Invisible

Dear Kendall,

I want you to know before I continue on with anything in this letter that I love you unconditionally and that no one and nothing in this world or any other can change that. I’ll love you where ever you are, wherever I am. I’ll love you worldwide.

There are a few things I need to tell you…well…, that I want to tell you, and that you need to know.

There was nothing you could have done. Nothing.

It wasn’t like I just woke up and decided that I can’t do this anymore. It’s been a built up thought process that’s been going on long before I met you. Long before I met you. I don’t want you to sit there, and tell yourself that you could have prevented this, because there’s a 95% chance that you couldn’t have. This was something I needed to do, because I couldn’t handle it. I couldn’t handle living with the secret anymore; I couldn’t go through with keeping it from you. I didn’t want you to have to see me when it got too bad.

I think now is a better time than ever to tell you why I decided to do this.

I have…well by the time you’re reading this, had, Huntington’s disease. It’s the fancy way of saying that by the time I’m 30, or earlier, my brain is going to waste away and I’m going to be a vegetable. I’d no longer be the Sofie Grace Jacob that you fell in love with. I wouldn’t remember who you were; I wouldn’t be able to do anything for myself. I’d be an empty shell. I wouldn’t be able to do anything for myself, and everyone else would have to do it for me.

I kind of lied to you earlier, actually.

In a way it started all before I knew you. My grandmother passed the gene to my mom, and my mom passed it down to me. The only reason I say I lied, is because I didn’t find out I even had the disease until about a year ago, when my mother started to develop symptoms. So her, my brother, sister and I went to the Doctors to get tested. Of course my brother and sister didn’t have the disease, but, I did. And from such a young age, I watched the disease slowly eat away at my grandmother, and I was going to have to watch it again, with my mother. It tore me apart watching my grandmother slowly lose her mind, to remind her who I was each and every time I went to see her, to hear her yell at my dad for trying to help her eat. I was going to have to watch it all again, I was going to have to be taking care of my mother, being the one she didn’t remember, crying every night because she was slowly wasting away, I was going to be the one that was being yelled at.

I didn’t want to be that. I didn’t want to have to go through that again. And yeah, that’s a fucking selfish thing to say. That I didn’t want to be around my mom because I couldn’t deal with it. I know that, Kendall. I do.

But that’s honestly not the reason I did what I did.

I did what I did because of you.

I did it because I didn’t want you to have to go through it. I didn’t want you to have to be the one that I forgot, or be the one that had to watch me slowly waste away until I died. I didn’t want you to have to watch me slowly turn into someone you never knew. I didn’t want you to watch the person you fell in love with turn into someone who couldn’t even do anything on her own.

I thought a lot about just breaking up you in the worst way possible. Just tearing you’re heart apart, so that you’d never try to speak to me again. So that way you’d maybe get over me, that you’d move on and be happy with someone else. But then I got selfish again. I didn’t want to live like that. I didn’t want to watch myself turn into someone I didn’t know. I didn’t want to not remember who the people I loved where. More importantly, I didn’t want anyone to have to go through this so many times. Three people dying in a span of maybe 10 years? I didn’t want that.

Kendall, I did want to marry you. I wanted to have kids with you. I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you. I wanted to be the one that you fell asleep with and woke up with each and every day. I love you Kendall, and I always will. Nothing is going to change that fact, nothing at all.

I would have done all that too. But no, I had to be the fucking sibling that had the fucked up gene. I had to be the one that was going to die early in life. I was the one that couldn't have kids because there’s a 50% chance they’d be in the same fucked up situation I’m in. I can’t do that to myself, to my kids, or to you Kendall. You know I cried for a long time, right? I cried a lot when I found out. First it was because I was the one that had it, not my brother, who doesn’t even care about life in general. The second time I cried was because I didn’t want to die. The third time I cried was because I was going to have to be the one that didn’t remember anything. And the fourth time I cried…, I cried for you…, okay make that the fourth AND the sixth time, because I’m crying as I’m writing this. I cried for you, because all I ever wanted to do was make you happy Kendall. I cried because you were going to have to watch me die. And I’m crying now, because it never really hit me how much I love you, until I’m forcing myself to sit down and write you all letters. It never hit me how much I depend on you, how much I care about what you think, how much I care about your well being.

I’m sorry Kendall.

I’m sorry for making you read this. I’m sorry for making you attend my funeral. I’m sorry for tearing your heart out. I’m sorry for ending us. I’m sorry I couldn’t be strong. I’m sorry I couldn’t be as brave as you think I am. I’m sorry I stopped believing that I could do anything I wanted. I’m sorry I put you in this situation. I’m sorry for everything. For not telling you earlier, for not trusting you with this, I’m sorry I didn’t believe you’d stay if you knew the outcome. I’m sorry that I didn’t say goodbye to you in person. I’m sorry I didn’t get to say I love you, or kiss you, or hug you, or lay with you before I did this.

I’m so fucking sorry Kendall.

So fucking sorry.

But know this…,

I will love you unconditionally forever and ever. I’ll always be where you are, always. I promise to watch you wherever you are. I’ll be there whenever you need me. I’ll always be with you, as long as you want me to be. I’ll never stop loving you, ever.

I love you Kendall Francis Schmidt.

Love,
Forever & Always
Sofie