Becoming a Detective

When Donovan passed away, we as a family got so caught up in every detail leading up to him getting on that motorcycle and all the way to when he was found after the accident.  He was the only one at the scene of his accident and he was no longer here to provide us with answers, so we were left with the task of trying to figure everything out, or so we thought.

What we didn’t realize is that we were trying to find answers that didn’t exist.  What we really wanted to know was why did this happen to us?  We thought we could find the answer to this unspoken question by dissecting the last hours, minutes and seconds of his life. 

We would sit around my kitchen table comparing notes and timelines as if we were detectives attempting to solve a crime.  Sharon and I meet people in this same situation and we immediately recognize it for what it is, a welcome distraction from the pain.  If you’re busy pouring over every single detail of your loved one’s last hours you don’t have time to allow the painful feelings to take ahold of you.

You can try to keep the feelings at bay by staying in detective mode and trying to intellectualize your feelings.  But this cannot be done because grief doesn’t happen in your brain, it happens in your heart.  Unless a real crime has been committed the details don’t matter because they will not change the fact that your loved one is gone.

This fact will not change no matter how much you find out.  The pain is not going to go away so the sooner you allow your heart to start processing the feelings the better off you will be. There is never a reassuring answer for why him?  Or why us? All there is, is a need for healing.