 The Grief I was going through was all very new to me. I didn't know if some of the things I was feeling was normal or if I was losing my mind. I moved around the house in a trance most of the time. I knew I had to keep busy in order to make it through this life. I completely redecorated John's room in his favorite colors. I painted his room and purchased new a bedspread and matching accessories. I felt closer to him when I was doing things for him. So I continued doing things for him. I visited the cemetery daily. No artificial flowers for my son's grave! However, when I was there and would talk to him, I didn't feel like was there. I felt his presence more in my home. He was everywhere there. I dreamed different dreams about him every night. One night I dreamed I was looking for John everywhere. I was walking the cobblestone streets looking all day. I couldn't find him. Then just as I was about to give up, I went to sit down because my feet were hurting. I sat down on a bench in the courthouse, but in the large hallway of the courthouse there was a classroom in session. There he was! He was about to give a speech. He gave the most intelligent speech I'd ever heard him give. I was so proud of him. He came over to me, but he wouldn't hug my neck. I was surprised, because he always hugged my neck. I told him what a wonderful speech he gave and that it was time to come home. He told me that he couldn't come home. I told him that this was ridiculous, he had to come home ~ it was time! He looked at me very calmly and said, "Mom, I love you. I miss you, but I can't come home." I went back to work one month after John died. I knew I wasn't ready, because I was still in a dream state. I felt like I was living a nightmare and wouldn't wake up. I couldn't do my job without crying. My friends understood and tried the best they could to be there for me, but they wouldn't sit down to talk to me about John. I needed to do that. I needed to talk about my son. Eventually, my friends began to avoid me. I didn't blame the, because I understood. They just didn't know how to help me. I didn't know how to help myself. I was new at this grief stuff. I didn't know what was normal or abnormal. One day I sat down in the lunch room with some of my friends. They had been talking about their children. The second I sat down to eat my dinner, they stopped talking and began looking very uncomfortable. The table was completely silent. They just didn't know what to say. I started asking about their children. They looked at each other and just mumbled an answer. After a few minutes I started to cry. They all came around the table to me and asked me how they could help. I look at them all and told him that it really hurt me when they stopped talking about their children. I told them I enjoyed hearing about their children and I enjoyed talking about my child. I didn't want him to be ignored just because he was dead. He lived in my life for 20 years, I was proud of him, he did exist. I didn't want people to pretend that he didn't exist just because they were afraid they would make me cry. I told them I certainly had more bad days right now than I had good days, but that eventually I hoped it would change. I would have a way of letting them know when it was not a good day to talk about John. From that day forward, they brought in pictures of their children. Told me little cute stories about them and would listen when I had a cute little story about John. One day, I was looking through my Bible and as I closed it, something fell out. I picked it up and discovered it was a poem I had written when I was 16 years old. I had not thought of it for years. I had a fairly new Bible and just transferred everything from my old one to my new one. So I had the poem for years. As I read it again, after all these years, I couldn't believe what I had written. Was it a premonition? A Baby's Touch The joy in his face, the look of surprise; A happy sigh, a weeping why; A wistful sneer, a solemn cry.
A baby's touch, a Father's groan;
A tiny squeeze, a playful spank; A youthful giggle, a nose that danced;
©Sonya Marvel
I have no idea what make me write this poem so many years ago. Could I have known one day something like this would happen to my only child?
I spoke regularly with a new friend I had made with Victim's Homicide Group. She helped me so much in the coming months not only with the grieving, but also to prepare for the trial of the girl who killed John. I really don't know what I would have done without her guidance and understanding. She pulled me through some pretty tough days.
One thing remained constant in this thing called the grieving process. I was in total denial, shock and disbelief! After all I had lived through since the day John died, I still had it in the back of my mind that John hadn't really died. That any day now he would be walking through that front door or calling me on the phone to tell me he was at Billy's house. About six months after John died, the reality that he was never coming home again came to light. I went into a 5 day hysterical crying binge. I was now alone most days. My husband would come home from work and I would dry the tears as if he couldn't see the swelling and redness of my face.
It was then that I began to plan my own death. It was too hard to live without John. I wanted to be with him. Life was too hard to cope anymore. Nothing could ever hurt me like the pain in my heart for losing my child. I tried to talk normally to everyone including my family. I planned to die just like John did. I had to feel what he felt when he died. My husband had bought me a gun a couple of years ago because he was afraid of me driving home from work late at night. I planned to use that gun and shoot myself in the heart. I was a little scared, but the fear was nothing like the yearning I had to be with my son again. I would lay at wake at night and plan it. One day I sat up on the bed and said that it was time. I got the gun out, but I couldn't pull the trigger. I told myself that it would be easy, don't think about it, just do it. Then something very interesting happened. My mother's face popped up in my mind. I could see her as clearly as if she were standing right in front of me. I could see the pain in her eyes and face, the same pain that I had in my eyes and face when I lost John. I couldn't let her hurt over losing a child, as I had hurt over losing John. I just could not do it to her. I loved her too much to see her suffer anymore than she already had with helping me get through John's death and her losing her first grandchild! I put the gun away and never had those suicidal thoughts again. I called my friend from Victim's Homicide. She recognized the symptoms immediately and sent a psychiatrist to my house in a relatively short amount of time. I began meeting with this person for the next 4 months. I went on medication for depression and had a chance to talk out all of the frustrations of what I was going through. The guilt I felt at not insisting John come home the day we had breakfast together. Guilt is a large factor in the grieving process. If only I had done this or if only I had done that. I still do it.
I still have my good days and my bad days. It's been 11 years since John died now and as I sit here writing this, I have cried a thousand more tears reliving it. There's so much more I can write here and eventually I will add to this. There are emotions we go through that would cripple any sane person. I hope to share every aspect of the grieving process with you because it is so important to let others know we are not crazy. We are not losing our minds. We are going through the normal grieving process and are healthy in mind and in spirit. This is a very important topic. I don't know all of the answers, but I can tell you my experience. My story turned out better than most, but it took both of us working very hard to make our marriage work. When my husband was growing up, he was taught that men don't cry. That has been a great injustice. My husband was very supportive the first couple of months after John died. Dave was a drinker before John died. He became an alcoholic after John died. When parents lose a child, they mourn in different ways. My husband mourned his way, which was with a bottle. Each parent live through regrets and guilt when a child dies. We each felt the same emotions, however, Dave chose to deaden those emotions in a bottle. Eventually he lost his job of 14 years where he made very good money. I was dealing with John's death the best I could. I was sad most of the time and I didn't think I would ever smile again. I became angry and blamed my husband for drowning his sorrows and guilt in a bottle. He blamed me for not paying attention to him. If I was feeling sad at any given moment, Dave was feeling anger. If I was feeling anger, Dave was feeling sad. Parents very seldom have the same feelings at the same time. Therefore you begin to have arguments. You are driven further and further away from each other. After a couple of months, I felt I could not talk to my husband about John and how I felt. If I would mention his name to my husband, I would start crying hysterically. I could talk about John to my parents and to my sisters and brother without getting hysterical. Why couldn't I talk to my husband about John without getting hysterical? This caused a lot of grief in itself with each other. About one year after John died, and I'd gotten through the trial of the girl who killed John, I felt it was time for me to leave my husband of sixteen years. I moved out of the house and divorced him. I moved into my own apartment. In the apartment, where I could be alone and not have to put on an act for anyone, I could finally mourn the loss of my child. I didn't feel I could do this married to my husband. My husband *never* wanted a divorce. He tried every way possible to get our marriage back. I refused to talk to him on the telephone or in person. I had completely wiped him out of my life. We had problems before John died. After the initial shock was over, I felt like I just did not have to put up with unhappiness anymore. I threw myself into working 12-hour work days for a year. If I had two days off in a row, I worked another eight-hour shift. I made extra money ~ money I didn't have time to spend. One day I decided I didn't like apartment life and wanted to purchase my own home. I had never done that before and I had something I had to prove to myself. I could depend on me and nobody else. I took the extra money I had saved and put a down payment on a house. The house became a great project for me. I stopped working overtime because I was exhausted. I began working on the house. I painted inside and out, cleaned, kept the pool in great shape and it looked wonderful and it was all mine. It was something I had done for me for the first time in 18 years. I began dating again. This is also something I hadn't done in 18 years! After losing a child, your confidence level is at an all time low. Throw a divorce on top of that ~ well, let's say it's the pits! John had been gone now for a little over 2 years. I began to feel confidence again. I woke up one morning and was laying in bed looking at the ceiling ~ thinking about John. I decided I was tired of mourning; I was tired of being sad and negative; John would not like for me to live my life in a negative world. It was his way of telling me to "Get a Life" and move on. I still thought of John alot, but from that day forward, I decided to think only positive thoughts. If I had a negative thought, I would turn it around to be something positive. I began to feel happy again for the first time in over 2 years. Oh, I still had my bad days, but now I had a mixture of good days. One day Dave came to the door and said he wanted to talk to me. We had been divorced two years by this time. He asked me to please see a counselor with him. He told me that for over a year, he had stopped drinking. He wanted me back, but he wanted to come to me when he knew he had completely stopped. He wanted to put our lives back together. I was dating four men at the time and I could not believe that I actually agreed to see a counselor with him. That counselor turned out to be our pastor. I still could not talk to my husband about John. It had been over two years and I would cry hysterically when we talked about him. This was the main focus that our pastor worked on. He told us to begin by going out to lunch or dinner. He wanted us to talk about John every single time no matter how much I cried hysterically, but don't stop talking about John until we could have lunch or dinner and John's name not come up once. We tried this for a few months. I was back to my negative thinking. I was beginning to think it would never work. Shortly after that, we went out to lunch. After the lunch was over, my husband looked at me as we were preparing to leave and said, "Do you realize we have had a very nice lunch together and we didn't talk about John one time?" I was stunned! He was absolutely correct. I looked at him and smiled. He said he still had some time from work, so please let's go to John's grave. I had not been able to go to John's grave with my husband since the second day of John's death. I guess I felt John was mine and I didn't want to share him with anyone including my own husband! We went to John's grave together. My husband began talking to John. It had rained that morning and the ground was a still a little damp. My husband got down on one knee and talked to John like I'd never heard him talk to him before. I got down on my knees and cried like a baby. I looked over at my husband and saw a tear run down his cheek. This is the first time in 18 years that I'd seen him ever shed a tear. I think at that very moment, I fell in love with him all over again. It was a different love than I'd felt when we were married before. I now felt he was my best friend and I could talk to him about John and not get upset. It was just the opposite. I felt better now talking to my husband about my son! My husband now knows when I feel sad about John and will sit me down and hug me and tell me he loves me. We go to John's grave together on holidays and his birthday. I still visit alone, but when my husband goes with me, I actually feel we are a family again. My husband and I were remarried in a Church Wedding on April 4, 1992. It was almost three years since John died. Our pastor married us! When the ceremony was over, the pastor looked at the guests and said, "My friends, I am usually very old fashioned about second marriages, but this one has really touched my heart. I very proudly would like to introduce you to Mrs. and Mrs. David Marvel." As I said earlier, our marriage was the pits when John died. Now I am very proud of our marriage. My husband is now truly my best friend. It is so different now than it was the first time. I'm happy for the first time since my son was killed. I'm sure John is smiling down at us every day. My husband kept is promise to me and does not drink. It's been 6 years since we remarried. The girl who shot John was 20 years old. She was the girlfriend of a drug dealer. This girl was know to have games pretending to take a gun and shooting someone knowing the gun had no bullets. This fact was unknown to the people who were the recipients of this prank. She was seen doing this a few days prior to John's death. The gun that was used in the shooting of John had been showed the night before to a potential buyer and was laying freely on the dining room table. The bullets had been removed from the gun, however, this was the type of gun that one bullet remained in the chamber. On the day of the shooting, John went into the kitchen to get a sandwich. When he came out of the kitchen, he had the sandwich in his hand. The girl who shot John had picked up the gun and said, "I'm going to shoot you." She then pulled the trigger. The bullet sent into the front part of John's heart and out the back. If the bullet would have not gone out the back of his heart, he would be alive today. This caused him to lose blood at a rapid rate. John lay on the floor with the sandwich in his hand. He immediately went into shock and began shaking. At that time, the girl who killed him, dropped the gun and ran out of the house to another house down the street. She called 911 and told them that John had tried to commit suicide. In the meantime, John was still laying on the floor. The ambulance arrived and began transporting him to the hospital. John died enroute to the hospital. I know the ambulance attendants were working furiously to save his life and that the hospital also did everything to save him. After calling 911, the girl ran again. She later turned herself in to the Sheriff's department with her lawyer present. The Sheriff's department told me she showed no remorse and I saw the same during her trial. She claimed that it was an accident. She said she thought the gun was empty and she was playing a prank on John. The Sheriff could not find any premeditation in her act, therefore, she was charged with Manslaughter, with a gun. The Sheriff told me they thought she should be charged with Second Degree Murder, but they did not have the evidence to convict her on this charge. In order to get a conviction they had to charge her with the crime that they were sure she would get in the conviction. During her arraignment, she pled *not guilty*. The Judge let her out on her own merit. I'm sure you know what happened next. Yes, that's right, she ran. She was on the run for almost a year. She now had another charge brought against her for Flight from Prosecution. I could not believe these events! The Sheriff's office was very frustrated. They continued to call me often to advise of current developments. One day, almost a year later, I received a phone call that she had been involved in an automobile accident and called the police! They ran a check on her and arrested her on the spot. This time she did not receive any bail. She was to stay in jail until her trial. There were lots of hearings, depositions and pre-trial appearances. I attended every single one of them, except for the depositions. About six months later, we were ready to go to trial. My entire family joined me in Court for the final trial. During this entire time, it's amazing how the defense always makes the claimant the *bad guy*. They drug my son's name through the mud! Most of the information about this senseless crime was brought to life after the trial, because the State Attorney can not say anything to jeapordize the case. The information I had prior to the trial was from the Sheriff's office. The day of the trial, after all of the evidence was presented, the defense began trashing John without mercy. My family and I were sitting in that court room and could not believe with all of the evidence out there, the defense would chose to not defend her, but to trash my dead son. Just before the trial ended, the girl changed her plea to "no contest". This stopped this portion of the trial. At a later date, the sentencing took place. I had gone through a month of pure hell after the trial. The State Attorney told me I had the right to talk to the Judge, as the mother of the victim. I wasn't going to do it, but after hearing the defenses opening statements, I changed my mind! While I was talking, I felt like I was completely out of my own body watching this person defending her dead son and trying to persuade the Judge to give this girl the maximum sentence. I do not remember anything I said during that time. I do remember looking back at my family and seeing them *all* crying in heaving sobs. It was later that my family remembered every single word that I said and told me. "Judge Bucklew, I am very grateful you have heard this case. I trust your judgement explicitly. This case came as a result of the shooting death of my only child, John Dion Ridenour-Marvel. The death of my child has changed my life more than most people will ever imagine. The murder of my child is almost too much for me to accept. The died months ago and it is still as new and devastating as the day it happened. He is on my mind all day, every day." "The trial has been extremely painful for me and my family. I have been speaking with a member of the Homicide Victim's group, who has been a tremendous help in keeping me informed of the facts of this case and trial procedure. Each time new evidence surfaces, it seems my life shatters even more. I have dealt with the Sheriff's office and the State Attorney's office. I did anything and everything I could to find out about this case before it went to trial so I would have no surprises in the courtroom. I wanted to do nothing that would cause me to be taken from the courtroom, because I had to sit here! I knew it would be hard not only to be in the same room with the girl who killed my son, but to hear new evidence which would have been very crushing." "I am grateful that I have a chance to express my thoughts to you and this Court before the sentencing. It is so important and settling to know that victims have rights, too!" "My son was a wonderful person. His murder was the first time I had ever had a violent crime occur in my entire family. It has hurt and violated each and every one of us. I have always been a strong minded person, until this girl took my son away from me. I am seeing a psychiatrist weekly to deal with his death, his murder, and this trial. Most of the time, I still can't believe this has happened. "John and I had a relationship most parents only dream of. He was a follower, not a leader. He was supposed to come home the day after he was murdered. This girl, in a joking manner, took him away from me. In one brief moment, she took all choices away from him and me. I will never again feel his arms around me saying, 'I love you, Mom.'" "God gave John to me for 20 beautiful years. Only God had the right to take him back ~ not this girl. She took more than my son's life, she took my life also, because John was my life." "My plea to this Honorable Court is that she be punished, with no chance of parole, to the fullest extent of the law, for the senseless death of my son. She deserves the maximum sentence just to feel a small portion of the pain I have felt losing my son. Even after she serves her time, she will still have her life, my son will not have his life and I will never have my son again." After I was seated, the Judge looked at me and said, "Mrs. Marvel, you have gone through one of the worse tragedies imaginable. I have 2 sons and I don't know what I'd do if I ever lost one of them. I'm so very sorry you have had to go through this." The State Attorney told me later he had never heard the Judge speak from a personal view before. He was very surprised. The girl got 17 1/2 years in prison. Thanks to gain time and early release she spent 3 years in prison. I was not notified before she was released. She received a full education and is walking the streets today. Today is January 20, 2002. John has been gone thirteen years ago today. How am I doing? I'm making it today. That's all I can promise. Holidays, birthdays and Heaven dates are very hard on parents who lost a child. That never gets any easier. John was twenty years old when he died. We are already over the halfway point of his time on earth with us. For some reason today I thought about his thirteenth anniversary of being gone and I thought of him when he was thirteen years old. He was so happy when we gave him a bicycle for his birthday. He stayed busy playing football with the Brandon Steelers, attending camping trips with the Boy Scouts, winning that big brown stuffed horse at Disney World and the year that we moved into our long time residence. John was a very healthy, happy and normal boy who loved music, sports and attention! Each year that he has been gone, I think of what he was doing during that year of his birth. Today is January 20, 2004. John has been gone fifteen years ago today. I still miss him very much. I still dream about him. In fact, those dreams are my quality time with him. The dreams I have about him are of different years of his life from infancy to when he was older. I'm thinking today of when he was fifteen years old. We took several trips this year. We went to Dallas, Montreal, Canada and London, England. John loved London. We have a video taken while in Montreal and London. It is so good to see John walking & talking and it makes me miss him so much. I am so thankful to have that video. I think of how far my grief has come since John died. I still miss him so much and carry my love for him in my heart. There are still days that I cry because I miss him so much. However, I can smile and laugh again. I can be happy again. This doesn't make me love John any less. It does mean that eventually we can go on with our lives. I will always grieve for John. That's a given for the rest of my life. The loss of a child never leaves you, but you will smile again.    
  
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