I Forgive Myself

I forget where my car keys are, to return phone calls and text messages as I'm looking at them, to put Mia in the car, why I'm at the store and what I'm saying even as I'm saying it. And because I can be dramatic, my tone also loses momentum and the sentence goes thud. But I forget. All the time. My mom bought me an organizer to jot down my plans and reminders that can promise redemption from guilt, but I never seem to get around to using it.

I was never like this. I was the punctual person who made lists for the sake of making lists and to keep myself organized. I was the coordinator who kept everyone in check and played mediator- I didn't  mind it because I was a control freak. So instead of organizing myself as I used to, I instead talk to myself with conviction in my thoughts. Because I'm also forgetful on a deeper and ultimately more damaging level than birthdays and phone calls. I forget that I'm doing the best I can with how I feel. I forget that I'm a lovable, capable, talented woman. I forget to forgive myself for being forgetful. For being less than perfect. For feeling emotionally lost. For being spunky, prickly, a dental hygiene perfectionist, awkward and unpolished. I forget that I'm a vessel that houses my true soul and being and that I can choose to do only the things that contribute healing for my life. Even if that means that I hermit myself for days on end in an effort to just be with my forgetful self.

The sticky side of life is quite honest. This place allows you to be yourself with zero judgment and liberty. There is a hustle in everyday life that requires us to go-go-go! It is in these moments where we just want to breathe with absolutely no pressures, that we are also prodded to slow down and see the magnificence hidden in the creaky floors we walk on. Just to be present. Listen to your inner wisdom and and act when you feel comfortable doing so. Choose meaning over "what's right".
I know that I've fully embraced being in a moment or heck, moments of time whether it's hours or an entire night of solace and barefoot walks in the backyard. The cool grass dew reminds me that I'm alive. The soft chirping of crickets running their wings together like the teeth of a comb play a soothing sound to serenade my wandering thoughts and bring me back to focus. The dark silence encourages me to free my thoughts into a wild spree of love for my brother. Sometimes, I catch myself smiling at the thought of him and the millions of memories that feel real. Because they are real and he truly happened. So what if I visit a grave where his body lies with no spirit and no heavy breathing. Afterall, the cemetery isn't his final resting place, his home is. My heart is where he infinitely lives.

I'm inspired to deal with my excruciating feelings and those of my brother's. I am not taught nor encouraged to turn my back on grief and sorrow. I call on my courage to help me manage my open self and imperfect soul. I love that I'm imperfect more than I've ever been. I love that I'm human and openly scratching at my itchy wounds. Why is it so difficult for most of us to choose to do what is best for ourselves? Why don't we practice self-kindness more and share this sentiment with our worlds? I don't have answers for myself, but I choose to try to understand myself and the circumstances I'm facing. I allow. I choose. I will try to remember to embody my brother's way of living and happiness by being honest and forgiving myself for living.

Loss Doesn't Make Emotional Sense

Charley, My Heart...

I'm so lonely for you. My eyes slowly scout every detail in every picture I take hoping that I catch a glimmer of you in the background, as a blur, as a shadow as a light. I zoom in and search for a face that I miss and only see in my memory bank of delight. Even as I walk through the house at night to shut off all the lights and close the blinds, I look to my reflection in the mirror or my own shadow just praying that I see you right beside me. But what do you look like? Will you appear to me in your human form so that I may recognize you? May I hear the sound of your voice calling my name? Might your energy be so abundantly clear that I see you in your spirit form illuminated by heavens and love? Have you been present, reached for me, spoken to me and yet I have no idea? Questions, questions, and no answers.

My therapist tells me that I'm mourning, still. STILL. Of course I am. Your passing is fresh and I gladly participate in freely feeling. So what if I'm consumed by you, our memories together and your life. Another therapist has cautioned me not to idolize you so, that I want to be you and lose sight of myself- not to identify mysef with the consequences of your loss. Truth is- I've always idolized you...I've always looked up to you in hopes that I would be you someday. Like a child with her hero, I wear your name embroidered into my cape. It flows with brisk attitude and encapsulates strength, devotion, courage and unconditional love. My right arm raises high in praise of all that you do-the good in you and the human in you. With your imperfect flaws and no-nonsense atttitude, you never do any wrong for my hero is forgiven for being himself. I, as an avid admirer, strive to measure up to a man I'll never be. And I've always been comfortable knowing that I'll never be you but have been beyond happy navigating life immediately at your side.

I miss you deeply, Charley. It's a longing that I can't comprehend. Time doesn't help to heal my pain- it only reminds me that you're gone. Time darkens my pain and settles further into a reality without you. I'm comfortable with pain. But I'm also frail and vulnerable. It's as though every emotion I can possibly feel is hitting me at once and I'm either being smacked in the gut with it or dodging every other launch because I'm afraid that I can't manage anymore than I am. I'm afraid of what rock bottom looks like for me. Thing is...I'm there. My emotions affect my mental balance which affect my physical strength. I'm tired all the time, Charley. And not just tired because life effen sucks or from working or from being a Mom. It's all of me combined into all of you. You survived for six weeks and one night you couldn't see or feel straight. I'm experiencing a fraction for eight months now and I honestly question myself, Am I going to feel this way for the rest of my life? Not that loving and missing and mourning you is negative, but how will I manage my sorrow? I suppose you felt this multiplied by an unknown force so I tell myself to quit thinking and just feel.

A friend asked me a pretty honest question yesterday, "Has anything good come from losing your brother?" I yanked all my feelings from all the hazy clouds hovering over my heart and tried to make sense of it all so that he could stumble through my grey.
After verbally chicken scratching my thoughts, he instead said to me, "Say exactly what you feel".

(Quick deep breath) I want to continue living his life as though he were alive. I want to live his life for him so that nothing changes and I still have him. That's the honest truth. And the added truth is that all of you is mostly all of me. Your character, your jubilant smile, your athleticism, your drive, your ambition, your physical nature, your travel goals, your inspiration...that's me too on a smaller scale. So why not? Then he peacefully offered, "You lost your brother and your best friend and your life is forever changed". Simple words created complex thoughts and provoked hot tears. I felt like he shoved a slab of concrete into my hands and asked me not to drop it. "Too much?", he offered. Yes, too much.

Living a life without you is too much. We've been synced for 32.5 years...and synced for the rest of my years without you is how it will remain.

Love you, adore you, want to be you,
Your Sis, Yolie

Mother's Day Minus One

Sometimes I put myself in the shoes of a person who doesn't have a relationship with their mother, whose mother has passed on, or someone who's never met their mother. Would I prefer to be a blank slate and expression when it comes to owning and experiencing the virtues of a mother-child relationship or would I rather have the strongest relationship I've known from the comfort of my womb and have it disappear like a magic trick from my life? "Is it better to have loved and lost than to have never loved at all"?

The last couple of weeks have been more than rough- deep-saddened tears and desperation in search of my brother to support me in fulfilling my role as a mother, and for my own mom not to experience the loss of her only son. I. cannot. fathom. her pain. It hurts me. My only son. I wonder how empty her own soul is and how much more she searches for Charley than I do. When she reaches for him and does everything in her power to bring him back, where is she pulling her strength from? Does she rummage through a barrel of "Only a Mother Can Feel This" in search of the very tool to lure him back into the safety of her arms? What color is her heart and how thick is her fog....

As a mother myself, I can only speak to the empty role in my daughter's life in which he is so excited to share in. When I found out I was pregnant, I drove to the fire station and walked in on Charley who was cooking dinner in the kitchen. I lightly tapped on his shoulder to get his attention as my smile grew in length and my mouth said,
Hey Charley.
He looked behind his left shoulder as he does so well and smiled his gorgeous smile.
Oh hey, Yolie. What's up?
So....you're going to be an uncle!
You guys bought a dog?!
(laughter)
No, Charley. You're going to be an uncle. I'm pregnant.

I've never seen him smile so brightly. There were no words for his happiness as he embraced me tightly. I couldn't wait to bring my child into our lives so that he could single-handedly be the force in her life she doesn't know she needs. And what a lucky girl to have him for the rest of her life.
Our relationship grew fifty-fold as he nourished my soul in preparation of the little Lopez to add to our duo. And when she was born...he was speechless. He held her little body in his arms and all I could see was the life they would lead together and the man that would help me raise her. Another woman would take my first place in his heart and I gladly relinquished that position.
We had a year and a half together with him. He once sat quiety in bed of his truck while he held her face to the warm setting sun as I looked on watering the front yard. Every few seconds I'd look over at them in complete awe and admiration- they are bonded and he's so in love. I trust this relationship and I rely on him to live for her as much as I do. He said to me," I promised Mia two free passes in her life. She is allowed to call me twice to get her out of a jam and it will stay between me and her. Whether it's a ride she needs or my support, I won't ask any questions. But she has to promise to always be honest with me and never lie. As long as she can keep this promise, we have a deal." I smiled at him and nodded in agreement. My favorite man is going to be her favorite man. Life was sweet.

The weeks leading to his passing, the three of us spent nearly everyday together at the beach, playing in his backyard, hanging out on the balcony patio while we colored together, napping together and just existing as a unit. He would kiss her tenderly and gaze into a face he could never abandon.

So when he took his life, he unintentionally abandoned us. The life I fantasized about having with him has become exactly that~ a fantasy with temporary memories and conversations.

The other parent I looked to for reinforcement, is gone. I grieve the relationship she'll never have. Nevermind the "He's always looking over her..." because she'll never know the force he and I planned for her. She'll never experience the laughter and love he reserved just for her and the soft pallet only she could have developed. She will never get to use those two free passes. And I? I feel inadequate without him and try as I might, being her Mom isn't enough. If I could bring him back just for her sake and hers alone, I would. She doesn't know it yet, but she needs him. I desperately need him. And Mother's Day communicates only one sentiment for me: I'm not a mother without my brother.

Lesson Number: Never

My mind and heart are made up of emotional layers which collapse on top of each other like a sandwich with one too many heavy. Navigating death provokes so many unknown factors which don't come with an end in sight nor an empathetic gesture of "this will only sting for a few seconds". Nope, it's not a toddler injection or a prick to the hip; it's excruciatingly painful and a needle that breaks your skin in search of a vein it'll never find.

Charley loves me like no other person has. And I in turn love him equally. As I grew in spirit and maturity, I also often felt guilty for allowing him to love me as much as he does; never expecting me to reciprocate my love for him. I questioned the degree of my love knowing very well that he certainly deserved more than I was providing and hoped that I could someday love him as much as he deeply loves me. It wasn't until he passed away that I realized I always loved him more than I love myself and always validated my self-worth and value according to his perspective. He consistently told me I'm beautiful, resilient, strong, driven...a phenomenal mother and his rock. These are words I trust and believe from no one else's mouth but his. It is Charley who is a constant and consistently invested in my growth and reassured me that I am valuable. In every event in my life from childhood to now, Charley has been at my side, within reach and never more than a millisecond thought away.

As I stated in my eulogy, Charley has been the man in my life...and unfortunately for everyone else in my life who loves me and wants to build a prosthetic limb for me, they will never be Charley. No one will ever fill his shoes and meet the standard that bears his name and glorifies his soul. I measure everyone's love and loyalty against his...which I know is unfair for those who genuinely want to help me, but unfortunately for all involved, I cannot accept love from anyone if it's not his. Giving into this unconditional love to two handful of people who want to embrace me, makes me feel as though I'm betraying Charley. So I stoically stay on the defense and sit on a fence that guards my heart from any further rejection or pain. I simply cannot endure anymore. Losing Charley has been the most devastating and worse event in my life that didn't just occur almost eight months ago...it occurs everyday and spans across my now-life and that of my daughter's. I'm often at war with myself- some moments I'm angry because Charley left me knowing how much I love and need him. How could I not "despair in his departure" when a bond like ours depends on the other to thrive and live? The other side of me apologizes for being angry because I completely understand how pain took over. I grant him the desperation and hold nothing against him but my own embrace. Of course he wasn't thinking of me. Of course he didn't understand the consequences. Of course he was thinking of only his pain. Of course I'd be left behind to mend him and myself. Even in his death, I'm fighting for him. Even as his soul visits mine in the middle of my dreams, I'm guarding him and holding his hand tightly.

I'm broken. And damaged. And dysfunctional. But we all are to some extent, right? This is how I justify my state of mind- by comparing my personal trials to a culture that is all kinds of fucked up. How can anyone really want to be my friend or family or confidante or partner when I come equipped with so many layers of work? So instead of letting people in, I keep them out. I'm giving them a jump ship card before I even burden them with...me.

Life Is But a Dream

Even if I were the brightest, most intuitive mind in my circle of life, I can't describe how skewed my perception has become in terms of our lives here on Earth and how our souls survive the thrashings we continually experience.
Whether it's conscious movements or emotions we naturally feel, our souls also participate in each of these markers.

As you know, I search for my brother everywhere. Sometimes I pretend I'm not searching for him in hopes that he appears to me because I'm not looking for him. But even then, I'm pretending to pretend and I'm sure he can see right through me (literally) and knows what I'm doing even as I'm thinking it.

Just last week as I hurried home from work to quickly change before picking up Mia, I walked into the house and immediately smelled Charley. The hollow sounds of my footsteps sprung off the now decorated walls and my heels clacked across the customized hard wood floors. Walking towards Charley's room and past his firefighter memorabilia, I reflexively called for him, "Hey Charley, are you home?". But as I entered his room and only recognized half of it as his, the veil fell from my eyes and my heart dropped. Charley's not here. My shoulders slumped and my footsteps sank into sorrow as though I allowed ocean wave after wave to bury me tightly around my ankles. I couldn't move. I didn't hear myself calling for him but I somewhat did in the same breath because I really hoped I'd walk into his room and he'd stick his head out of the bathroom with toothbrush in mouth and smiling eyes. A slow walk to the bed, loud shoes came off and I sat staring at my ugly reflection with reality pointing its finger at me in mockery.
Or a couple weeks ago when I walked through the parking lot at work and saw a Tacoma drive into the lot. It was gray in color, two-door and the driver was wearing a cap. I slowed my pace and took a sharp left so that I could eye this guy in hopes that it was Charley. But after he hopped down and turned to face me I saw that his eyes were not my brother's and his height was much too short. He smiled at me and I nervously looked away, Damnit, it's not him.

My mind combats my soul every waking hour in an effort to shake truth into it and speak the fact that I know, but don't believe.
When I sleep, I often wake up with wet eyes and disappointment in my breath. My jaw hurts from clenching all night and my hands hurt from keeping them tightly fisted. Dream of him? Yes, sometimes. The first few dreams were vivid and real. He visited me and answered questions in a tone and form only his soul could and expressed neutrality in the lines of his face. It's taken months to see him smile. It's taken almost eight months for him to tell me what I've always known.
The last dream I had was a few days ago...I put Mia down to sleep and walked through the house in search of him. Music serenaded my thoughts and led me to the guest room. I opened the door and there Charley stood by the closet that cradles all his clothes and personal belongings. He motioned me in and sweetly smiled at me. I walked towards him and saw that he was at least 15 years younger with smooth brown skin and lots of hair crowned his head as it did years before age and stress took over. I reached to touch him but my arm went through his transparent figure. He encouraged me to try again and so I did. My right hand touched his shirt and it was then I realized he was dressed in white. I fingered his shirt which felt soft and warm. I looked up into his eyes as he wrapped his arms around me and pulled me in. I locked my arms around his waist and cried into his chest while inhaling his scent. All I wanted was to have that moment for always. My mind searched for questions but I knew better than to break the time we were being blessed with. Then he whispered, "I want you to know that I'm okay". I nodded I know and prayed that this beautiful moment was real, so real.

Then I woke up crying and wiped my face from the dream that was only a dream.

Let's Talk About Time

Infamous words for just about anything: It takes time.
Does it really? Does time smear your heartache with imaginary sutures and hardening glue? Does time build a ramp for you to disengage from pain and confusion? Does time wrap it's forceful arms around your frail-like being and mend you back to life?
Maybe for some it does, maybe for some it doesn't. I'll tell you what time has done for me: nothing. I personalize time as an unruly nature that we have no control of. We can't speed it up nor slow it down. We can't ask time to freeze while we grasp onto a moment or memory. We can't bend and manipulate it into a sculpture of lucidity and permanency. Time just is. And it sucks.
Change occurs within oneself. How we manifest it, suppress it, own it, discard it, is completely up to us. I personally ignore time and instead focus on myself and what I can control versus what I can't (but it doesn't mean that I don't try). In fact, because I don't like time, I've also grown to not like people very much. Call it a phase or a consequence of my brother's passing, but because I don't trust time, I'm also distrusting of people and what they think is best for me.

What is best for me is running. I run. I run thoughts in my mind as though the very action of thought will change the world I live in. I run my hands and wring them through water several times a day as though I can wash away what I've touched and frequently grasp for. I actively nourish my body with healthy meals and water to ensure that my blood is running at full capacity to support my aching insides. I run with my feet a few times of week in a desperate attempt to feel my brother running with me on my left. My knees ache, shoulders tense up, face burns from the early morning sun but my voice says Run, Yolie, run. Don't stop. C'mon. Keep going. I run to keep Charley alive and breathing and within the beats of my heart. Who cares that others who have fallen wayside don't understand why I run when he's since passed- what does he care and how does that help him? It does. I believe that while I run, my soul channels his with intents of positivity, warmth and support. Although the place he dwells may offer all the love he could manage, I firmly believe that he feels our love for him, too.
Don't you feel loved? Don't you know when someone is basking you with genuine embraces and commitment? Can you not identify fakeness, a phony or call out pure bullshit? I can. I know when I'm being coddled or toyed with. And I have zero tolerance for anything or anyone who doesn't belong in the realm I'm dizzied in.

So, I run; run to provide myself with endurance and strength for myself, my family and for Charley. While I run and seek prayer, I am feather-light and withered. I have not a thought about anything else but rallying my pain and the loss of my brother. While I run I contemplate the time that's passed and I dismiss it with all the cliche's that come with loss. As my feet tire and swell, I envision my brother's own tired mind and swelling heart and actively remind myself that no matter how painful the pavement is to my knees, no matter the amount of tears I sweat, no matter how fatigued I am, my brother Charley felt insignificantly more on such a painful level. Perspective. While I run, I have perspective. And this is how I manage time: I run. And I celebrate a life that never quit.

Your Pain Is Yours

Loss feels personal. When you're crying and confused and broken into bits, it feels like you're the only one who is experiencing such breathless tragedy. No one knows how you feel, no one can climb into your heart and soul and feel the strain of absence of and longing. No one has ever felt the way you do. And guess what? You're right. You're rightfully isolating and personalizing your pain as yours and yours only.
When someone tells you they're brokenhearted, you try to empathize as best you can with words of comfort, offer consolation for happier days and ensure the confidence they aren't feeling.
Everything is temporary, right? Everything is a phase? I believed that when I told my brother weeks before he took his last breathe, "Charley, remember, this too, shall pass". Stupid me. Stupid, stupid me for offering words I thought may resonate with his spirit and lift him out of his sadness if only for a moment. And maybe it did...for a moment. Or maybe he agreed with my sentiments because "it" did "pass". There was no way of knowing how all the words I embraced him with would quietly express duality.

I DO feel like my brother's unfair and untimely death affects only me. He and I are connected and bonded like no other duo I know. The majority of siblings aren't close or as tight as Charley and I are- I'm eternally grateful for our relationship. The majority of people aren't close or as in sync as Charley and I are- I recognize this blessing and treasure it now as I always have. But my selfish and solitary feelings doesn't mean that others aren't hurting on their own scale and carrying that sorrowful weight in a very real way. I hurt for their loss, too. I hurt for the companionship they no longer own in their lives- they own their friendship with Charley if they invested, made genuine efforts and managed it just as we take ownership of anything we may say, do, and act on. The laughter and smile they no longer rely on and the clownish jokes? Gone. The reliability of high-fives, "bro", costume get-ups, interest in their lives, social energy, etc, etc, etc? Gone. Of course they're hurting. Of course they miss him. Of course the closest to him feel some level of guilt.

Charley has two sisters, a mom, a dad and a niece. We are all hurting very differently. Can you even imagine what it's like for my Mom to have lost her son? To feel like a failure for not saving her child? No one knows. Not one person knows but maybe a parent can empathize. My Dad keeps busy with house projects by using his hands and constructing. He's in control. He's in control of the tasks Charley had in mind and the projects they are currently working on together. He's quiet but I see the loss in his eyes and the the way his smiles linger. His hugs are longer. My sister? She's shut down. She won't talk about him and doesn't come around much- but it doesn't mean she's not hurting. She lost her brother, too. She lost our only brother…a man who is a man of all sorts. The golden child. is. gone. And my daughter? His niece, his goddaughter and the little love of his life? She wakes up to a sweet thought and tells him good morning. During the day she calls for him, waves at him, tells him she misses him, has conversations with him and sees him. She sees him. Lucky girl.

I Don't Know What I Believe, But I Believe

I haven't written in several days because my feelings have been somewhat numb in regards to my brother's death and what has become of him. It's always a tricky subject-religion- whether to believe in God, a higher power or a place some of our population refers to as Heaven. I suppose I can say that I've always pondered what Heaven is but I've never deeply contemplated-and question-where it is. What does Charley do there? How does his soul expend energy and how does he thrive? How often does he tune into our human lives and is he truly, undeniable happy?
My philosophical mind dreams thoughts that sway my logic into thinking that there just HAS to be another dimension our soul returns to-one that offers comfort, serenity, education, peaceful livelihood and treasured memories of the lives we once lived here on this earth. My logic surrenders to the romance of light that is so intense we are immediately thankful for such an embrace and don't "miss" the human life, but instead continually celebrate the lives of those we love. We don't "wait" for others to join us because time isn't kept, we just are...as Mia so surely told me the other day when I told her her Nino is asleep. She argued, "No, Nino no sleeping. Nino no mimis. Nino is". I encouraged her sweetly mature selection of words and asked again where he is. She shrugged her shoulders matter of factly and said again, "Nino is". How can a two-year-old be so sure of what she is communicating to me and how can her brightly engaged mind process this thought? But she is right. Charley is. His soul is. He is neither here nor "up there". And why doe we say "up there" anyway when love exists "on earth as it is in heaven"?
What I believe is different from what another believes or what you even believe. Truth is, no one knows what happens to our souls once we pass on and leave behind the vessel of our body.
When I discovered my brother, I could only look at him as my brother and not as a body. His hands and hair were his still and his scent was his presence still, though I knew he was dead. I clung to the thought of how long he had been alone waiting for me and how lonely his soul must've felt. I punished myself for showing up mid-day rather than four hours before when I woke up to a terrifying feeling and the instant disconnect my heart cried for. I felt guilty for ignoring the persistent voice in my mind telling me to "go to the house" when it was the same voice asking me to go discover a love I lost. It wasn't until a month ago when I realized the guilt I'd been carrying was unnecessary- by the time I found my brother-even if I had stayed with him while the paramedics arrived-was no longer my brother; it was his body. My brother Charley was gone but it was his soul who waited for me and wrapped his energy around my body to brace me for the impact that I struggle with everyday. This impact hits me at random times even when I'm looking.

So today, on a Sunday when Jesus Christ rose from the dead, I visited my brother's grave and caressed his headstone as though I were running my hand over the soft skin of his face while I looked deeply into his eyes and hugged his heart, "I didn't go to church today, but it doesn't mean I don't believe. I will try to maintain peace in my heart today, Charley. I will try". And so I tried all day and I held it together, believing that my Charley dwells in a tranquility I can't reach...but exists.
When my brother died, I did as well. I died with him at a young age when life was in shambles and I could only turn to him for guidance. I died. And although I know now, today, that I can't bring Charley back to life, I can keep him alive and I can also allow others to help me bring myself back to life. I can.

Grief Etiquette Doesn't Exist

What's personal and applicable to one person doesn't translate into a universal sentiment. When someone says to me, "You'll be okay" it's because they're coming from a well-intended position that wants to extend comfort and a promise of a brighter outlook. But because our culture doesn't prep us for mortality and death, we are ignorant to what to say and do for someone who is grieving.
We go online and search for retail prices, images article and information…it takes minutes to search "support grief" or "how to support a grieving person" and I'm sure the majority of folks don't take the time to research so they imagine what's best to say.

I realize that my emotional state makes others uncomfortable. I visually experience the discomfort as I observe how people act around me and dance around me like I'm the estranged dog in the room no one wants to rescue.
"What do I say, how do I approach her, what shouldn't I say, I don't want to say anything to hurt her, I'll talk about her daughter", etc. It's almost as though I have an invisible barrier around me that people make a conscious effort to stay away from. I have a missing limb and rather than acknowledge the pain and tragedy of losing my limb and forcing myself to manage without it, people would rather not look, not make eye contact and make silly conversation with me- or no conversation at all.

Here's some advice: if you truly care about someone who is experiencing what is possibly the worst times in their human life, be compassionate even if it makes you uncomfortable. Be real. Address the obvious and ask how the week has been or how this month is different than the last or what this person is currently missing most or just hug them. Be there. Don't ask, just do. Believe me when I say that 90% of aching hearts would rather you extend a heartfelt gesture than to say nothing at all. Everyone in my world knows I'm lost and broken- I communicate this frequently so I naturally expect the world surrounding me to see that. What I don't expect is to be accepted as I am now: different Yolie, hurt Yolie, lost, Yolie, broken without Charley Yolie. My eyes see the world different and my heart thumps at a slower pace than it did before. I'm distrusting and am more raw that I used to be. I have zero patience for unnecessary bullshit or hypersensitivity to trivial matters; matters that can be solved by just letting it go or not taking it so seriously.
I envision myself walking through a demolished house all alone and am continually breaking down the remaining walls until I find myself standing with only the foundation beneath my feet and a hammer in my right hand. It's my house with my rules and my walls- don't confine me to the box I used to be placed in and don't wish that I would go back to the old Yolie or go back to being "normal". That's a person doesn't exist anymore. How could she when most of who she was, was created with Charley as a source of almost everything? I'm new Yolie with aspirations I will attain no matter the amount of people who don't want to venture with me and dreams which feature Charley as a constant source of guidance. I'd rather trek alone with sorrow as my forgiving companion that to hide my tears and my sad eyes. I give myself permission to feel exactly what is natural to me...

Fear of Abandonment- Among So Many Other Issues

I'm no expert in the subject of grief, much less am I a preacher of how to handle grief. I've only handled my brother's loss the best way I know how which is to emotionally communicate with zero filter without any judgment placed on myself.
Grief isn't the same for every person and it's not one size fits all; it's more like...the right size fits you. You meet grief as you do a nasty neighbor whom no one knows how to interact with but there's no choice in the matter- you live next door and there's no moving away there's only learning how to manage him. He's frightening, he scares the kids when grief makes you cry, he oversteps your comfort zone and won't apologize, he meddles in every space in your life without your permission, he reveals character traits you never knew existed and better yet, uncovers emotions within you that are magnified beyond manageability. He makes you feel helpless but he's inexplicably forgiving and you become fast friends. He becomes your shadow and you welcome his company...except you wonder when he'll wear out his welcome for it may be days or it may be years. In my case, it's going to be years.
I've been withdrawn as of late- a total 180 from where I was three months ago eager to be present in people's company and accepting of their offerings and support. Wanting nothing but to be embraced with their love for Charley, I reluctantly trusted their loyalty to him but subconsciously questioned their genuine interest in me. Still, I blindly ventured in a collaborative love with my arms and hands stretched out before me and my eyes on the back of my head...watching and waiting for anyone to swipe our frail legs out from under us and laugh at our unconditional love for my brother.

Suddenly, and without warning, this life and the world around me became a distrusting place. One that rejects and hurts without a moral compass or compassion. I evaluated the people we allowed into our grief and scrutinized what their hidden agendas may be. But when I found none, I also found that I wasn't convinced. So I did what my defenses suggested I do- I made my rounds and thanked each steady soldier for their service and offered the option to end their assignment with me and my grief companion. No one should feel obligated to check in on me, text me words of encouragement and positivity, offer to come over and help me out with Mia, listen to me endlessly cry with nothing to say to ease my pain or continue on this journey of loss with me. Just because his friends love him doesn't mean we have to be insta-friends...I don't have to be loved out of guilt or remorse. I gave them an out. Leave before you get tired of grief. Busy yourself with your life and don't worry about mine. "I appreciate your loyalties to me and my family but it's okay if it's time for you to move on. I understand you have your own life and don't expect you to be around while I grieve for always".
So during my therapy session yesterday and over sobs and self-abuse, my therapist looked over at me with sad eyes and empathy glowing from her face, "You're giving people permission to leave before they abandon you. You're hurting yourself before they hurt you. You're in so much pain that you are afraid to take on anymore". My heart opened with understanding and I nodded in astonished agreement. It's true- if the man who loves me more than anyone else, if he was able to leave me (although unintentional), who's to say everyone else won't? If HE hurt me, why wouldn't his friends who don't truly know me? Some of his fire crew abandoned me, his no-good unworthy callous ex-love abandoned me and my brother six weeks after his passing, and my own "friends" abandoned me the moment Charley passed. I'm terrified of being abandoned by no fault of my own. I'm keeping people at arm's length while keeping my heart guarded and my legs steadfast so I can run at any given moment. Truthfully though, while I'm terrified of feeling more alone than I already do, I'm also needy and hungry for a tangible love that I will never touch again. I can easily spend my life looking for him, tire myself out and will never trust in the bonded manner I trust my brother.