Day Seven of My New Reality

"I’ve always believed that life is weird and random and mysterious. There’s no rhyme or reason as to why some things happen and some things don’t. In short, more often than not, life makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. 

Despite this belief, there’s a certain natural order that I, along with most people I think, typically expect - we are born, we grow up, we grow old, and then we die. From an early age, we expect grandparents and parents to die before us. That’s the “natural order” that we presume our lives should take.  

Death, under any circumstance, is hard. The death of a child, however, is often more difficult because it completely disrupts this natural order that we believe in.

My paternal grandparents outlived two of their four children. My grandfather once told me, in a rare moment of emotional expression and vulnerability, when my uncle and aunt died, that he lost a part of himself. 

Yesterday, my husband's 23 year old son died.  Yesterday, R lost a part of himself. 

Right now, life make absolutely no sense whatsoever. 

The upcoming days will bring rolling waves of emotion and an endless array of questions that probably have no answers.  Our lives are forever changed."

My stepson died on Saturday, May 18, 2019.  On the day after his passing, I posted the above statement on Facebook.  It came a day after my husband woke me in the early morning hours to tell me that his son had apparently collapsed in the house he shared with 3 friends and was found unresponsive by one of his roommates.  Despite the best efforts of first responders, he was unable to be revived.  

This time last week, neither my husband or I had any idea that our lives would be so drastically and permanently changed within 7 hours.  We had no idea that when the sun set that evening, it would be the last sunset his son would ever see.  Whoever coined the phrase "life turns on dime" was absolutely right.

Today is day seven of what R and I are calling "our new reality."  During the past seven days, we have survived the initial shock, made the necessary arrangements, attended the services, and said our goodbyes.  We have taken GA as far as we can take him; where he has gone, we cannot follow.