Tragedy in CT

I feel great sadness when I think about what happened to the families and children in Connecticut. I have lost so many important people in my life and I know the pain of loss, including the loss of a child near to my heart, but just as I was touched in a new way this year on the anniversary of my 11 year old cousin's death, I am heartbroken like I never have been before over these types of tragedies.

As a mother, I would do anything and everything to protect my child. I have had to do numerous things in his first 9 months that he didn't like but were ultimately for the best. I've already gone through a couple of medical emergencies that have made me ponder the unthinkable sadness of a hurt child, but this is so different.

It takes an enormous amount of trust to hand your child over to someone else to care for and to have a tragedy happen in a trusted, safe place like an elementary school is so disturbing and unfathomable.  I am heart broken for those families. I have hugged and kissed my son even more today than usual and I can not even begin to think about how those 20 families are not able to do that to their children anymore. I am thankful that he is still young enough that I don't have to explain this to him and he doesn't have to feel fear.

I don't often step into the political arena, I don't feel educated enough to throw my thoughts into the ring but to me it boils down to this...

There are people in the world who are sick enough to kill innocent children. We allow those people to buy guns. Until those people are treated or laws are in place to better screen these types of people from purchasing guns, I feel that gun control absolutely need to be stricter and frankly I hate the second amendment for its vagueness. I have friends that hunt, I respect that, I do. I have friends that have guns to protect themselves, which frankly I understand because there are too many people who SHOULD NOT have guns that have them. It is a catch 22, I realize that, but deep down I feel that if it were harder to obtain guns there would be less need for people to have them for protection and less tragedies like these.

Ditto on mental health - if we were able to help more people PROACTIVELY there would be less of these horrific acts of violence happening among our own citizens and frankly, we have enough to worry about from the terrorists that hate our country.

It makes me sad that there are more and more of these types of shootings happening each year, or at least it feels that way. I now feel anxious when I walk into the mall, into the movies and into the airport. I am constantly on alert for anything or anyone out of place...this is NOT the world I want my son to grown up in. IT NEEDS TO CHANGE.