18/05/2026
Ever since my son died, time feels different.
Before Braedon died, time felt abstract. Infinite, almost.
Something I assumed would keep showing up for me.
There would always be another summer.
Another conversation.
Another chance to become the person I kept saying I wanted to be.
But after you lose a child you come face to face with your own mortality. And time feels more fragile. Limited. Real in a way you can’t unsee.
You start noticing things you never used to.
The way someone talks about a dream they’ve had for ten years
with the same detached tone they use to talk about buying laundry detergent.
The way people postpone joy like they’re storing it somewhere for later.
The way entire lives disappear inside routines and perpetual busyness.
And maybe that sounds dramatic.
But I watched my son run out of time before he even got the chance to graduate high school...
So now when I hear people say things like
“maybe someday,”
“when life settles down,”
“when I’m more healed,”
“when I’m ready,”
Or worse, "maybe in another life..."
It doesn’t just pass by me anymore.
It stays. It weighs on me in a way it never used to.
Because I know how fragile all of this is underneath the performance of normalcy. I know how easily time disguises itself as endless right up until it’s not.
I know there are people dying with lives still trapped inside them.
People who are technically alive but haven’t felt fully awake in years.
And I know “someday” becomes a habit so slowly you barely notice yourself disappearing.
Eight years ago, after Braedon passed,
I found his bucket list tucked away in the back of his closet.
“Things I Want To Do Before I Die,” stretched across the top in his childlike handwriting.
And ever since I held his dreams in my hands, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about how many people are quietly absent from their own lives…aching for more.
How many people who don’t recognize the person staring back at them in the mirror.
So I’m starting a special project in memory of Braedon because his list is still shaping my life, 8 years later.
This is something deeply personal and honestly, a little scary
(because… what if it flops?).
I want to inspire 1000 people to stop waiting and write their bucket list.
Not the curated version.
The real one.
The honest kind.
The kind that exposes how much of yourself you’ve abandoned.
The kind that reminds you you’re still here because you are and your life deserves to be lived with intention and purpose.
This kind that makes you excited to get up in the morning.
If you want to be part of it:
Write a bucket list with at least 5 things on it.
Take a photo. Send it to me.
I’ll be sharing them throughout this project
because maybe what we need most right now
is proof that there are people are still willing
to imagine a life beyond the one they accidentally and quietly settled into.
