It didnt happen all at once. The youngest were now twenty-five years old. We had lived thru the agony of losing a son and brother. For ten years after his murder we had to regroup. Three of the girls were still in high school. Being just fifteen and sixteen. The twins had a birthday that February on the 28th or 29th I cant remember because they were leap year twins. Their older sister had a Birthday that February, the 18th, two days after her brother was murdered at her 20th birthday party at her house. Yes, she had moved in with several other college students and decided to have her party. Every ten years she would be reminded on her 30th, 40th, 50th etc. That her brother was gone ten more years.
It took quite a while for her to even allow me to talk of her brother Jerry. It was just in the last few months, and it had been thirty years this February 16th. She never did get counseling. She said it was a waste. The girls tried but didnt like it. I went. I was prescribed anti depressants. I tried going to “Parents of Murdered Children” (POMC). But to be a a large group of people, telling their horrible stories was too much for me, being there alone. I needed support. The girls would’nt go. My parents had already passed away and I had no siblings and had no husband or significant other. I had been divorced ten years before my son died. And there had’nt been much time for a lasting relationships with five kids under the age of twelve. With working and going to college, there was only so much time for romance.
Twenty years is how long I have lived in pain. No not the pain of losing my son. The pain of losing his sisters. Not by a knife, but by their own doing.
Where Are The Lost 