"There is no grief like the grief that does not speak." - Henry Wordsworth
Today is my son’s birthday.
I am not planning a birthday party. There will be no Harry
Potter invitations or Minecraft-themed goodies adorning my tables. He will not
hastily wipe off my kiss when I hug him and tell him happy birthday in front of
all his friends. I will not see a lop-sided smile over a pile of presents just
waiting to be torn open.
My son is dead.
He would have been 12 today.
There will be a birthday cake. We make one every year, his
sisters and I. We sing him “Happy Birthday” and have birthday cake. Sometimes I
take a slice to the cemetery but even after all this time I am not always quite
up to it.
There is a private torment that occurs for the parents who
have lost children, regardless of the age of those children. Perhaps they were
young, perhaps they were adults. It doesn’t matter. When a child dies before
the parents, it feels wrong. Sam was only three months old when he died from
SIDS. The doctors told me there was nothing I could have done to prevent it.
Such things are hollow comfort to a grieving parent. The rational part of my
mind understands the doctors’ words, but the guilt will never leave me. It
consumes me, little by little, and eventually it will eat me alive.
I can still remember how it felt to hold him. He was a
schlumper. When I held him, he didn’t use his arms: they hung by his sides and
his whole body weight just sort of sagged – schlumped – down. And he always
nuzzled into my neck, sort of buried his head into it as if he wanted to
hibernate.
I think about him all the time. I wonder if he would be
tall. And if he and his sisters would be close. I think he would have big feet.
I don’t know why. I just do. I wish I could have just one more picture of him.
I wonder if he would wear his hair long or short. I’ll never know what his
voice will sound like. I’ll never get to hear him say my name. And I’ll never
get to say, “I have a son” again.
My beautiful boy, my heart is with you. Save a place for us.
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