….. 3 Years Later, I’m Still Here, and Your Still Gone…….

This is a picture of me and your first born on November 8, 1994, you took this pic as I held him and just marveled over something so perfect, that you made.

January 4, 2011. You left us, Your boys, your parents, your siblings, aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews, friends, co-workers, your job, the programs that you helped create to further education in your sons school. I wont list your boyfriend of 9 years as part of the important things you left….. in my heart I know he failed you, he pushed you, and he killed you just as sure as he put the pills in your mouth. Every January 4th, I call our dad. Funny he really isn’t either of our father, but yet he is the only real father either of us ever had. Married and divorced to my mom twice, poor man, and your aunts neighbor for years. He excepted you as my friend, then as my best friend, and he made us sisters. A blood bond couldn’t have been stronger. Our kids are growing up calling him papa. I guess there is some joy in that legacy, as it solidifies the bond we had. 

November 11, 91. I moved in with my moms newest husband and next door to your aunts house where you lived. Me, a tomboy, who knew nothing about make-up, or fashion. You, this short little blond girly girl, almost 2 years older then me and very grudgingly you became my friend. it took you almost 4 months to make me over, and after that….well…… I was your shadow. When you bite of more then you could chew, I had your back. Your amazon body guard, and sometimes reluctant partner in crime. You took me everywhere and changed the direction of my life. So when your aunt was losing her marriage, there was no way we were going to be separated. You moved in with us, and you became my sister. And Gawd help anyone who said otherwise. I can remember singing Garth brooks at the top of our lungs as we VCR recorded his free concert from Central Park. The guys that you set me up with in your boyfriends crew of buddys’ so I wouldn’t be a third wheel.

We Fought, and they were doseys, we let guys and drugs come between us more then once or twice. Marriages, you twice with me as the steadfast Maid of Honor each time. You moving all the way to Illinois for a few years nearly broke me in half. New friends, careers, life, that separated us before we even realized we had drifted away. Your first born, born 10 months before mine. Your second born only 2 months before mine. Deaths that we mourned together, be they your blood, or mine. They day my fathers ashes were delivered to me in a mason jar, with a beautiful antique wine bottle that my dad had brought home from Italy. And we got drunk and used a funnel and wooden spoon to put him in the bottle. Laughing at the absurdity, and then freaking when I put the spoon and funnel in the dishwasher. you swore to never eat at my house again. That didn’t last long though. In July of 05, when I hid from my doctor to avoid a hysterectomy due to cancerous lesions. You picked me up and took me in, and help my hand as we scheduled the surgery. 7-27-05, You were to emotional to see me off to surgery, but you were the first face I saw when I woke up, broken hearted because I wasn’t a whole person anymore. Or, when in October of the same year my step sister and husband tried to audition for Jerry Springer. WE beat all of Jays stereo components with hammers with him on speaker phone. Good times, the best.

We had 6 kids between us, your 2 boys, my 3 boys and our only girl. You saved my life, and I couldn’t save you. Now, that’s just not fair. We let drugs and 1 stupid man tear us apart in March of 06. Without you I had no direction. I stayed high for the next 3 years and some months. Lost my husband, my kids, my job, my car, my friends, my family………I was just floating until I met someone who gave me hope, and faith. Together, Lolo, Jeremy( my boyfriend ) and me, picked a day and on that day we quit METH. February 19, 2009. I’ve never looked back. Slowly I got my life together. Stable home, made good on my court fines, was proactive in my kids life, now I have a home, a car, a job, my kids, a divorce, and the best boyfriend ever. But still you couldn’t forgive me……….as family began to believe in me, I would run into at family events, good and bad. You were cordial, but distant… that hurt. But I knew it would take time, and I was willing to wait…years if necessary. In March of 2010 our kid brother married, and I decided it was time for me to let go of trying to fix us, I told you I was sorry, that I loved you, and missed you. I forced my hug on you and walked away. I felt like I had lifted a suffocating weight off my shoulders. Now, it was all you, the next move would be from you when you were ready. December 28, 2010 you showed up at the pizza place foe our brothers step daughters birthday…..I knew something was wrong, you didn’t stay, and you looked at me for a long time. I wonder if you were asking for help, and I failed to see it. 8 days later you were gone. I will never understand how you could think the world would be better without you, as you were the world to so many people. And I still miss you. 

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Just what to say to your sister, who is deceased….

The picture I posted with this post, is me ( the red head ) my brother ( on his wedding day ) and my older sister ( almost a year before she died )

My sister and I were not close, anymore, we used to be. So close you couldn’t tell us apart if you called the house. We loved the same music, movies, places to go, even friends. We each had our own friends, some that didn’t like me, some that didn’t like her. We had friends that were ours to share, who excepted that with one you got the other. Those friends that didn’t really like me or my sister didn’t get called much and were only seen at school really. My sister was a grade above me and so we didn’t see each other much at school so it was ok to have “other” friends at school. But once we were home, we were inseparable. My sisters boyfriend had to find one of his friends to date me so that I wasn’t the third wheel on all their dates and I wasn’t annoying him. He is still my friend to this day, we don’t talk often or hang out much, but he is there when I need him and vice verse.

I guess that’s enough babbling about high school stuff. We were not always so close, I mean we fought. She moved away for a few years, but no matter what we always found our way home. We fought drug addiction in our early 20’s, we made it past bad relationships and marriages. Through people who wanted to to break up our sisterhood. Cuz see in reality we weren’t sisters. In reality she was the neighbors kid, when I moved to Arizona in 1991 so my mom could remarry. My step dad and Shawnees aunt thought it would be nice if she took me under her wing and befriend me and stuff. It was a nightmare at first. She resented having to babysit me and I resented being in a new place, having this preppy popular neighbor telling me what to do and how I needed to change because she couldn’t be seen with a girl who wore ripped jeans and biker boots and listened to head banging noise. But as time passed and I gradually let go of being a hard bitch and she excepted that I was a foul mouthed, loud sarcastic girl who laughed at everything and intimidated all her friends. We found ourselves spending more time together, and gravitating to each other for a shoulder to cry on, and a person who had your back no matter what. Shaw was just shy of 5 ft, and small, I was 5’9 and 200+ lbs of amazon. She was never one to pursue conflict or confrontation, being more of a passive person. But knowing that whether she was in the right or dead wrong, I would have her back she gained confidence in speaking up for herself. I was quiet around large groups and people that I didn’t feel like I needed to talk to, but I was loud and often abrasive and my social graces were sorely lacking, until she helped me find my inner grace and I looked up to her enough that I started thinking about what I said before I said it, just so I didn’t embarrass her to much. After High School, she graduated I did not, we each had somewhat separate lives, but still spent time together. We each picked men that smothered us and kept us apart from each other. But in Oct of 94 she had her 1st son, and I followed in Aug of 95 with my boy. We loved having kids so close together. My step dad, took to Shaw so much that he basically adopted her into our family and refused to let anyone say she wasn’t his kid, same went for me after my mom and he divorced. We were his and that was it. So he took our kids as his grandsons and to this day counts our children as his own. So years went on and friends came and went, she had another boy, and another failed marriage, I had 2 more boys and a girl, and a failed marriage. But until March of 2006 we still had each other, till the wheels fall off, that’s what we used to say. In 2006 we both began using Meth, we both covered for each other to our spouses when we would go out and cheat, we partied together. Then we decided that we wanted to tell our boyfriends the truth. So then began the 4 of us using together. Until my sister decided to try to get back with her ex husband. I helped her, even going as far as to moving her boyfriend in with me and my husband when she threw him out. She got her ex back and she didn’t feel guilty because she had made sure her boyfriend had a place to go. Well, Meth makes you do things that you would not normally do, and Her boyfriend and I had a history. We were friends for years, before he ever dated my sister, we were friends. He says he nursed a crush on me the entire time we were friends. And when he knew I was never going to look at him as more then my friend, he turned to my sister. For 9 years they were together. Moving from here to Illinois and back. And now here he was in my home dumped by my sister and being my husbands best friend he knew that my husband was unfaithful and abusive. It was easy for the two of us to ” fall in love ” The drugs helped alot. So we kept our affair going for a few months, until my sister found out. She wanted him back and couldn’t believe I had slept with her boyfriend. No amount of reasoning or logic mattered to her. And he loved her still, he used me to feel better about himself, and to hopefully make her jealous enough to want him back. It worked. It was the most horrible time in my life, except for my unreasonably supportive husband. He wanted to make us right again, no more affairs, no more lies. He told my sister my side of things, but she only wanted to believe her boyfriends side. Painting me as the bad girl who pursued him and seduced him away from her. She was so filled with hate and revenge was what she felt she deserved.

I couldn’t understand and to this day still don’t understand how she could put aside the fact that she threw him away for her ex husband, she pushed him at me, and went on with her happy little life until she realized that that he wasn’t just waiting for her to take him back. It was all my fault in her mind and none of what she had done made any kind of an excuse. So, my marriage did end, and I continued to use Meth until Feb of 09. I got clean with my boyfriend and best friend. I began to put the pieces of my life together. Every piece of my puzzle put back in place but for her. She wasn’t going to forgive me. Her life had seemed to be all together. No one ever believed that she used Meth, and her and Chad never admitted it. So I carried that weight all by myself. We were thrown together at family functions, or family emergencies. But she refused to bend. Finally, at our younger brothers wedding in March of 2010 I told her I loved her and that I forgave her and I would wait no matter how long for her to forgive me. She never will, she is gone. I sometimes think that if I would have tried harder I could have been a part of her life and seen the warning signs that things were falling apart for her. But it wasn’t to be, on Jan 4, 2011 my sister died. She overdosed on her prescription meds, and other illegal drugs. I will never know if she was on the path to forgiving me. My dad, and brother tell me she was. She had even started referring to me as her baby sister again. I love her still, and I am at peace in a way with the fact that I was able to tell her I loved her and I was able to forgive her and wait for her to forgive me.

There are songs that I hear and find myself crying as I sing along, because they were our songs. Garth Brooks ” A friend to me” is a big one. Doug Stone “Better off in a Pine Box” is another. But last year Black Shelton wrote a song for his brother, his wife Miranda Lambert recorded it as Blake said it would be to emotional to sing over and over again at shows and concerts. ” Over You” expresses just how deeply I feel about my sister and the loss of her. So I’m going to end here for now as this subject has finally made its way to form a knot in my throat and my vision blurry. But I share with you the words to this song and hope that it may be a song that you can hold dear to your heart like I do.

 Weather man said it’s gonna snow
By now I should be used to the cold
Mid-February shouldn’t be so scary
It was only December
I still remember the presents, the tree, you and meBut you went away
How dare you?
I miss you
They say I’ll be OK
But I’m not going to ever get over you

Living alone here in this place
I think of you, and I’m not afraid
Your favorite records make me feel better
Cause you sing along
With every song
I know you didn’t mean to give them to me

But you went away
How dare you?
I miss you
They say I’ll be OK
But I’m not going to ever get over you

It really sinks in, you know, when I see it in stone

Cause you went away,
How dare you?
I miss you
They say I’ll be OK
But I’m not going to ever get over you