This time of year, ever since December 1st, 2021, sucks.

I’m sure that there are many much more eloquent ways to say that December is a trainwreck every year but “sucks” seems to encapsulate the general mood pretty succinctly.

It’s funny because the other day I heard someone say that nothing could ever take the joy out of Christmas. Oh, how mistaken they are. Lucky them.

As we come to the end of another calendar year, and the beginning of another grief year. the thing I am most aware of is how incredibly emotionally exhausting this past year has been.

For one thing, it is our fourth year of grieving. Most have long since forgotten our pain and somehow assume we have moved on by now. They will likely never understand that the day Charlie died, our hearts were torn to shreds and we will never be able to put them back together the same way again. Tears, while no longer daily, are frequent. Pain is always there.

Not a day goes by without thoughts of our beloved Charlie, as a beautiful, brilliant teenaged girl who left this world far too soon. Speak to any mourning parent and they will say the same. Yet what few can ever understand is the constant battering I feel by media filled with hate for trans individuals. It’s hard enough trying to get through a day without falling apart but when your own dead daughter is vilified over and over for just being her, it’s impossible not to feel the pain of her loss and anger at the ignorance. I myself have been vilified for having supported her. I have even been told that I am the reason she is dead.

Literally not one day goes by without a hateful or unjust story or reference to transgender issues. I feel every one of these viscerally. They shake me to the core because I know what they did to Charlie, and to us, so I know what they are doing to others. It reminds me over and over of what Charlie felt. In her suicide letter, she warned us that we would find a lot of transphobic material in her recent internet history. She wasn’t a transphobe, she assured us. She just read it to remind her that she was a monster and would be better off dead. That is what transphobia does.

Every day I am reminded of this. Every damn day.

Just to add insult to injury, another hateful theme I see over and over has been all the garbage about autism being spewed by the turds in power down south. When one of my offspring isn’t being attacked, the other one is. Today in the news it was shared that MAGAs are driving by Tim Walz’s house and yelling the hateful r word (currently being normalized by the hateful t word) at Tim’s autistic son. This is my message to anyone who thinks autistic individuals are less than, or who takes seriously any of the crap about autism being a horror show or being caused by vaccines or whatever else rubbish they can come up with. Tim Walz’s son Gus, my son, and other autistic family members are kind, hilarious, and intellectually brilliant. The idiots who think otherwise can only dream of being more like them. The truth is that Gus, James and my other neurodivergent family members would leave RFK Jr et al in their dust. He’s the Lada to their Ferraris—but he’s too stupid to know it.

Rant over. I just wish the world would leave us all alone.

Our other battle this year has been for James’s health. One of the hard parts about being autistic is that you’re much more likely to have other health issues. In James’s case, 12 years of chronic pain nearly led him to the brink this year. I may have failed Charlie but I cannot fail James. So I have fought with tears and words and every ounce of energy I have to keep him alive. Slowly, with limited help from physicians for whom James is a bit of an anomaly, and a lot of help from the internet, we are figuring out ways to reduce his pain. We have much more work to do but a prescription NSAID and monthly ketamine infusions are helping to keep James off the proverbial and literal ledge. For this I am grateful.

My wish for next year is that James get more relief from his pain. My other wish is for a world without a hate- and ignorance-filled media; a world where hateful words and actions are no longer normalized by powerful bottom-dwellers; and where trans and autistic people are supported and allowed to live in peace.

Life and grief are hard enough without constant hateful reminders. Oh and speaking of grief, this holiday season, please remember those who have lost children, siblings, and parents in the recent past. Be kind. This time of year is rough for us all, not just for those whose offspring died this month.