More random thoughts about death

[Greaseball]

This elderly woman in our town got hit by a car and died a few weeks ago. She went to Bi-Mart and got a case of Snapple and crossed the street a block away from the crosswalk and a drunk driver hit her. I wonder if someone in her home sent her out to get Snapple and feels guilty now, or if whoever drank the last of it feels guilty.

Also, yesterday one of my dh's 6th graders died. (Actually it was just one at his school, not in his class.) He was told that the kid accidentally hung himself. I wonder if that means it was really a suicide. Dh's dad had a brother who died when he was 9, who also accidentally hung himself. I know it's not impossible for 9-year-olds to commit suicide, and dh says he has wondered if that was what really happened. How would you accidentally hang yourself? But then, when I was that age I was fascinated with nooses and often made my own and hung them in the doorway. Who knows, maybe the other kids put them around their own necks and fell out of trees.

Does anyone else notice themselves fixating on the deaths of other people after losing someone close to them?

[Joyce in the mts.]

Oh gosh, you made me remember...wow...

I spent a couple years as director of the local afterschool program. I doubled the attendance, and it sometimes was kind of wild, but all the kids were good kids...some were there because moms worked outside their homes, some were there because it helped them get homework done, or gave consistent structure...some were honestly there because otherwise they would have been wandering the streets inappropriately, and some just liked me.

One little girl, was Sabrina. She was bright, cute and often just needed consistent reinforcement of her own self-control...she needed to be reassured by consistent acknowledgement and appropriate affection that she existed. I didn't mind giving all that to her, but the teachers acted like she was a problem when I saw that she just was a high needs child in a family context that was not maybe providing all that she needed. No judgement on her mother, who had remarried and had a new baby...Sabrina was definitely a handful. But she also reminded me of me.

Sabrina was on her own alot. I would see her wandering the streets, dressed inappropriately, just wandering. In winter with a very light jacket, or windbreaker and no boots, in summer wearing what looked like a nightgown with too-big-for-her highheeled shoes, (the latter made me very uncomfortable).

She took "shelter" at the local library and thank heavens it was there for her...the librarian and workers were all very tolerant of her even if she was very demanding...and she was. She wandered from business to business, from the library to the resale shop, to the laundromat, to the post office, to the hardware store to the supermarket to the video shop, to the flower shop...you get the idea. I always wondered, how her mom felt perfectly safe about all that wandering, but again...not knowing the whole picture, I can't judge, even to this day, though my heart sank every time I saw Sabrina wandering. It was like she was looking for attention everywhere and it made me afraid for her...I had to keep thoughts about what could happen to her, as thirsty for attention as she seemed to be, away from my mind.

One day, it happened...Sabrina "accidentally" hung herself. I could not believe it. I was stunned. She was according to the story...fooling around with a belt, clowning around with her baby sister in the room with her, and accidentally pulled the belt so tightly that she passed out...and she hung herself in her closet.

I will always wonder...and I will never know the truth. Your post reminded me of Sabrina...her cute face, her big brown eyes, her curiosity and wit...11 years old. I remember that year...I tried to make sense of her death, tried to take some comfort in something about it...and just had a very hard time.

Then I saw it: a dandelion in November. It had turned cold here in the mts., and then there was a week, a couple weeks after the funeral when dandelions peeped up their heads because of the warmth. And so I wrote about Sabrina, her death and funeral, which I attended. I sat with her mom and held her hand. I told her what a wonderful child Sabrina was in my opinion, so cute and bright, so curious and a voracious reader...full of good ideas. I told her how much Sabrina reminded me of myself as a girl in those ways.

But looking at Sabrina laying there...so still. I knew she was not wandering anymore...or looking for anything anymore....but I will also never know if it was an accident or a suicide. Perhaps it's not important...but I will always wonder.

Thank you for reminding me of Sabrina and the dandelion in November. I know this doesn't answer your question about fixating on death after losing someone...but I think that it might be that you are trying to find things to relate to in the context of death...relating death of someone close to death in general...getting a handle on your thoughts and feelings. I think that is normal...just as I had to find something to act as a handle for all my feelings about Sabrina's senseless death...who would latch onto a dandelion? We just all have our own way of going about processing and find the "handle" that works for us to hold onto...grounding us maybe...I don't know. I hope I have not offended you with my post.

Feels like a lifetime ago that Sabrina died though...amazing.
Joyce in the mts.

[Greaseball]

Dh told me the medical examiners determined yesterday that the death was an accident. I don't know how they do that...maybe there were signs of the kid trying to free himself?

I've often thought accidents are worse than suicides. At least with a suicide there may be some signs and someone could intervene. With accidents there is often nothing you can do.

[Ms. Mom]

I too found myself doing that after Amanda died I wanted to hear EVERY story I could about the death of a baby, how they died if a cause was found - you name it.

The feelings have passed now as I've traveled many paths on my journey through grief. But, there's still an odd curiosity that lingers.

[applejuice]

Yes, I got fixated on celebrity deaths after my DH passed on - John Ritter for one.

My favorite Aunt died over ten years ago, and Audrey Hepburn died about the same week. I know how my Aunt loved her and wondered if my Aunt and Audrey got together somehow - in the afterlife - ?

I think we just want to mark that point of time in our memory. It is an event and mark in time that is unique and that never will be again.

I know that I remember all of the births at the times I had each of my children and all of the events that happened at the same point in time.

[Ms. Mom]

I know what you mean Applejuice. The woman who plays John Ritters wife on 8 Simple Rules (then Peggy Bundy) lost her baby to a stillbirth shortly after I lost Amanda. I sent a card to her expressing my sympathy and watched every TV appearace she was in - weird isn't it?

I also found out that Jackie O had a stillborn son and found myself reading anything I could about her - I could have cared less about her before I heard that.

LOL - I found Mothering after my loss as well - I was given an article from the hospital written by Marion Cohen on the birth and neo-natal death of her daughter Kerin. It was a re-print from Mothering. I've been reading Mothering ever since.

[Greaseball]

When my brother drowned, there were 2 other kids with him who lived. One of them only survived because at the last minute a fisherman pulled her out of the water. He looked for my brother for a really long time. I didn't meet him but I read about it in the papers, and he felt bad that he wasn't able to find him. I sent him a card thanking him for trying so hard, but he never wrote back. I wonder if he was offended. Some people just like to forget about these things.

[Irishmommy]

I doubt he was offended. More likely he didn't know how to reply. But I bet he appreciated hearing from you.