How do you feel about the future? Is it something you look forward to, or something you’d prefer to avoid? How do you see yourself in the future? Is there anything you’d like to accomplish, or anywhere you’d like to see? What is one thing you would like to do or be or feel or see?
What you need to understand is that your loved one isn’t there right now; they are here. And here, today, they are hurting. As much as you want to point them to “someday,” it is so much more important to acknowledge where they are, today.
Three years ago, I would have said suicide was cowardly. I didn’t understand, then, how quickly life can change. Suicide may not be an ideal answer, but I better understand the complexities behind the issue now. Awareness isn’t enough—suicide prevention starts with understanding.
I promised you I’d be okay. I’m really really trying. But sometimes I realize I didn’t know what I was promising.
I read a story a while back about a father who planned the cutest keepsake, having his daughter’s teachers sign a special book throughout her school career. I planned to do the same thing, & set myself this timed email as a reminder for the future. And even though my son died, the email still came.
It feels funny to say that: I miss you. It feels like there should be another word, something that acknowledges that part of what is missing is this unrealized idea.
I think about “moving forward”. I think about “trying again”. These words are hurtful. These words feel like I’m trying to replace you. It isn’t possible to replace you.
Over the past few years, I’ve come to view birthdays as a means of marking time, another year forward in the future I had planned. I had so many plans!
My son, Adrian James Hernandez, was stillborn exactly one year ago today. And his loss was the first time in my life where there was nothing I could fight and nothing I could do or say. These are my reflections on the past year since his death.
This instinct for planning is painful to me. The best parts of my future are still achingly incomplete. I didn’t find him here because I carried him with me. I carry him and the world and the world is so heavy.
Death has never been my friend. The necessity of her existence is no more comfort than my own. I don’t hate her, but I look at her the way she looks at Disease. We are all harbingers. We all bring Pain.
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