Tag Archives: christopher

Broken Tiles

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It’s St. Patrick’s Day. Eight years ago today I met my wife for the first person at O’Keefe’s in Clearwater. It was one of the best days of my life.

A year ago today we were moving into our temporary home in a downtown St. Petersburg AirBNB while our floors were being done. It was less than two months after the suicide of my step-son, Christopher. They say that you shouldn’t make any major decisions in your life in the first year after losing someone to suicide, but I thought that since Christopher was my step-son I was immune from that. I was going to be able to be the strong one and keep the ship going while my wife grieved. I went into therapy myself a few months after we had the floors done, and I’ve realized in the months since how very wrong I was. I’ve always known that I was a “fixer,” but I didn’t realize how much that my desire to fix things had to do with me. The house I live in has always been a source of great comfort for me. If I can keep it clean, and neat, and organized, and well-maintained…well, the rest of the world could go to hell around me but I’d still have a place to seek comfort. Christopher’s suicide broke us. It broke our sense of peace. It broke our ability to take comfort in each other, and in our house. I realized this morning that my decision to get the floors fixed was an effort on my part to fix the psychological damage in our home. The broken tiles represented us. They were a constant reminder of the fact that we were not at all ok.

If I fixed them…maybe that would change.

It didn’t. The floors are beautiful, and I don’t regret our decision to get them, but our damage was still there when the workers had left and everything was cleaned up and put back into place. It’s still there now. We’re working on it. Both of us. As hard as we can. But it’s still there.

And then…

Today I’m physically in the office for what could be the last time in a very long time, with the world falling down around us as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to grow. Again, I find myself doing whatever I can to fix a situation that can’t be fixed. What can I buy to prepare ourselves? What can I do to prepare? How can I make what’s going on ok?

I can’t.

I’ve been putting on a brave face for all this, but it’s getting to me. I’m not OK. I’m not going to be OK if it gets a lot worse. I’m not cut out for this kind of thing.

This is the song stuck in my head today. It’s not a good angsty blog post without song lyrics, right?

Until I should die, until I should break
Not a god, not a devil my soul shall take
If I should lie to betray myself
Then I would damn myself, and my soul forsakeI don’t want fifteen minutes want a whole lot more
Don’t want to suffer the fools and the spoils of war
I don’t want fifteen minutes, or a reason why
I want a stainless steel road stretching off to the skyI don’t need sentiment, want, or hate on my mind
No crimes of passion or obsessions in kind
No walls, restraints, or momentary thrill
No blood on my hands, no time to killI want more body, I want more soul
Flip the switch to automatic, I want controlI want control
I want control
I want controlIf I should give in, if I should turn away
Not a god, not a devil my soul could save
I want more body, I want more soul
Flip the switch to automatic, I want controlI want control
I want control
I want controlI want control
I want control
(I want control) I want control

2019? Good Riddance.

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Oatmeal 2019 comic
Image courtesy of Matthew Inman (The Oatmeal) on Twitter – https://twitter.com/Oatmeal/status/1212232294364151808

I’ve been noodling around with this post in my head for a few days now. As much as I’ve neglected all of my blogs for years now, I generally seem to be able to churn out at least one “this is how the last 365 days went” posts around the New Year. When I think about what to put down for 2019 though, everything comes up as a blank. Or at the very least, one phrase comes up.

We survived.

I mean, that’s pretty much all I can give you at this point. When Christopher took his life last January, we immediately went into survival mode. Just doing what we could to get through every day, every minute. At times it was all could do just to hang on by our fingernails. Some times we couldn’t even manage that.

While managing my own grief, I’ve done my best to be there for Lisa when she needed me. I haven’t always been successful. In fact, I’d probably be willing to bet that I haven’t been able to help more often than not. If there is anything I’ve learned in the last year it’s that I cannot, no matter how much I try, imagine the grief she is experiencing – and I don’t want to. I won’t even put down in words what the circumstances would need to be in order for me to even start to relate, and it still wouldn’t be the same.

So I try to be there as much as I can. I try not to make it about me when I can’t be. Together we try to figure out what life is supposed to look like now, but we still haven’t really figured that out. I’m not entirely sure we ever will.

When you have to open an annual recap talking about suicide, where do you go from there? Do you talk about the mundane things? The improvements we’ve made to the house? The trips we’ve made to Chicago? Our cruises? Our careers? Health?

It all sounds so trite in comparison. I know it’s not – That what has happened in our lives in the time we now call “The After” matters. I know it won’t always feel this way. But right now? In this moment? When we are only a few days away from what would have been his 19th birthday and a few weeks away from the first horrible anniversary? It’s the only thing that seems to matter.