When I was around six years old, I remember my parents slowly walking up to me in the morning and giving me a hug. They kneeled down beside me and said in a soft, slow, sad, and apologetic voice: “I’m sorry, honey. The raccoons got Mrs. Frizzel last night.”
I sobbed for hours. I was sad for days. I made my parents have a funeral. My tears fell to the ground as we buried my dead chicken. My parents bought a chick that I raised and loved, but I still missed Mrs. Frizzel.
When I was eight, Fluffy and Ginger passed away. My parents broke the news to me in the same way. I cried the same way as I had before. I got two more chicks.
When I was twelve, my parents again approached me with the same sad tone and told me that that a couple of our chickens died in their sleep. I didn’t cry as much when they died, partially because I was old enough to understand that everything dies of old age at some point. It was much more bearable. I would be sad, but not sobbing like I had done in the past.
Today, I came home and asked if he bought food at the store. He said no. Something happened, so he had to come home. “What I happened?” I asked.
“The neighbors dog got into our yard and into the chicken coop,” he said with a flat tone.
“You stopped right, the chickens are okay?”
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“No,” he said. “They are dead, all but three are dead.” He said it with the same flat tone.
He just told me straight up, assuming I wouldn’t be sad. No soft, slow, sad, or apologetic voice. He patted my back and walked away.
I went outside. The corpses were gone. All that remained was feathers.
Eight year old me popped in to my mind. The funeral for Mrs. Frizzel. My parents stroking my back and telling me everything was going to be okay.
There would be no funeral, my dad had put their limp bodies in the trash before I came home. There would be no comfort from my parents. Fifteen year olds don’t cry when their chickens die.
I’m shouldn’t be sad. I’m too old to be sad. But, I’m sad.
I remembered holding the chickens when they were less than a week old. Moving them to the big coop when they were old enough. Hand-feeding them mealworms and celebrating the day that they laid their first egg.
I raised them. They are dead now.
If I was a child I would be sobbing in my parents arms. Now, I’m sobbing alone.
I know if I went to them they would comfort me, but there’s an age where you need to accept reality on your own.
Being treated like a child is now nonexistent. Just like my chickens.
When I was little, if I had a lot of homework, my parents would tell me I could do it and tell me I could have a cookie when I finished. Now, when I complain about my homework, they say lots of homework is part of growing up.
When I was little, my parents were by me at every moment to guide me through life. Now, I am old enough where I need to handle things on my own.
When I was younger, my parents could fix everything. They could make everything feel better. In their arms, I was safe.
Yes, the death of my chickens is part of the reason I’m crying. But, there’s more to the tears running down my cheek.
No matter how much I want to believe it, my parents can’t fix everything. As much as I want it to, they can’t hug me and make me not be sad. As desperately as I want to deny it, my parents can’t protect me anymore.
I don’t know why all of this came from a dog breaking into my chicken coop, but it did…
Rest in peace Lucky, Trouble, Darwin, Lemon, Pepper, Oreo, and Henry. I may not be a child anymore, but I still love you and miss you.
I never would have been able to imagine someone making me this happy. The little things he does makes me happier than anyone else’s little things has ever done.
Listening to the dumbest songs in his truck and watching him sing them and just act like a dork makes me smile so much my mouth hurts. Just sitting next to him makes me happy.
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He does sweet, small things which add up and make me feel so happy and he is actually happy to be with me.
He always opens doors for me, picks me up, and takes me out. He treats me with respect and takes care of me. I almost never pay for anything myself and he just makes me incredibly happy with the conversations we have.
On Saturday, he told me that after he washed his truck, he found something weird in the mud. I never would have imagined that someone writing out prom with mud would make me so happy.
Even when I just go to his house and watch TV with his family and him, I am happy. I love spending time with him and I love the girl’s days I have with his mom and his younger sister.
I am so lucky to be with him. He is so sweet to me and I feel like I don’t deserve him and the way he treats me. I haven’t felt this love and appreciation since my dad died. It sounds weird, but he was the only person in my life who showed how much he cared about me until I met him.
I know he was hurt in the past and I hope he knows I could never do that to him. I, also, hope that I make him feel as special and happy as he makes me.
People come and go so fast. It’s almost like they’re here one day and gone the next. With a blink of an eye, a bullet is in their brain, a tumor is in their body, a rope is around their neck, lethal amounts of Codeine is in their system. You try to save them, but they’re already gone.
I beat myself up and ask over and over again: what could I have done to help you?
Photo credit: drawingpenciled.com
Why didn’t I realize? Looking back now it seems so obvious. I could have done so much to save you.
A text? A call? A drive up to LA? Would that have kept your heart beating?
Well, here’s the answer. No, I couldn’t have saved you, even as much as I wanted too. You may have had a pulse and air going through your lungs, but you were already gone.
It comes to a point where a person is faded to a point of no recovery, no matter how much you do, the sadness inside of them can never be erased.
You can tell so much by looking in someones eyes. Looking at your most recent photos, your eyes said it all. The color, the joy, the happiness, it was gone. Now, you are gone.
I blame myself a lot.
But sometime I’m going to have to realize, no matter how much I deny it, there is nothing I could have done.
but, we both know deep down that we will most likely never be fully okay.
i ask myself all the time… what could i have done better?
how could i have helped you, made you see what i saw in you?
you sat on the edge for a while, staring over the ledge at the busy freeway. i stood starring at you from below, sobbing.
in your mind, there was nothing to live for, nothing worth living for.
live for me, i thought. live for me. please live for me.
it’s selfish, but i needed you, in all honesty, i still do.
i loved you then, i love you now.
you didn’t jump because you knew that if you did, it wouldn’t kill you. you’d survive the fall and, when you woke up, you’d be sent to a place far worse than the center we were at.
i lived with you for two months in a residential treatment center for eating disorders until we were both discharged.
we suffered together, we cried together, but we laughed together too.
we’d talk in spanish complaining about the staff, we’d talk about boys, we’d talk about all the things we’d do once we got out of center for discovery (the treatment center we were at), and all things we would do together.
at the center, all sharp objects, from knives to pen caps, are locked in a cabinet which only the staff has a key too.
i remember that one night in our room. i heard a noise coming from your side of the room.
the staff who watches us at night had fallen asleep and someone had forgotten to lock away a pen cap.
you lay in bed, a broken pen cap in your hand, and blood on your wrists.
i ran to you and tried to take away the cap. you pushed me away, i lunged at you again and took it.
i grabbed your arms and forced them around me. you sobbed, begging for the cap. i could almost hear you internally begging to me, “end this please, end me please.”
you kept on saying please in between sobs. over and over again: “please.”
“shhh,” i whispered crying. “shhh”.
you were seventeen at the time, i was thirteen.
i was a ninety-pound, anorexic, thirteen-year-old girl living in a metal hospital.
you were a bulimic, suicidal, seventeen-year-old girl living in a mental hospital.
i held you for what felt like hours, i hugged you until you stopped crying.
you’re nineteen.
i don’t see you much anymore, we talk sometimes though.
you were sent back to the center twice because you relapsed.
you seem better now though, you seem happy now, but i worry a lot.
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you’re nineteen. if you go back to your old ways, you’re parents can’t legally force you back to the center, you’re an adult.
if you wanted to, you can find a bigger ledge, one that could end it all.
i can’t protect you anymore, i’m not there to grab the pen cap.
you are happy now, but we both know how fast things can change.
i hope you stay happy forever. please stay happy forever.
if you are ever sad, please tell me.
thirteen years old in a treatment center, fifteen years old in my room writing this, twenty years old wherever i’ll be then, no matter what age or what place, i will always be here to hold you.
I found this a while ago, while looking through notes on my phone:
To many people, Christmas is a day to wake up early and run to all of the presents that await you. Many of my friend’s stories on Snapchat were pictures of things they got, like a Hydro Flask, new phone, drum set, AirPods, and more, with the caption “Merry Christmas.”
Unlike many of my friends, for me, today was not a day focused on gifts. I spent the day with my grandparents and parents. We did not exchange physical gifts, our gift was being together as a family.
Instead of being sad or mad that my family doesn’t celebrate Christmas, I took a different approach. Today reminded me of all I have and all I can do to give back. Christmas is about giving, so I did, but a little different that most people did today.
This evening, I spent over two hours signing petitions, calling senators, and sending letters to change the injustice happening today.
This evening, I sent, signed, and made over 105 petitions, letters, and calls.
No, today I did not wake up to an abundance of presents. No, today I did not celebrate Christmas like most people do.
But today, I used my power to make a difference, in my opinion, and learned my ability to express my beliefs is better than anything that could be under the Christmas tree.
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