I Miss My Mom

Taylor called my name at least ten times a day. Or, if she wasn’t home, she called or texted. A crisis of epic proportions called her to the phone. I smile thinking about how she said my name. A lot of times, she’d call me when she felt safe. She called my name while she was in bed, worrying sometimes, but never showing the extent of her emotions or state of mind. She worried about beautiful hard things. Not always. Like my sister and me, she giggled a lot with her friends when she hosted a sleepover, the best time in my life. She liked to be held. I think it was the dark that soothed her into conversation.

She worried about the animals at a nearby circus and I sometimes wished I hadn’t educated her about their plight, but Taylor knew how to fight her battles one at a time. She fought for other people’s rights. She spoke gently to them, whoever it happened to be. When she called me to her at night, even until she was 22, she wanted to be held. The visceral connection of mother to daughter and the devotion and struggle we shared…so many parts of us wove together and I felt as if my heart grew two sizes bigger when she held me. Sometimes, she’d tell me about a dog WE needed to go find again because she couldn’t catch it.

She called my name when she felt safe in the shower, too. Maybe the curtain between us, the excitement she felt at going to a carnival, the mall, or if in crisis, Taco Bell or Buffalo Wild Wings. I never did convince her to eat vegan. She chose her battles, I thought. I feel like I was suspended when she talked to me. I didn’t want to move. She told me funny stories about her friends and family members. It was like news hour. She didn’t speak negatively about them; she and I shared a love for our gang of miscreants. She told me about a person who needed help or needed a phone call. Her loyalty gave her authority and power and she showed love with a hug, a tiny smile, and a kick in the pants.

I turned off my ringer at night because she would be in an area with people who were not healthy, and some crisis would occur, usually a traffic violation or something minor. If you ask her about the people she could have avoided, she said they needed her. Taylor was right. We needed her.

When she was born at 9:05am on June 23, 1993 Taylor brought with her a tiny face surrounded by thick, soft and dark hair. 4 pounds, 11 ounces and 21 inches long. She arrived into the world in protest of the light and cold. I’m sure she was hungry. She cried, I cried, her dad cried, the nurses laid her on my body, no clothes, just physical touch and quiet. Taylor Nicole fell asleep with the sound of my voice.

I dutifully returned to full-time work and after three very short weeks, I vowed to sell whatever necessary because I decided to raise my child. I am grateful to have been supported in raising her and her brother. They benefitted immensely from support systems and unconditional love. But, Taylor experienced crying spells earlier than normal colicky babies. She was overwhelmed by too much movement or stimulation. Rocking her, patting her, singing to her with the lights on could not happen and Taylor mostly napped in some lucky soul’s arms. But, she needed me then too. I didn’t want to work full-time and the crying became a problem and it seemed as if I calmed her.

When she was about two years old, her dad and I watched her scream under the coffee table where it was safe, I assume. She screamed at 6pm and it usually lasted for about a half hour. Although hard to watch, and doctors who tried but couldn’t’ determine any issues. So, naturally Taylor talked early enough. She also frequently stated, “I miss my mom.”

I remember that she didn’t want me to see her smile. Often, her cousins and friends descended upon the house and she hid her smile. But, if there was a single problem, question, request, “Mom!” I don’t know what it feels like to win an award but hearing her call my name was my favorite sound in the world.

Suicide, Borderline Personality Disorder, and Grief

I carried my coat and cake into room 239 on the last night of class. Placing the cake among the faculty and student contributions, I listened to the professor talk about her cousin who passed on. She told some interesting stories to the class in the past but this time, she spoke of a medium at her place of work. She spoke of listening to the medium’s encounter with a young man who hung himself. The medium told the family member, “He didn’t mean to do it.”

I hunched in the middle of a Master’s class and still standing, I sobbed. I wondered if that story was for me. I thought it must be. I wanted to know if Taylor meant to do it. She would normally persevere and I just asked through sobs, “I wonder if my daughter meant to do it.” No one really knew what to say and I didn’t need for anyone to say or do anything. They mostly ignored probably the professor’s and my story and query into the deep.

How could this be any worse? In suicide prevention trainings, they show video footage of people who attempted suicide, failed, and stated that the second they made the decision to end their lives, they changed their minds.

Maybe Taylor’s Borderline Personality Disorder took over and the abuse from the man and the lack of my presence and the psychosis added up and Taylor literally lost sense. Would it have happened continuously?  Would she have had children? Would she have suffered for her entire life? Did she mean to do it?

Brain training is sold in all forms and sorts through meditation, medication to get your mind right so that you CAN meditate or run, bike, write, draw, talk to a counselor…there’s so much I know now that I didn’t know about before she left. We could have learned together. It’s been just over 2 years now and I’m still bargaining. BUT, I trained my brain for a while to stop slipping so deeply into the questions, doubts, physical pain and psychological damage. I just used a skill from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) to put a “STOP” to myself when I wanted to share stories about why it was my fault and why I couldn’t think straight enough to have her funeral cards made with a photo of her that she wasn’t eventually cremated in. Suicide is sickening.

Thoughts of suicide pervaded throughout the most difficult of my days. I chose to call around until I could find someone home to talk to me through it, talk to me while I was laying knees to chest bawling. A friend talked to me one night about a tool used in Dialectic Behavioral Therapy (DBT), and as a matter of fact, DBT is the only treatment known to help Borderline Personality Disorder. There’s no medicine, no cure, nothing but exposing yourself as a raw, frightened, confused person in pain. It is possible to work through. It is hard to reach out. But, we must or we leave a hole in the souls of too many people who blame themselves. I will never be okay without her.

My friend shared one possible solution, a thought even that helped me change course when the pain was like hemorrhaging her body and soul from mine. Grief is too much, sometimes. Grief is lonely and my friend taught me how to help myself. When I thought of taking my life, she said I used my Emotional mind. She told me to think with my Logical mind to decide if suicide would be a good decision.  I don’t share my daughter’s disability so I was able to be brought out of the core of my despair.

I did not choose not to suicide because I wanted to stay. I chose to stay because I have a son who I love as much as my daughter. I didn’t “think” he needed me, I mean look at what I did to his sister. I killed her. Of course, logically I had to know that I was not responsible wholly for her suicide. Emotion vs. Logic. A feeling vs. a thought. I chose to stay for my parents and sister who I walked to heaven. Carla asked me to take care of her as she slowly died. I stayed for my fiancé who stands with me now and loves me through the betrayal of my wanting, for a time to leave him behind in this world.

If you or someone you love is thinking of suicide, call or chat online 24/7 to 1-800-273-2855 or text Hello to 741741.

I’m back at the beginning. I’m back to the people who wanted to kill themselves to escape their pain and who decided not to. My reality at the moment is a silent depression, one for which I saw a doctor, am taking medication, and will eventually pull away from. I’m taking the steps. I don’t try to offer people my advice when they say they’re depressed. I offer to help find resources. I just don’t think I could function without taking care of myself. I can work full-time now, go for a day without crying, and tell my mind to stop and think, give myself time. If I’m too depressed, I go to bed. Going to bed is not a cure. It's buying time for you to change your mind by morning. Put your ear buds in and listen to meditations, talks, breath work, calming music and go to bed. In the morning,start researching to get help. There are free services and low-cost services available wherever you are.

We must help ourselves by reaching out for support, even when we believe the world would be better without us. It won't. She tried to call so many people…even me. Ultimately, our lives are our responsibility and we sometimes can’t fight for ourselves in our Emotional mind. But, for the taken and the ones whose ashes we sift into the ocean, they couldn’t make their mind logical and they couldn’t stop and they couldn’t go to bed. She didn’t mean to do it. I cry about it every single day. No matter whether you think you matter to people or not, I am telling you that you do. I can barely hold on, knowing that my bright and beautiful, funny, charming, smart-mouthed, water-loving daughter would have chosen to live. 

The Transforming Tapestry of Life and Your Tribe After Suicide

 I could hear the fabric in the Universe tear apart to reveal space. If I raise my fist or flat palm into the air to touch Taylor’s Universe, I could have seen the rip already. Taylor, on Earth was the nucleus to the cell, friends and family rotating, spinning, mostly in uniform, around her in a set rotation. She calculated schedules and personalities, clustered friends who served purposes for which she orchestrated trips to the beach, parks, restaurants, protests, or friends’ houses to hang out.

While the orbits were set in motion and all people and their satellites played well together, no major planetary mishaps on her watch unless she caused or righted them. Taylor navigated her atmosphere quite well. She knew who needed help with alignment, who to turn to for solace, food, and missions to buy the latest phone on the market, find the right hair color (and leave traces of it all over the bathroom and towels) or create her next tattoo that she would not like to be asked about.

Florida! From left: Taylor, TJ, Paulie, Tommy, Haley

I’ve read that the 2^nd year in grief is harder than the first. I think this is true in the case of the torn fabric of Taylor’s Universe. You see, the people who love Taylor, the people who she collected and loved, nurtured and explored with did not necessarily bond together with each other outside of their relationship with Taylor. Some did, of course. Lifelong friendships were forged with and because of her. But, it’s only been since this June, a year and a few months after Taylor left the physical Universe that I discovered the tear. I can push my hand through to the nothingness, to the space outside. It’s lonely out there.

Taylor held everyone together and while in the first year of her departure due to Borderline Personality Disorder I tried desperately to celebrate her birthday and plan a vigil or Christmas party for her friends who I happened to find in my home and on my couch for most of their lives. Most years I babysat or just planned parties with so many growing kids. I remember scenes of pillows, blankets, wet towels on my couch, clothes and random socks on the floor or in the wash, and dirty dishes for most of Taylor’s 22 short years.

Taylor and cousin Nick

The planets, sun, moons and stars could not remain woven in this web of Taylor’s love because Taylor was and is the sun and without her there is no gravity that bonds them to each other and in some of the most painful losses is the people with whom I’m no longer in contact. Tommy, her brother, is in college now 15 hours away. People and circumstances change. I remain lonely for her and the people who will always remain “my kids” are loved unconditionally. No one was handed a grief manual as I distributed her clothes, jewelry, mementos, memories. My reality is without most of them, the ones I love as is natural even if I were the mother of these grown up children. I am in flux, flotsam and jetsam under a wobbly moon.

I look at my new space without my son in college and still wish for dirty dishes, clothes on the floor, the sounds of occasional yelling at the computer from the basement. I cried a lot before and after he left for college. When I returned from Africa to the devastation that was all of our lives, the house was not silent for a few months. Gradually, people returned to life. The quiet and physical pain are my only memories of those first months. I waited for someone to need me, to call me, to text me, anyone. I did not realize at the time that I was waiting and wanting and needing her. I’m immensely proud of “my” kids. They have relationships, children, attend school, maintain jobs, and they’re self-actuating, something Taylor craved but was not able to do. It is natural that they, too would be leaving my continual space but not completely. Fear is part of grief. I fear loss. Fear of loss leads to depression, loss of hope. I had to break through.

Trevor Hall concert from left Amanda, TJ, Taylor, and Mom

This time of my life has been difficult not just because I miss my daughter or her friends or even my son. I lived in service to them, I loved to care for them, I learned to care for others before my Self. I forged an identity when she was born. It was based on giving to others, to her and then Tommy. Tommy played an integral role in Taylor’s life. She seemed to see him as a playmate and then, although 4 years younger, the big brother who she could trust.

As a parent suffering the aftershocks of the Universe trembling and tearing and them silently slipping into new orbits and habits and homes, I am still here. My mission is to see my Self as Love, to see Taylor in me, to see and to know I am needed and worth more than the condemnation I throw at myself because my daughter took her life. I want to be a living example of the her who was an extension of me, sometimes. If people learn to love by first loving themselves, I must make good choices and take a proactive stance in my self-care. It’s a struggle and sometimes, I can take a step forward. I have a support system I can count on. I don’t reach out nearly enough. If you’re grieving now, you probably understand the race to get home after work, the exhaustion of “grief brain” and fog. You may understand the feeling of loneliness and simultaneous inability to pick up the phone yourself.

Six Flags Ariel, Mom, and Taylor

I love my life partner (and king of patience), son, family, and friends. I must try to forgive and love my Self. Until I do, that tear in her Universe? It allowed me to see into mine. It’s a topsy-turvy view with wonky space junk, a few solid strong planets, moons and stars…and a struggling sun striving to shine brightly and right the Universe I live in. Tonight, I just want to see the 3D universe and live my dream, in the country, sitting outside and staring at the stars.

If you or someone you know is considering suicide text HELLO to 741741, call The National Suicide Prevention Hotline at Call 1-800-273-8255 or chat online through Google.

One Year After Losing my Daughter to Suicide

Unedited from original 2016

Let’s get the questions out of the way first. No, I don’t feel any better. No, I’m not unusual in this. No, this is not a quick process and it doesn’t ease up after 11 months. No, I did not enjoy the holidays, even with family as there was a clear and significant part of our family missing. Yes, I’m getting help but grief has no timeline and no rules. The only healthy thing I would advise that everyone should do is to stay alive. It’s not a matter of what you want to do for yourself, especially as a parent. I stay alive for my family. Yes, suicidal thoughts are normal. No, they don’t last forever. No, having another child doesn’t help and people who have lost their only child, although I try to connect and even replace all of her needs by transferring them to my son, I believe I have done more harm than good to him. People who comment that at least I have another child is like erasing her from 22 years of our lives. My son is different with different needs and I focus on him as I feel I’ve always done. Just as I focus on my relationships with my family and partner.

I remember things now but almost never know the date. I don’t remember people’s birthdays that I clearly remembered in the past. I don’t remember the first 6 months or about after her passing from the physical. I don’t feel the immense and excruciating physical pain that rocked my body in the second and third months and I don’t wake up every day with panic but the anxiety presents.

 I feel as if I’m not rushing myself but failing at healing so that I can honor Taylor. I want to educate and raise funds for Borderline Personality Disorder and teach about mental health. I want to get a good job first for a year and have no interest in doing it because I feel like a massive weight is sitting on my chest still. I feel useless and hopeless. I tried to learn astrology, I tried to learn about crystals, I tried the I Ching and tarot cards, Christianity and I read about other religions to find out how others see death in the physical and how to reach her in her spirit form. None of it helps. Counseling has helped with other relationships and group meetings are horrible for me. People are “stuck” for years and years and I cannot live like this forever. I’ll give myself the time now but in this time I suffer with my Self. I do not feel useful and do not want to hear that people need me. My immediate and caustic response is that she needed me and I failed. I know that’s not the “right” perspective but good luck changing a parent’s process.

I’m not even close to the same optimistic, funny, hard-lined animal advocate. I don’t blame myself for focusing on Africa but I’m completely different now. I don’t feel hope except for my son and partner. I don’t feel happy inside. I am not optimistic. I am depressed and I believe still in shock. I do take medication and don’t care what people think about it.

I hang my head every single time I see my parents or her friends, feeling I took her away from them even though I know it’s not true. Stop giving me logic. I can be logical on some days and even for a week. But, there is nothing I can say to my crying parents who are now losing my big sister and their daughter to cancer. I am trying so hard not to have regrets about her and love her and help her transition peacefully. That’s all I can do.

I ask questions every day and try to go back and examine what happened in those last months and days and I want to know why no one told me, why I felt anxious and didn’t know why, why no doctor or counselor ever asked the right questions or even mentioned BPD. I am angry sometimes and I’m scared I’ll always feel this way. I want to go back and talk to her about the diagnosis and to the doctor who she said made her feel like there wasn’t much hope for her for at least a year. She wasn’t talking to me about that at the time. I want to expose her abuser because he hasn’t changed a bit, even after cutting her down. He was the last person she spoke to after she tried to call me. He abused her until the end and she stepped off the chair. How can you possibly think a year of this trauma would be better?

 

I know all of the rational answers and I don’t want to hear anyone mitigate the process I’m going through. The best answer I’ve received to date when I have had to tell people she passed is “I’m sorry.” That’s it. People don’t understand it and I’m ok with that. I understand. I’m not holding anyone accountable but myself. But, for me this is what an almost year looks like and this is where I am. I am angry, fearful, in despair, selfish, without an ounce of self-love (I don’t even understand what that means), and in physical pain. The only advice I can give now to anyone is to please phone a friend or 10 friends if it means you’d take your life. I understand completely why you want to if you’re suicidal. It makes sense to me. But, things will change and suicide is permanent and ruins the lives of those who will stick by you and will suffer. I won’t let anyone suffer for me the way I suffer for Taylor.

Inside my head I rage, I scream, I cry, I flail. My mind still cannot comprehend what has taken me a year to understand. I am in shock, I torture myself with questions, and no I am not better. No one who has lost a child has EVER told me that they are “better” after the first year. I heard it’s the worst but you don’t get “better.” The most I can do is wait…feel useless waiting…for the day that I can pick myself up and create a new “me,” which is the last thing I want to do.

I want to see my son happy and successful. I want a better relationship with my parents and partner. I want to WANT to do something good again. I want to WANT to live fully again. She cried as I held her and kissed her head. She said, “I don’t want you to leave but I’m proud of you.” I said, “I’ll cancel right now. I will not get on that plane if you just say the word.” She wanted me to go and walked away a little teary. She could not reach me as she was taking her life. I can’t reach her physically and a year is not even close to feeling a bit better.

 

I’m not writing this for sympathy, empathy or through the Ego. I’m writing to tell you that if someone is suffering, support them like I have been supported and don’t do it for that first week or month. So many friends have returned to their lives because Taylor was not their daughter. I understand that. But, if you do make the commitment to support someone, remember you’re walking with them and possibly holding them up or allowing them to hold on for one more day, for life…for hope. This writing is an example of one way I try to “fix” people. I want to help people and when people call me with problems because it gives me a sense of purpose. I just couldn’t fix her from Africa or for 22 years of her life. I will sit with my pain until it no longer serves me. I’m told that suffering is our greatest teacher. I’ll let you know when I figure out that lesson. But, it’s not after a year.