It’s been over six months since Kristine passed away, and it still feels like it was yesterday.  When does grief finally subside, or does it ever? I picked up Michelle Richmond’s book, “No One You Know” after reading the synopsis.  It’s about a woman dealing with her sister’s death that occurred over 18 years ago.

I wonder if the author lost a sister because she describes my feelings perfectly. I am constantly comparing my life before and after Kristine’s death. It’s like an abrupt slice of my life. There is no continuum; just a sudden halt. There is also a heaviness in the air now that I can’t escape.  Every day I wake up missing my sister, but also my old life. It’s a life that seems like it’s always out of my grasp.

Like the family in the book, we are having a hard time getting closure due to the mystery still surrounding my sister’s death. How can you move on when no answers have been given to you? The only thing that we have been told is that Kristine died due to alcohol poisoning.

For a couple of months that followed, I felt like a zombie.  I went through life not feeling anything but anger and sadness. I finally woke up and realized that I was letting the grief consume me.  Instead of doing nothing, I needed to do something.

It’s S.A.D.

I talked about it before, but I have launched a non-profit organization.  It’s called Stop Alcohol Deaths (S.A.D.).  I started it to bring awareness about the dangers of drinking excessively. In the last few years, I have seen how people are increasingly equating having fun and drinking, or drinking their problems away.  I see it everywhere I go.  I’ll hear things like

“I’m going to get drunk tonight.”

“Drinking it up! So much fun.”

“Rough day…going to get drunk.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of alcohol-induced deaths, excluding accidents and homicides is 22,073 in the United States. In January 2010, the Office of National Statistics (ONS) showed that alcohol-related deaths are on the rise in the UK from 4,023 in 1992 to 9,031 in 2008.

If I could spare one family the pain and grief that we are going through, then I will feel some happiness from that. We are still awaiting our 501(c)(3) application to be approved, so we can’t be 100% operational until that happens.

You can check out us out at the following locations:

• Facebook Page
• Facebook Cause
• Twitter
• Pledgie
• JustCoz.org

Any non-profit gurus out there, I would love any tips that you can give me.

I am in the process of planning a running event.  My sister was an amazing runner, and loved to help others.  I know she would love that idea.

I can’t let this grief beat me.  All I can do is spare others the same feeling.

There are days when I can wake up and feel ok for a bit until a memory triggers something inside me, and I get the feeling of sadness.  There are days, like today, that even before I even get out of bed, I feel this weight that makes me want to stay in bed all day.  I don’t know why that is.  I have a theory: Involuntary memory.

Involuntary memory is something that is connected with the French writer Marcel Proust. In his famous book,”Remembrance of Things Past,” Proust talks about how a smell, sound, touch, or taste can take you back to something that happened in your past. It might even invoke a memory that you had forgotten even existed. I think that is why I sometimes wake up feeling like something is weighing me down. There was something that touched one of my senses and triggered a past memory of my life before.

I know that eventually I will wake up every day and not feel any pain.  However, at the moment, it’s all I can think about. I wonder what it was this morning that I encountered that caused this.  I guess it really doesn’t matter.  All I know is that this is part of mourning, and that I will accept this feeling.

If you asked me last year if you thought I was going to be a pretty good runner, I would have laughed at you, and told you that I didn’t have time for jokes.  Now, it’s a different story. I love running.  Yes, at times, it can be a little daunting.  However, after awhile, you can run and run without even thinking twice about it.

Last year, when I went to Panama, I couldn’t even run for a mile.  Kristine was my motivation and moral support.  This is a girl who did marathons all the time, and was always one of the fastest girls in her squandron.  I remember that I allowed my friends to convince me to sign up for the Army Ten Miler.  I would chat with my sister and tell her that I couldn’t do something like that. She told me not to give up, and that before she joined the Air Force, she was a terrible runner.  Like me, she said that she would constantly get cramps because she didn’t know how to breathe properly.  Also, she would get tired after she took two steps.  She said that it took her a couple of months to finally build up her stamina, and not think that running was half bad.

I remember being in Panama and running with her.  She would be running without even heaving, and I couldn’t even speak.  I would tell her to keep running cause I felt bad that I was preventing her from running the way she was accustomed to.  She would stop and smile at me.

“That’s ok Shevonne.  I want to walk with you.”

It was due to her support that I was eventually able to run the Army Ten Miler without stopping.  The first time I ran one mile without stopping, I sent her an email, so excited that I was able to do even that.  She was so ecstatic.  She responded, “I am so happy for you! I knew you could do it.”

When she passed away, I stopped exercising for awhile because it was hard for me to even get out of bed.  Eventually I had to because I had two children to take care of.  I didn’t even want to do the Cherry Blossom Ten Miler that I was doing in April.  However, I knew that Kristine loved that I was running, so I decided to start training.  The first two times I tried running, I could only do a mile.  I finally said to myself, “STOP THIS! If you can’t do it for yourself, do it for your sister, who was so proud of you.”

I started running two, three, and now five miles without thinking twice.  Yesterday when I ran five miles, I kept thinking that she was running right next to me, and encouraging me to keep going.  It was the only way that I kept running until I reached my goal.  I felt great afterwards, and I was able to smile, without having to force it, for the first time in over a month. 

I want her to be proud of me in anything that I do.  I hope that she is.