Eight Months

It is almost eight months since the dreadful day when the apple of my eye, my Shahdi, took her last breath and left us with an incurable wound in the land of the living, but in the most feared and detested area: the parents' hell. The events between November 26 when I found Shahdi's lifeless body, and November 30th, when Shahdi moved to her final resting place, sadly, a cemetery, are kind of blurry in my mind. I remember I was trying to function as normally as possible under the enormous weight of grief, while visiting with our guests and the steady stream of people who stopped by throughout the following days to offer their condolences and bring us love, support, crying shoulders, flowers, and food. Our Arman arrived on November 27 and took over the management of the household and food preparation for all the guests while he was here for six weeks after the passing of his sister. I don't know what we would have done without his help. He is a wonderful son and we are so fortunate to have him. May he live a long and happy life. May we not live long enough to ever see him in harm's way. May he be spared from enduring any more distress in his life.

 I witnessed so many surreal events in those few days that I still find it remarkable I did not lose my mind by the extent of pain and agony. Seeing the paramedics administering CPR to Shahdi for an hour to no avail; watching Shahdi being put in a vinyl body bag, zipped up, and placed on a gurney to be moved to the morgue; seeing my beautiful daughter for the last time as she was lying in her white coffin with a red rose in her black hair and red lipstick on her well-formed lips; seeing the coffin's lid lowered after I bestowed one last desperate kiss and hug on my departed child; and then the worst part - seeing the ground open up and swallow our Shahdi as her coffin was lowered deep underground, out of sight for eternity.  I remember on the day of her burial, I simply could not wrap my head around my daughter being buried in a cemetery. I was worried about her being alone. I wondered if she would get scared there on the first night buried in a box underground in a cemetery.  If I were allowed to, I would have loved to spend that night with her, lying down by her side, next to her grave, to keep her company.  It was most difficult for me to leave my child alone in the cold in a huge cemetery. My only consolation was that she was near her friend, and I knew that she was quite familiar with that corner of the cemetery due to her frequent visits to Lauren over the past six years.

Even though almost eight months have passed, but I still get angry at the world whenever I visit Shahdi. I get mad that I am standing above ground, but my gorgeous 19-year-old child is buried beneath me. That is not fair. It still makes me angry that such injustice exists in this world. I have never been angry at Shahdi for her action. If anything, I have been angry at us for failing to get her the kind of help she needed. I am mad at us, her doctor, the universe and life in general, but never at my poor daughter. When I talk to her in my mind, I always ask for her forgiveness because as her mother, I failed to save her, to offer her a solution, to help her get over her emotional issues. I should have been more proactive and intervened more. There is a fine line between offering an adolescent independence and privacy, and failing to offer help and guidance when necessary. As parents, we have certain obligations and insights. Sometimes it is best to follow your natural instincts as a parent, at the cost of the child's independence and privacy, and intervene at the right time even when faced by rejection and opposition, in order to avoid undesirable outcomes like ours. Timing is crucial when dealing with adolescents, and one should never expect them to overcome their issues on their own with little intervention from their parents. The parents know their children better than anybody and should be directly involved in any treatment course the doctors prescribe. Mental health is a relatively new field and the professionals in this field have a long way to go before developing effective treatments for many mental health issues. There is still a lot to be learned about the human brain and how chemical imbalances in the body can affect the brain.  It is too late for Shahdi but I hope there is soon a breakthrough in finding the physiological causes of depression, anxiety, and other mental health issues, and finding ways to treat them.