Wow...where to start. No one can imagine the pain, sorrow, and emptiness of losing a child. It's like before you became a parent, you could not understand the amount of love you would have for a child until you had one. It's the same with the loss of a child, you do not understand the pain and emptiness until it has happened to you. It's not something any parent thinks about happening. You have a child and love him or her with everything you have, never imagining that one day, he/she will be gone before you. That's not how life is supposed to work.
The devastation of losing a child is hard to accept. For a long time, you are in denial. You just can't believe something like this has happened. And no way do you want to accept it! I fought for a while with this concept. I did not want to believe it was true and refused to surrender to it. I did not accept it and fought hard to think she was just at college and would be coming home soon. But over time, with her absence, there was no choice. I HATED it! Ultimately, there is no other choice. You did not want this awful reality, but it is here and you can not get away from it.
The loneliness of your child's death is again nothing that can be explained. It's probably different for each parent as it has to partially do with your relationship and knowledge of your child. For me, my daughter was my best friend and my mini me. We had the same interests, same passions, very similar personalities, understood each other, and loved hanging out together. We really enjoyed each other's company. We talked about everything, spent a lot of time together, and made sure we knew how much we loved each other. In our family, we were the only females dealing with three males which bonded us as well. While they fished, and built things, we decorated and helped animals. It was easy to become best friends. This is also what makes my loss so lonely. No one else can truly understand what I lost and no one will ever be able to fill that hole in my heart. I am blessed with amazing friends and know that someday, maybe each one of them will fill a small space of that hole, but it is hard to imagine right now.
In a few days it will be 11 months ago that my precious Carly was hit by an intoxicated driver. I still have a lot of healing to go through. I've learned that grief is a journey that will be with me the rest of my life. Learning to live this new life without her is something I need to figure out now. This was definitely not my choice, but is something that has unexpectedly happened. I am still here and somehow need to figure out what to do now.
I'll always love you sweet Carly!!
