Grieving, Remembering, and Honoring My Son

My heart is shattered beyond words.

On Sunday, my beautiful 15-year-old son Daniel crossed over, and I can barely breathe under the weight of this loss.

I don’t know what to think. I don’t know what to feel. I only know the ache... the emptiness... the numbness that has taken over me.

Please, I ask with all the tenderness I can muster—don’t ask me questions right now. I don’t have answers. ( We are asking members of our Cuban family to please not reach out to his 99 year old grandmother at this time. )

My spirit feels like it’s dissolving. I am lost in this grief, and I don't know how to move forward.

Hold space for me. That’s all I ask.

My coven, Al Anon, Roanoke Diversity Center and my neighborhood friends are all taking very good care of me. I'm so grateful for you my online friends and everyone who loves me and loves him. 💔 I love you Daniel.

My dear friends,

I've been meaning to write something to you for days now… but the words just haven’t been there. I keep hoping that soon I’ll feel that familiar flow of Life Force energy again—that spark I love to share with you when I’m feeling grounded and whole. But right now, I’m empty. I’m doing my best to be gentle with myself and to allow space for what’s here.

Thankfully, my short videos are already scheduled for the month, so you’ll still see me pop up. But beyond that, I just don’t have anything else to give at the moment.

I want to thank each and every one of you for the love, the messages, the gifts, the prayers, and the healing light you’ve been sending me and my family. It means more than I can ever say.

Please also hold in your hearts his mother Eileen, his sister Gabriela, his Tía Cachi, his cousin Chelsea and her daughter—all of whom were constants in his life and are just as heartbroken. And his Tiger family—he was just beginning to connect with them and was so excited to have found that circle.

For now, I’m giving myself at least two weeks to grieve, to rest, to begin the long process of saying goodbye to my beautiful son Daniel. It may take longer—I just don’t know yet when I’ll be ready to return to work or show up in the ways I’m used to.

Your support has given me something so precious: time. The gift of time to grieve without the stress of finances pressing down on me. I can’t begin to express how deeply grateful I am.

I’m doing my best to find the silver lining, to trust that strength and wisdom will rise from these ashes. I love you all so much. Thank you for walking with me through this.

With love always, Bernard

A very big thank you to Elizabeth Parsons for organizing this fundraiser to give me the opportunity to say goodbye. I don't even know what day it is much less have it in me raise money or book a trip to bury my son. Thank you all so much! 💖 To help go to https://gofund.me/5ff222ab

For Daniel, My Beautiful Boy

Daniel…

My son.

My beautiful, brilliant, beloved boy.

Only fifteen years in this world,

And yet—

You carved your name so deeply into the walls of my soul,

The echo of you will never fade.

I was not your everyday, not your morning alarm or nightly tuck-in,

But oh, how I cherished every second we shared.

Every FaceTime ping, every text—

Each one lit me up like fire in my chest.

You called, and I sang inside.

You—

So sharp, so dazzling with thought,

So loud with justice,

So full of love it spilled out in quiet kindness,

In passionate words,

In that look you’d give that said, “I see it, Dad. I see the world. I want to change it.”

Your compassion could shake mountains.

Your beliefs, strong like our Seminole roots,

Proud like the warriors we come from.

You were proud—of us, of you.

And Daniel, I was—I am—so proud of you.

You amazed me.

You always amazed me.

Your smile—God, your smile—

It lives behind my eyes now,

Flashes in the dark when the tears won’t stop.

And they won’t stop.

My heart is shattered,

Grief has swallowed me whole,

And yet—I would choose this pain a thousand times

For the joy of being your father even once.

The world feels wrong without you.

Bent, incomplete.

But I feel you still…

In the hush between breaths,

In the morning sun,

In every hawk that flies high above our grove.

I will always be your father.

Always.

In life, in death, in memory,

In every whispered prayer,

In every song I sing for you from this broken place.

Thank you, Daniel.

For choosing me.

For loving me back.

For every moment—

You are my miracle and my mourning.

My gift, my guide, my sacred son.

And I will love you,

Forever.