It wasn’t how I imagined starting off my 39th year…  or ending this month for that matter.

In just a span of seven days, I have gone to two wakes:  one, for the father of a good friend; the other, for the six-month old son of a good former colleague.  With their ages on the opposite sides of the spectrum, so too were the nature of their deaths.

The father, though advanced in years, was very healthy on the day he died.  As told to me by my friend, he even went to the market in the morning and did some other activities.  That night, after getting something to drink and upon sitting down on the bed to get some sleep, he just choked and died (if I remember the story correctly).  My friend was supposed to come home from Australia earlier during the month for a vacation, but since she was sick with the flu during that time, the father himself told her not to come home yet due to quarantine issues for travelers who are sick (and she even works in a hospital that accepts patients with Ebola symptoms).  I could just imagine the irony of it all.  The family refused to have the body autopsied since it would never really tell them anything; aside from the fact that, well, it won’t bring him back.

The baby boy on the other hand, had Type One Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA).  It was already diagnosed while he was still inside the womb, has no cure, and the life expectancy of the infant is between six months to two years.  It turns out that both parents unknowingly have that gene that passes SMA to their baby.  What’s more heartbreaking is that this is their second child who passed away with the same disease; their first born having died after seven months of him having it.  So in a way, both parents have somehow “prepared” for the inevitable.  The father (my former colleague) even had the notion of preparing a PowerPoint presentation of all the pictures taken of their baby during the short time he lived on this earth while he was confined in the hospital during the final days.  It was shown to me while I was there, and I just marveled at the baby’s smile despite not fully aware of what’s going to happen to him, as well as the parents’ strength to go through the same ordeal twice; only this time, they were more knowledgeable about the disease and did everything they could to make their son’s very short journey through life a memorable one.

It doesn’t matter if it was sudden or somehow anticipated, nothing really prepares you and nothing comes close to the pain of losing someone dear.  Whether it be a family member, a friend, or a loved one, the reality of not being with them anymore hits us so hard and cuts us so deep that it paralyzes us; and makes us question everything without really knowing anything.  I lost someone too this week.  Though not in the same manner as the two people I mentioned, but the feeling is exactly the same.  It is both as sudden as it is somehow anticipated; I did everything I can, yet it was also beyond my control.  I guess with these two wakes I went to, it’s like fate trying to soften the blow in dealing with my own loss.  But what it also did was made me lose one more thing:  my personal faith.  Up until last week, despite my struggles, I tried to keep that faith going.  That somehow despite fully knowing that what I am doing is sincere, selfless, and nothing short of pure, at the end of the day, goodness will always prevail over adversity.  But it didn’t.  At least for me.  It just showed how I am truly destined to be part of the unlucky ones.

So now, I also mourn.  Not just for what was lost, but also the loss of what might have been.  The loss of something so real that I risked everything for it.  The loss of happiness that I truly want.  The loss of believing.  .There may not be a wake or an elaborate final send off; just trying to keep a straight face amidst the tears and trying to act like nothing happened by covering it with a smile (if I can).  But the pain is there.  Pain so real it’s crippling inside.  And it may be there for a long time, or will probably never go away.

Toll the bell.