When 'What if' Consumes You (Pt. 1)

When I ask people what I was like 3 years ago when Howard’s death was still fresh, the most common description I am told is that I was ‘alive', but I was 'not living.’

I remember looming from place to place, having conversations that I don't remember, holding everything close to prevent more uncertainty. 

 I suppose I was trying to keep everything else in my life the same.  I didn't want anything else to change. 

 I was mad at change. 

 I know now that change is something that is inevitable, but I remember thinking that. I remember feeling like I was dropped into some parallel universe that fed on chaos and sorrow. 

Was Howard’s death some form of punishment?

  I was constantly asking myself rhetorical questions like “What did you do to make this happen?” or “Did you do everything that you possibly could have that day?”

These were questions that ate me alive for years. When I dared myself to think of the day he died, I would ask myself impossible 'what ifs' such as:

 What if I called the police faster?

 What if I went outside to help him cut down the trees?

 What if I asked him to stay inside?

 What if I didn't go to work that day?

 What if that Sunday the weather wasn't so nice, would he still have done it? 

 What if I could have stopped it?

Written: 1.31.17            

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