Letter 4 – Deep-Seated Belief

 

Dear Garrett,

The question I always circle back around to, that I can’t get over, that I can’t think my way through, is how could I not have prevented your death? How could I not have prevented it? As a mother, I only have one job – to prevent my children from coming to harm. To protect them. Did I not protect you enough? Did I not hear you when you needed me? It is very clear to me, now, that I wasn’t there in the way I needed to be, when you needed me. How could I not have done that?

I don’t know what the future would have held if you hadn’t died. I don’t know if it would have been miserable. I don’t know that you wouldn’t have overdosed at some later point, but the fact is, is that you overdosed when you did, when I could have gotten to you. If I had been just a little faster. This is such a deep-seated belief on my part that I don’t know if I will ever get over it. I knew you were in trouble. I knew you were feeling down, depressed. Anxious. You told me these things.

I can’t pretend ignorance. I can’t say, if only I knew. Because I did know. I just didn’t know how much. How bad you were, how low you were, how hopeless you felt right then. That night. How many nights before then. How many years before then. This is what I struggle with. I had the knowledge, and yet I was ignorant. Stupid. And you were slowly being pushed into a corner. How I wish I could just pull you up and out of it all, and tell you, rest, my beautiful child. Rest for a minute, and we will figure out a way. But I didn’t. I didn’t create a space for you where you could just hang on for a minute, until all of us got it together enough to find a different way.

I am sorry. I’m sorry I didn’t protect you. I’m sorry I wasn’t there at the just right moment. I am sorry.