Reply #16: Thank you so very much, and what you said is so healing for me.

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When it happened, there were some people who said, "What kind of mother are you to let such a thing happen?"

You can imagine what that did to me. Guilt on top of grief. The cruelty....

It took me years to realize that what they did was quickly go through in their heads just what you said.... that it would be horrifying to have it happen to you, and they couldn't allow themselves to consider that, so they turned it on me.

Years later, during Columbine, when I was hearing the same things being said about the parents of the shooters, it really got to me, and I was having flashbacks. I finally called the hotline number and said I didn't know anyone involved and wasn't connected in any way, but it was affecting me, and she assured me that it was OK to call, and that I wasn't the only one. As I unburdened myself to her, she let me know that she understood and empathized. I said that what I had learned was that these people were being cruel to the parents, because they couldn't bear to consider that THEY could be parents of shooters, and lose them in that way. She agreed completely. The pastor who ministered to the families and buried one of the shooters was run out of town for having show compassion to these parents.

That is the kind of cruelty that so many of us have experienced after a loss of our children, and this is also what we must do better... we MUST learn how to deal with our own feelings, rather than project them in such cruel ways, and we MUST learn how to listen and care... even when we think someone has been to blame.

I know that very few people are even remotely close to being able to deal in that way, but that is the ONLY way we are going to be able to come close to any sort of PEACE.

Thank you for understanding, and reaching so kindly. Given what DU has become, I was NOT comfortable before with talking about this... as you can see, I don't need more of the vitriol that DU has become well-known for. But if speaking of this shows even one person what we need to do to make this country more hospitiable for mothers and children, then the risk was worth it.

Thank you... I appreciate your kindness more than you know. :hug: