In 1970 my sisters moved from Michigan to Oregon. They drove the entire distance in a VW bug, with five kids. The older four (ages 3 1/2 to almost seven) were in the back seat; the baby (three months) was held by whichever adult wasn’t driving. I don’t remember if there were seat belts in that car, but if there were the kids definitely weren’t using them and I doubt the adults were, either.
This wasn’t considered particularly abnormal.
Thank you for that post. Very touching.
When I was little (I was 6ish and he was 3ish) I almost drowned trying to save my brother from drowning. Obviously things could have turned out much much worse for my parents and family had things been a just bit different. Oh, we both survived btw.
Thank you, choie, for your sad, eloquent post. Your whole post explains so well how she was, as you say, her own judge, jury and executioner. You made me cry.
Thank you for that post choie - devastating to read and I can’t even imagine how devastating it was and is for your family.
That was a very powerful post choie. And provided a lot of insight into how far-reaching the effects can be. Thank you for sharing. I’m so sorry that happened to your whole family
Thanks for the kind words, everyone. I was reluctant to share that (though, considering how long I blathered, apparently I needed to) because even now I’m aware blame can and likely will be assigned to my late mom, and I don’t think I could bear it. July is coming up and it’s the worst month for my family. She died on July 1, her birthday (which she never celebrated because she associated it with her son’s death) was the 25th, and my brother died on the 27th. It’s impossible to comprehend that this is the 50th anniversary of his death. He’d be in his sixties now. Jesus.
Anyway, Essured is definitely right: guilt reaches out to all of us, even those who weren’t alive. My sister and I, born after the accident, always tried to “fix” our mom, even before we knew she was broken, much less why. When she wasn’t happy we didn’t understand it. Why weren’t we enough? Self-centered but typical of kids, I think.
Once I finally did learn about my brother, I eventually started to put two and two together (especially as I was a pretty morbid child) and became somewhat obsessed by the fact that if the accident hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t have been born–I mean, no way would my parents have had four kids, especially so far apart in age. So I basically owed my entire existence to his death–it felt as if he had to die for me to live. That’s a pretty big burden, to feel like a replacement, not that my parents ever vocalized such a thought. Still, I was aware of the grim truth: I was born because my brother drowned. Compared to the things I’ve heard about him, I never felt I measured up. I sometimes wonder–yes, even now–whether I was worth the sacrifice.
On the lighter side, I will say that my sisters and I have probably helped our many therapists take some awesome vacations through years of dealing with our issues! There’s surely a fascinating case study in there somewhere!
Thank you choie, it must be very difficult to share something which was so powerfully there-but-not-there for so long. It was a very powerful, moving and compassionate account.
I would imagine that it would be much easier to cope with the death of a child if you went to prison and suffered properly for it.
I would imagine that it would be much more difficult to cope with the death of a child if you were forced through a legal process that required you to claim innocence for something you felt really guilty about.
My favorite ever story about how this kind of thing happens is one of the stories about the hang-gliding instructor who forgot to strap in (it’s happend more than once). He became distracted during his pre-flight checklist, and missed the -strap-into-hang-glider- step. He launched with is passenger, and fell out of the sky. Leaving his passenger to crash into the ocean.
The interesting point about that story is that ‘falling-out-of-the-sky’ is potentially fatal. You can’t say ‘if we had the death penalty, he wouldn’t forget to strap in’. You already have the death penalty, and he did forget to strap in.
If you want to stop people falling out of the sky, you need different solutions. Ordinary punishment is just ineffective.
I’m encouraged by reports that some parents have managed to forgive themselves and move on (and even stay married). My heart goes out to them and I’m the first to tell them that they are not to blame. Having said that - I would’ve killed myself, I just don’t have the resources to rise from that sort of tragedy.
OP here. Choie, thank you for posting that. Very insightful. I’m sorry for what your family went through, but am grateful to you for sharing your experience on this topic.
Thank you choie.
choie, thank you for sharing with us all, and anyone who would label your mother or anyone like her as a “murderer” or put them on the same moral level as someone who commits an unlawful killing is frankly a monster to me.
Thanks for sharing that choie, very moving story and a massive impact on a whole family over several decades.
FWIW I wouldn’t consider leaving a 10 year old who knew how to swim unsupervised in a back yard pool for a couple of minutes to be in any way negligent, that situation was just a horrible accident.
choie, I hardly know what to say about your post other than to thank you for sharing such a devastating event in your family’s life.
Choie - wow, that’s a terribly heartbreaking story. Thank you for posting that. That must have been hard to post.
I came to post a similar story of my best friend who I have known for more than a decade that only recently told me the story of his younger brother I never knew he had. When they were kids living in Michigan in 1970s, they lived in a house with a pool. His mother had left both kids in front of the TV and my friend’s younger brother wandered off. At the time, my friend was five and his brother was three. All he can remember from that day was his brother floating face down in the pool and his Mom jumping in to save him but being too late and then all the crying of both his mother and father.
His mother and father were both home at the time and both ultimately grieved for a number of months and then ultimately got a divorce. It was the discussion about why his parents divorced that brought up the painful story. The weird part is, I know both his parents now that we are all adults and they are both is somewhat loveless relationships and only seem happy when they are around each other with my friend, so I can only assume they must have blamed each other for what happened. Such a tragedy 
I’m sorry for the belated bump, but I haven’t had time to post lately and wanted to thank everyone for your kind words. I appreciate that people thought I was able to provide some perspective on this subject, as hard as it is to deal with. Well, all in all I’d rather not have been able to, if you know what I mean, but having the experience, at least I could share it.
And I’m very sorry for your friend’s family, Yarster. Sadly the break-up of a family after such a tragedy is pretty common. As I mentioned I don’t know how my parents went on together. Maybe it was because they did have kids after the accident; maybe because they were of a different generation/background where divorce was kind of taboo. Among my parents and their three married siblings, all of whom got together in the 1950s, only one couple ever split up. Even the remaining sibling who was a lesbian had a partnership that lasted until her death.
Thank you, choie, for your courage in posting that - my condolences.
Here’s a more recent case that, fortunately, did not result in a fatality: Michael Cegers, Jessica Hurley Smith Arrested: Cops Say Couple Left Baby In Car To Hit Sex Shop | HuffPost Chicago