in 2018, I wrote from my then 5 year old's point of view of my death. I still think of this writing often, only because the thoughts of suicide still seem to linger. i have never been able to picture myself as an older person, time is ticking and my heart is still shattered.
I was five when my mom decided to end her life.
It crushed me. I loved her more than anything, I followed her from room to room, I begged to sleep with her every night. I stole her lap, snuggled under the heated blanket. I raced my brother and sister to the door when she got home from work, always winning. I’d run so fast and leap into her arms that she said if I were any bigger, I’d knock her over.
And then one day, she was gone.
My life was never the same again. My dad moved in next to my mom’s parents and my grandmother tried. She tried so hard but she never did quite like kids like my mom did. She had always told my mom that too, that she was always jealous of the times she’d walk in and the house would be a disaster and there was my mom on the floor with one of us, reading books or building blocks. Mom could let the floors get dirty, the dust get thick, and leave the clothes wrinkly. Grandma was a different story and we had a list of chores that included dusting and putting our clothes away. She taught us the proper way to fold shirts and pants, smoothing them out so that they didn’t look like they came from the corner of the floor.
I decided to sleep in my own bed after she left me here without her. I kept her pillow under my head and breathed her smell in every single night. I played her voice over and over through my head, trying not to forget what she sounded like.
I wish she could have loved herself as much as I loved her.