I’ve decided to return to blogging after a very long hiatus and it’s a really weird feeling. Everything about my life is so different since I last blogged on a regular basis that I can’t even pick it up where I left off. Instead I’m starting over, which is a pretty good representation of what this year has been like in general.
You see, I lost my youngest son to suicide in January of this year. He was mere days past his 18th birthday.
I’m broken and trying to rebuild a life with what my grief counselor calls “my new normal.” It’s nearly impossible. Since Christopher died, I’ve had a lot of friends and professionals suggest I keep a journal and write out my feelings. Nah.
Instead I’ve opted to keep dropping all my hot takes on life and more recently, vague mentions of losing someone to suicide, on Twitter. It’s non-committal enough to have served me well until now.
Lately I’ve been worrying that I talk about or around my son’s death far too much on Twitter. Of course, then I remember it’s my account and I can say whatever I want. Still…thoughts of setting up another blog have been tapping me on the shoulder in the wee hours of my sleepless nights.
Anyway. I made a comment on Twitter about something recently, I can’t even recall what, and a woman I’ve known for more than 20 years but had lost touch with responded to my Tweet. We chatted over Twitter for a hot minute, one thing lead to another, and my blog v2.0 was born.
I have no idea what all will go down on this blog, but I can tell you this. It’s not going to be all about the grief of losing my son, but there’s going to be a lot about losing my son. Some of it will also just be about the life of a middle-aged woman who’s a little too dependent on Baskin-Robbins ice cream and dreams of living near a White Castle again.
And there will be a lot of swearing.