every once in a while, I tell him I wish we had had more time . That I was the mommy who taught him to tie his shoes, read, tell time, and the list goes on. This I know is because I have lost part of my future , the best part and it makes me nostalgic for a past we never had. Its not hard for me to dial in when kiddos presence is with me. Its a deep vibrating peace , a strong sense of space being held on my right side.He always had the best timing, still does. When I am  ready to be prostrate on the floor with grief or at that pain where I cannot think of the next second, he shows up for me .

This past weekend I watched my good friends baby while she got out for a night of I need mommy time. Almost 5 months , the baby is at the age of delight. She tracks, makes sounds, smiles and is so fascinated by the sound of voice. She brings healing to the heart . So here I am holding her singing and singing you are my sunshine. As she smiled at me I told her I wish I could have done that for cousin Mike at her age and she just cooed and laughed. When she fell asleep I just sat and talked to my  son, telling him I wish I could have done that for him. I hope someone did that for him and if not mom was so sorry that no one did. I had that moment where I did feel like my baby was thrown to the wolves as a little one and what if we had been found sooner. That is  the thing when you grieve these moments where you feel like your heart is being drug through broken bottles , so raw, bleeding and no way out but through it .

In that moment the sun went through my friends stained glass piece, lots of rainbows, which always for me is a sign of Mike . The baby sleeping peacefully, and a sense of warmth and peace entered that very jagged space for me. I know he knows, if that was God's plan , I would have been that mommy for little Mike. But the plan was  Ty and I were destined to bring teen Michael back to the land of love , family, support, saftey. We did not have baby Michael but the little lost boy inside my son , was finally loved unconditionally. Despite trepidation , my peaceful warrior did soak up our love and begin to  heal the wounds that were left on his inner child. We love him because he was our gift from God, proof that love wins and that our family was amazingly , freaking, nontraditional and awesome. We did not get the little kid stuff , but our stuff was so good. we taught him to love to read, to travel, to think. We showed him that families can fight without crossing lines or abusing. We taught him everything could be worked out because we loved each other. We taught him he was perfect just the way he was .

When I look at this picture of my son so little , I see who I was nurturing in my young man's soul.
We love you kiddo and I will keep working on the faith .

Barely breathing but not dead

 The picture above was Mike's last selfie taken the 4 hours before he passed
Almost 60 days. This at times is what blows me away. How time is such a human construct ,created for us to mark time and create order. The reality is that I wake up everyday and like some demented form of groundhog day, for me it feels like June 11th, not 60 days later. Each day we won't hear him shuffling around or singing as he showers, his room now a time capsule in some ways, a refuge in others and at times the place my heart goes to die.

I know some folks might think I am waxing poetic but this writing is not for anyone else. And what I have learned is that while everyone says "take the time you need" they mean it with good hearts. But for them life is moving on. When you first suffer  catastrophic loss, its not about wanting life to move on but figuring out how you navigate, re arrange , pick yourself up. And fuck we miss our son.  I miss my son, my mom, my dad , all gone in less than a year and in the scope of time an eyeblink.

There are days I am a warrior, a champion  a survivor. There are other days I am fetal on his bed , trying not to pass out because the sobs are so deep and air constricting. When you suffer loss , you know that people love and support you, you can reach out , but 60 day later , a year later the depth of your pain can scare those who love you. It does so because their hearts are so open to wanting you to heal that like you they feel powerless when your heart is still just beating no less mending.

Please understand I do take it all in , like a movie you watch at 3 am bleary eyed and half focused, but its reaching me. The depth of what a kind kid my son was and how he was growing into an impactful young man never ceases to amaze me. He was at times the stubborn eye rolling teen but there was greatness there. His ability to be present and engage was astounding , his ability to want justice and compassion tremendous. Our adoption agency whom he loved , is doing a sweet celebration of him at their 10 year anniversary fundraiser . My work did a lovely tribute and donations to our adoption agency . All around our area I am seeing friends sporting Mikes last tattoo as tribute. His adoption agency in ND is doing a luggage drive in all their branches in his honor. At 19 he as a legacy, most adults never have. Of being known for being true, kind and light. I love having our adopted family from the agency who understand I am not mourning my adopted child but my child period. I love having other parents who feel like I do: someone else birthed my kiddo, they took rotten care of him, but he came and he lived. Right now I do not care about his rotten past but instead want folks to see the man he was becoming in 4 years as family. The man my child was in his heart and soul . The man who was Ty and I's baby even though our baby came as tall as us, with furry legs.I take you all in and love you all so much for holding space for me in the world as I find a way to come back to me. I am a cocoon right now, which without support would be the one that withers of the branch. But the Chrysalis inside is being nurtured by love and support I feel even if I cannot always express. I am not sure who I will be when I emerge , or who we will be as a family , it will be new, scary but I know it will be beautiful since the most powerful force we ever met , our son still fills us both every day and in big and little ways. Smiles and tears in this weird circle of healing .

Please don't take this though as I always do this well. I don't. Anger that is dividing and scarring can boil out of me at the seamless little or big things. Spell my kid's name wrong right now and I freak, do anything that feels self serving or exploitative to him and I will cut you. Don't martyr him or hold him up as a victim. He was none of that , he was my kid and loved and like others on the road of grief he was taken by a freak accident our of our control. Do I still have problems with that loss of control , yes. Do I feel like I failed to protect him , yes sometimes. Do I celebrate his presence , yes every single day. Will I ever stop missing him, no.

Ty and I are on this journey together. He is my partner and the only other person on earth who understands my loss of Mike as his parent. His style of grief is more stoic and inflection, while mine is the bat shit crazy extroverted out pourings. Like as parents we compliment each other in grief . We know when to hold each other and when to give space. I love him to the deep crevices of my heart and more so that he took the chance with me to create this family. And we did , with Mike we all learned from each other, grew and challenged each other. He is also the only person who understands that when I say I just want to be with our kid, I am not suicidal or wanting to leave him or my life. Its just me placing words to an ache that can never be filled . And we love each other through those deep moments, maybe not always gracefully but honestly.

My child was a big personality. Energy, curiosity , movement. The house is quieter and smaller without him filling the space. It feels a little grey garden like minus the racoon and garbage but its hard to invest . we bought this home in preparation for bringing home our child, We never though we would be mourning our child here. 

Maybe this post makes sense, maybe not . For me it is an awareness and thankfulness that while the world is passing by, people still are holding the door for me.

Where you tread in mouring ( graphic warning)

Sadly there is buck to be made in death . Google grief  and besides lots of lovely true compassionate  groups and blogs  you hit the books and the tapes . The steps, the process, the signs , riding out the waves, the x method, they y method , all there for 19.99 or 5.99 ebook. All promising to relieve you from this hell called mourning. But with deep loss,if you ever experienced it, in some ways these books are a crock of crap . No one wants to say it or admit it. As humans we want compartmentalized answers, steps, plans control. But if like me you are living through or have lived through unbearable loss,there is no order to your grief , no sense and no control. You have to feel it when you feel it, ride what you are feeling even if it is not socially acceptable or rational. When you try to control grief it becomes an insidious trickle into your soul . The deeper the infection the deeper the damage. The more you control it your body becomes damaged. If it becomes gangrene to the heart and soul you get bitter, withdrawn or lean to victimization where you never have to account for yourself because you have had a great tragedy. You never become a survivor, you never find a path to light or passion . And then the great loss you had is not only a tragedy but a travesty. In the spinning wheel of mourning you get dizzy, disorientated, lost. But if you stop holding onto center, your core, well when the wheel finally slows down and you have nothing left of you , your fucked. There is no book for that . Its just reaching out to those who love you, letting others hold space for you and  seeing how others moved through their loss to a place where life in no longer the same but where hope and joy can be let in again. I am not there yet , as I tell my son each night I kiss his urn , I am trying kiddo but you were my life , I have to relearn it.

In the last 9 months , ironically the time span to create a new life , I have stood in a funeral home looking at three of the most important people in my world. My dad fought his cancer with the same strength he fought in the boxing ring . But even champions meet  a stronger opponent . He woke up long enough to tell my brother and I to take care of mom  and he loved us. My father's death was one that if you have lost someone to a horrific disease you hit the wall , where you pray that death comes to end the pain . I could feel every bone in my fathers body under that hospital blanket , I doubt he was even 100 pounds. The  night he went my mother was in their house and she told him she was ok , it was ok to go . He died that night and I watched his breath exit for the last time. The father I thought could beat anything didn't. Several days later it was just me in the chapel saying goodbye. For a man ravaged with cancer , damn he still had his swagger and looks. When mom went she had been having stomach pains and was anemic but one the mend. The doctors found no infections everything looked good. She laid down for a nap and never work up. As everyone says its the best way to go , painless and the way we would all like it . True but in all the craziness of death and family discord , when my son and I  stood in the funeral home with her,. I felt abandoned. I knew she did not want to be without him but I did not want to be without her.

Ok here is the graphic part . My son , my world , our pride  had one of those violent kinds of death . He came out of a curve into another slight one , overshot  and hit a tree. His seat belt was on, the phone not being used , airbags galore. His neck broke on impact and he died instantly. This was confirmed by the house right by the accident who ran out to help him and found him already gone. Wonderful Samaritan who I will never get to know or thank  used fire extinguishers to put out the car so my son's body was not burned. When the mortician let me in after hours that night to see him , I steeled myself for the worse. He had a bruise across his nose and around his mouth bit that was it. I saw the blood under the sheet and when I ran my hands across his body, I knew things weren't right , especially with his legs. But he looked in the face like my love, my Michael. As social media goes , fb lit up and without wanting to I saw what the car looked like and  I wonder what angel shielded my kids face so when I said goodbye to him, he still looked like my son. I thank God that when he took him, it was instant . That Mike crossed over and did not suffer. But in our society, I am not suppose to think about the rest of this, how my son died . Its not done to obsess on or be ghoulish but my child died and I was not there , my purpose to shield him from bad things failed. My son died in a  horrible, horrible accident and it was that an accident . But for me and some others  the "don't think about it , how it happened mentality" does not work. To make peace with that my son is gone , I have to make peace with it all, even the gritty, the visceral, the scary and the heart shattering. The story of my son's life includes his death and to push it out of my mind without accepting it would have left to toxicity in me. It had to pour out , infected and deep for me to clear that hurdle.Of course it hit me in most inappropriate spot: Portland traffic after a almost near collision of two cars in front of me. It was in fact that baseball bat to the chest moment and in all clarity , it struck me how my son died , not just that he was dead. I pulled over and sobbed for about 20 minutes deep wracking , painful, fighting for air sobs. Because even though he was taken with mercy, the light that completed Ty and and I's life was taken from our end in a violent way. He was literally ripped away from us. That part of me torn, had to accept this fact. And no one wants to talk about when you have to face that dreg hiding in your soul and how painful but necessary it is to purge it . If I had stuffed that , it would have quietly chipped away  from the inside to my mind and sanity. Now it is just part of our history , a tragic part  but still just woven into the tapestry that was Michael not the dominating factor. I can say now Kiddo lived for glitter and can say my son was killed on impact in a car accident. Both bring up feelings but neither lurk to hurt me another time.

So if your living this world of grief , feel what you feel , when you feel it . Don't worry what step or stage it is . Don't  hide it because you may make others uncomfortable, don't fear your feelings if they are outside the social polite norm . Feel because if you do not , the mourning goes deep in you and hurts you. At some point my life will have more joy again and less tears. I will not forget my son or ever stop missing or mourning him . But when I am in the place of more healed than hurt, my tribute to him will be a well lived life .