FatherLESS Day

Dear Brian,



Today is another big FIRST.


It is easier to prepare and tense up for a big blow you know is coming and brace your self to endure the anticipated pain from it than it is an unexpected flick on the ear.



So it is not these big events - these MONUMENTAL 'firsts" that are so difficult to endure. It is the small unexpected events in life - like seeing your favorite CINNAMON LIFE in the cereal section and realizing I am wiping a tear from eye in the next aisle - a tear I didn't even know surfaced.


Today on this first Father's Day without you, Brian. We celebrate your memory. We celebrate YOUR Dad. We celebrate your brothers. And I celebrate my boys - because I see parts of you in all of them.



And I know the Dad that you were to our children in their young years WILL mold them into wonderful big kids, young men, and responsible adults.














KEEP BELIEVING

another nail in your coffin

Dear Brian,

I continue to slowly kill your memory. I am sorry. I do not mean to do this. The world is forcing me. I resent every step I am required to take.

Each week since April, I have taken another step to secure our finances and establish things in MY name.

MY name.

It sounds so selfish. Each time I take the next step, I feel exactly that - SELFISH.

Since you died, the world is forcing me to do all these necessary, SMART, and what it considers to be "logical" things.

Things like close joint accounts and open single accounts.
Things like create a trust.
Things like change beneficiaries on all existing accounts.
Things like change benefits into my name with my social.
Things like change the deed on the house.
Things like change my emergency contact to someone OTHER than my spouse.
Things like take your name off and change my status to WIDOWED on school, medical and other forms.

WIDOWED.

Did you even read that? It looks like a typo doesn't it?


Each time, Brian. I am LITERALLY erasing your name from my concrete world. My checks will soon no longer have your name on them. Our account statements will soon come to MS ANGELA ONEILL and not BRIAN E ONEILL.

It feels so wrong.

I feel guilty doing all that I am. I am sorry for this.

The world is making me do this. The world is forcing me to gradually move on one step at a time. I hate that they won't allow me to take your name along with it. It's as if the world thinks I should get over it already and move on. I truly resent it all right now.

One thing that will have your name on it forever - your headstone.

Yeah, I am 37 years old and I just designed and ordered my husband's HEADSTONE this week.

Of all things to keep your name on it, I could do without that one.

I miss you, Brian. I love you.

KEEP BELIEVING

mentally exhausted

Dear Brian,

I cannot muster the mental energy to write to you lately.

Everything else in my life - from establishing my trust, to researching counseling, to handling life insurance and social security, to managing a constant stream of whining and never-ending fighting that is physically escalating each day - is draining all of my mental resources.

I am spent. I am sorry.

I miss you, Brian. I love you.

KEEP BELIEVING

complicated

Dear Brian,

I am tired of everything being a battle with the kids and between the kids.

But more than that, I am tired of being the only one that is enforcer and referee. Sometimes I just want to close my ears and walk away knowing there is someone else to handle at least this ONE episode. Only there isn't.

And then I have to put on my happy face and take them out in public and then kiss their little heads and put them to bed later.

It is way harder than I thought being the only one to handle these two little boys.

WAY HARDER.

Some days I just want to put my own self to bed early and cry myself to sleep. I don't want to listen to any more whining and fighting and crying and wrestling and breaking and falling and tattling. I don't want to be the only one to enforce and redirect and discipline and tie shoes and run errands and find sitters and watch games and play catch and make dinner and clean up and maintain the house and pay bills. I just want it all to go away. How am I ever going to go back to work and handle all of this, too??

I guess I am just feeling deserted, overwhelmed and lonely lately.

I miss you so much, Brian. I love you.

KEEP BELIEVING

missing

Dear Brian,

What I miss most of all right at this moment....

hearing you tell me you love me

looking into your eyes and that "knowing" look we shared

being appreciated

feeling beautiful

having someone to be beautiful for

your voice

your smell

your facial expressions

your music

the sound of your shuffling feet

your foot rubs

helping you tie your shoes

hearing your snoring

folding your clothes

taking care of you....

Wow, Do I ever miss you!


KEEP BELIEVING

another reason I need you

Dear Brian,

Holy Cow! Do I ever need you?!

Two terms that came up this evening:

penis boogers
wiener mustache

I am not even kidding. Apparently both are complications of muck on the private parts of males. The former is something that can happen just about any day. The latter is something that happens as a phenomenon of playing and sliding around in the mud.

Seriously?

And I learned of BOTH these complications at dinner tonight. It seems they were both discovered as the boys avoided eating their corn.

And while I feel ever more educated, honestly, I could do without this knowledge or conversation. I know you would answer and handle the topics with just the right amount of rudeness and ridicule dignity and grace as you handled everything. I just want to know what they are talking about. And then I want them to wash their hands.

I miss you, Brian. I love you.

KEEP BELIEVING

the nightstand

Dear Brian,

As you know, Gavin is a collector. He gathers and hoards all sorts of "treasures" and keeps them either in a box in his closet so his brother will not touch them or lined up on his dressers for a proud display of his most recently acquired nuggets of nostalgia.

For him, this is an expression of himself and part of something he can control in his life. And Gavin likes to control the little bits he can around him. I have learned to accept this about him despite the fact that it looks junky and it encourages him NOT to share. It is Gavin.

However, every so often, I go on a rampage cleaning out his "treasures" when they begin to overrun his room or when the collections under the bed overflow into NOT under the bed causing me to step on them or when I can no longer find room in his closet for a pair of little boys' shoes (which are 1 size away from fitting me, by the way).

The other day, on his nightstand, I was tired of looking at this, and was a few minutes away from forcing him to find a different place less conspicuous:

Before I said anything, I noticed a small memo pad with a pencil inserted into the spiral binding at the top. I looked at it and asked Gavin what he was writing at night when he was supposed to be sleeping. He said, "a list." A list of what? "A list of everything on that table."

So not only is he collecting, he is compiling lists of his collections.

This list said the following:

Cat hat

trofy (trophy)

Cat dumptrukc (dumptruck)

cros in a bag (cross in a bag)

goo

bake pak thing (back pack thing)

shrt thing (shirt thing)

neclis (necklace)

And I realized that this particular collection, the only one thus far worthy of a list, was a collection of all things YOU. His nightstand is a little shrine to some "treasures" we have found around the house that were yours or that remind him directly of you.

Your hardhat

Your BMX racing trophy

A Caterpillar dumptruck

The cross keepsake that matches the one we placed in your casket

The putty you used for your occupational therapy to regain some hand mobility

A Caterpillar luggage tag

A magnetic shirt nametag with your name

One of your lanyards from the Diavek diamond mine you visited in Canada

And this is one collection that I can live with. It no longer looks like clutter and chaos.

It looks beautiful.

I miss you, Brian. We all do. I love you. We all do.

KEEP BELIEVING

quit it

Dear Brian,

Okay. It is time to cut out the joke. I am ready for you to come home now. It no longer feels like you are just on a trip or away for a while. It's been too long. I miss you so much. I am ready for you to come home now. I just want you back. Why can't you just come back?!? The party is over. Everyone is moving on and forgetting. I miss you. The boys miss you. We need you. Just come back. I don't know where to go from here.

I love you!

KEEP BELIEVING