3 posts tagged “mental”

I have had quite a few blog post topics circulating in my mind, but have not found the time nor the mental clarity to write them. I intend to publicize versions of my Design To Inspire banner creations to share with the Vox community for use with personalized Vox themes. I also want to discuss quite a few things that have been occurring in my life as of late, some of which were hinted at in my recent Tweets. I hope I find enough peace of mind to successfully formulate my ideas to a degree that would allow me to coherently transmit my thoughts and feelings to text. Maybe I will begin with my custom banners as that post will require the least amount of writing.

First and foremost, I should state in advance that I mean to pun by the title of this post. I do not handle the death of anyone very well. I have expressed how my mother's death has effected me in previous posts and very recently wrote about my strongest thoughts about Heath Ledger's death. I apologize for the recent "death" theme occurring in my blog entries, especially as a major topic that brings me out of my blogging absence, but the most negative experiences and perspectives of my life tend to have the most impact on my writing.

I just learned several hours ago from my sister that a girl she used to work with was hit by a bus and died. My sister believes the girl, Audrey, was killed instantly (hopefully she did not experience any pain and terror). She and her mother, as I've been told, were walking across the street late at night. It was dark and the street was poorly lit. The bus came upon her very fast. I guess Audrey either didn't see or hear it coming, or didn't have time to react. Poor girl! And poor mother!

Audrey was about my sister's age (mid twenties). She, like my sister, was mentally handicapped, and going through a lot of stress in her life. She was very good friends with one of my sister's good friends and co-workers, who was to call my sister with the fateful news. The two girls (not my sister, for clarification) went to the same school for mentally and physically handicapped children, so they were friends before they started working together. Audrey held a job at my sister's workplace for a couple years, but had to leave due to stress and to care for her mother. Audrey and my sister weren't very close, but kept tabs on each other through their mutual friend.

A few years ago Audrey's father passed away from a fatal disease that my sister believes was cancer. Not long after her father died, TWO of Audrey's sisters died of unrelated causes (one from lung cancer and another from undetermined causes during sleep). Audrey and her only surviving sister did not handle this vast amount of loss well, but their mother handled it even worse. Audrey eventually left her job. Fast forward a couple years, and now Audrey's tragic life is cut short by a terrifying accident. Her mother is now being hospitalized for a nervous breakdown. Audrey's family has been through so much -- too much! Her mother has lost a husband and three daughters in less than a decade (possibly less than five years). Her mother has only one daughter left. I hope and pray that her mother recovers and that her last surviving daughter will remain by her side through all of this. I also hope Audrey's mother recovers for the sake of her living daughter. They need to be there for each other.

I can't stop crying over Audrey and her poor family. I did not select "hit" for this entry's title as a pun to the nature of this poor girl's accident, despite how well suited the word was. I truly could not find a better phrase to describe how this has effected me. I keep imagining the possible scenario of the bus accident, the ambulance and police cars at the scene, her distraught mother screaming over the mangled, lifeless body of her daughter, and the silhouette of the mother in a hospital bed staring blankly off into space with her living daughter caressing her hand, trying to coax her mother back into reality while tears stream down her cheeks.

I know I shouldn't think this way. I have an over active imagination. When something effects me very deeply I tend to visualize the perspectives and experiences of others to bring substance and depth to the issue. My mind is still reeling with this news.

Oh God, the mother witnessed the accident firsthand! I want to embrace this woman tightly in my arms and tell her everything will eventually be all right. I want to comfort her and her daughter, and let them know they are not alone, even though I have never met them and that they have probably never even heard tell of me. While I know death is a part of nature and life I can't help but sometimes wish that no one ever had to die.