the saddest day

i know that if you are reading this, you probably know what i am talking about. but every year i want to document again what this day represents. it has a double sadness for me. it will always be the worst day of my life..............ever. it has been 6 years now since i lost my daughter. she would be 27. old enough to be a mother, to make me a grandmother. or perhaps she would have had a career, a teacher, an attorney, an artist. maybe she just would have been like me; in a job that is not a career but one i care about. i don't know what she could have been, i just know she was special. she was smarter than most. she was beautiful. she was kind. she was full of energy and life. but she was also mentally ill. my daughter made my life special in many ways, she made me a mother. she taught me to laugh. she made me see things i would overlook. she loved cows! she loved a good mystery. she could do math like nobody i know! she spoke spanish impeccably. she was artistic. she was goofy. she was independent. i miss her every single day of my life. i have seen her ghost. she has spoken to me in my dreams. losing my daughter changed me from who i was to who i am; drifting through life waiting to see her again. her story is long and complicated and full of mysteries. i will not bore you with the details of her life and i will not horrify you with the details of her death. i just hope you all are with me in thoughts and prayers on this day.

and the reason for my double sadness: my mother also died on this day. after my daughter's death, she went to bed..... and stayed there. she was not healthy to begin with, but going to bed made it worse. it was two long years of her illness becoming worse. many days were spent in the hospital. many times i was angry with her because i needed her to be there for me. many times i cried and cried on her shoulder, but she just was too sad herself. she tried to console me, but she could not face the loss of my daughter, her first grandchild, herself. when my mother died, much too young, i know it was not from smoking and COPD as the doctors would say, it was from a broken heart. there is more to her story with my daughter. they had a very special relationship. and they died minutes apart, on the same day, two years apart. it was unbearable. it still is. i hope you can see my sadness, how it will never go away, how i long for both of them, to talk to them, to touch and hug them again.

and the reason i have gone on with my life after losing the two most important people a woman can have in her life: my oldest son, Samuel, and my youngest son Robert. without these two amazing boys, i would be lost. they make me smile still, when smiling is very hard. they make me remember that there is a reason to go on. they make new memories for me. they hold my hand when i need it the most. they make me madder than heck by being kids and make me love them more than is possible because they are MY kids. they are funny and musically talented and steadfast in their love for me. they are always there and listen when i cry about their sister and hug me and try to help me remember the good moments in my daughter's life. they are the best thing i have in my life and i love them so very much.

and the man that stands next to me, that holds my hand, that comforts me in my deepest darkness, the one person who is ALWAYS there to listen, to let me cry, to know and understand the depths of my despair, my darling husband. he has been a rock in my life. he is a giving and loving man. he has suffered his own loss of his father and his brother, yet he goes on. he is strong and wise and yet sensitive enough to cry with me at times. i can not express my gratitude and joy in having this man in my life. i love him with all my heart.

and the final person i need to introduce to you is my dad. he is actually my step-dad. he has been in my life since i was about 7. he raised me. he paid for everything when i was little. he taught me to be a good employee, to follow the rules, and yet how to let my hair down and have fun. he loved my mother from the beginning to the end and continues to love her still. he is here, but wants to be there with her. he suffered a massive stroke in february, but he is aware of my mother's picture. this is the man who told me of my daughter's death. this is the man who held me as i collapsed in grief. this is the man that i try to visit every day, to let him know what he means to me, that he is MY FATHER, more than any man could be. he grieved with me and has felt my losses more than anyone else.

i am blessed to have the people i have, those i have lost and those i still have. i hope you have the same in your family.

family is the reason for living.