Cause of Death... in One Day At a Time

Finally…after 5 ( almost 6 ) months, we got your autopsy results back. I was terrified to open it. Scared of the truth I felt I already knew. It shook me up more than I had expected but not in a negative way. There were so many rumors before you died. Even the day before you passed. I was dreading those would be there…staring me in the face as a harsh reality of what you had become after we separated.
I opened it up.
Read those words.
Manner of Death: Accident
How incident occurred: Substance Abuse.
Fucking Substance Abuse. Not surprised. But the, ” Pulmonary Edema ” that took your life due to the drug intoxication freaked me out. I wasn’t expecting to see what exactly took your life. I guess I was kind of hoping I’d just see the blanket of truth and the wording of ” overdose ” and the rest would be kind of clouded under autopsy lingo. To know you were laying there and had your lungs swell with fluid and you just stopped breathing while you were asleep…yeah that was a rough pill to swallow. I wish I could’ve been there. Is that morbid? I wish I was there, in that moment, to hold your hand and make sure it was easy. I remember laying next to you a million times when you were out of it and feeling like,” oh my God, is he gasping? Was that his last breath?! Then just waiting for your next one, praying this wasn’t it. I would’ve chosen to be there when it was ” it ” though Levi. I have comfort knowing you had no idea what happened. I have comfort knowing you had no pain. I do not have comfort in the fact that I KNOW you woke up in the afterlife…heaven…and looked down and felt rocked. You didn’t mean to do that.
As I scrolled down the autopsy, I felt no air coming in and out of my lungs. I was waiting to see what the rest would read.
Says you were 71 inches tall. You’d be pissed to read that. You always said you were 5‘11 and I always told you you weren’t.
” The scalp hair is brown and measures up to 2 inches in length.”
Fucking gut wrenching. The instant I read this I could feel it in my hands. I can feel it through my fingers as I write this. It’s a tangible memory. That soft, beautiful hair your mom never wanted you to cut. She’d be so mad when you’d buzz it. I finally talked you into growing it long on the top for your mow-hawks and would touch it endlessly. I’m kind of offended actually they didn’t point out this style in the autopsy report.
” The abdomen has no injuries. There is a 2 1/2 inch long scar in the lower right quadrant.”
I can feel me tracing this scar underneath my fingertips. my whole finger could fit inside of it. I can picture you walking around shirtless, like you always did, heavy scar right in sight.
” There are plastic bands on the ankles bearing the identification ” Johnson, Levi “
I want to throw up.
Wasn’t interested in reading the weight of your heart and brain so I skipped much of the next portion. Knowing “you” were there as they were cutting open your body sickens me.
Ah..here we are…the moment of truth…the toxicology report.
Caffeine- Positive.
That damn sweet ass tea. Drank so much it’s in your blood screen.
Cotinine - Positive.
Cigars. Black n Milds. Jazz flavored I’m sure of it. Plastic tip, you don’t fuck with the wood ones.
The rest were your current prescriptions.
I flipped through, back and forth, looking for the rest of the results.
Nothing.
No street drugs?
Not even alcohol? Surely you had a drink lately.
Not even a little weed?
Nothing.
Only your prescriptions.
FUCK Levi. You took too much medicine. That’s IT?!
How can I be so elated yet so fucking disappointed at the same time? Clearly you were being reckless and took too much. But no opiates? Makes me feel like damn, you did feel like you were doing better. You did feel like you were getting yourself together. Granted, you were still an addict under it all. Never knowing your limit.
Without you even realizing it though, you’ve given me a gift.
The gift of being transparent with our children.
Yes, they’ll know the ins and outs of addiction and your struggles with it. But with this, I can honestly tell them, ” Daddy was prescribed medications during his accident. He took them incorrectly and they interacted with each other. He passed away in his sleep. ” I won’t be hiding any truth. I won’t be only giving them enough information they can handle then crushing them with more truth later.
Now, the things I want to do to that person who spewed all the hateful rumors online the days before you died.
I wish I could contact them directly and give them an FYI.
I wish I could post on your Facebook ( where they decided to post all the lies ) to make your name clear. Let everyone know the things they said you were doing was NOT the truth. Not even a little bit.
It haunts my mind to know you could’ve died thinking that people believed all these hateful things about you.
It makes me irate and want to reach out to them just so they know the impact they could’ve made on your death.
But I won’t. It won’t matter. The important people in your life know the truth. Nobody else matters.
I am so glad this cloud of unknown is gone. We know what took you. You took you.