Why? (Eight Years)

Eyes burning, throat constricted, I want to scream and break things. To stand howling in the wind, at the world… Why?  Why my child? My protector of the small. My girl so full of life that her tiny body could barely contain it.

She is gone. Rotting. Left vibrant only in our memories, in our pictures, in random recordings which capture her voice, her face, her laughter, her getting high. WHY?

What could we have done differently? At any point, before she began experimenting, during her initial drug use, or after when she was hooked and convinced that she was beyond hope. Was there anything more that we could have done? Should have done.

I think about this constantly. So much of life is about striving to be better, to be more successful. There is one place that this really matters beyond all doubt. As parent’s we owe it to our children to learn from past mistakes and use that to be better, don’t we? How could I have been better? What didn’t I do? What did I do? I need so badly to know, and I know I never will.

Is there a time that I yelled when I could have been gentle? Should I have found a way to be more engaged? I wish that I would have known which signs were meaningful. When I should have left her alone and when I should have refused.

Why my sweet girl? I used to think that life only gave you the lessons you could handle… what you were meant to learn. But these things cannot happen in a world with any grand design. Lost children, destroyed by diseases that they were too young, naïve, and irresponsible to avoid. This is not how it is supposed to go. 

And I must remember that this was not my story. It was her story. Her beautiful, epic, tragic story. I would give anything to have her back, but none of this was my choice.  Not even having her, really. Because there was never an option not to. From the moment that little being took hold my future was written. Was hers? Eight years later and I still can't believe it ended like this.

Eight years... just thinking about that is enough to push me back over the edge.

I can talk myself into and out of blame for hours. I can hold this conversation with myself forever. But I can never answer why. I can never get closer to understanding why I do not get to hug her anymore. Why she doesn't get to have all of the chapters she is supposed to in her life. In her story.

I want her back with a desperate rage that I cannot contain. With a grief that will, I think, forever be bigger than me and my broken heart. I do not forgive the person who left her. I do not forgive this world that took her from me. I do not forgive myself. And if there is a grand design, I find myself hating it.

I must admit that ultimately, there is no reason. There is nothing fair, there is nothing I can cling to that allows me to make sense of this loss. There is no answer to my question. There is no why.

Elannah Rose (left) and me

Backsliding

This is the time of year when I feel like I’m backsliding into a broken heart. I spend the year healing, learning to become more comfortable in my current state, figuring out how to be without my firstborn child. In May, as we draw closer and closer to her death day, I feel a hole growing inside of me. I sit on the brink of tears, the smallest thing tipping me over the edge. 

It always takes a few days to adjust to the constant intensity. From July through April I’ve learned to adapt and roll with this persistent grief. May and June are not my friends. They are not the time to make decisions, changes, sometimes even conversation. 

This year I feel guilty as I feel the loss washing over me. Who am I to wallow when so many are grieving, scared, and in a silo while Covid 19 strikes fear in our hearts and the worldwide lockdowns ravage our security, both financial and emotional. 

But grief is a selfish master. I want my daughter back. I want to hear her laugh. I would take everything and anything to have her creating joy and trouble. I give in to this selfishness, I want to stop explaining that I really have three kids. I want her to be 28, not forever 19. More than anything, I want to hug my child.

Unfortunately, the magic that brought this girl to me was a one-time thing. I wish I could sleep through the part of the year that makes it so hard to find a way forward. I wish I could stop backsliding, even though I am horrified at what that would mean. 
I am incomplete without her. 

Mistakes

I still like to imagine that Elannah Rose performed a super spy maneuver, faked her own death, and disappeared so that she could go live her days unfettered by her past mistakes. The fact that there was no reason for her to do so is irrelevant to this day dream.

She'd be a singer in a somewhat successful band with regular gigs and hopefully some good tours. Not so successful that her fame created more problems or drew attention to her true identity, just successful enough to enjoy life and not worry about the future. Probably, and unfortunately, still smoking cigarettes in the alley between sets. Loved by someone who wishes she would stop smoking, cherishes her quirkiness, and is as fun as she is.

This day dream became more elaborate when I realized that if I pretended that there was an issue of mistaken identity it didn't work, because if it was just a mistake she would have come home. Unfortunately, she has to be in hiding.

I like to play this game, although as I write this I think that it probably makes me sound crazy. It makes me happy to think that her life would have turned out happy, in some alternate universe where she was still here with us. Someday maybe I'll write the story of her alternate universe life, and in it I'll cherish every moment.

Maybe in an alternate universe she doesn't have to be in hiding. She'd be irritated that Noah is already taller than her. Proud of her sister for her amazing athleticism, and I like to think they'd be the best of friends by now. She would love Cassie, she always wanted a big dog. She'd be arriving this week for Thanksgiving and I'd be trying to figure out how we're going to fit everyone in the house but so pleased to have the family together again.

Her mistakes took this away from me. I'm still pissed at her for that, but mostly, I just miss her and the life she could have had. And, of course, how do you hold someones mistakes against them? It's just unfair that my biggest "mistake" resulted in her life and her biggest mistake took it away.

Maybe I'm just in a mood. Maybe it's the holiday season, which is notoriously difficult for so many. I feel haunted tonight, by everything that could have happened differently. By peppermint mocha's, and pudgy little feet, and un-punishable little girls who think a time-out is funny, tightly curled hair, and tinkly laughter, and beautiful voices that seem too big for the person they came out of. By life altering choices. By the success of her friends, and still, by the blurry memory of the person who chose to leave her to die alone.

I wish I could take an eraser to that piece of history. Since I can't, I'll just close my eyes for a bit and play pretend.

Birthdays, Deathdays, and the Middle

Someone told me that when I didn’t make my typical anniversary post they hoped it meant that things were finally getting better. That I was healing, or moving on, or whatever. I don't know if that's true or not. Can you get better? I think you just settle into different.  



I've heard that grief never goes away, that it just hits you differently over time, and maybe in less expected ways. So... that's a super positive outlook on the rest of my life. 



The reality is that I’ve really been struggling the past few months. I feel like I left Elannah Rose when we moved to the other side of the country and I feel this complete sense of guilt. My brain knows this doesn't make sense but my heart can't get over it because the life she lived and knew was in another place and that means we're moving on. Which is just not fair, because I wanted to bring her on all of my adventures and to witness hers. And because there is nothing I can do about it.



I miss my kid. I miss her every day and lately I miss her so much that my eyes just constantly leak. My heart lives in my throat, my emotions hang out under the thin surface of my skin... and I just kind of pray that, as in past years, I'll be okay after Sunday. After her birthday has passed. I already made it through the deathday, so I just need a few more days to finish with this cycle and then the new, normal, mostly dry-eyed me can return to residence. 



But then, there's this ugly part that has been pretty intense lately.



I feel robbed. I feel jealous of every mid-twenties young person I see. Not actually of them, but of their mothers who get to witness the rest of their offspring's lives. Because their offspring's have lives. This horrible disease stole my firstborn child and the ugly part of my heart just keeps screaming... why her?  



I have spent my life striving to be gracious, to think of and treat others with kindness and dignity. I am ashamed for these thoughts and feelings and yet they claw their way to the surface in an especially painful way when those twenty-somethings were her friends.



Occasionally, I read something by or about the parent of another addict. I am always struck by the fact that there is nothing unique about my grief, other than the fact that it’s mine. It's a horrible population to belong to and it defines us in a way that is life altering.

What do you call a mother who lost her child?



A failure. A mess. Or, in polite circles, you just hope she'll stop mentioning it.



On the other hand, I am amazed by these orphaned parents who become champions for every other child. I understand them. I strive to be a part of that population. I believe that it is the best we can do, whether it is for our own healing and self preservation, or to honor our loved ones, or for a truly selfless act. It is our path to salvation, to hope. To the future that we wish our lost ones had and to an end to this disease.

time and grief

Baby girl, 

Your little sister is older than you now. I think about that a lot. She’s crossing bridges that are lost to you, as she travels toward her future.

What a crazy thought, that she could outgrow you, outrun your life experiences. And someday your baby brother will, too. 

It’s almost another year. Time crawls, sprints, drags on in a world without you. Your life is frozen in our memories and recently I find myself worried that I’ll forget the details. 

I can’t imagine how that would feel. And what if I didn’t even realize that you were slipping away? I can’t lose any more of you than I already have. 

I miss you. I would have done anything to keep you. All this time later and I can reason through your loss, I can talk about it. But I don’t understand it. I mean, I do scientifically, but not in that cosmic plan kind of way that we all keep trying to divine about our own lives and those of our loved ones. 

I want you home with us. I want to plan trips to see you wherever you are and relish in your adventures. I want to hold you while you cry and celebrate your victories.

I’m sorry. I’m sorry for every moment that I was too focused on something else and didn’t see what I should have been seeing. I’m sorry for everything that failed you. I’m sorry for all of the times that I failed you. I’m so sorry. 

I’m sorry because I know that I’m a better, more patient, more understanding person now and I wish this version of me had been there for you.

I’m sorry for the dark, sad things you thought about yourself. Sorry that you even had the opportunity to make those choices that led you away. 

I’m sorry that I don’t get to hug you anymore. Or hear your voice or your laughter. And I know that’s selfish because maybe you’re just at peace. 

It doesn’t get easier. But I still wouldn’t trade one moment of our lives with you for this grief. 

I carry you in my heart, every day. 

Love,

Mom

Good Bad Dreams

Last night I dreamt that Elannah Rose was still alive, she had just run away from home. She wouldn't talk to me and kept dancing away.

Facts are fluid in dreams and so as this one wore on, she became younger. Toward the end, Elannah Rose was a little girl and she was being cared for by a woman who had been led to believe that she was protecting ER from me. The dream became chaotic, a crazy combination of events all geared toward ending any chance of reunion. Every time I thought I had conquered one thing, a new trial began.

When I finally woke up, I felt desperate and defeated. I must have hit snooze 42 times because as horrible as the dream had been, the chance to see ER's face and hear her voice was impossible to give up. The part where she was alive was amazing.

The problem, of course, with dreaming that she's alive is that waking up is devastating. For a few brief moments there is confusion and a renewed sense of loss.

I was reminded of my early and irrational hope that it wasn't Elannah Rose that they found. That she had run away and would return once she had made peace with her demons. Of course, I knew this wasn't the case, but I'm sure I'm not the only person who has tried to reason her way out of her loss.

I would give anything to have not lost my oldest child. Part of my heart went with her. I think often about what I did to allow that to happen, and I punish myself for what I didn't do to stop it.

I wonder why my subconscious chose last night to punish me a bit extra. Is it, perhaps, because my other two children are stretching more and more toward their own versions of independence?

I let my son walk home from his friends house yesterday after school. It's two blocks and I followed him in my car, moving forward half a block at a time so that I could make sure he was safe. His walk may have been short, but it was a big step for him. As significant to him as his sisters cross-country journey just a few days before. My inner untrained psychologist imagines that these giant leaps are the reason that my brain is suddenly focused on loss and danger.

Danger. I'm obsessed with it. With trying to ascertain what is real and what is overblown fear.  I strive to let my kids grow up normal and free. I refuse to let my loss turn me into a helicopter mom, although "free-range parenting" is probably eternally out of my reach. I tell myself daily not to punish my living children for the mistakes we made, for the mistakes ER made.

I can even reason away the fire that erupted at the end of my dream. It makes sense, this final devastation, considering that the California wildfires seem to have raged non-stop for the past several years.

Reason doesn't matter, though, when my heart feels like I lost my daughter yesterday. When I will jump into the nightmares that I've spent my life trying not to have, just to see her again. When my imagination tries to show me that I could have avoided all of this.

For my friends

Dear Friends,

When I was a little girl, I struggled to make friends. I could make the connection, sure, but I had to build up the confidence to talk to people first and this was kind of my kryptonite. 

My grandmother said that if I could fill up my fingers with the number of real friends I had in my lifetime I would be lucky. She wanted me to understand that though I struggled to make friends it wasn't a big deal. Quality verses quantity and all that.

Making friends never became particularly easy for me, as much as I do love people I have never stopped dreading the small talk that happens between the introduction and the moment that friendship begins to form. Maybe because it wasn’t easy, I understood the message and I deeply valued the folks in my life that I was blessed enough to call my friend.

No matter how much I thought that I appreciated my friends, though, it wasn't until tragedy struck that I realized how very blessed I was. 

This year as the anniversary of my daughters death passed a friend reached out to remind me of my strength and her faith that I would come out the other side of that awful day.  I wanted to tell her that that strength was greatly owed to her, and to all of the friends that have proven that the value of true friendship is immeasurable.

When our lives broke, you held us up. All of you.

You cleaned her room and packed her things, because I couldn't.

You fed me, because I couldn't.

You put on my lipstick, because I couldn't.

You made sure we talked, because you were afraid I wouldn't.

You gave me an outlet for my pain and made sure my voice was heard.

You listened to me scream.

You picked the flowers and understood everything.

You carried her to her final resting place.

You made me laugh again.

You made sure there was always someone watching, in case I couldn't bear it.

You did so much I don't even remember because I was broken.

You demonstrated a level of friendship that I would bet many people don't even realize exists and maybe I hope they never do.

I do feel strong now, and I believe that much of that is because you let me borrow it from you for such a long time.

Thank you.