You just have to be everyday on the edge. Are the kids ok? Did they get to school ok? How was school? Even if they’re just going to the store, I tell them to be careful, not to talk to anybody. Once you get violence into your life, once you’ve experienced it, you’re always on the edge.
Guilt
I do have guilt. I think, this is the one day I let my daughter play outside- it was summer time and she was having fun with her cousins. It was a whole lot of people outside, it was in July. This young man walked up to them, and he saw all these little kids outside playing, and then he started shooting.
You never imagine
Trying to pick out a casket, trying to pick out flowers, things that you never imagined in your head you would do… for a person that you saw the same day. It’s like one moment you’re here, and another moment you’re not.
I was really angry
We had six months when nobody wanted to go out. Nobody wanted to go out, because we really didn’t know what was going on. I was angry. I was really angry. Your children are supposed to be able to have a childhood. These two individuals took my children’s childhood from them.
You have the police riding up and down, sweeping in a community that’s considered a “hot spot.” It doesn’t make me feel safe. It adds even more trauma.
I wasn’t expecting it
I was upstairs by myself when they were doing the surgery on my daughter. The surgeon came back to me and he said, “She has some angels. I can’t explain this to you, I don’t understand it myself. I’m baffled because she’s supposed to be dead.” Can you imagine the surgeon’s telling you your kid should be dead? I wasn’t expecting it. I was expecting him to say “She did good, she’s out of surgery.” But he came back and said “She’s supposed to be dead.” When the surgeon said that, that just blew my mind. I just wasn’t expecting that.
It affects the small decisions I make
I live in the community. I hear the police often, nights, days. I watch the news and I hear about the little kids who are at the park around the corner getting shot. It affects me as a parent in terms of the small decisions I make, like what park I take my kids to. My four year old always wants to go to this park because it looks so pretty, but two summers ago a four year old was killed there so I refuse to take her. I am just too anxious, quite frankly, to take her there. So, I go outside of my community because I don’t want to be at the park with my kids and not be able to focus all my attention on them because I’m worried about who else is around and what’s happening.
People don’t think
People don’t think that the person they’re shooting might have kids. They are leaving a kid without a father, without a mother, without something they need in their life. They are taking something away from kids, and even if they don’t have kids, they have families, they have somebody. They are taking that away, and they’re not thinking about it.
I am able to say, yes, this is what I’m dealing with. I’m not feeling good today. I’m having my pity party today. I’ve learned what this means. I’ve learned, oh, I’m not going crazy. I’m supposed to be feeling this.
It’s better knowing
Whoever knows something about what happened should come out to give us peace. Then at least we could know why, just the reason. If my son did something wrong it’s better knowing than not knowing, because then we think they just took his life to take it. If we knew the reason why, I don’t know, but it’d make it a little bit easier. It’s so hard, but at least it would make more sense.