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We continued to limp through the spring and summer of ‘08, barely hanging on to our sanity much of the time. I fantasized daily about ending my life and joining Ryan in the hereafter. Ron had similar feelings. We talked about those feelings and made a pact not to do anything drastic in spite of our unrelenting pain. On top of our crushing grief, we worried constantly about Ross. He was living alone in Turlock, enrolled at CSUS. We knew he was struggling mightily with his brother’s death, but we weren’t aware of the magnitude of his depression. All the grief books warned against “forgetting” your other child or children as you struggled to survive the loss of your deceased child. Although counter intuitive, that sometimes happens when a parent loses a child. They get lost in their grief and emotionally abandon surviving children. We consciously tried to avoid that. We checked on him daily, if not more than once a day. Not wanting to worry us or add to our own anguish, he would assure us he was fine but we later learned he was far from fine. He slept the days away, a common sign of deep depression. It’s hard to succeed in school when you sleep all day instead of attending classes. Ron eventually went to Turlock in late October and moved Ross in with us in Sacramento. We needed him and he needed us and being together under the same roof proved to be the right decision.

I find I don’t remember many details of 2008. The entire year was a painful blur – a little like the hours immediately following surgery. While it’s happening, you feel every bit of the pain but later when you look back on it; it’s a hazy, foggy, difficult time that you never want to repeat.

We were grateful for Ryan’s friends who stayed close to us. Teenagers & young adults often get a bad rap as being self absorbed but that label didn’t apply to these kids. There was a large group who stayed in close contact with us for the first full year after our tragedy. Many still do. They sent us emails; visited us; called us; left Facebook & MySpace messages for Ryan that we read daily; sent us cards and generally loved us. They called us when they had dreams about Ryan and shared their memories. They told us funny stories we didn’t know about him. They remembered us and him on the 29th of every month. They came for barbeques during their spring and winter breaks. Some of them even spent the night with us sometimes. Losing Ryan was hard for them too. For many, it was their first big loss and it happened at a critical time – just days before they left for college. They were grieving in their own way. When they shared their grief with us, it somehow helped alleviate ours.

I believe some of us go a little crazy in those early weeks and months after a loss so big it seems unbearable. We fell into that category. We were high functioning and outwardly we appeared to be doing okay. But we were suffering mightily and hope was hard to come by.