Picking up the pieces... Part 12

"Roses are red, Violets are blue, Life was complete, When I had you...

You were my mind, You trained my soul, A work of art, Your beauty beholds!

My heart in parts, My heart turns cold, WE are torn apart - The story is told……

Are roses still red?  Are violets still blue?  Because everything changed,

When I lost you!

Saskia Burke ...15 days until your 19th birthday ...by now, you would have graduated and been accepted to MSU and everything would be different. But yet still amazing, because you would still be here. You wouldn't be gone!

No one realizes how torn apart I am from losing you, my entire life we fought and it was because of the age difference and I didn't realize that you're who I want to be.  You are everything I want to be and who I can't change into now because it would hurt our parents.  But I realize that you're the one person I was supposed to have help me throughout my teen years, the boy drama, friend drama, kicking my butt to get my grades up because anything lower than a C would be unacceptable...

But I don't have you anymore, you're gone and I need you back! I can't cry, because I know that if it was me you would cry, you'd think that you're gonna be a good sister to Ian, and I have failed you Saskia. I have failed at keeping Mommy healthy and ok, and I've failed at keeping Daddy from being more depressed, but most of all I've failed you at keeping Ian part of our family.  You would have kicked his behind if he tried leaving or doing anything like he did.  But I didn't.  I have failed, and I've failed you at making you proud of me.

My grades are low, my self-esteem is low, my hopes are low, my dreams are low, and I dont know how to raise them!  So I really don't know what to do anymore.  You helped me get through and accomplish so much in life!  And now I need you to guide me, to help me with everything, I need your help to make it through this because I honestly don't know how I'm even alive...  I've been trying to do everything I can for everyone, even if I hate them, and in reality I need more help than any of them! They complain about boy issues or drama and I think ...They have it so easy! I'd give anything for that, and yet I have the worst thing ever ....

NO, I didn't say goodbye to you that night!  It was the biggest mistake of my life to not tell you I loved you that night.  1 more I love you would have changed things.  And of course I think that if it had been me, then maybe things would be different.  Ian would still be here, you would be in college, mom and dad would be dealing better.  Because I'm younger.  I don't quite know.  But the biggest mistake I ever made was listening to mom that night!  I was a coward, I was scared and stupid, if I had hung out with you, Connor and Mitch that night, then you and me would have gone downstairs and you would still have been alive, because I would have screamed for Dad and Connor.  They would have killed Gary and you would be here, but no... I was being a bad sister, and decided to go to bed instead of stay up with you.  I didn't fight for your life!  And I let you down.

I'm sorry Saskia!  I let down the most important person I'll ever have in my life, and I'll regret that for the rest of my life!  And I'm sorry!  I love you Saskia, so much more, but I never got to tell you!  Every wish I make is for you to come back, but I know it's no use..   It's over.  I'm sorry, I love you forever Saskia! "

I found Kessa's note on Saskia's facebook page this morning...  It breaks my heart, to see my baby in so much PAIN!  That all of us are left with the burdens of REGRET, and GUILT -  and SHAME!

For  WILLIAM GARY SIMPSON'S    CHOICES AND ACTIONS!

It's not enough to say OUR LIVES WILL NEVER BE THE SAME...  It's not even enough to say OUR LIVES HAVE BEEN DESTROYED...  We carry shame, regret and guilt for what HE DID TO SASKIA!  We will pay for his choice, and fight to stay alive immersed in the PAIN of his actions, every day for the rest of our lives!

We bleed, we ache, we scream out loud - but nothing helps, nothing will stop ANY OF THIS, EVER!  Everyone else hopes for us, that one day the burden of all this may lift a little.  But that's not enough, either.  We really are, only human after all...  And for as many times as we've heard other people say "I don't know how I could go on", well, we are only human too, and just like you, we have no idea.  'Going on' has a different meaning for us.  It is not the return to living one's life, it is the state of 'being alive'... 

WE MISS OUR PERSONAL FREEDOM!  We want that freedom we used to have, the freedom everyone else still has, to feel joy and happiness in our lives.  I want nothing more than to give Kessa what I gave her every day of her life before this - Love, Happiness and Security...  I want that, for all my children!  A kind of Parental Constitution, devoted to keeping them content, and safe!  And oh, the pain, that Kessa's personal freedom has been FOREVER taken from her, and that as a parent, well, I am simply destroyed.  I FAILED, to keep Saskia safe that morning...  I FAILED, to protect her and keep her alive!  And this failure, has robbed me of my 'motherhood' - I can NEVER offer security or real comfort to my children, ever again!  I can never hold Kes in my arms and make her feel safe, and I am helpless to ease any of her pain!  

We are asked to accept this NEW NORMAL LIFE - our life AFTER murder, without Saskia...  But this life is something you are trapped inside of, never to be free outside from, and pain comes at you from every direction.  Kessa's friends who come over, and complain about their siblings...  Seeing mothers and older daughters who look alike, doing things together...  Comments people make, about doing something with their 'girls'...  The holidays that are approaching - and the preparations others are making.  It's not intentional pain, just a monumental pain found in the emptiness where we exist now - without Saskia.  And this pain is like that of terminal cancer in it's last stages...  You ache to be released from the pain, and go on...  Instead, you go on with the pain.

I carry on with my own regret, guilt, shame and pain.  And as this Mom now, all I can do is help carry everyone else's.  I can no longer shoulder the burden for them as I once did, because I'm unable to take it away...  And I am forced to look into the eyes of all my children - who all once trusted in me, that I once kept so safe and warm, and I see the pain of MY FAILURE reflected there...  This, on top of MY FAILURE to keep Saskia alive!  And there is GREAT regret, guilt, shame and pain in this too!  And I flounder, AS ANY HUMAN WOULD, under the weight of it all.  As we carry on, with this all-too-terminal cancer trapped inside us now.

I'm so sorry, that we've been given a new life - that in truth, is everyone's WORST NIGHTMARE!

I'm so sorry, my sweet babies.  I'm so very, very sorry.