There Aren't Any Answers

Along with the majority of our country--as well as our world--I'm closely following the stories stemming from the Uvalde shooting.  Like many others, I watched the tragedy unfold, eager for any sort of news, hoping for any bit of good.  Needing a bit of good.  Shawn and I have been trying to have age-appropriate discussions with the kids concerning safety and what to do, if God forbid, we're ever caught in such a situation.  We've talked with our kids about the victims, making sure we use their names.  We've had conversations about right and wrong, and explored appropriate and acceptable ways to express our emotions.  We've done our best to answer Avery's questions, but truthfully, there just really aren't any answers for this sort of brutality.  We've tried to assuage his fears, but how exactly should parents do that when we're trying to hide our own fears from our children?

As a mama, I am heartbroken.  I am shattered.  I am just plain physically sickened and disgusted.  I am angry.  I am in pain for the families and parents experiencing the absolute most tragic moments of their lives, who are having to do so publicly.  I have wept, I have broken down into sobs, I've hugged my own children that much tighter.  I have screamed that primal scream, that anguished howl only a mama can unleash for other mamas who are grieving the unimaginable losses of their babies.  

I don't understand any of this, nor do I think I want to, really.  I'm afraid of what it would mean for my own humanity if I were to have the ability to comprehend this pure madness. 

And, if I'm being honest, like so many others, I'm tired--that kind of weariness that settles in your bones and casts shadows across your brain.  I'm emotionally exhausted from the "thoughts and prayers" after each casualty, given out like free candy.  How useless and pointless.  I'm sick of hearing other Christians proclaim, "someday there will be answers!"  I'm fed up with hearing of God's goodness as they announce, "this is all part of God's plan!"  Can you imagine saying that to a grieving parent or having to read it again and again on social media and in the news?  How positively ludicrous.  Then there's, "They're all little angels now, God has taken them home!"  Read the bible.  That's not how being an angel works.  And let's not forget, "One day there will be a glorious reunion and their parents will see them again!"  Fairly certain their families would rather be able to see them now, here on earth where they belong.  What purpose do any of these platitudes and cliches serve, exactly?  I am spiritually nauseous and fatigued from the ways so many other Christians react to each new act of inhumanity.  That shouldn't even be a sentence I have to write... "each new act..."  I am thoroughly disgusted with how victims--children, babies--and other loved ones are used as political fodder, talking points, false anger, photo ops and empty promises.  There is absolutely no shame.  I am downright emotionally worn out, having to scan the nearest exits when I'm out with my kids.  I can no longer take having to always be on my guard, playing different scenarios in my head, terrified of not being able to protect all three of my children.  I hate--HATE--the conversations we need to have with our children because of the state of our world.  This is a reality we should not have to face.  It sickens me to my core.  This is pure, unadulterated, evil and insanity.

NO.  Full freaking stop.  NO.

Thoughts and prayers are getting us nowhere.  NOWHERE.  They weren't shields between the children and the bullets.  They didn't serve as the comfort only a parent could offer as those babies lay there dying, confused, terrified and hoping for help to arrive.  Those thoughts and prayers didn't bolster the police to do their jobs (at all), and do them efficiently and quickly.  Neither did they serve as divine intervention to the shooter's mentality and actions.  And they certainly won't prevent the next shooting.

I refuse to believe God's plan includes children dying from mass shootings.  I will not believe such a plan means parents will never hear their child's laugh again, they'll never get to kiss them goodnight or tuck them safely into bed again.  There won't be anymore hugs, and the milestones have come to a jarringly unexpected and tragic halt.  I will not accept the ever-so-popular Christian trope that God will make something good out of the pain these families are feeling and the terror their children felt in their last moments.  These families shouldn't have this pain, nor should those children have had to experience such terror in the first place.  Children should not have to cover themselves in their friends' blood to be already dead.

I am absolutely DONE hearing "there is no fear in the Lord!"  What do you think those children felt in the last few minutes of their lives?  They felt fear.  They were terrified, you twits.  What do you think every single parent felt, standing outside the school or waiting at home for any word about their children's safety, urging the police to do their jobs?  They felt the absolute worst fear they've ever felt.  And the children who survived and their parents?  The mere idea of returning to school, the thought of going out in public petrifies them.  I feel fear every time I go out with my children and sadly, I know I'm not the only one.  I scan crowds, looking at faces, watching behaviors and actions, deciding if that person poses a threat to my children.  I look for hidey-holes I can safely stash my children in.  I felt extreme fear and panic the day Noah's school was locked down due to an active shooter.  I'm one of the tremendously few parents who saw her child come home at the end of the day.  All the students from him school went home that afternoon.  We got lucky.  And that is not something I take for granted.

In truth, there are no answers for this sort of nightmare.  There are only excuses, victim blaming, a complete and total lack of accountability, and a system which utterly fails our children and loved ones over and over and OVER.  And, as we've also learned this past week, there are lies and attempts to cover up fatal inactions and catastrophic failures, and general incompetence.  So many lies, inactions and failures.  So much incompetence.  This was pure evil.  There is no answer for that.

I desperately want to have hope, I want to have faith.  But I'm sick to pieces of platitudes and cliches.  I'm sick to death of the same arguments, the same politics and the same inaction every single time one of these tragedies strikes.

This has to stop.  Parents should not have to bury their children.

We owe our children--we owe mankind--so much better.  Our children deserve better.