Life - New Year, Same Sadness, New Hope

First and foremost, let me preface this with therapy is important, mental health is important, and being transparent with your feelings is important too. This blog for me is another area for me to be transparent in the way that I feel about all aspects of my life. Yes, I am in therapy and I am okay-ish. Please do not be alarmed or feel the need to reach out to me. I have amazing family and friends who keep me positive, filling me with more love than I could ask for. However, you cannot be positive all the time...

Christmas has been a rough time for me since my mom passed away. Due to the pandemic, this Christmas and New Year, we stayed in Florida for only the second time since we moved here in 2012.

Christmas day 2018 was the last picture I took with my mom. January 2nd was the last time I hugged her, told her I loved her, cried in her arms at the airport for the last time. Now as we inch closer to February 4th, the anniversary of her murder, I feel ashamed in most cases that I allowed another year with no justice to go by.

Mentally, I have debated contacting the Special Agent for my mom's case. No one has reached out to me for an update or to show that they cared from the Illinois State Police Department since April of 2019. The last time I spoke to the Agent, he was joking on the phone with his partner while he questioned me about my mom's stuff being found in the city, later to find out it was because some guys broke into a detective car and threw everything she has on the ground looking for guns.

In ways, by not being there in person to fight, I feel like I let her down...

January 1, 2021 not only am I getting married in 8 months, but everyone who raised me won't be there to see it.

I lost my grandfather who promised he would dance with me at my wedding in 2011, I lost my godfather, my grandfather's brother, in 2015, I lost my mom in 2019, and lastly I lost my grandma in August of 2020. I'm 26 and I honestly still have terrors of who else I will lose and how, constantly forcing myself to keep busy so I can't hear my own thoughts.

I love the family that I have left, but I know that our relationship isn't the same. I am not a part of the nucleus. Sometimes I feel like an organ that is transplanted into the body that is slowly rejected. I am wanted, loved, nurtured, but I know that I am not the same. This is no fault of their own. If my real dad was worth two cents, I would still have some aspects of a child's love with their parent, but I cannot love someone who has never understood love, responsibility, or sacrifice.

I say all of that to say this, I gain a new nucleus this year. In-laws that have cared for me since I was a child, siblings that bring nieces and nephews a different aspect in life and happiness that I need now more than ever.

I have lost so much, I am finally happy to gain this year. Just know, I still want justice and new justice for my mom...