It has been a long time since I came here, and for that I apologize.  Life has been really tough.  We lost Jess on February 13, 2019 around 1am.  It was a long hard fight, and he is finally at peace.  He was able to say goodbye to just about everyone he cared about.  He was able to make amends and right wrongs he felt he had done throughout his life with all but one person, and that person he attempted, so it is on them now. 

Jess had everything he wanted for his funeral.  He pretty much planned it.  We had the music he wanted, pictures he wanted, he liked the obituary I wrote.  He had his Patriot Riders escort him to the cemetery and he was surrounded by the people that meant the most to him.   In all honesty, the last almost 9 months have been a fog.  The kids and I have been moving on with life, but in a different way.  I cannot speak for them, but I have been in a fog.  Have done as little as possible.  Threw myself into the Paparazzi Jewelry I started selling shortly after his passing, to help with income and keep me busy.  I was able to go through some of his things without any problems, and yet other things I cannot even touch.  And everywhere there are memories.  This house is Jess.  I'm sitting writing this in the chair that I bought for him.  His pug, Sophie is laying in the chair across from me looking so lost, as she has every day since he left us.    She is only 4 but her muzzle went gray after he died.... 

Jess has shown each of us signs that he is still with us.  Whether everyone takes those signs to heart, I do not know.  I got in the car one day and literally the station on the radio played 3 songs of ours in a row.  I hear his voice in my head and as  I'm laying down at night I have conversations with him.  Some might believe that this is just my mind wanting to have these, and not reality, but in my heart I feel like he is reaching out for me.  

I will admit to being angry at some of the problems he left me alone to face.  I am angry with the fact that I am a single mom now and at least one of the kids plays the "Dad would have let me...." or "I wish it was you, not Dad."... and it hurts. It cuts deep.    We were supposed to grow old together.  I have emails from when we were first talking that detail us sitting on our front porch, drinking coffee and discussing life and this will never happen.  I will admit to being angry with God for taking him.  But I'm also grateful to God that he gave Jess months longer than the doctors said he would have.  Those months were filled with stress, but with love.  Caring for him while he was sick was the hardest job I have ever had and at times the most frustrating.  You just want to take the pain away, and make him eat, and cure him...but you can't.  The helplessness is overwhelming at times.    As much as I didn't want him to leave us, I didn't want him suffering anymore.

There are so many things in my head and my heart I want to write about.  What it is like after 22 years being with someone to suddently not have them around.    Then having my Mom pass away August 5 of this year on top of that.  The two people who I spent the majority of my life with.  It was always Mom and I growing up, except for about 3 years I was on my own and then Jess came along.    I don't like being alone.  I dont need someone to take care of me.  I need the companionship.  Jess was happy when he was alone. He was always in his "bubble" as he called it, and now having learned more about his past, I understand that more than I did while he was alive.  But me, I hate being alone all the time.  My kids are all older and while they "need me", they don't. If something happened to me they would all be okay. They would survive.  So there is nobody that truly "needs me to survive " anymore....  My purpose. My identity has disappeared. I am not Jess' wife, or the kids' mom anymore.   Claudia is back, but I am not quite sure who Claudia is.  Other than a mass of anxiety and panic and fighting through it every single minute of every day. I have to push myself to get some things done.  I regret not doing things while Jess was alive that would have made life now easier, but hindsight is 20/20 and you can't change the past.

I know Jess would want me to be happy.  He told me as much.  I feel like I know him better now than I did when he was here with me.  The walls people build and the things some of us don't let others in to see, even those closest to us, matter.   My advice to anyone reading this is to treasure every day with your loved ones, and don't let those walls get so high that it affects your relationships.  Let the walls slowly crumble as you get to know one another, and even if its tough, tell the ones most important to you about the things that you hold closest to your heart.  Make sure you tell people how you feel about them.  And don't stress the people that vacate your life.  They weren't there for the right reasons, and you do not need them. You may miss what "you thought you had" but in reality, you didn't have that, if they are disappear so easily. 

It is okay to have a small circle of friends.  And it is okay to be sad, and heartbroken and empty.  I am at that point right now.  The fog has lifted off of me and the new reality is settling in and this next week I have what would have been mom's 91st birthday on the 4th and Jess' on the 6th. The 7th is 19 years since I lost the baby that would have been between Jessica and Mike.....  Its going to be a really hard week.  And one in which I'm not going to act like I'm okay in...because I have to get the feelings I've really tried to keep somewhat buried out.    I miss Mom.  I miss Jess even more.  He was my other half.  He was an ass in many ways while he was alive, but he was my ass, and deep down I knew he loved me..and he made sure I knew once he was sick.   Please, dont let it be illness that gets you to tell those you love how you feel.

Day by day.  Hour by hour. Sometimes minute by minute.   I honestly don't know how people do it who lost a loved one by accident and didn't have the time to say goodbye.  I used to think that would be easier, but now, months later, I treasure the last year I had with Jess... I hated the decline in his health and the frailty and the devastation cancer causes, but the conversations, and the love.....  I am grateful for.

I miss them. I'm a widow now and technically an orphan too as both my parents are gone.  And it sucks.  It sucks really badly.