April 27 - Three Years Later

With the third anniversary of the tornado tomorrow I thought I would go ahead and write this one. After every disaster there are always pictures of the survivors in the media. Notice, that I said “survivors”. I've never once called myself a “victim”. To me the victims are the ones whose lives were tragically cut short. We all see the pictures after tornadoes – the person digging through the rubble of their home looking shocked and lost. What most people never know, and a lot of people never think about, is what happens to those people after the media attention disappears. What happens down the road when everyone else has moved on?

Being born into a family that was devastated by an F5 on April 3,1974 I've seen the pain that my family went through, and still goes through, because of that day. I wasn't born at the time of that tornado, and even though it's my family, I could never fully understand the lasting trauma it inflicted. That's something that you can't imagine until you live through it. My grandparents were the strongest people I ever knew, and I didn't realize it until April 27, 2011. I don't know how they went through the pain of the tornado and the grief of losing a child and two grandchildren at the same time. I was born seven years after the 1974 tornado,- and I always remember my grandmother being happy and my grandfather being more quiet and reserved. It took me thirty years to discover that you can smile and be happy while still being torn apart inside. I know – I've smiled and laughed at times during the past three years while I felt like I was dying inside. So while I'm happy and have moved forward with life, here's the other side of my life that I don't tend to let people see.

Three years later...

I'm terrified of storms.

I'm sure you're thinking that's a given. The thing is that people don't realize how terrified I am. I've been through a year of counseling. I can function through my terror during a tornado warning, but the fear doesn't go away just because you learn how to function through it. I hear and see some people make comments, especially on social media, about people “overreacting” to the weather. When I read those comments to my husband he just shakes his head and says that they don't know; that they haven't been through it. The thing that people who haven't been through it before don't realize is that we aren't overreacting. We are simply reacting to what we know. Before you go through it, when you hear about a chance of severe weather you think it might get a little bad but nothing is going to happen. You'll go to your safe place, wait it out, and everything will be okay. After you've been through it your frame of reference changes. For me,when I hear about a chance of severe weather I remember the fear. My first thought is “I don't want to die today”, because for me the word tornado is synonymous with having to fight for my life. My mind goes back to that day and I remember everything going black. I remember the terror of hearing a freight train in my ear. I remember the wall vibrating and moving against my back. I remember the horrible pressure when it went across the top of my body. I remember the strongest wind I've ever felt pounding at me. I remember reaching up for something to hold onto, and realizing the walls were already gone. I remember the feeling of debris hitting me. I remember the moment when I realized that I was going to die – the moment I realized that my family was going to be devastated by a tornado again. They would never know how hard I fought to stay here with them. I remember how horrible it felt to know that my husband would be the one who found my body. There's no amount of counseling that can take away those memories. There's no amount of counseling that can take away my fears. Overreacting? No. I just have a different frame of reference when it comes to severe weather.

The memories sneak up on you.

This is one that continues to surprise me because I never know when it's going to happen. It can be the slightest thing. If I walk outside on a windy, overcast day I remember the wind on April 27. Sometimes I can walk through our house and smell the really strong odor of wood that was in the air after the tornado. I smelled it on April 27 and again on March 2 of the following year, although I think the second time was just a trigger of the memory from the first tornado since I was the only one who could smell it. Once I was at a children's consignment shop and saw a little wooden dog pull toy. I had the exact same one as a child. Out of nowhere tears started coming. A few weeks later we actually found my little dog in a tub in the garage. Someone found it after the tornado and packed it away. For about two years I thought it was gone. Now it sits on the bookcase in our living room. There are a lot of things like that, especially things from my childhood that I saved for my children and lost that day, that just hit me out of nowhere.

My memory is still affected.

For those of you who have spent time around me in the last three years you probably noticed that I can't remember much anymore. It's a little better than it used to be, but I've finally conceded to the fact that I'll never have a good memory again. I guess there's just too much trauma for that. Brandon and I play trivia every Tuesday night and there are times when we know that we should know the answer to a question and we just can't remember it anymore. Once there was an easy question on state capitals – what's the capital of New Jersey? I've known my state capitals since eighth grade history class, but I just couldn't pull it out of my head. I told Brandon, “this is going to make me mad when I hear the answer because I know it.” When I heard that the answer was “Trenton” I looked at him and said, “no, that's not it.” Even though I've known the capitals for most of my life I'd never heard of the town of Trenton. Obviously, I had heard of it, but as far as my brain was concerned that was the first time. That has happened over and over in some shape constantly for the past three years. It used to bother me more, now I've just accepted that there are some things I'm not going to remember.

Life moves forward and I've chosen to move forward too. I can laugh. I can smile. I can find joy in what God has given me. I'm alive – and that in itself is a miracle. I have a roof over my head, plenty of food to eat, and a warm bed to sleep in at night. There was a time, just three years ago, when I didn't have those things. I have a great husband, a sweet baby girl who makes me smile everyday, and another little one on the way. That's not to say that I don't have my bad moments. I still have nightmares about tornadoes, and I know that I always will. The morning after those dreams are rough because the memories are right there again. Why God chose to bless me with being one of the survivors of April 27, 2011 and not one of the fatalities is beyond my comprehension. One of the hardest things for me is knowing that absolutely nothing I did that day was enough to save me. Other people did the same things I did and didn't make it. That's a hard reality to live with, but as hard as it is I thank God that I'm here to live with it.