You should have gone

Yes, I am not doing so great lately. I think it's a combination of things but I am not really sure what's up with me. Just not feeling good.


On another happy note:

I had a conversation with Luke recently that pretty much had me between wanting to burst into tears and scream at him at the top of my lungs. I didn't do either of those things.

We were riding in the car, talking about why we don't go "the short way" to our usual destinations any more. He knows that his daddy died somewhere on that road ("the short way" road) and knows the general vicinity of where it happened. At this point he finally asked to go down there. I am just not sure about that. I know Luke, and I know that seeing the actual place will cause him to ask me many, many more questions. Some I am not yet sure how to answer and some I am not sure I want to answer.

So anyway, Luke started to question me (again) about the events that took place that day. This time he was particularly focused on the fact that Joe went to Hannaford after work. He kept saying the same phrases to me over and over and they were:

"Mommy YOU should have gone to Hannaford. Then you would have gotten in the accident but you wouldn't have died because you would have been in your car".

"Mommy YOU should have gone to Hannaford. Daddy NEVER went to the grocery store, but he went that day. Why didn't YOU go? You should have gone mommy".

"It should have been opposite mommy."

"WHY did Daddy go to Hannaford? He NEVER went to Hannaford and he had to go that day?"

And the one he kept going back to, that he said many, many times to me and which I did not respond to many of the times he said it:

"You should have gone Mommy. You should have gone".

Over and over he said these things to me. It was like he was just realizing a way that the accident didn't have to happen. I explained to him that I thought about those same things too, but it was daddy that wanted to go to Hannaford that night and there are lots of ways in which the accident would not have happened...if it had been raining that day he would have taken his truck; if there had been another person in line in the grocery store in front of him it wouldn't have happened; if he took a few seconds longer or shorter to leave the parking lot, etc etc. There are so many things that could have changed it and I explained to Luke that it is awful to think about all those things and we just have to deal with the fact that it did happen.

This conversation with Luke was one of the most awful conversations I have ever had. I felt so many emotions. I know my son and I know that he was just voicing out loud the thoughts in his head of how the accident could have been avoided. I know he wants no harm to come to me and that he loves me. It did hurt though. Tremendously. Partly because it was my son saying these things and partly because I have thought about those things over and over myself. But there are a million what-ifs. So we deal with what is.