You know at times, it was hard parenting a teen. The worry
where you were, who you were with, were people leaning on you to make choices
outside your inner compass. I thought that was hard but in comparison it’s
easier than parenting the dead. Because until you lose a child you say it, I am
your parent forever but you don’t understand it, that depth of unconditional
love and commitment and bond that defies death. There is one thing I now longer
worry about, where you are and who you are with. If you are not with Dad and me
then God is the only acceptable place, the only place that offer solace and
comfort in my daily electrocuted heart. But I parent you. In that each day you
are still the first thought when my eyes open, my last thought when my eyes
close. And throughout the day a barrage of thoughts and memories. And the mom
guilt still here. My rationale, my mind knows you growing up was learning, growing,
sometimes falling on your face, sometimes hurting, sometimes questioning. It
was always a fine line for us was it not kiddo? In our case, you a young man at
19, like any young man wanting to move out in the world, find your way, get
answers but always knowing dad and I were in your corner, home was always open,
our love unbreakable no matter what. You blossomed in love, testing us sometimes
hard core but always becoming more of yourself when each test we passed. We never
left you, you could make us mad, sad, and frustrated but never was our love to
you breakable or conditional.
The hard part came for you in that each time you realized
how much I loved you, me, mom loved you, part of you struggled with adults in
the past who just let you go, abused you, abandoned you. We walked through
teenage angst just like most parents with their sons. But we had an extra
piece. As a child you were not given what you need, I can’t sugarcoat that. It
was so hard for you, to me, a young adult wanting everything a young adult had
and did but still needing mommy. The mommy Michael needed at 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12,
14.The mix: your development and age in independence, the heart still needing
more gentle, more coddling, more love to heal that lost little boy. So very
early on I learned to take your lead, when you needed to soar and test and when
unlike many kids your age, you needed more and closer. You needed me to sit
while you cleaned your room, you needed me to make your lunch, to hold your hand,
to sit on your bed and stroke you hair while you cried, and to sit with you in
the dark, in silence putting the ice on your neck for the migraine. You needed
me to talk about safe sex but still buy you batman underwear and socks with
rainbows.
And now you are gone and my heart wrestles with my rationale
and my mind all the time. You had so many great connections, friends, and
support. In the last few months your were growing, strengthen relationships
with friends and all sides of your family But in the last few months of your
life you were doing what we all do, testing as well. You were doing things with
people with questionable intentions, being in situations that would not enhance
you. We talked pretty open about a lot of it, you shocked that I knew, me
testing out that mom knows all or finds out all skill. There is a FB live post of you now that you
are gone with a person I never met, hanging out being you but stoned. At 19 I
got stoned so it was not a shock, you actually would call us or text us if you
had smoked or had been and were staying put. I also know how you bragged to friends
we didn’t know, all the while being cool to them but checking in with us. I
really rallied against that post and was frankly at first pissed that people
kept reposing it. That was not how I wanted to remember you. But now I watch it,
my kid being a kid. Still being you and that’s the part I parent not this perfect,
infallible human, but you my son, being you. I have been in your computer and while
I have great pictures of you and pictures you did as art, I also saw messages.
And again as a parent of a teen, get over it. There were message from people I
trusted you with doing things that put you at risk or without thought of your
best interest. But the reality of that is none of those things contributed to
your death. They no longer matter, they are not blame, or cause, just white noise
in your history. I have to remind myself, I could not have chauffeured you
around until age 65.People drive. And no matter how I go through that day’s
chain of events, none of them could have prevented that accident. None. So I just
see you that morning, your shorts, Simpsons tee, your hoodie, your beanie,
having breakfast with me, hugging me saying I love you talk to later. And then
you were poof, gone from my world into Gods. As your parent I figured out when
you needed love, space, attention. I could tell when you were struggling, sad, happy,
secretive or about to blow. I could gauge so much about you and where you were
in head space but there was nothing in my arsenal that ever let me know you
would never walk back in our door, that was the last hug , the last I love you
mom. I didn’t know and I feel like I failed my promise that you would never
have to walk through anything alone again failed. I was not there when you left
this world. You were not alone God was there, grandpa was there to bring you over,
but I was not. That is hard to forgive myself for.
I still am always slightly amazed and amused when people
tell me how well I am doing with all this. I still feel the same depths of pain
and frankly am still batshit crazy, but the cadence of my crazy looks
different. It still here though. I am not bearing the unbearable. It is
unbearable, the magnitude of the loss of you and grandpa and grandma so quickly
in sequence mind numbing, literally. So in unbearable life you have two courses
of action, you leave the world or you break. The break is inevitable: as human
you can only handle so much. Without breaking you become withdrawn, bitter, a
victim. You my son I know have seen it from your new view, I break. Like a cartoon
character with blocks falling off me I break into the deepest places of pain in
my head and my body. It becomes a primal almost transcendental release of
sadness, aching, failure, self-loathing, sadness and yearning. Every part of me
breaks but in those moments God does not take me, my book of life has more
chapters. So in the break I have two choices, stop juggling the unbearable, end
my life and be with you or use the beauty and people still gifted from God to
me to glue myself back together. I remember Dad and all of the people, all of
the children still alive and beautiful in my world. I remember my friends who
would literally walk through broken glass to get to me if I was about to go
over that emotional cliff with no return ticket.
Each time I pull myself
together from a break, it’s like this love from others welds me back together, giving
my structure more support. There are times unexplained about me about to go
over that side of death where folks reach out to make me think you had a hand in the timing.
Missing you is still unbearable but I thank God that he has put people in my
life, your dad, our family, friends that are like soft pillows to cradle the
blows. I can navigate the unbearable because I am never alone in this loss.
I miss you every day Michael
Love forever mom
