Grief and healing is a funny thing. It’s been 14 months since Jaime died, and sometimes we can go days or even weeks without crying about her now. Charlie and I still share melancholy smiles and sighs from time to time when we hear her favorite song or Stella tells a story about her, but tears no longer happen regularly.
Then, out of nowhere, BAM. I’m sobbing like it was yesterday.
Last night I watched the Grey’s Anatomy season finale, and near the end of the episode Amelia listened to Meredith’s final voicemail from Derek. I was already emotional because (1) Grey’s was the show Jaime & I always watched together, and (2) Derek was Jaime’s favorite person on the show so I know she’d have been outraged he is gone. After the scene ended and I had a good cry, I opened up my computer to pull up her old voicemails that I had saved from my old iPhone to my computer last fall before I upgraded my phone.
They’re gone.
All. Gone.
Remember how my computer hard drive crashed last month and I lost about 7 months of documents & videos and 6 weeks of pictures? Well, I didn’t realize it at the time, but I also hadn’t backed up the folder on my desktop that had miscellaneous Jaime stuff in it – including those voicemails that I had saved about 6 months ago.
Words cannot express how hard I sobbed last night.
Her voice. I can’t believe I lost my last recordings of her hysterical voicemails. “Oh Jos, have I got a story for you…” or “Dude, CALL ME BACK. [Boyfriend] called me his ex-girlfriend’s name last night. Yeah, I obviously did not handle that well. CALL ME!” or even a simple, “Yos-mite (my nickname for some reason), I’m coming over after this stupid dentist appointment. Call me if you need me to pick up anything.”
I cannot believe I lost those voicemails.
#Crushed
I am so sorry 🙁
I am so sorry, Josey. That is a tough loss. Nothing can ever take away the love you have for her in your heart. That will remain forever, even after all the memories fade. Thinking of you.
Oh Jos. I’m so, so sorry.
Oh no. I am so sorry.
I am so sorry you lost your link to her voice. That is crushing. ((Hugs))
That is so sad. If only we didn’t live half way round the world. I would offer my husbands services. He finds lost data….if you wanted to post to NZ let me know.
Thanks Becky. That truly means a lot. Unfortunately, I’ve returned to hard disk to HP at this point or I’d probably take you up on it. :*(
Oh no! Sometimes I hate technology so much. I’m so sorry this happened.
I am so sorry. I don’t have anything to say that can help at all. This is devastating.
Oh Jos.. I am so so sorry. I know there is nothing more that can be said to make it better. Just so sorry. Big big hugs.
I would be devastated too if I lost my mom’s voice mail recordings. you’ve still got videos and all the memories so hold on tight to what you do have. I’m so sorry. Hugs.
I am so sorry, Josey. I’m guessing you don’t have your old phone at all anymore? This exact thing happened with my mom’s VM’s, but we were somehow able to located my old phone in a box in the back of the basement. This is so hard. And grief is awful. No matter how long it’s been, I think there always be moments of crushing grief. Sending huge hugs to you.
We do, but my husband used the phone after me, so his SIM card cleared all of my information out unfortunately. 🙁 I just double checked to be sure. *sigh*
Oh no… I’m so sorry. That is such a loss. 🙁
After my dad died we found that he had saved a voicemail from his mom from five years or so back (she had passed a few years before my dad did). It was of her singing him happy birthday. We buried him on what would have been his 43rd birthday so we played the voicemail during the service. There wasn’t a dry eye in the house. I know he cherished that voicemail so much, he listened to it every year. I wish that I had something similar with his voice. Anyway, sorry to ramble about that, obviously this is triggering feelings in me too. Sending love.
It’s such a gift to hear those voices…
Mac or PC? And do you still have the hard drive? Brian MAY be able to help.
PC. I sent it back, actually. 🙁 I had our IT guy try and he was unable to get anything off it – said it kept freezing his system completely whenever he tried whatever techy-trick he had. It was $1,000 to try the big guns, but for what I thought was lost it didn’t seem worth it. Now I kind of wish I’d have held onto it and reached out to my blog friends for ideas first. *sigh*
I’m so sorry. I had a recording of my great-grandmother — the person I named y daughter after — and I think I lost it in the move. A single recording lost 23 years after her death. I can’t imagine how devastating it would be to lose all those voicemails so soon after Jamie passed (and so young). I hope there’s a way to recover them from your hard drive.
I’m so sorry. I’d be devastated too.
A couple of weeks after E was born I was uploading my camera’s memory card and it got bumped while plugged into my computer. The whole memory card went blank and I lost every single picture I took of her in the NICU. My brother, who is pretty tech savvy, was able to retrieve the data. Sometimes things aren’t as gone as we think they are. You should look into a data recovery service. I’m so sorry Jos, I’m devastated for you!
I did look into a data recovery place unfortunately. 🙁 They couldn’t get anything, and at this point I’ve already send the hard drive back into HP. I paid a couple hundred to try to retrieve the data and the next step was closer to $1000 which didn’t seem worth it to me at the time. I hadn’t realized the voicemails were on there though. 🙁
This just leaves me speechless and tight in the throat. I am so sorry for this loss. <3
So SO sorry Josey. No words. xo