Like most of you who have heard about the tragedy in Ohio, my heart has felt broken over the loss of life. Yet another high school shooting, with the death toll now at three.
It brings back memories. Not just memories of previous high school shootings—such as Columbine—but memories of my 17-year-old son’s first year of high school.
You see, at first it was thought that the shooter in this latest incident was bullied. Since then it has been said he wasn’t “well,” something is psychologically wrong with him.
That was the case nearly four years ago when a high school student stabbed another one at my son’s school. But it was a little more personal for us. My son knew the boy who did the stabbing and he was good friends with the boy that got stabbed.
To make matters worse, we were left with a lot of unanswered questions about what could have been. You see, the morning of the incident I was running late getting my son to school.
At the time I was working as a preschool teacher and so I would drop my son off early at school. He would sit at a table in one of the “pods” located outside some of the classrooms. At the table were three other boys, one of them was the perpetrator and another one the victim.
That morning not only was my son not at the table but another boy had orchestra practice, so it was just the two. Suddenly, for no apparent reason, the one pulled out a knife and actually chased my son’s friend down before he stabbed him.
Later we heard stories that he believed he was possessed by demons and didn’t know what he was doing. Thankfully the stabbing didn’t do much damage, physically at least.
It was a crazy day, receiving text messages from friends who have children that attend the high school, my son texting me asking me to please come get him because his friend had been stabbed, the school surrounded by police and news crews…it was surreal.
I picked my son up early and for the next couple of weeks, helped him to deal with the situation. We visited his friend when he came home from the hospital and my son was enlisted to help carry his books while he was recovering.
But it was difficult for my son to return to school after it happened. My heart goes out to everyone…to the victims and their families. And to the students who have to try and go back to “normal” life.
It is times like these where I wish I had answers for my children. But all I can say is that there is evil in the world and sometimes terrible things happen.
It’s important to keep the communication lines open during these types of events. Our children need to know we are there for them and will talk them through it.
Even if we don’t have the answers…
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Photo by masonjar in stock.xchng (Columbine High School Memorial)