"I don't believe time heals. I don't want it to. If I heal, doesn't that mean I've accepted the world without (him)?"
- Jandy Nelson
Two months. Two months without our sweet boy. Without his smile. Laugh. Sounds. Smell. Voice.
Two months without being able to grocery shopping with him, driving in the car, jamming out to music, talking with his device, watching movies with, swinging or riding his scooter.
It's summer time now. The summer I dreamed we would explore the entire state and have epic adventures. We always thought he would get better. That he would get through this and shine even better. We never dreamed that he would stop breathing. That he wouldn't recover from his lack of breath. That he would die in our arms. Nothing. Nothing in this world prepares you for this.
The agony. Guilt. The way your mind replays every second of the end and you keep thinking what maybe we should have done or could have done. And always come to the same conclusion that our boy was gone. The sadness. Grief. Emptiness. The death of the only life we've known. The death of our own souls. The way our hearts stopped when his stopped. Except we still look like we're living, breathing.
The way it hurts by breathing, knowing he was out of breath and it took him from us. It hurts to get out of bed. To do anything... because we can and he can't. The guilt. Cuts us straight through like a hot knife. Searing. Burning. Exquisite pain.
When you lose a child, the act of living is the most painful existence. The grief comes in waves, at times tidal waves as we drown in the swirl of emotions: guilt, sadness, emptiness, agony.
Every second of every day we live in excruciating pain. All you want is for the pain to end but it won't. Because every morning when we wake up, Kreed is still gone. He's still buried in the ground away from us and we don't get to call his name and see his dimpled face. We walk around ghosts of our former selves. In a life that doesn't feel like ours. In a life we didn't agree to. A life we didn't expect. And Kreed left his life unfinished.
We have to pick up the pieces...but all the pieces won't be there. Our life will always be empty. A shell of what it once was. Kreed's passing took the joy. Two months. Two months without joy. Unconditional love. Without the main part of our existence. With a life full of complete and utter emptiness.
Two months without our buddy. Two months.
