Sharing the Awful News

There is still a lot about Aaron and Noah's deaths that I haven't blogged about, and don't want to forget in years to come.  I recently had to get a new iPhone as my old one was playing up.  Before I swapped the phones over I saved everything from my old phone, but couldn't work out how to save the text messages.

As I was going through the messages I found the ones that I had sent out the nights that Noah and then Aaron passed away to different people.  I just couldn't delete them from my phone and as I didn't know how to save them, I ended up taking a screenshot of them.

It still doesn't seem real, even when I look at the messages now. 

When Aaron died I was physically sick.  I was vomiting as they were trying to revive him, and was in so much shock as I watched what was going on.  When the paramedics told me there was nothing else they could do, all I could think was that I had to ring his Dad to tell him that his only son had just died, and that I had to tell people what had happened. 

I rang his Dad first and couldn't stop shaking as I said the words 'I have some bad news for you.  Aaron had a heart attack tonight and died'.

I then rang my friend Simone.  I felt sick as I knew what I was going to tell her was going to be such a shock.  I didn't know how to say it except to just come out and say it.  All I can remember her saying is 'no, no, no, no!'. 

Then it hit me - school! Aaron was supposed to be going back to school in a few weeks to teach.  He loved his job and the kids loved him.  He had so many good friends at school and talked about them all the time.  I knew he was good friends with his colleague Kristy, and searched through his phone for her mobile number.  I rang it and felt sick as I knew what a shock it would be for her. I got her message bank and remember rambling something to it like 'I don't know how to tell you this, and don't know whether I should even tell you this in a message, but Aaron had a heart attack tonight and died'.  She rang me back within a minute.

I rang a couple of other friends and had no energy to ring anyone else.  My brothers had already rung my brother Jared and Dad who weren't with us on holiday.  

I knew that I had to let people know, and remember how shocked I was as I typed this text message to send to people.  I felt terrible as I imagined what it was going to be like for those people to see they had a message from me, and then to open it and read what it said. 

I got a couple of phone calls from past students on Aaron's mobile. They had heard from another friend on Facebook and didn't think (or didn't want to believe) that it was true.  I felt terrible having to tell them as they were crying that it was true.

A couple of hours later I decided to put something on Aaron's facebook wall, as news started getting out and everyone was wondering if it was actually an awful joke.  I obviously put it up after midnight as it was dated the 27th January.  Within seconds comments started coming through and Mum, Chrish and I just kept reading them all night as we couldn't sleep anyway.  

Aaron missed Noah so much and just five days before he had put up on his wall how much he was missing him.  His profile picture was of him and Noah and it hadn't changed since Noah passed away. 

That day almost seven months ago seems like yesterday, but then it also seems like forever ago.  So much has happened since then and sometimes I think about things we have happened in the last seven months and think that Aaron was here with us, but then remember he had already passed away, and it hits me again that it was just me and my three boys.    

I know that they are both dead but I'm still not used to the fact that Aaron is.  I feel like he's away on a really long holiday somewhere and imagine him walking back in the door one day saying 'just kidding!' as that's something silly he would do.  Oh how I wish it was just a bad joke and that he would just walk in the door after work one day.  

I wonder if it's ever going to feel normal for it to be just 'me and the boys'.