My fellow Americans,
There are moments in our history so grim, so heartrending, that they’re forever fixed in each of our hearts as shared grief. Today is one of those moments. 100,000 lives have now been lost to this virus here in the United States alone, each one leaving behind a family that will never again be whole.
I think I know what you’re feeling. You feel like you’re being sucked into a black hole in the middle of your chest. It’s suffocating, your heart is broken and there’s nothing but a feeling of emptiness right now ..
For most of you, you were unable to be there when you lost your beloved family member, or best friend, for most of you, you were unable to be there when they died, alone. With the pain, the anger and frustration, you’ll wonder if you’ll ever b e able to get anywhere from here.
It’s made all the worse by knowing that this is a fateful milestone that we should have never reached, it could have been avoided. According to a study being done by Columbia University, if the administration had reacted just one week earlier to implement social distancing, and do what it had to do, just one week sooner, as many as 36,000 of these deaths might have been averted.
To all of you who are hurting so badly, I’’m so sorry for your loss.
. I know there’s nothing I or anyone else can do to dull the sharpness of the pain you feel right now, but I can promise you from experience, the day will come when the memory of your loved one will bring a smile to your lips before it brings a tear to your eyes.
My prayer for all of you is that that day will come sooner rather than later, but I promise you it will come. When it does, you can know you can make it.
God bless each and every one of you, and the blessed memory of the one you lost.
This nation grieves with you. Take some solace from the fact, we all grieve with you.