Here's what I know.

I'm going to sign the contract with That Attorney. He's going to investigate. I should know if there is a prima facia case by the end of the day Wednesday. 

It's Wednesday again.

1.  I'm still eating casseroles from my freezer. It's a blessing to not have to worry about dinner when....

2. Somehow I wound up with 2 bushels of apples from apple picking. Apple sauce is on the stove and apple butter is in the crock pot. 1.5 bushels of apples to go. Anyone want to come help make apple pies to freeze?

3.  My never ending rotation of hoodies is good now that it's starting to get cold. 

4.  I'm getting lonely(er), though quiet is good for my soul, too. 

5. I hiked around Doctors Park today looking for Libby's cell phone. I also stopped to talk with Katie while I was there, then had coffee with the rabbi. 

6. I want another pajama day. Soon. Like now. 

7. I'm not enjoying fall this year. I don't know if it will be my favorite season ever again. 

8. On a large scale I know what I want and can't have. On a smaller scale, I want something that I can't put my finger on. 

9.  I really think that grammar will change sooner rather than later to allow ending a sentence with a preposition. 

10.  6 weeks, 5 days. Almost to the minute. 

Days

It's just been since Saturday that I blogged. It feels like I've had several weeks in these 2.5-ish days. First there is the diary version of events that you should know, then there is the journal that will come. 

Saturday night we went trick or treating. 

Sunday morning we adopted a tiny two pound girl kitten. 

Sunday evening was the memorial. 

Monday morning we went to get passports. 

Monday afternoon we went apple picking. After that and a late lunch L and MK went back home. 

Late Monday afternoon we sang happy birthday to Katie and sent balloons to heaven for her. 

Monday early evening the three sisters made a birthday cake for Katie and shared it with her in her bedroom. 

Monday evening we had dinner made by the Other Mothers, then Joe, Cheryl and the Littles left. 

Monday night, all family was gone and the Other Mothers stayed until after 10. 

It was a long weekend. Parts of the weekend were nice. I felt Katie with us especially at the lantern lighting and at the orchard. I thought about her constantly. I cried a lot more than Libby expected. She even called Joe and me "saps." 

Joe and I separately had conversations with Katie at the orchard. Apple picking was one of Katie's favorite things. We always ate our weight in apples and laughed about how we were cheating the system. We found an unmarked variety of apples that were amazing. We were also the only people there for most of the time. 

Joe an I held each other and sobbed at the birthday balloons. Libby asked if we were falling in love again. I had to explain that Daddy and I are the only ones who come close to understanding what each of other is going through.  She said that made a lot of sense. 

I missed Katie every second. 

It's a long road

Someone asked me today how I am. I said that it was hard to hold it together. He told me that I make it look easy. I'm sure he meant it as a compliment, like I have so much fabulous grace under pressure kind of stuff. But I don't. 

I cry at the shoe section of Burlington Coat Factory. I weep during my massages. I lose it in the driveway. (That's all today.)

Maybe he just catches me when I'm lucid. When I put sentences together with the words all in the right order. When I don't consistently and without noticing call all female children that I'm related to "Katie."  

I feel that I speak like a stroke victim.  What I'm saying is not what I'm thinking in my head. It's a huge disconnect. I can't remember the word "blue," but I see it in my head and then I say the word "red."  I tell the same three people the same thing ten times, but I never Renee to tell it to the twenty people I need to inform. 

Yeah. I'm fine. 

A weird thing happened on Facebook

I know Facebook is full of weird stuff, but this is in the cool kind of weird category. 

Anne Lamott the author is someone I follow on Facebook. It seems like her unorthodox Christianity meshes with mine and makes me feel better.  Several days ago she put an essay of sorts as her status. That's what she does. She has these uber long status messages. This one was about permission to complain, whether it was small or large.  I complained about losing and missing Katie. Then my comment was swallowed by hundreds of others, lost, or so I thought. 

Today I received a notification that someone responded to my comment on Anne's Facebook post. Mine. The one sentence that was lost. 

"Shannon...I'm walking along side you in your pain, it's a pain we both share...I'm a few more months down the road and barely hanging on, but I AM hanging on and I hope you can get through this minute..then the next one..then the next one. My prayers and hugs to you. Keep breathing as best you can."

Someone way out there heard. 

You guys always hear. You always know. And THAT is a true miracle. You carry me. 

But what are the odds? Someone heard my little voice in the wilderness. Amid all the complaining, big and small. My tiny voice was heard. Some stranger took the time to acknowledge my pain and share her own with me. 

I friended her and she accepted. She's in San Diego, but spent 6 years in Milwaukee. She said my profile made her smile because of the Milwaukee connection. We've started a conversation. 

A weird thing happened on Facebook. My voice was heard in the vast babble; I made a new friend. 

Amy's words

Here is a text that Oklahoma Amy sent me. I thought I needed to share. It's huge. Yes, I'm also grieving losing who I was *before.* She was a lot more carefree and open. 

"Yeah, I get that.

I told Jody the day after it happened, this is so selfish of me, but I'm grieving you as much as I'm grieving Katie.  Obviously it breaks my heart that I'll never see Katie again, but what I'm most crushed about is that I'll never see YOU again.  Not the you that you used to be.  That person is gone.  You'll never be the same again.  And my God I loved that person.

I'll never stop loving you, of course.  I'll love whoever you become, every part of you, physical, mental, and emotional.  I will have your back as long as we live.  But "you" as you were no longer exists.  How could she?  There's no way.  So that's a loss that I'm grieving.

And a huge part of that grief is fear.  I'm just terrified for you having to live the rest of your life like this.

I'm sorry I'm rambling.  You've just been on my heart so much."

Random Wednesday

Maybe I'll make it a practice (when it suits me) to have Random Wednesday. We'll see how it goes. 

1. My soundtrack in my brain is now Why? by Annie Lennox. Or is it when she was still in the Eurythmics? I'm sure someone will look it up for me if they care enough. 

2.  I think I may start reading a book given to me by a friend of a friend who lost her son three years ago.  

3. I've got to write thank you notes to the little old ladies who expect them. And probably to the cash donors to the memorial fund. Definitely to the girl whose name I didn't recognize who sent a card and a half-dozen pink roses to the funeral. That one touched me the most. 

4. Grief? Depression? Exhaustion? 

5. This weekend will be hard. Very hard. 

6.  I put on Facebook that I needed a cookie. Cookies were delivered. Maybe I should put on Facebook that I need wine. 

7.  I still haven't touched alcohol since. I'm rather afraid of falling into the bottle. If I drink, I don't want to drink alone. 

8.  I need to find purpose again in my life.  I need Libby to consistently be in school.  

9.  *That* attorney will be here the morning of November 1st. 

10. I can't get what I want out of a lawsuit, but maybe I can prevent someone else's grief. 

Grief

Lib's question to the school social worker today was, "Why am I not over this yet?" The social worker told her that usually grief takes 3-5 years, but in her case when she and sister were so close it will probably take a lot longer. 

It's okay that we can't see the end of it. I was told by someone else today that it's probably good that we can't see the ups and downs in front of us. It would seem too daunting. 

Reading glasses

So I'm starting to always pull out my reading glasses to read something. I can only squint for so long. It's weird, but I swear that my eyes have changed drastically in the last 5 weeks. Initially, I really had a hard time seeing anything clearly. Up close was fuzzy, across the room was fuzzy, driving was fuzzy (which was one reason why I didn't drive initially).  Now my driving is fine, but I can read green with white road signs much better than I can read others. Thank you US Interstate uniformity for figuring that out. Now my reading glasses help up close, and I can focus better on the far when I take them off. 

Grief. It does weird things to your head and your eyes and your heart and your body. 

I just wish that I had some reading glasses (or, Hell, any kind of glasses) that would make my heart see clearer. 

I am having a hard time deciphering moods. Even my own. I'm having a harder time deciphering Lib's moods--when it's going to be okay; when we are heading for a full-blown melt down. I can't even predict that for myself, who am I fooling?

I'd like glasses that would give me a compass to where I need to go. 

I'd like glasses that would show me what I should do in any given situation. 

I'd like glasses that would melt away the fogginess sometimes. (Other times I like the fact that the fog softens the harsh reality.)

And I'd like fortune telling glasses and a time machine to go back to August or early September. I'd like to prevent what happened. 

Libby has a Harry Potter time-turner. Oh how I wish it was real. 

Wicked

We went to see the touring Broadway production of Wicked today here in the Twin Cities. I planned ahead and packed Kleenex. That was good because I needed them. 

Amy D could not have chosen a better song for Katie's funeral. People are amazed when I tell them that I didn't know the song until I saw the service program at the church. 

"It well may be

That we will never meet again

In this lifetime

So let me say before we part

So much of me

Is made from what I learned from you

You'll be with me

Like a handprint on my heart

And now whatever way our stories end

I know you have re-written mine

By being my friend..."

--For Good. Wicked. 

Now I'm crying again. I miss you, baby girl. 

What happened to fun?

At Ikea I had a panic attack walking through the area where I would normally buy care package stuff for Katie. It continued throughout the store, barely under control. To get through to the checkout I had to pass through the Christmas stuff--Katie loved Christmas decorating.  Then I was at my breaking point. I had to get out of there as quickly as possible. Sadly, I snapped at Libby while I was trying to get our stuff packaged. When we got back to the house, Libby and I headed up to our room for some quiet time. I wept some. Mainly, I just worked on my breathing and tried to center myself. 

Now I'm back out at the Mall of America with Lib, MK, J and L. It's blackout riding at the amusement park. It's just dark, not dangerous. And I'm keeping it together so far. 

So many memories jump out at me everywhere I go, even if I've never been there before. 

And I'm tired. 

Update: I did weep in the amusement park. It's hard not to weep. 

Another weekend, another train

It's weird the train travel I've done this month already. Before last weekend I had taken the commuter train to Chicago three years ago and before that the last train ride was when I was eleven. 

But train rides are easier than driving. I can knit. I can read. I can eat dinner at 65 mph at a table with a white table cloth. I can blog. None of those things can be done behind the wheel of a car. At least not safely.  I'm all about safety. 

Be careful driving home! I say. Don't text and drive! I remind. Call me if you need me! Watch your step! Watch that last step! 

It's what I do now. Because I sometimes wonder if I said it enough. Even though the accident wasn't Katie's fault, I still fret. 

And I tell you that I love you. I'm grateful that my last words to Katie were, "I love you.  Look for the good tomorrow. I'll talk to you tomorrow night. Good night. I love you."  

End of the rope

I shouldn't blog when I'm at the end of my rope. I am there now. Here goes ten random facts in no particular order:

1. A personal injury/product liability attorney will probably be flying at his own expense to Milwaukee to meet me. Yes. About that. 

2. Green was Katie's favorite color, and it matches her eyes. 

3.  I threw away nail polish today because the brush annoyed me. 

4. It doesn't take much to annoy me. 

5.  I ended a text message tonight with "It's not about you."  I meant it that way. 

6.  I'm ambivalent about a lot of things. 

7.  If you're reading this, you are not someone I'm ambivalent about. I need you guys. 

8.  I wish I could smack John Boehner on his Oompa-Loompa colored head. This government shutdown was ridiculous grandstanding. 

9. I've watched no sporting events since It happened. And I'm a die hard OU football fan. I just can't bear to watch anymore. 

10.  My skin is so sensitive that some days I'd rather not wear clothes. But then I realize that I love you guys too much to scare you, so I put them on. 

It's a long day.

Maybe I should have said that it has been a long day. But it is still a long day. Every day is a long day. 

Tuesday the 15th of October. I've gone from good mother to okay mother to pretty good mother to WORST MOTHER EVER to good mother in the span of 14 hours. Exhausting when I'm at the top of my game, but I definitely am NOT at the top of my game. I'm not even close to being at the top of the bottom half of my game. 

But at Pier 1 she kissed the top of my head. That was the beginning of the last swing. I was forgiven. Forgiven feels pretty good especially when you've not done anything wrong in anyone else's eyes but hers. 

So many things are not in her control. Normal teenagers go through these same emotions. Hers are just exacerbated by trauma. Yes, I said it, trauma. I'm going to own the word. It's more than grief--it's also trauma. When you go from fine to destroyed in less than 5 seconds, it's trauma. 

I have to get through the trauma and then the grief and then find a way to live with the pain. 

The impossible will take a little while. 

Life goes on. Somehow. Maybe.

It has been decided that we are going on a cruise for Christmas. We all need a break from the reality of staring life in the face. I think all of us felt better this weekend for being together. 

Libby asked why there were times that Joe and I just looked at each other and didn't say anything. My only answer was that we were being the witness for each other's grief. Our grief. The burden we share. We started it. We're gonna finish it. Somehow.  This has brought us closer together as a family. 

On a separate note, we are back to couch sleeping tonight. I'm not sure why. I don't think Lib could tell you why either. It's so complicated. It's tied up in tired and emotional and sad and angry and I-don't-want-to-be-brave and it's-not-right-without-Katie. 

It isn't. Nothing is right without Katie. I cried on the train yesterday because Katie should have been with us. I miss her every second. Even if I'm laughing about something a part of me thinks, "Katie would think this is funny." 

Or "Katie would like this book."

Or "That's Katie's favorite ice cream/color/coat/quote...."

Surely there will be an end sometime to the pain. 

Breaking rules and traditions

This has been a rule breaking weekend.  I'm back on a train, headed back to Milwaukee.  This time I invested in a roomette (small sleeper). I figured we'd need it coming back to decompress some. The top bunk is supposed to only go down at night. Dude, Libby has been in that bunk already. Without her anti roll pillow.  Without her mummy-type seatbelt. Breaking the rules. 

Peanuts, peanut butter, peanut butter cookies on the train? Yep, we've been doing that. (It's not a rule, but I'm generally more courteous than that.)  I left trash, like last night's dinner for 6 from Pei Wei, in the hotel room. Semi-gathered up. All the way Chinese-food-leftovers smell.  (Again, against my personal norms and code.)

Which goes to our breaking traditions. This year we probably won't be doing a white Christmas in Milwaukee. We may be doing a Caribbeen cruise. (Eastern or Southern or Bahamas--NOT Western as there are too many memories of Katie tied up there for Joe.) Crazy, I know, a Christmas NOT at home.  There are just too many memories there for all of us and too many spoiled Christmas plans at the Oklahoma house for Joe. (Katie was already sketching out her decoration plans in August for the Christmas decorations and had asked BOTH Joe and Cheryl separately for decorating budgets--I think she was angling for combining both to a $10,000 total for the grand extravaganza.)

Today is one month. I've dwelled on that since early last night. There was one day between the milestones. Four weeks. A day off. Then BOOM one month.  I feel like the milestones are zooming at me and I can't slow them down to catch my breath. For every second I wish that time would pass ("Wake me up when it's all over, when I'm wiser and I'm older..."), I feel that there is an opposite reaction in me where I can't catch my breath before the next wave goes over my head, continuing my drowning theme. 

The song in my head

When you're lost and alone

Or you're sinking like a stone

Carry on. 

--fun.

Four weeks and in St. Louis

We are at the four week mark. In fact, almost to the minute that I got the call. Today we are together: Libby, Sammie, Maddy, Joe, Cheryl, and me, and we are in St. Louis. We are trying to pretend that our upside down life is normal, that we are completely human. 

And we are trying to pretend that our lives that are merged as they are can be completely normal. A whole lotta people wouldn't understand why I'm "vacationing" with my ex-husband and his family (ahem, you can guess).  They can all just suck eggs.  It's my new normal. It helps me keep my sanity. It's the only way we can all share everyone's lives without missing anything. 

So I sit, watching Nick, with Lib beside me and Maddy on my lap. It's not what I would choose, but it's a life. It's just what I've got. It's all that I've got right now. 

Wake me

"Wake me up when it's all over;

When I'm wiser and I'm older."

It is a nice dream. 

Baby girl time

Libby, my baby girl, made it through a whole day at school today. This is a huge first. And for our "treat" we went to Gigi's Cupcakes where she interviewed the employees for a school project on cupcake bakers. She's baked the cupcakes and is now doing the voice overs. And she's exhausted. And I am, too. 

I didn't do much today. I was so tired I actually laid on the couch and dozed for a while. I certainly don't feel like Wonder Woman or A Good Mother or even a sloth mother. I'm just surviving. 

Maybe that's the point. Just surviving until I can feel human again. 

If we can make it through...

I tell myself I we can make it through the year of firsts, it will get easier. Today is the first big day: her dad's birthday. Then in 3 weeks hers. Then Halloween which she loved.  Not a good month to start with. Next is November and Thanksgiving and Christmas decorating. Then the Holiday Cookie Exchange  and Christmas and then New Year's Eve. 

It will make you crazy if you try to start cataloging the number of traditions you have. Everything from Family Game Night to a new pair of PJs on Christmas Eve to watching old musicals or playing games with friends and finger foods for NYE. 

I never thought our silly off-the-cuff things could be so huge. 

It's Daddy's birthday today, though. It sucks that his is the first. A part of me is grateful beyond belief that I have another 8 months to prepare. Another part of me cries that I have to prepare at all. That Joe has to go first. That ANYONE or ANYTHING ha to have a first. And I want to scream about it. And flail. And cry. And let my hurting two-year-old self throw a temper tantrum about it. 

But what good would that accomplish? I'd scare Libby and my mom. And feel worse for doing that. 

So I'll just let it trickle out as tears. 

Exhausting

It's exhausting just breathing in and out. I don't know if it's the grief or the allergies or just life wearing me down. 

Today is the three week mark. 21 days. I'll think about it all day and almost hold my breath from 6-8 tonight.  

Lib asked to stay home from school today. I said it's okay. I've got to call her in to school soon. Yesterday was a long day. School. Orthodontist. More school. Counseling. It's a Friday. As Libby says, Fridays are hard. This is only the second Friday she could have been in school. 

The first Friday, we were in Oklahoma because the first funeral was Thursday. On Wednesday, Joe and I saw Katie. Then that Friday (after discussing and consulting with counselors) we gave Libby the option of seeing her. She did. She has since repeatedly told us that she regrets seeing Katie and that she blames us for giving her the option. 

So. Fridays are hard. And exhausting. 

Hard things that used to be easy.

I cooked dinner tonight for the first time. What I really mean is that I opened bags of frozen things and heated the contents in appropriate manners. How did I go from the even-homemade-broth-kind-of-mom to this?  But I fed myself and my girl. (That was really hard not to add an "s" on girl.  I actually wrote it plural 3 times before getting the singular form to stick.)

I rearranged my bedroom in the hopes that Lib and I can sleep in a real bed for the first time since...a long time. We've been on the couch, the sleeper sofa, or at someone else's house for probably 16 of the last 19 nights. Maybe 17. It's too hard to count.  Feng shui is out the window. We're just looking for different enough to sleep there tonight. 

My allergies are kicking my ass. What is worse than permanently screwed up sinuses from crying? Adding allergies and sinus congestion into the mix. I'll probably have to go into rehab for my Afrin addiction before I'm through. 

I've had no alcohol since before that night. No wine. No cocktail. I've only taken sleeping pills (rationed out), vitamin supplements (my immune system is in major compromised mode), allergy pills, tums, and naproxen. I think it would be too easy to stay numb. Numb would be simple, but it has a price--not being aware for Libby. And I've gotta stay functional for her. 

She asked me today why she's still alive when she feels so dead inside. I told her that she's my reason for being right now and that we would both find meaning in our lives again sometime. We just have to trust that we will. I can parrot my counselor.  That's not hard. Making her believe that I trust is hard. Making her go to school when it seems pretty pointless to her is hard. Not panicking in Target is hard. 

Meanwhile, I can sit and knit. I've started a simple knit afghan, just knitting every row. It's methodical. It helps me regulate my breathing. It may cover a football field when I'm done. I have no concept of size, when i started I just cast on however many stitches and then knit rows until I ran out of a skein of yarn, then I changed colors and knit another skein.  Someday I'll either run out of yarn and end it, or it will get too big to carry around.

It will probably always be easier to carry than my grief. 

19 Days

It's been 19 days and counting since I've lost my beloved oldest daughter. Now my beloved youngest daughter and I are trying to figure out how to be two instead of three. 

We were already working in this because Katie had decided that she wanted to try high school in Oklahoma living with her dad. Her words: Mom, if I don't live with Dad now, I'll never live with him. One month from waving at her as she rode away with him, leaving Wisconsin, boxes in the back of his Suburban, I got the call from Dad. "You've gotta sit down, Shannon.  There was an accident. She's gone," he said. "I'm so so sorry. I tried so hard to fix her."

She was driving one of those overgrown golf carts (like the ones at the zoo).  She was by herself on their 20 acres on her way back from quiet time, reading, watching the deer. It has been ruled by the police as a mechanical failure, not operator error. The steering shaft (rod? seriously, my brain is mushy) broke--probably metal fatigue, which should have never happened on a machine that new. She tried to turn. It didn't.  She hit a fence. It flipped on top of her.  There was no roll bar. The rest is history.  It was instant. 

The first was a fog of grief and disbelief--I'm still there a lot of the time. I'm processing a little at a time, marking milestones.  A day. Two. The trip to Oklahoma for the first of two funerals. The trip back to Wisconsin. The second funeral. 10 days. My baby's attempt at returning to school. Two weeks. 

Counseling appointments. Casserole delivery. Cards. But no Katie.