It feels impossible that you’ve been gone for EIGHTEEN YEARS. New mommas look at their babies when they turn 3 months and can’t take it. From the day you were born to each tiny milestone you made, I felt like you were growing up so fast already. To think 18 years have passed is not right.
I can close my eyes and feel how scared I felt when HE answered the phone and said you hadn’t woken up yet.
I can remember running out of school frantic to get home.
I can feel my hands shaking as I tried to dial your Dad’s phone number once I got to the house and realized the ambulance took you.
I can remember walking into the waiting room of the ER. I was terrified but knew they would fix whatever was wrong.
I can feel the energy from the nurse who sat me down and told me she didn’t know anything and would take me to you. It didn’t feel right.
I can see you laying on the hospital bed with the nurses and doctors with you. I started to not be able to breathe.
I can remember the doctor standing there. Time was frozen.
I can remember the shock that took over. In that moment, it didn’t feel real. It felt like a lie. You were coming back. You had to.
I remember the weight of your head in my arms as I held you.
I remember twirling your widow’s peak around my finger.
I remember the split second of hope I felt when you made a sound. It was quickly obliterated when the nurse explained.
I remember how my feet felt like cement bricks when they told me I needed to say goodbye and leave. I wish I never did.
Then it was all just a swirling nightmare. The disbelief, grief, numbness, fog, despair, and confusion came. In the following days fury, self-hate, and hopelessness followed.
If those moments were an eternity without you, what is this last 18 years?
Time doesn’t heal this. I won’t move on from you. I haven’t found something to fill the void. I’ve just learned to do the best I can each new day. I was so angry with the world. I didn’t understand why this was happening to us. You were perfect.
What you have given me in these last 18 years is strength. I look to you when things are hard, and I tell myself that I can do anything because I try so hard to live a life that you would be proud of. A life that I will try to push through because I know that you weren’t given an opportunity to fight when HE stole your life.
You keep letting me know you’re there. When you come up in conversation, I feel like you’re by my side. I am forever grateful that after nearly two decades, you are close by. Writing to you and filling your website with your memory helps release some of the pressure of the grief and pain I feel. This is your story and I hope that this is a place that your sister and your brother can look back on to remember your impact.
I have a story to add, that makes me feel so proud of you and thankful for the good people in our lives. First an explanation.
Detective Kolcharno, as a dear friend would say, is a good egg. We met in the worst days of my life, as he worked in the Special Victims Unit in the county that Zachary’s crime was committed. He was on Zachary’s investigation. Being thurst into this nightmare, I didn’t even realize who all these people were who were coming into my life and just how lucky I would be to have them all in my corner since then. I am almost certain that every single time I see Detective Kolcharno and we get talking, the conversation goes like this:
Happy to see him, catching up chit chat.
Sadness, crying, sadness. (that’s me)
Reassurance, empathy, kindness. (that’s him)
Gratefulness. Weight lifted off my shoulders. (that’s me again)
Det. Kolcharno and his colleagues, were recently tasked with creating a new class for the National Criminal Justice Training Center for Conducting Unexplained Child Death. They want to cover a section on how non-offending caregivers were impacted by the investigation. I was honored to be one of the people he reached out to, to ask if I would share my voice regarding my initial perception of law enforcement and how it changed throughout the process. Sharing your story and my experience will help others understand the deep impact of this crime and how crucial the law enforcements’ actions, words and support are. How I faced the days ahead of me, being thrown into the criminal process, was heavily shaped by everyone who was there to support me. The ADA, my grief counselor, all of law enforcement, the people who greeted me when I called, the doctors the nurses, they all mattered. So, thank you Det. Kolcharno for still being a pillar for me. Thank you for continuing to share Zachary’s story to everyone who will listen and more importantly to anyone who can take something away from him to better understand their role in the worst moments of someone’s life.
I hope this next year continues to have opportunities to tell your story, share your legacy, and help shed light on the silent epidemic of child abuse.
I love you, Little Man.
Love your Momma Bear