My Fearless and Fabulous Life

One Year Ago Today

    One year ago today my baby girl’s whole world changed. She learned the hard way about how harsh life can sometimes be. On May 17, 2010 her boyfriend shot and killed himself. Making her one of what they call “Survivors of Suicide”.  A survivor of suicide isn’t someone who tried and failed to kill themselves. It’s one of the mass amounts of people that are affected when someone kills themselves.      

     If there was anything that I wish I could have saved my daughter from this would have been the event. Death is always hard, but when someone chooses to leave I think that makes it that much harder to deal with their loss. I know in the end when we all look back there will be many lessons learned and somewhere in disguise there will be some hidden blessings…..there always is. Sometimes they are just so hard to see.    

 Dear Alyssa,    

      I hope that you are not to sad tonight. I hope the change of scenery is helping. I hope you know that you are stronger than you think you are. I know that this hasn’t been the easiest year for you, but you made it. I hope between now and the next anniversary that you feel a little lighter. I know that life’s not fair, and that is a hard lesson to learn…not just for you, but for all of us. Just don’t forget to look once more for the good in life and find the happy moments. We never know how much time we have here and I hope more than anything that Nick helped you to learn to not only appreciate life, but to live it.      

     I being biased as your mother believe that you have an amazing future ahead of you and I know that Nick is still with you. I hope you can learn to hold him in your heart and keep him as a beautiful memory of someone that you loved and let him lead you into your future instead of the weight of it all holding you back.      

     I hope that you know how much you are loved. 
     One year ago today Nick Lancaster transitioned from this world. I hope that you’ve found the peace that you so deserve. I wish you Love and Light Nick. I pray tonight that no one ever feels so lost that they think suicide is the answer. No one is unloved, not needed and none of us are extra. We are all supposed to be here, even during the bad times. Live may never be Fucking Perfect…..but it’s always worth living. 

 

 

Conquering Death (just a little)

      A few months ago I took a class called Lifestyles and Diversity. The class is about many different things, but mostly it’s about judgment. Our judgment on everything from illegal immigrants, to homosexuals, to people who have been in prison, to addicts. Basically if it’s a subject that is regularly subject to judgment, it gets looked at.     

     One night that made me particularly uncomfortable was the night on death and dying. A woman that I judged to be completely crazy was brought in to help us take a journey that night. That journey was our own death, or at least the dramatic equivalent that left us all still breathing. Lets just say that my anger caused me to completely miss my own death, let alone the other person that I was supposed to be holding space for in this exercise. I even carried this night around with me for weeks, telling anyone who would listen about crazy death lady and what I had to endure in this class.     

     At one point I thought that I had actually moved past this experience and found a little good in it, but deep down inside there was something about it that still lingered in me. Then I started volunteering at the HIV center and every Wednesday I get to hang out with the (maybe not so crazy) death lady. I thought I was so far past the first night that I even spent one afternoon telling her how much I hated it and how over it I was. Needless to say, she didn’t buy it.     

     Today I walked into a room and death and dying night was being discussed, I ran the other way, because of course I’m so over it. On my way in the other direction “you should come” was yelled at me. I felt that all to familiar anger jump up inside me, but let it out with a laugh and a “whatever”. Every time I saw her for the rest of the day she kept saying come tonight, of course never imagining that I actually would. She isn’t the only one that couldn’t imagine me there, neither could I.                Today of all days someone asked me if when the time comes for them to leave this world if I would be willing to hold that space for them. The second the word yes came out of my mouth my mind kicked in with all of the “what are you thinking” and “are you crazy”, “you know you can’t do that .” I can’t even be present for a pretend death, how could I possibly have just agreed to show up for someone for the real thing. So after some pretty heated debates with myself, I decided that I should go to the class tonight and see if this time I could lose my anger and be present.     

     There are times when you go somewhere and you can’t wait for something to just be over. Then there are times when you are so unmistakably in the right place in the right moment that you could stay in the magic forever. As creepy as the whole pretending to die can sound, there is no place that I would have rather been tonight. I am often greeted by new dimensions of myself that I didn’t know existed and tonight I found one of those. I found out tonight that I do have the strength to not only hold that space for someone that I care about, but even for someone that I have never met. It’s not really a scary place to be, it’s one of the most loving and compassionate things that one could ever do for someone. To let yourself go so completely even for just a moment in order to share the experience, without all of our judgment about death…what a gift.     

     So thank you death lady, you bring a special kind of love to the world, thank you for bringing some of it into mine. Your gift is a gift that not all can handle, and I want to acknowledge you for that. Your light shines brighter in a space of death than most of us in the brightest parts of life. Thank you for the gifts that you gave to me tonight, I accept them with so much gratitude. I feel somehow tonight like I conquered death…just a little.