Six Years Ago...

I find it so hard to believe that exactly six years ago I spoke to my son for the very last time.  Hard to believe all of those words.  Six years. My son. Last time.  Still today those words defy reality.

I have of course played back in my head that conversation hundreds of times over the past six years.  Looking for clues.  Looking for evidence that proves my cause for disputing these findings.  Treasuring the normalcy and lightness of it.  Replaying his voice; the tone, his inflections, his laugh, his concern. Clinging to every word.  Hanging onto to every memory of it.  Today six years later when I can barely remember what I did an hour ago - I can recite that conversation almost word for word.

As I write this one hour and a half ago I stopped what I was doing and looked at the clock at the exact time I made that final call.  Like some force pulling me.  Just like still waking in the middle of the night like I did at exactly 4:00 A.M. Saturday morning the 23rd of August 2014 in a fit of tears without knowing why.  To this day I still periodically wake at precisely 4:00 A.M. sometimes I just look at the clock and realize why I awoke I make a mental note of it and go right back to sleep.  Other times I lay awake with them on my heart and do not - can not go back to sleep.  It isn't everyday anymore but it is still more often than not.  

Still six years later they all have their days with me.  Some days I will just sit and look at pictures of Paxton all day and cry on and off.  Think of the funny little things he did or said and laugh as if he were in the other room.  Other days are Kara's days.  I think about her all day long.  I spend time appreciating what she was to me.  How because of her I was able to have the relationship I did with him.  She was so unselfish with him.  She allowed me to have the sweetest relationship and the gift of loving him.  I think of what a great mom she was and how calm and easy she taught him.  I watch videos to hear her voice.  Then there are "Brian days" and if I'm honest there are more of them.  He was after all my child and I had a 41 year history with him.  I find that on his days I pick certain era's in his life and just relive those days.  Like thinking about different things he did or said say when he was three.  On another such day I will have a reminder of something he did at maybe 14 and then I will start thinking of all the things I can remember about the time he was 14. His first school dance with his first real crush.  He was dressed in a black suit, white shirt, red tie.  I remember thinking what a grown up outfit for such a little boy.  A very small 14 year old that looked all of 10.   

Ahh Celeste. His crush.  How he carried a torch for that little girl.  He was like that though.  Very like me in that.  He too, was one to hang on to those that mattered to him.  He was very sentimental and did not easily let go of a relationship. And he was about 13 when he met Celeste and was still secretly in love with her until the day he married though he never saw her but once after we moved.  

But once he married all of his love and attention went to his wife and children.  Though he was way too young he handled it like a trooper.  He loved being married and loved being a dad better than anything in the world.  Even when she was clearly running around on him, he never mentioned it to any of us.  I knew he was upset about something but his loyalty to her would never let him say a word against her.

He spent a lot of time with us and I was shocked when after she was openly seeing someone else, had filed for divorce and asked him to leave - he finally told us all she had been doing for over a year.  How she had been leaving every night when he came home from work and not returning until 4 or 5 in the morning --totally wasted.  How he had been working all day to come in to a filthy house, no dinner and out the door she would go leaving him to bathe the kids and get them to bed and then sit all night and wonder where his wife was.  How their four year old son told him about her friend "D" that had come to spend the night every night while he was away on a business trip to N.J. for a week.  

She had actually once left two years before, we learned later she was having an affair with her boss.  She came back claiming she wanted to work things out.  She insisted he buy her a new car and put it in her name.  She put in to buy a new house and then she turned up pregnant with their daughter all within a few months of agreeing to come back.  Their daughter was just nine months old when he found out about "D".  Shortly thereafter he found out she was pregnant again but this time he knew the baby was not his.  He was hurt.  Devastated.  I begged him to get a lawyer and fight for custody of his children.  He absolutely refused.  Saying "Mom, how could I do that to my wife! I cannot take her children away from her and I cannot take them away from their mother."  He loved her still.  He wanted her back regardless and he fell into a deep depression for over two years.  

She married D. just a few weeks after their divorce was final and she and D. spent the next several years until they divorced - tormenting his life away.  Controlling him with threats to keep his children from him or saying she'd turn them against him.  On his weekend to have them she called constantly and tried to control every moment of his visitation.  She bossed him and told him what he could and could not do with his children with threats that it would be the last time he saw them if he didn't comply.  She extorted about $80,000 from him on top of his already generous child support by beating him down and telling him what a horrible father he was because he wouldn't pay for them all to take trips to Disney or California or help pay for them a new van.  He ended up in bankruptcy, he couldn't even live on what she left him.  He never got a vacation.  He never got to take his kids anywhere but he faithfully paid for "their" trips all over.  He financed hers, D's and five children's vacations for several years.  He found out years later he'd been financing their drug habit as well.  They were both heavily on drugs and D. had even sent his 11 year old son into a crack-house to buy drugs for them. She gave her 16 year old son Xanax and then when he got caught with it at school she acted as if she was mother of the year and sent him to a drug rehab.  

After the kids got old enough to tell him some of what had gone on he lived consumed with guilt for not trying to take custody of the kids and sparing them the hell they lived in that set the tone for the near ruination of their lives when they hit their teen years.  They had been exposed to everything.

She left D. but not before she gave birth to two more children - one mixed race - after her husband had had a vasectomy claiming at five months pregnant that she'd been raped in the parking lot of a Publix by a black man. And when she left she was pregnant again with husband number three's baby.  He came from a well off family and she took them for all she could before she left him.  And shortly thereafter came baby number seven and husband number four and as I understand it - she now has husband number five.  

She is a textbook psychopath and the nicest person you'd ever meet.

And no one was happier than I was when Brian married Kara because I knew Kara was not the kind of person to sit back and let her run their life or allow her to continue to extort money from them.  And she did exactly as I expected.  She put a stop to it first thing.  For the first time in over twelve years he was somewhat free from that psychopath.  The only thing that scared me was that Kara believed that she was her friend. And she is the most manipulative person I've ever known and I was so afraid of what trouble she might cause her because Kara had stopped her gravy train. 

And weirdly after all the years of torment and bad blood between them and after being divorced for eighteen years, she was johnny on the spot at the scene of the crime from her home over 60 miles away just a short time after the kids were notified.  Chatting up the police; there for the TV cameras; there to talk with the neighbors.  She would not miss an opportunity to be in the middle of the drama.  weeks later I was told by the investigating officers that she had been calling their office regularly asking for updates about the investigation.  He asked me who she was.  I was livid.  Then she was the first one at the Memorial Service and the last one to leave.  They couldn't even close the church long after the service was over because she would not leave.

Afterward I remember the most intense anger I've ever known.  Screaming to the top of my lungs and throwing things and being in an uncontrollable rage --at her.  All the years of her torment of him culminated in the worst rage I've ever experienced.  I wasn't mad at God.  I wasn't mad at him even though they claimed he was responsible.  I was mad at his biological father and her --for all the hurt they had caused him in his life.

I have no anger now I will wait on the Lord and let Him sort out the truth and get justice for us.  I hold no grudges. 

And all of this makes the scenario the police built even more ridiculous.  After all she put him through for all those years and growing to hate her as he did - he didn't kill her.  So why on earth would he have killed the beautiful wife that he loved and the child he adored?

I'm better but there is still a hole in my heart the size of Texas that will never ever fill.  I miss them all every single day but I find peace in the fact that the days of seeing them again are getting close.  Very close. And I rest in that knowledge.

 

The Storms of Life

I have been bombarded lately with a common message coming at me from a variety of areas.  I listen to Charles Stanley’s radio message at 5:30 every morning on my ride to work.  I also listen to a local Christian radio station that does a Daily Devotion every morning.  I also have a Bible app that has a Bible verse of the day.  These three different forms of media have all come together with a common message this week. The Storms of Life – their cause and meaning.   There are three types of storms that God allows in your life. 

There are Protecting storms – as in you did not get that job that you were hoping and praying for – you feel at the time that it was a storm or an unanswered prayer but perhaps instead it was because the company was going to close and you would have been left jobless.  Or perhaps you prayed for things to work out in a relationship with a certain person but that did not happen and you are disappointed but you later meet the love of your life.  Your seemingly unanswered prayer was actually a form of God’s protection.  I’m sure if you think back you can recall a time when you have asked God for something only to find out later that you were thankful He did not allow you to have whatever you had asked for.

Then there are Correcting storms – storms that hit your life as a direct result of some sin or some wrong choice that you have made.  God is not trying to destroy you with these storms of correction but instead guide you to the best choices for your life for your own benefit. - Proverbs 3:11 My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord, neither be weary of his correction for who the Lord loveth, he correcteth even as a father the son in whom he delighteth.  Ask yourself this about whatever you are going through – Is this a storm of correction?  Is there something in my life that needs correcting.  Is this a disciplinary storm that God has allowed in my life to open my eyes to something I am doing that is out of His will or is pushing me farther away from my walk with Him?  His purpose is to move us constantly in the direction of a closer walk with Him. Our goal should be to be more Christ-like.  Is there something in your life; gossip, lust, envy, an addiction or an error in thinking that may be blocking that goal?  If so, He will do whatever it takes to get your attention and get you back on the right track.  That is a correcting storm.

And then there are Perfecting storms – A storm that has come into your life as a test to refine you like gold in a fire to remove the impurities in your life or like in Luke 22:31-32 where Jesus tells the Apostle Peter “Simon, Simon, Satan has asked to sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Simon that your faith may not fail.  And when you have turned back, strengthen your brothers.”  This was an Apostle of Jesus Christ who had listened to his teachings and left his personal life to walk with Jesus for three years.  But Simon Peter had such a love and loyalty to Jesus he began to be arrogant about it.  In the next verse 33: Peter says, “Lord, I am ready to go with thee, both into prison, and to death.”  In Matthew 26: 33:  “Though all men shall be offended because of thee yet will I never be offended.”  And in verse 35 he goes on to say “I should die with thee yet will I not deny thee.”  But when Jesus asked him to come to the garden with Him and watch and pray – he fell asleep.  And when the guards came and arrested Jesus Peter in fear for his own life, denied even knowing Jesus three different times.  So though Peter loved the Lord, he was arrogant and prideful about that love and his faith.  He was not nearly as strong as he had thought.  So Jesus agreed to let Satan “sift” him as wheat – to test and try his faith not so Jesus would know the depth of that faith for He already knew but so that Peter could see his own shortcomings.  So he could no longer hide from his failures as a loyal friend and follower of Jesus.  I’m sure this was an eye opening experience for Peter.  I’m sure he was filled with confusion, remorse and shame.  But it gave him an honest assessment of how his strength, bravery, loyalty and faith was tested and found lacking. God knew that Peter’s pride was going to have to be destroyed if he were ever going to be of any real use.  Peter suffered a Perfecting storm.

And yet again this morning still another confirmation as Charles Stanley spoke of “works” making you feel justified when in fact nothing but what Jesus did on the cross could ever justify you.  There is nothing you, personally, can ever do to make Him love you more or make you right in His eyes.  Nothing.  He was saying that just because you go to church three times a week, tithe 10%, teach Sunday School or sing in the choir --that does not justify you to Jesus.  He was making the point that you were made “free” from the bondage of the law but it hit home with a different message to my heart entirely.

I have spent nearly thirteen months assessing the Tsunami that decimated our lives August 2014; initially just trying to survive the storm - dodge flying debris, tread the rising flood waters, cling desperately to whatever small pieces of solid ground I could find and then after I survived the first waves of destruction I began trying to make sense of it. 

Prior to that storm I, like Peter, would have sworn nothing could shake my faith. I pretty much felt like I too, would have gone to prison or faced death in a minute.  I was “secure” in my faith and my relationship with God was, I thought, unshakable.  I was in church almost every week for the past 22 years, I tithed, and did all of the other things that I thought was expected of me as a Christian. I cared about people, I gave to charities and tried to help people in need.  I was proud to be able to do what little I did in the church and while I never consciously thought I could “work” my way into Heaven or gain brownie points with God or even work to make restitution for any sins in my life, I apparently did think it would somehow keep disasters of this magnitude away from my life because the first thing that hit me was the unfairness and the devastating feeling that I had been betrayed by the God I loved and trusted. 

Obviously, I had a huge issue with pride as well.  Let me tell you there is absolutely nothing that can humble you right down to the dirt like the devastation of losing three members of your family at once and the shame and horror and yes, even guilt of having the whole world believe the son you love with all your heart --took the life of his wife and child. 

While I recall thinking I would gladly give my life for God – I can confess here and now that I absolutely never entertained the illusion that I would be willing to give the life of my child or grandchild.  Giving one’s life sounds like the maximum sacrifice but let me assure you it is not.  I know first-hand what a maximum sacrifice looks like and it is certainly not my life.  My life has not meant two cents to me this entire year.  Sacrificing my life would seem like a cheesy consolation prize.

Like Peter, when three times he denied even knowing Jesus, I have come to the humbling conclusion – that my faith, love and loyalty has been “sifted as wheat" and found seriously lacking.   

Words I could never have imagined saying…

Four months out, and there are some out of state friends and extended family members that still do not know about the loss of my children.  I thought I was finally going to be able to make those calls but when I try – I find that there are no words… no way to relay this news.  What do I say?  How do I tell this?  How do I explain that what the police say happened – could in no way have happened and yet still I do not know what, in fact, did happen?  How do you tell this to anyone?  The few people that I have told were so freaked out by it until they were speechless, they either bolted or hurried off the phone and I have never heard from them again. 

Talk about a truly humbling experience.

I recall meeting a pitiful couple the first night we attended the 13-week grief seminar.  Their young adult son had been murdered by a man in his apartment complex.  They were having a very difficult time with the grief, anger, confusion and disbelief that someone could just walk up for no apparent reason and kill their son.  They wanted answers.  They were angry at the system and the way things had been handled although apparently, thank God, they had caught the killer.  They were baffled at how someone could be so callous and cruel as to kill another human being that was just doing what young people do and "having a good time". 


They still yet had to go through the rigors of a long, drawn out, emotional trial as they hoped at least for some sort of justice for their son.  They were of course, in deep grief over the loss of their son as well.  The sadness and empathy in the room was palpable.  Everyone could relate to that terrible feeling of loss but while everyone else in the group was reeling in shock; appalled at the thought of him being a victim of “murder” – I sat there and realized what I was feeling was more like sadness mixed with --envy?

Can you imagine?

I felt awful!  I realize that was not a natural response to the situation and yet I promise you at that moment I wish I could have stood up and said that someone had murdered my children.  What a comfort it would have been to say,  ”This terrible person did this awful thing and I am angry, hurt and confused at the cruelty of this situation.  I want justice!”  At that moment I thought how much I would love to have been able to say those words??? How awful! But how true.

I could openly grieve my son.  I could have poured my heart out over the loss of my child to any extended family and all of my old friends and co-workers and everyone would have understood the great loss.  I could have talked about how much I loved and missed my child to anyone in any circles without the devastation of having them turn away in what appeared to be --disgust. I could have had my loss validated instead of feeling like I had no right to love and miss my son.  I could have taken comfort from friends and family instead of feeling like I needed to instead launch into defense mode as I tried in vain to explain who he really was in his heart and how much he loved his wife and child.  “But, you don’t know him. There is no way.  He adored them.  But you don't understand, he was absolutely not capable of...  He couldn’t have...  He would never…” and I see "the look" and I choke and turn away leaving my words dangling in mid-air. 

This is why this blog has been so vital to my survival because here I can pour out my heart.  I can openly acknowledge my devastating loss.  My grief can spill all over these pages mingled with my tears.  I can talk freely about whom I knew he was in his heart; how he was such a funny, goofy child, a fun-loving young adult, a loyal and responsible husband, how much he loved his children and what a good dad he was.  I can talk about him like he was my son - a victim and not my son, the cause of another family's loss.  I can rightfully grieve this horrific loss.  I can love him in spite of what the Sheriff’s office said because I am, after all --Still Brian's Mom.

So many whys...

Well, we had the second and last interview with the Sergeant at the Sheriff's Department.  I came away feeling "defeated".


We have spent the last two months asking for only two things:  A list of the prescription medications (there was a total of 5, we only knew about two) taken from the house; and a toxicology report.


The Sergeant assured me he had the list of medicines for me finally.  And that he had the autopsy results back and he would meet with us to discuss his findings.  He agreed to this because I emailed him and asked him why no one cared to find out “why” this happened as they say because there was no cause. I told him I wanted a toxicology report as we were told would be done – we suspected if things happened like he said that Ambien was involved; I wanted the list of drugs taken from the scene.  And I had tried on three different occasions to get the drug list from the Coroner, to no avail.


I drove the 35 miles to the Sheriff’s office.  My daughter also drove about 25 and we met him a second time.  The big breakthrough information he had for us was that the autopsy showed Brian died of a gunshot wound to the head.  The list of medications he had for us were the same two we had had all along he had just changed the names to the generic name.  And the “why” that he told us was a story he apparently made up on the spot to give us some false sense of closure.


Our basis for not believing that this happened out of some vengeful act of malice caused by an argument or as they suggested, he had just found out that his wife was cheating on him and snapped or that she had threatened to leave him and take the baby - was the fact that nothing was wrong and none of that was true.  And that they needed to find out what the prescription drugs were that were in the house because something had to explain this - what they were saying happened was absolutely impossible.  Brian would never have intentionally hurt his wife or his child under any circumstances; Kara had done nothing wrong; and they were not getting a divorce.  Brian and Kara were not arguing, there was no other man, no depression, no problems that would have even caused him to kill himself much less hurt the ones he loved.


So to make me have a quasi valid reason that might explain this.  He sat there and told us that Kara's mom told him during her "interview" that Kara had in fact called her and confided to her that she "wanted to leave Brian and come back home and live with her."  My daughter and I both sat in stunned silence unable to dispute it because we could not of course prove it had not happened.  He assumed because of the circumstances that we were not in touch with Kara’s mom to know the difference I guess. We asked when this conversation took place?  He said, "I do not have timeline on that."  Well if this, in fact, was an interview to try and determine probable cause - why not?  Wouldn't that have been important?  It upset my daughter and I and we just gave up and left.  It left us both speechless.  But my daughter would not rest until she heard that straight from Kara's mom - who adamantly denied ever saying that.  As a matter of fact she only said, "If Kara had had any indication that they were either one in danger - she would have taken that baby and left. But apparently she never did.  My baby was determined to make that marriage work no matter what."


So he had tried to pull off a deception regarding the medication names.  And then turned right around and made up a complete lie to get us to go away and stop asking him for information as to how the investigation was carried out and why they just came to this conclusion.


And as for me requesting that they order the toxicology report like they told us they were doing – He says he spoke with his Major and that they will absolutely NOT order the test because they do not need it to prove cause and manner of death.  But that I can hire an attorney, get a court order and have the blood released to a private lab of my choice and pay for it and do it myself.


We thanked him and left.


I will leave him alone. But not because of his ridiculous scenario about Kara leaving has given me closure but because asking him anything is a waste of my time and gasoline.  He told me a lie and in my eyes that makes him a liar.  I have no interest in hearing anything more he has to say because I cannot trust him.


I called the GBI myself yet again regarding getting the blood sample.  They told me they could do the toxicology test if I would call the Coroner and get her to order it.  I told them she would not.  The Sheriff’s Department would not and I just needed to know the proper channels to get it myself.  They told me I needed a court order to get it.  I asked her why I needed a court order to get what belonged rightfully to his next of kin and not them?  She told me she would transfer me to open records and I could discuss it with them.  I did.  They told me all I needed was to request it in writing and gave me an email address.  No lawyer.  No judge.  But I did need a lab for them to send it to.  I then hung up to call private labs.  Where I was told that they could not test the blood because it was over 7 days old!  It was three weeks before I found out no tests were even being done and because of the lies we were told about that – we now had no recourse.  


How can I ever believe what I have been told about their death when not one single piece of information we have received has been the truth?


These were my children.  They deserve better than what they have gotten.  Brian's may have been a suicide but to accept this without an explanation, a motive and a believable truth is to diminish Kara and Paxton's lives entirely like they just weren't worth the trouble.


We owe it to all of them to get the truth.  They do not deserve to die and have nobody care "why" enough to even investigate it.  All of the reasons that someone walks in and does this; all of the scenarios that he gave me are absolutely NOT the case here.  According to what the Sergeant himself stated: There was no alcohol in the house.  There was no evidence of a single thing disturbed in the home.  They had bathed, put on pajamas, put the baby to bed, cut off lights, closed the blinds and "all" gone to bed.  According to their investigator "all" of them had gone to bed and it appeared everyone had gone to sleep. How did this not raise a red flag?


No answer.


Why if everything appeared normal was this just accepted at face value as being a domestic murder/suicide?  How if nothing fit the normal expected scenario and you walk in and there are five prescription drugs in the house did someone not assume drug interaction or drug side effects could have contributed to this and do a simple toxicology screen to find out?  Why when the  police on the scene said they had never had a “domestic call” to that house ever and they walk in and see a custom-made baby gate to keep the baby safe on the stairs, toys and a  child's room lovingly decorated, hundreds of children's books and movies, hot wheels cars, a clean and organized home, fifteen different translations of the bible, various bible study guides and books on religion on the book case, family portraits lining the walls and by all accounts no evidence of anything but a loving and happy little family.  Why was this not a red flag that something about this scene was amiss?  Why if they could explain away a suicide did “murder” not require a full investigation?  Why did Kara and Paxton's life not mean more to them than that?  They didn’t even bother to check their phones for texts or emails indicating a spat, infidelity, threats?  No one even cared enough to give us the correct date of death.  No one cared.  Period.


We care.  It is important to us.  The truth, a motive, something that makes sense - matters to us --because they mattered to us.  They always will. 


I love and miss them every one every single day.  And I believe with all my heart they deserve better than this - all of them.

What exactly --could be worse?

I had a very full day today.  I actually went in to work again and I definitely can see the benefits to getting your life back to some small semblance of normalcy.  Afterward I went to the hospital to see my sister.  She had a rough weekend with the dreaded "fever" 103!  She was better today thank God.  So I just visited a little while, picked up her dirty clothes and ran home to wash and dry them so that I could send them back clean with her husband when he got in.


I finally got a therapist to return my call.  She actually tried to talk me into going to someone else because she didn't have an opening until next Monday and she did not think I should put it off.  It has been six weeks and she is the first one that has returned my call - I'll take whatever she has open.  So I have an appointment next Monday afternoon.


The Sergeant at the Sheriff's office emailed me that the autopsy was back and that he wanted to see me so that he could discuss in further detail "all" of my concerns.  He said Tuesday was the only day that he had any time available so I had planned to go back and meet with him again tomorrow but he has never responded to my email asking what time.  So much for that... 


I'm quite sure it will be another wasted trip anyway where he assures me that he did everything he was supposed to and that we would never know the answers to all the whys but that it absolutely was a murder suicide and thank you for coming.  We are done here.


Wasted trip or not, I will go because I will do whatever I can do to get any closer to the truth. I remember after that first week when we were all going crazy trying to make sense of all this - my son in law asked me to please stop searching for answers.  He was afraid the answers that I might find may just make it worse.  How?  What could they possibly tell me that would be worse than this? 


What could be worse than them saying my son killed his beautiful 29 year old wife and their precious baby boy and then himself?  What could be worse than everyone in the free world thinking that my son is a murderer?  What could be worse than my knowing how very much he adored them and was absolutely not consciously capable of this and yet "this" is the official determination that we all have to live with?  What could be worse than not knowing what to say when someone says "Oh my God, what happened?"  Or in the case where they already know --"What was wrong? What was going on in his life?  He must have had a lot on his mind.  Had he lost his job?  Was his wife leaving him?  Was he depressed?"  And I always wonder if they actually believe any of these reasons would justify "this"? 


What could be worse than living in a small town and knowing everywhere I go people "know" and are pointing and staring at me until I am uncomfortable even going out in public in a town that I have lived in over 20 years?  What could be worse than having the people that have been my friends, my co-workers, my church family and my neighbors for many years - actually avoid me now because they do not know how to act, what to say or how to be with me anymore? 


What could be worse than having the coroner be so judgmental and have such a negative opinion about my son that she is rude and downright cruel when she talks to me about the death of my child because clearly she thinks that he "deserved" to die?  And I guess by virtue of our being blood relatives that we all deserved to have lost our family and do not deserve any compassion or respect. 


What could be worse than knowing that my son, up until that day, a loving and dedicated husband and father - was not even placed with his family in death but in separate states to be separated for all eternity from the wife and child he adored?  What could be worse than knowing we, as his family, were not to be a part of the Memorial Service for the daughter-in-law we all loved and the baby I had loved and nurtured since his birth?   


I would stake my life on the fact that my son did not consciously do this but I absolutely know that we, did not and yet we have all been punished as if we are all guilty of this horrific tragedy.  So, really, what could be worse than this?