Ten Things I’ve Learned Since My Son Died

Keven David Legere

December 7, 1990 - August 11, 2020

Hello Readers,

Thank you for taking the time to read my musings  -  it's been quite a while since I’ve written anything but I hope to be more consistent in the future.

August 11th marked four years since losing my son, Keven, to suicide. I’ve been pondering what I’ve learned and how different my life is now. There’ve been a lot of changes, and some positive. Here’s the top ten things that I’ve learned:

1. The pain of losing a child can be physical. That first year, in addition to the emotional pain, I had an ache in my heart that was a constant reminder that he was gone. Some days the ache filled my whole body. 

2. My number one “healing tool” is helping others. I’ve written a couple of books, been on many podcasts, do volunteer work and a little speaking plus I am available to anyone who needs emotional support after losing a loved one to suicide or overdose. I feel like this has been my calling all my life, but not until I lost my boy was I equipped to take action.

3. I love talking about my son. It's my number one favorite pastime. My number two favorite pastime is listening to others talk about my son!

4. No one can possibly understand what it's like to lose a child unless they’ve also experienced it. They can try to imagine how traumatic it would be, but it doesn’t come close to how it shatters your entire existence. The experts are correct when they claim it's the hardest type of loss to endure.

5. Many people will say things that are hurtful, anger provoking or bizarre - they mean well. Our society is so uncomfortable around death that we say things without thinking or avoid the griever altogether (this is what inspired me to write “Talk to Me I’m Grieving”.)

6. The worst thing that could ever happen to me has already happened, so whatever happens from here on out, I can handle it. 

7. Similar to above, my worst fear has passed, the amount of stress and worry in my life has lessened a lot.

8. I can be 100% truthful when I say I don’t care what people think of me (ok, 99 %!) because so many things that used to concern me seem trivial compared to losing Keven.

9. The first three months after losing a child (for me) was almost unbearable. Every action took all my strength. Going out into the world to run an errand was traumatic because for some reason I thought the rest of the world should be mourning the loss of my precious son - my world was gray and theirs was still in color. It sounds ridiculous now, but it seemed like everyone needed to be aware of my loss and understand that my world was so different from theirs.

10. It’s okay to enjoy life. It's not always easy but I firmly believe that Keven not only wants me to enjoy what’s left of my life, but he’s also proud of me for my accomplishment and pleased to see that I am getting out there and doing things vs. being depressed that he’s gone. Some days are good - some days not so much. But as the years pass I am having more good days than bad. 

Thank you for taking the time to read this! I know we're all inundated with things to read these days so if you stopped and read this, I deeply appreciate it.

Let me know if there is anything related to grief, substance use disorder, writing a book, life in prison or mental health that you would like me to write about!