Nightmares....

It goes without saying that our lives are now a nightmare. But today I wonder 3 years and 3 months later what is going on with the nightmares I encounter while I sleep. They seem to come and go but now are much more vivid and violent. Loved ones being stabbed as well as us chasing after evil people and trying to kill them. However they just seem to never die no matter what method we use to try and defend ourselves. They just keep coming after us as if some cheap horror flick. Perhaps it is because we will never be able to escape the evil that has been brought into our lives and never stop worrying about the safety and well being of the loved ones that are still with us. We know all too well by how our lives are now a constant struggle that we are immune to nothing and life just gets harder as the days, months and years go on. No we don't get over it.....Luv ya My LiL Wheezie ♥

Our New Life After Murder

So we've always talked about writing a book to the name of the forgotten moms, voices of moms, etc., but were just never able to get together due to the heartache that goes with our new lives. So last night as I was thinking about how famous all the murderers are ie: Casey Anthony, the latest, I thought we really need to get our views out to the public. After all they even have a reality show with a family that hunts wild boars....Hoggers....yes they will show just about anything from being 16 and pregnant to paying millions to hear a murderer tell you how she killed her child and got away with it! Oh excuse me, how her child "accidently" died and how she panicked and threw the child in a swamp. After all the longer you keep the body from law enforcement the better your chance of getting away with murder. But I am sure the cold pathetic excuse of a human being didn't know that anymore than she knew about chloroform being used as a babysitter. Oh wait about the latter she knew and those witnesses who heard her brag about how she used it to silence her child weren't allowed to testify or so the media tells us. But enough about that or is that all the American public wants to hear these days? Maybe it is but maybe we should just see if maybe it isn't. Maybe we should see if just maybe there are so many others out their just waiting for their voices to be heard. But does the American public want to hear about the victims or is that just one day out of the year or once in awhile? Perhaps it isn't something they want in their faces once a week or something they want to think about especially if they haven't been victimized. We all know all too well, even some of us before our loved ones were murdered, that we could sleep better at night if we didn't believe that it could ever happen to us. Definitely we felt sorry for those who had so tragically lost their loved ones but as long as our family is/was intact then we do our best to not think about it. So why then if the American public doesn't care to see the victims on a regular basis because of how painful it is to them...I know they don't know and could never possibly know the pain...then how is they are so interested, fascinated, mesmerized, etc. by the murderers? You know the ones that devastated a family and changed their lives forever. They can watch them on tv and the media loves to continue on with the murderer, the murderer, the murderer. Will they get parole, how "bad" life is in prison, how two lives were lost....wait a minute that is where I draw the line on that one! Hello...they are still alive and now and forever everytime I hear that saying that two lives were lost I will equate that persons intelligence/common sense to that of the Anthony jurors. Sorry not trying to be insulting here but the obvious is the obvious and my child is dead and the murderer is alive! Our visitations are at a cemetary thinking or trying not to think our loved one is laying in a casket under this fine earth we walk on! Or in a jar knowing that is all we have left of all the hopes, aspirations and desires we had for our loved ones. That is because someone, no lets call it like it is, some coward murderer decided to steal their precious life without any regard whatsoever. So now they are the ones whose life was "lost" and they are the ones who the media sensationalizes! Before finally falling asleep last night, with the usual thoughts of how our lives have been destroyed , it came to me. I should look into writing about the tragic murder of my daughter Lisa Christine Maas and so many others like Lisa whose lives were so tragically and brutally ended. I shouldn't give up on trying to let others know how our lives are changed and how much we hate our new lives and what we must do to cope with the loss. Lisa loved to write and was so very good at it. Some of her writings might even suggest, to those who believe the theory of predetermined destiny, that she somehow knew her time on this earth would be limited. What would the title be? We have had many good ideas as that one but there must be words in the title that would get the attention of others to make them want to read it. I thought well then it must have the word MURDER in it as the VICTIM just doesn't seem to spark the same interest with the public. So how much more appropriate than Life After Murder or so I thought. Sounded good to me but unbeknownst to me the title has already been taken. What surprised me, however, was not that it was taken but moreso what the title was being used for. Yes you are correct it is the title of a book and a series of interviews on a radio show based on life after murder for the murderers! Please tell me that isn't the only thing the public wants to hear and read about. I am determing and I will find a title but it will still be based on the "true" life after murder. You know the lives that are left in shambles, a million broken pieces, that are trying to learn not only how but why they should live this new life.

It seems lonely here but then again so is our journey. I haven't been here in awhile but I wonder if that is because the reality of it is so difficult and some days it doesn't seem real at all. This past week was always the week we went to Cedar Point Amusement Park which we haven't visited since our beautiful Lisa was taken from our lives. One morning I could smell the fresh morning air and for just one moment, one tiny moment I felt like we were at camp waiting for the morning dew to burn off and head over to the park to start with our early bird passes-another tradition of ours. For just one moment in time I remembered what it felt like when our lives were whole and we weren't living this nightmare and we were happy. Just like that it was gone and the sadness engulfed my spirit and soul reminding me one of the most important things in my life was gone and would never be returning.....

St Patricks Day

Yet another day, holiday, passes without Lisa in our lives. Memories of the shopping trip to the outlet stores when Lisa purchased all her green "garb" on sale after St. Pattys day in anticipation to wear for the following year. Frugal she was and she put it away in preparation to wear the next year. Like so many things in life she was denied...wearing them and celebrating the holiday was taken away from her. Such a trivial thing yet so painful when we found them and now today again remembering. Every small memory that so many other take for granted bring such pain to those who have lost their child. Things that were and those that never will be again...How can the sadness ever possibly ease...IT DOESN'T! It just gets worse as the journey begins to wear away at you not only physically but at your soul or what is left of it after your heart has been so broken and torn apart.

I am a Mother

I am not an indirect reference...

I am a mother

As a child I played with dolls

I guess it was pratice

I am a mother

As a teenager I babysat, also practice

I am a mother

I remember when the dr said yes

I am a mother

I'll never forget the day of delivery

I am a mother

There were diapers and bottles

I am a mother

Learning to walk and to talk

I am a mother

There were skinned knees and measles

I am a mother

Riding a bike and learning to read

I am a mother

There was drivers ed and a first date

I am a mother

Then came that call

I am a mother

Only a few short years

I am a mother

Now just memories and sadness

I am a mother

Only tears and photographs

I am a mother

I am not an indirect reference

I am a mother

by Julie Dinkens

In Loving Memory of

My Son

Jeremy Earl Dinkens

Here it is, Here it isn't...

For some reason this was much funnier when I heard it said by Johnny Depp as he played the peculiar yet loveable Willy Wonka while searching for the key as the spoiled child was being overwhelmed by squirrels. Now it has new meaning for the mother of a murdered child as she tries to get the "square" wheels of justice to turn. You see they don't move very fast, if at all, and well when they do they clunk forward only to stop until the next time you can get them to turn over the next edge of the wheel. Which brings us to the title...Here is your trial...here it isn't...here is your final pre-trial hearing...here it isn't...you get the picture. All the way down to the phone call we received yesterday saying a hearing was to be held today for the murderer whose lawyer believes he needed to be recommitted back to the mental hospital. Seems he doesn't really like jail too much these days despite only being there for 2 out of the last 21 months since he murdered our beautiful Lisa. So we spend all night wondering how we will handle seeing this pathetic excuse for a human being in person for the first time. We are told we will get a phone call later in the day with the time of the hearing. No phone call, no info on the "official" docket sheet...nothing but endless hours of now wondering if we are going to once again be bypassed in the process only to later be scolded with You need to be at all the hearings so the judge knows her life mattered to you. WTF!?
We would if you would do things they way you should and notify us! So this morning after a long night or limited sleep and nightmares we finally get a phone call with a Gee I guess I forgot to call you and tell you the hearing has been postponed and we are not sure when we are going to reschedule. All the way down to the phone calls we are left with the Here it is, Here it isn't game. Don't worry it is just our emotions you are dealing with. We just all better learn to take it in stride as after all our name in nowhere to be found in the Criminal Justice System. Perhaps we could have our own and call it the Victims Justice System and promise the murderers different things like visitations, appeals or early paroles and then say: Here it isn't!

Questions

Questions

For 18 years & 364 days I was blessed,
Now by some I am told it is a test.

To see if my faith is strong,
Or will I tell others to believe, I was wrong.

Was that all my daughters life was in the scheme,
Her loss leaving our lives with no meaning or theme.

A simple test as if it were a chess game,
between good & evil in His name.

Brutally taken by such an evil spawn,
Was my daughter's life just a pawn?

One who is manipulated, powerless & weak,
A mere peon so to speak.

Is that all her life meant to Him,
That she could be taken on such a whim?

For there was no miracle on that horrific night,
Her body bloody & lifeless after a courageous fight.

Her killer watched as she lay dying on the floor
Wasn't my beautiful daughter's life worthy of more?

Lisa's spirit visited me before she went on her way,
She wanted to let me know that she would be okay.

Lisa told me, Mom I was not alone you see,
The angels were right there beside me.

Now I must believe that Lisa's spirit is free,
Because of her kind heart she held that key.

How can I ever see the beauty of this life,
When the pain constantly cuts my heart like a knife?

Ironic that is, some might say,
As Lisa died the very same way.

As I walk through life behind my mask.
There are so many questions I must ask.

In Loving Memory of
Lisa Christine Maas