The King of Hearts

Everyone grieves in his/her own way. This is something that's become very clear to me over the years, especially when I've had to confront grief in my own life while my family has gone through it as well. I'm a big cry baby in general, but when I lose a loved one I usually immediately fall apart. Once I've composed myself, talking about it is the last thing I want to do. After I'm forced to face the reality of the death, I usually sink deep into depression where I find the fork in my road forward: stay there or find a way out. Right now I'm in the not talking phase.

After the initial calls last night, I barely made it home. Once here I needed to talk to someone who could focus solely on supporting me in my devastated state. Before I lost my church I could go to my prayer partner's house. Since I now live in the middle of no where & have no friends or family here, it was just me & my cell phone. I exhausted myself with talking to my prayer partner, my boyfriend, & my best friend & now find myself in phase two: external denial with a forced smile & the internal fight to keep it together all the while knowing I'm going to have to go to a funeral all too soon.

I'm trying to keep things as close to normal as possible. At this point I don't feel I'm ready to hear the details of how my nephew died by suicide, but I also need to prepare. This picture is the last time I can remember seeing him smile, but now that I look at it, I guess he wasn't really smiling. I'm not surprised it's happened (the signs have been there for a while), but more disappointed because I prayed about this. I even told my mother when they released him from the hospital that I'd prayed about it and God & I had decided he would be fine. "God + me, that's a majority. Kaniu will be fine." I guess Kaniu trumps God, me, & everyone else.