No one will ask you

What did you do with that 'dead-kid money'?

They tell you not to make any big decisions in the first year after your kid dies.

I consciously tried to heed that wise advice.

Then, I made a major financial move - I bought a car.

Not out of excitement or retail therapy or some glossy desire for newness. Honestly, I barely remember that year at all. It lives behind frosted glass. But I do remember the way my old car started to feel like a threat every time I slid into the driver’s seat — a simmering panic for which I didn’t yet have words.

The trusty steed I gave up was a beautiful VW wagon. The one I drove the kids to school in every morning, the one with crumbs from a hundred breakfasts and the smell of wet mittens baked into the seats. I’d poured money into keeping her alive — three major repairs in one year, including fixing the back end after a friend borrowed it and totaled it. We didn’t make it through that.

I loved that car. I ache for it now.
But at the time, every new sound that old car made felt like a warning. Every light on the dashboard suggested catastrophe. Every time I turned the key, something in my chest tightened, like I was bracing for another phone call that would split my life in two.

I didn’t understand why I was suddenly so stressed about a car. If it broke, I could just fix it like I always did. I like using things right up. I’m the one who uses a spatula in the mayo jar.

From here, I can see that I wasn’t connecting the dots between “my car is getting old” and “my daughter died in a car accident.”

I wasn’t at all worried about my car failing and getting hurt even though that’s how it seemed to be pouring out.

I just knew I couldn’t handle one more thing being UNHANDLED.
One more thing that could go wrong without warning.
One more reminder that life can break open with zero notice.

So I bought another Volkswagen.
Newer and safer. Also boring in that responsible way.
But it wasn’t haunted.

The dealership guy was a total dick salesman. He never returned my emails when I found parts of the old car he might want for resale. Or when I found the second key. He had no concept of what I was letting go with this sale. Neither did I really.

Then there’s a part I don’t love admitting.
Some of the money came from the fundraiser people set up for us after Chloe died.

So many sent money because they didn’t know what else to do.
Some of it went to therapy.
Some went to replace income and buy food.
Some went to the fog.

Some went to the entirely overpriced cardboard box that is the bare minimum container legally required for cremation.

And some went to a new car.

I told myself I only used a little.
That it was there to make our lives easier.
That I could have afforded it anyway.
And all of that is true.

But no one asks what you do with “dead-kid money.”
They don’t ask anything that first year.
You’re radioactive. If you said you spent it on a clown college tuition, people would nod solemnly and tell you they’re proud of you for “taking steps.”

The ugliest thought I had — the one I shoved as far back as it would go — was this:

Chloe wrecked a bunch of lives. At the very least she owes me is a new car since I’m the one here picking up the pieces.

(Ugh - I know.)

Grief is not known for its digestible morsels.

That first year, I stopped cooking and so I ate in the car constantly — drive-through wrappers shoved into that car door cavern at my hip. Dinners in parking lots where I’d scroll and scroll. In a year where I remember so very little, I CAN recall the exact ratio of lettuce to Big Mac sauce of the burger I ate while parked outside yet another thrift store inhaling the written wit of Lila, connection artist, on Substack. All the while, that car held me.

The new car became an unnamed symbol. Not a joy but just a little something that hadn’t been involved in anything catastrophic. A neutral object in a year that felt akin to wading through spent raspberry bushes.

I held the wheel too tightly on that first drive.
I definitely remember the silence.
Chloe’s bio mum even showed up in ghost form a few times — a raised eyebrow in the passenger seat.

It took more than a year to understand why I needed a new car so urgently:
I couldn’t survive one more surprise. Not one more thing dying without warning.

People like to give rules for grief:
Don’t sell the house. Don’t renovate.
Don’t start something new. Don’t end anything.

I followed some of it by accident. Ignored some with intent.

And then there were choices like buying a a new car — decisions I made for reasons I couldn’t yet name, and had to live with until the truth floated to the surface.

Now, years later, I miss my old VW wagon.
I miss how it was built.
How it held the girls and their backpacks and their bickering.
It carried all the versions of me I no longer am.

The new car is fine.
It’s FINE.

It hasn’t done anything important yet: no school runs, no Halloween costumes in the trunk. Maybe it won’t. It’s not sentimental or sacred.

It’s just a tool.

I didn’t buy healing.
I didn’t buy closure.

I bought one small place in my world where nothing was allowed to implode.

I just wanted to feel safe.