A Mother's Grief

A Mother's Grief

6/18/22

My daughter Maryanna came home for a visit and a wedding 2 weeks before this happened. She and her brother Billy were going everywhere together. They were having such a wonderful visit. Maryanna was to leave at 9pm Tuesday night. They came home Sunday night and Maryanna was tired and went to bed about 10:30 pm. She went to say good night to Billy but something was against his door. She decided to leave him alone and went to bed. Billy had a doctor’s appointment at 9am the next day. Afterwards they had made plans and were looking forward to it.

That next morning she went to wake Billy up. The door was still blocked but she pushed it in. She came out into the living room visibly upset and incoherent. When I went to her she said. "I think he's dead" I froze for a microsecond. Then I ran into the room. There he was, in a fetal position cold and blue. I kept thinking “This can't be. This isn't right. What the fuck did you do?” An empty syringe lies on his dresser, a puddle of orange liquid on the floor.

Maryanna was able to stay 2 more weeks to take care of EVERYTHING. My niece also came over and helped her clean up Billy's room, donate clothes. I don't know what I would have done without her. Several of Maryanna's friends have come over to do things for us since she's gone back to Bahrain. She will be back here 7/3 to 7/8 and the again in October. She only has about 5 more years left to retire. She's looking into getting stationed closer to us after this deployment is over.

I keep asking why. It shouldn't have happened. He had gotten clean the month before. The image of him laying on the floor, blue and cold in a fetal position keeps repeating in my head. Less so now, but it's still there.

Several weeks earlier we were going through a very difficult time with Billy. It was a terrible time. He was raging, so much anger. We had called the police one him several times. Considered eviction, considered restraining order. So many angry things said; so many feelings of guilt now.

Looking back and looking forward part of me knows that Billy would have continued to have a difficult life. I know he was depressed. He broke his hand when he punched the freezer in anger and was in so much pain; both emotional and physical. He had broken teeth (Probably due to the drugs) hurting him. He was not able to eat certain things anymore. I had just gotten him health insurance. I had just opened a checking account and credit card in his name to establish credit for him. I hadn't told him about that because I knew he would abuse both. I was, in my mind, setting him up for a better future. Since he got clean, he wasn't working because he was in pain and of course, couldn't take anything for it.

Realistically I don't think he had much of a future ahead of him due to several felony drug possessions and the DUI he recently got. He crashed my car two different times. Before that he crashed his dad's suburban. He had no real friends anymore because they were either people he got drugs from or he pissed off for one reason or another.

I absolutely know he did not do this on purpose. We don't have the toxicology report back yet but we are pretty sure he got something for pain and it was laced with Fentenol. Fentenol has run rampant here and is laced in everything now. We talked to him about this and he said "I know who I deal with." We replied that he did NOT know the people THEY dealt with. Obviously he didn't remember. He would have been 36 on May 19th.

I cannot look at a picture of Billy, talk about Billy and think about Billy without breaking down in tears. Nothing stops that. I just have to get through it. I have applied for short term disability and am in the process of putting all my paperwork needed in order. soooooooooooooooooooooooooooo many forms.

My husband Bill is doing better with his blood cancer. I thought I would lose him first. Meds are working but very slowly. Since Billy passed I can tell he's gone into a depressive state where he sleeps a lot. (Sound familiar? Yeah, I've been there) we are both getting a tiny bit better at keeping the tears at bay some of the time, one day at a time.