The Day My World Ended

I've never talked about this, nor have I ever written about it, either. The day my world ended was November 27, 1979. It should have been a "happy" day, Mary had just given birth to our second child, Amy Lynn Martin, but it was far too early, and Amy died. I didn't know what to do, I hadn't been prepared for anything like this to happen. The only thing I knew to do was to be the "Man," to take care of business. I thought I was doing pretty good, until a nurse approached me and asked, "What do you want to do with the remains?"
I knew I needed help, so I took my dilemma to the Navy. Fortunately, the Navy would take care of "collecting the remains," and transporting them back to Vacaville for interrment in Mary's family's plot. I put the wheels in motion, and things got done in a prompt and orderly fashion. It wasn't quite that easy, as is the case of reporting anything in the Navy. I was having trouble getting over the denial stage, but I must have had to tell the same story to fifteen different people. fifteen different times.
I was going back to the office, to collect my leave papers, and clean-up my desk, when I was approached by a woman, a civilian programmer in our office, who had recently lost her husband of 20+ years. "I know exactly how you feel." She stated simply. She didn't realize she was going to jump-start the Anger-stage. I know she meant well, but she had no more idea of how I felt than I did, and I was really confused. Unfortunately, for her, I let her have it. I dumped a load on this woman, asking how losing a husband and losing a child were, in any way, similar, and how dare she presume to know anything about how I felt. It was ugly. In time, I appologized to her, but we never became friends, or anything.
I still cannot put my finger on what I was feeling. Probably because I was drinking pretty heavily, trying to stave off the grief. I wrecked a car, drunk, and got taken in by a guy I knew. When I told him about Amy, and broke down crying on his desk, he took me home, and filed no charges. I got sued by the guy who's truck I hit, but was advised by my attorney to stall until I could get transferred, as Louisiana civil-law is only binding within state boundaries. The guy's lawyer, somehow, found out I was in San Diego, and called me on the ship. I told him, yes, I understood I had a civil judgement against me in Louisiana, but I also understood it wasn't valid in California, and to never call me again. The lawyer wasn't happy, but he knew a lost cause when he saw one.
Losing Amy was a convenient exuse for me to drink. It was a subject non grata at home, and one of the last few planks in the fence we'd built between us. At the start of 1980, Mary became obssessed with having another child, but by that time, physical relations were about our only form of communication with each other. When Cory was born, 355 days after Amy, I was relieved, another loss would have killed me. The entire pregnancy was text-book, and proceeded right along, but I was scared, the whole time, and drank to make the scary stuff go away. It didn't (Duh!).
When I finally drank my way into the Navy Alcohol Rehabilitation Center, in 1984, I dealt with a lot of issues, primarily in my relationships with people, Amy came up, and was successfully deflected. I got sober, started talking to Mary again, created new and better relationships with my kids (Jacki being born about six-months prior to ARC), and took responsibility for my alcoholism. Amy was still one of those "nagging, unfinished" issues in my life, but it was burried pretty deep.
From '84 to '89, I would, on occassion, think about Amy, and get that uneasy feeling that something had been left undone. While on deployment to Misawa, Japan, I got a letter from home, containing a picture wrapped up in a piece of stationery, upon which were warnings written to prepare myself for the picture. The photo was of Amy's permanent marker in the cemetary. That was it! That's what was left undone. Ten years worth of grief welled up in a day, my co-workers wondering if I'd lost my mind. But it was over.
All that remained, until now, was to write about it.