The worst day of my life is when I lost my dad, Al. The second worst day of my life was when I lost my husband, Jeremy. 

My father and my husband passed away 2 months and 2 days apart; Daddy's Angel Date 02/07/2019; Jeremy's Angel Date 04/09/2019, and I felt, for a while, like I had completely forgotten about dad. However, one day from out of nowhere, I heard my dad say, "You haven't forgotten to grieve me. I stepped back when you lost your husband. You will eventually be able to properly grieve me". He was right. Since Momma Beth passed away, I've learned how to tell who I'm grieving over. To me, it's a feeling I get. 

Don't thinks me crazy here (hahaha), but when I'm grieving over my dad, I get flooded with things that remind me of my dad. The feeling I have is, it's like I can feel a paternal presence. I guess you could say it another way, but I don't know how to. I just know that I feel like dad is standing beside me when I am grieving him. I feel his paternal love and protection. 

When I grieve Jeremy, I feel his spousal presence. I get flooded by memories of our relationship, and I find myself crying when I was fine 5 minutes before, and have been all day long. 

When I lived on the streets for 11 months, I would tell them my story, and someone always asked, "How are you not in the fetal position and crying your life away?" 

My response was, "I have my husband on my left side, he's my pilot. My dad is on my right side, he's my copilot. The Good Lord is guiding me up front, and Jesus Christ has always got my back. I love those 4 "men" very much, and they are my pillars of strength". 

In June of 2020, I left the state of Texas, and went to work in Alabama. I was only gone for 4 months, but during that time, I stopped "speaking in metaphors". I don't know what else to call it. I just know that when I lived on the streets, I was always talking about things in a way that wouldn't offend anyone. I'd never been homeless before, and I vowed not to be on the streets very long. But, during the time I was, I did my best not make anyone mad at me because I just didn't need people trying to beat on me or do worse because I said something to make them upset so, I told people that I was "speaking in metaphors". It kinda made me look Looney tunes, but very few people had any personal problems with me. Kinda made it easier to deal with that period of time when I was homeless. Y'all should have heard what I would tell my elementary school aged nieces. Because they're 4 not quite 5 when Uncle Jeremy passed, I told my nieces that I lived out under the stars. I still have a hard time saying, "Jeremy is dead". When I speak of my husband, I say, "Jeremy passed away". I will probably always say it this way. Yes, I'm aware of the fact that not saying, "Jeremy is dead", means that I have a problem with the finality of his life. I see it as it being what I'm comfortable with saying. 

I don't know how everyone else does things, but I also don't say, "May God Bless his soul", "May she rest in peace". I've never been around anyone who lost their loved one and said one or the other of those things. I'm not accustomed to doing these things. I hope I'm not being rude when I don't say any of those things before or after I speak about someone I have lost.

If you have taken the time to look at my profile, you are aware of the fact that I lost several people quite rapidly. My dad, my husband, my nephew, my aunt, my ex, and my sister. Deann was someone I met in the 16 years I was with Jeremy. One day, I called her, "mom". She said, "Uh, no ma'am. Not from you. I'll be your big sister but I'm not old enough to be your mother". So, I looked at her like she was my big sister. My nephew wasn't blood relation. His sister, Brandy and I were best friends, and I looked at her little brother, Keith as my nephew. Probably because he was 16 years younger than Brandy and i and her brother so, he "became" my nephew. 

Brandy's mom, Terry and Brandy's stepdad, Brian are the first people that my biological sister and I "adopted" as family. It messed with our mom for a long time because she felt we were replacing hers and dad's siblings. Helen, my sister told her that we weren't replacing them. We were just using stand-ins. It wasn't until mom met Terry and Brian that she was capable of accepting them.