Author’s Note:
The recent tragedy at the youth camp in Texas has been sitting heavy on my heart. As I tried to process it, I found myself thinking about Sandy Hook—something I’ve carried quietly since 2012. I went back to my journal from that week, and this letter is what came from that space.
To this day, I still can’t listen to Hallelujah without tearing up. My family could tell you—it stops me in my tracks every time. That song became a thread connecting my grief to theirs, even though we’d never met.
This isn’t for attention. It’s for witness. For remembrance. For the children.
May we never stop remembering.
Dear Mom and Dad,
You don’t know me, and I feel a little silly writing you.
But I heard a song today, and it brought me back to a day that I know feels like both yesterday and a million years ago to you.
It was the kind of loss no one expects—
The kind of grief I’ve wondered for years how you survived.
On December 14, 2012, I was holding my seven-day-old baby boy.
I was in my black office chair,
A Boppy pillow on my lap,
Exhausted—trying to get a stubborn infant to latch.
I was scrolling Facebook on my computer when I saw it:
“Prayers for Sandy Hook.”
That’s when my heart took a new shape—
Because part of it broke.
And that piece—it silently floated to you.
And that part? It never returned.
It’s yours now.
Back then, there was an ocean between me and you—
But that didn’t stop the ache of knowing you,
In a way I wish I didn’t,
Without ever having met you.
I felt your last kiss goodbye.
Your rushed morning.
The goodbye you may have wished you could say—
If only you had known.
I watched the lights go out on the earth in front of me, too.
My heart broke thinking of the presents already wrapped under the tree,
And the ache of putting away a tree that would never grow up quite right again.
I held my baby tighter that morning.
A child in one hand, and grief for you in the other.
And that grief?
It took root deep in my soul.
It’s not something I want to excavate. Ever.
Maybe that’s why, on long nights—when my soul forgot to remind my patience—
I held onto the truth:
Even though his little cry was loud,
It was a cry that could still be heard.
And that wasn’t silence.
Silence is what screams.
Silence is what soaks the pillow all the way through.
No more pitter-patter of little feet down the hall.
No more, “Mommy, I drew this for you.”
The sound of laughter—once deafening—
Replaced by floorboard whispers.
I wondered if your heart broke a little more each day with each creak,
Each echo that used to be her.
Does the silence still speak—
Haunted by the shadow of a giggle?
Did the time alone that showed up so sparingly on December 13, 2012,
Walk into your life like an unwelcome guest you didn’t invite?
The one that makes the clock stop in the worst way—
And never leaves?
No backpack to empty anymore.
One less seat taken in that three-row SUV—
The one you bought when you found out you were expecting.
One less face you see through the mirror as you drive.
The heartbeat that used to sit back there and catch your smile of adoration,
Who would reciprocate like the loveliest unspoken language
You never had to learn to understand.
Days after that awful morning, the Voice coaches sang “Hallelujah.”
And from that moment on, your children’s gut-wrenching day became the meaning behind the lyrics for me.
To this day, I weep when that song plays.
I don’t care if I’m in a store, at the doctor’s office, or home—
Your children, and your pain, have never stopped being worthy of reverence and remembrance.
But I am torn.
I don’t know which type of grief steals the most breath:
The memory of a small face with the prettiest eyes you’d ever seen,
Or the missed goodbye?
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