My Way of Grieving

A few weeks ago I lost my cousin to suicide. I have to say, I haven’t had much contact with him due to distance and him being in prison. He remembered me from when I was younger but I don’t have any real memories of him. He was death row, but everything became stalled sometime last April. I wrote a letter to him pretty much to say hello and goodbye at the same time. When everything got put on hold, there was a rumor that they had found something new that could possibly get him out. I guess I got my hopes up a little to high.

He had wanted that part of his life to be over. He was tired of having to see his family go in to the prison to see him. He was afraid something would happen to them. He was ready to go, and I thought I would be too when the time came, but I wasn’t. Maybe if he had waited for lethal injection I would have been more at peace with his passing, but he couldn’t hang on any longer.

How do you miss someone that you only have pictures and 2 letters from? He remembered me and he loved all of us. He was kinda mad at himself for not being able to be there for all of us when my dad passed. I guess I found someone who missed my dad as much as I do and I wasn’t ready to let that go.

You may be wondering why I should care about a man who committed crimes that landed him on death row. Now I’m not saying he was a saint, but I believe that the crime he was charged and convicted with was not him. I could be wrong. I will never know. All I know is I miss him more than I thought I would. He said that even though he was not guilty of these crimes, he was paying for ones he did not get charged with. At least that is what I have been told.

This isn’t like loosing someone I have ever lost before. Yes, I’m sad. I miss him even though I hadn’t seen him in I don’t know how many years. It is really hard to explain how I am feeling because it is totally new and a different type of grief than I have ever had. With his passing my anxiety and depression have gone up a little. I gues just because of the unknown.

He thought this was the best way of protecting his family. Maybe it was. I don’t really know. I do know that I would have gone over there, how many states away, and said goodbye to him faceto face like I wish I could have. But this was not written in the stars.

I know he is at peace with himself and I know he is where he wants to be. Hopefully its up above with my dad and all of his family he hasn’t seen in many years. Either way it doesn’t help much with the pain. I feel as I should be used to it by now. I have lost so many people I was closer to, but the sting of the loss is always there. Fly high cousin,

Please do not judge him because of where he was at. (Death Row) He was a kind good hearted person that made some really wrong decisions. He was my family and loved by us so much. Remember he had kids, an ex-wife who still was there for him, and all of his family. He was a person with feelings that count. He just decided not to wait on the state to kill him.



Nicole