It has been nearly 12 years since she died. I have been terrified to watch the home videos we made of her, scared that after watching them I might not be able to function; That the sheer memory of her short life would render me lifeless. I had almost entirely forgotten what it looked like to see her move or to see her smile. My therapist told me, “You’ve never grieved her death properly.” My ex-wife told me, “I don’t think you’ve grieved her death at all.” Maybe there was some truth in this. What I am is a “doer.” After her death, I simply “did.” I created a foundation for her. I worked. I wrote songs and put out albums. I did things. Lots of things. I thought this was grieving… Wasn’t this grieving?

Every morning for months (maybe years), I’ve woken up scared. The anxiety has become unbearable in recent months – the distraction of “doing” isn’t working anymore. My doctor recommended an anti-anxiety medication, and I’d tried that sort of thing before. The drugs render me barely functional and apathetic, though I definitely don’t feel anxious anymore. Alcohol is increasingly ineffective – though as a fix for anxiety, alcohol is sort of like trying to cure cancer by giving yourself more cancer; Alcohol is a kick in the stomach so you don’t feel the pain in your heart. Death some days seems like an alternative, but who would be a father to my beautiful son. Thank God for my beautiful, healthy son. And so I suffer, daily, quietly, and without answers. “Maybe,” I thought, “It’s time to watch the videos of my daughter and let me feel something. At least it won’t be fear.”

And so, on an ordinary Wednesday night in an ordinary January I pulled out the old 8mm video cassettes along with the silver video camera I had used to film her. I drummed up a never used blue A/V cord and wired it to my TV. Popping in the first tape I sat back on bed and began to weep. It was the first time I’d seen her move in over a decade. All of the wires connected to her, the tube in her nose so she could be fed, the wound in her chest where they had operated on her heart. I cried a deep belly sob that had never emerged from me… and I sobbed, and I sobbed, and I sobbed. “My baby… my baby… my baby…”

The next morning I woke up and I felt better. Strangely no anxiety, and though I don’t think this feeling will last forever – you see, we grieving parents will always be a little broken from missing our kids – perhaps this can be the start to living a life that is less fearful and more joyful.