Telling Stories

University writing peaked my interest in writing. Animal advocacy spurred my writing into a new direction, and I learned new writing styles and formats, including how to write in technical formats. Writing helped me process through a bit of grief, too. In fact, I wrote blogs and Facebook posts about the ramifications and realizations within the tragedy of my daughter’s passing.  In October, 2018 I stopped writing out my pain. Eventually, I had to learn to stop expressing it to people who could not support me or talk about Taylor at all. I utilize a multitude of practices to heal and to cope and after moving through the shifting intricacies of life and death, I destroyed some practices I engaged in during the most shocking and intense times of pain, too. For example, I listened to a certain meditation app to help me sleep, I visited a horse that lived close by, and I wrote this blog.  

Something happened after I stopped blogging at the end of 2018. I couldn’t visit the horse anymore. I worried about him dying, a natural and temporary casualty in death. I most definitely do not listen to that mediation app I used in the beginning. In fact, when people mention events from 2016 and call to mind people or memories, I feel panicky and I exit the topic immediately. I choose not to expose myself to the trauma of the first minutes or year. I found those triggers to be driven by anxiety still.

So, what is this if not a blog about grief and pain? Well, I think I created this blog to talk about Taylor. I thought a few things would happen:  People will call me and message with lots of memories and laughs and they will send me pictures of Taylor with her friends and we’ll all live in togetherness with stories of Taylor as our bond. We got the bond part. The rest never happened. To be fair, after 4 years it’s still hard for people to talk about someone who dies by suicide.

As I looked back at my blog recently, I couldn’t understand why I would title the blog about my daughter’s life and then just write about my pain. I understand now that I start to panic when I think of telling a story about Taylor much less about how to celebrate her life. I feel nervous and she’s my daughter. I want to celebrate her life and still my memories are scant. The brain fog of grief protects us for a bit but I’m not sure why I struggle with the best part of my daughter; her life.

I’ve been alone so much in the past 4 years that I may have processed through the public side of myself, the one who wants to scream at the world that I messed up or that she should be here or no one cares about her to talk about her or no one cares about me; temporary manifestations expected in grief. I triumphed over loneliness. I like being alone. I read, hike, write, research, eat, and micromanage three pain in the ass dogs.

The truth is, I don’t remember so much that I maybe should. I feel like I don’t know how to tell her story or to bring her to life in words. I feel like it’s not real or it’s not enough or it’s diminishing who she is. Talking about her dying isn’t working anymore. 

Telling random stories or packaging her life feels like I'm boxing her in, like this is all there is. How do I put her in a box? What the hell kind of box could contain Taylor? Why can’t I do this? I’m an expressive writer, I know the subject, I adore her. She’s worth talking about. She’s interesting and funny and those are just words and they don’t mean anything on paper, you see. 

How do you choose to describe the sky, the earth, wind, and water? I know big words. I know how to use big words and flowery adjectives. I am ashamed of myself for feeling this way. It’s not that Taylor isn’t worth a library of books written to, for, or about her. I think that maybe if I really concentrate on telling her story, on talking about her, really digging in and finding the right words, doesn’t it diminish her to being just a story that people can't identify with or relate to? I can’t answer my own question and I can’t get this lump out of my throat. 

My worst fear is happening as I write this. In my last blog I talked about her. Now, I feel anxiety and I'm rattled. I feel defensive and caught. Why can’t I just write page after page of stories?

I don’t know where to go from here. I know I want to tell her story. Maybe I already am. I hope I don’t forget all the stories I want to tell by the time I’m brave enough to tell stories. I hope I don’t start resenting all the people who never mention her but also lost her and are not expected to do a thing? There's no reason for me to feel left out of her life via others. I know it doesn't make sense, like everyone else who knew her holds the keys to who she was as a human. How does that even make sense? 

I guess the reason I stopped this blog in 2018 is that I’m not ready to progress here. I don’t know what I need to be ready for, how long it will take, if I will forget, or if anyone really cares that much about Taylor to read stories about her by her mom. I’m not sure why bitterness leaks out here after I feel like I’ve resolved these issues. I just typed above that I’ve healed a bit! Did I learn something today or just give myself more suffering in effort to do the impossible? Damn all the expectations in the world that we place on ourselves. You'll get your story, Taylor. 

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.