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The comments, emails, texts, calls and visitors have been overwhelming. Donations of xanax that have kept me from having a major meltdown.

My aunt Jennifer and her husband, Jeff (both in local law enforcement) personally arranged for the same officer who delivered the news to Jed's family members, to provide the same dignity of formally visiting me as well. I had already gotten the call, but it was still the formality they felt I deserved as much as any other member of his family.

I woke up this morning, and opening my eyes brought in a flood of dread and fresh devastation. I looked over to see my mom and two sisters curled up on the floor beside me. I moaned. The night before, I had begged them not to leave me alone for any minute. They stayed...so in the morning I saw them and that's how I knew. It wasn't a dream. I was hoping I would wake up, and it would all be a bad dream. It's still a bad dream, but I'm living it. I'm just living it without him.

My mom sat up and knelt beside me. "So he's still dead mommy. He's still dead isn't he."

She nodded quietly with tears streaming down her face.

References to "recovering the bodies" in the news are a spark of reality, the very harsh kind.

I have to return phone calls to all those people who pleaded for updates all along, I'm overwhelmed. Not only can I not keep up, but I can't repeatedly break the news that reboyfriend in all his perfection and wonder, died in a plane crash this weekend. I can't make that phone call over and over and over. I can write one blog, though. I can type out one catharsis and hope that replaces all those calls I can't make.

The idea flashes through my mind (for just the quickest moment) to pick up my cell phone and call reboyfriend. I keep having split-second thoughts where I, just for a second, think of how much better I will feel after I can talk about this horrible day to my boyfriend, to my best friend. That's right before I realize I can't ever do that again.

That's not to say I didn't talk to him out loud, alone in my car yesterday, before I knew they'd found the plane that had flown into the side of a mountain. I talked out loud, saying "Jed, dammit, please tell me you're still breathing somewhere. Please don't you dare end this love story like this." I think it's safe to say that I will probably have conversations with him (maybe a little one sided, but he didn't talk back very much anyway) frequently.

My stomach turns and nearly rejects the two bites of banana I shoved into it earlier today, any time I think about going back to our home, where his best friend and I will have to go through his closet. Or worse, the day we have to start going through his things and deciding what to do with them.

Deciding where I have to move, because I can't live there anymore. I can't live in the home that was ours, that still has his desk scattered with errands and post-its that need to be done today. Mercy God, with his smell on every towel (we shared) and his loofah (ew, we shared that too).

I can't bear the thought of his funeral. I can not bear this.

My family sat around this morning, after my sobs woke them up and they were forced to confirm that it was not a bad dream. They sat around in a circle around me and asked what my favorite memory of Jed was. How can I narrow this down, and how can I bear to revisit them, wishing for him to be here to laugh about with me - or better yet, share his own.

I know I will never be the same, ever again. This blog, as those of you who've read it from its inception until now, has chronicled nearly a year...of more loss and more bliss condensed into one small person's small life, than you could ever justifiably call fiction. Yet, you so wish that it were. So do I.

Friends I haven't heard from in years, call me choking on their own sobs. And this was before we knew he was gone...this was just when we knew he was missing. My friends are sobbing with me. They are in shambles, with me.

The 12-hour span of sheer nightmare between the moment his family called me at 8:15 a.m. saying they couldn't find the men, and the moment at 8:15 p.m. where Shelley called me to confirm that our men had been taken from us, I was able to function somewhat. This is because I kept holding to the hope that if he crashed, his studly toughness would have him crawling out, hobbling through the wilderness to find help, bringing us all back together in tearful reunion.

I am surrounded by family, all of whom have volunteered to make the calls I can't bear to make over and over. If you get one from them and not me, please know that it is because I am in a little bit of a trance. I know this is probably a rare moment of lucidity I will have before the truth of what I've been robbed of sinks all the way in, and I am beyond functional. If I didn't answer, it's because they had the common sense to turn my ringer off and let me stare into space, a daze punctuated by violent cries and comments like, "Should I call him? Should I just listen to his voicemail greeting?"

The length of the life I have ahead of me that can not be shared with him, looms ahead of me like a seven back to back marathons (we all know I can't run more than 500 feet without being done). That much time without him is the cruelest form of torture.

I can't email him or text him where he is. I can not give him the "offspring" he begged me for. I loathe the sight of the Utah Bride & Groom I bought on Saturday to pick out ideas for the wedding he asked for 10 days ago, ignorant to the fact that he had been dead for an entire day when I bought it, with nobody in the world knowing of it.

The phone rings and there is that split second where I wonder if it is him, then the horrific realization that that's impossible.

My family watched me screeching in horror as I knelt down on the ground last night, getting The Call. I saw the tormented helplessness in their swollen eyes. I heard the tormented helplessness in the voices on the phone.

My 3 year old cousin Allie is pulling my 21-year-old sister Caitlin around on a leash. Caitlin sits. Stays. It's making me smile.

I read the forums in the motocross circuit, where friends of Jed logged on to say what a great guy he was. I know this. More than anyone. I know he was the best man in the world, with a good heart and the most potential.

I can't imagine how inappropriate it must seem that I am on my blog - usually set aside for cataloguing my embarrassing moments and irreverent opinions - the morning after finding that he was so violently ripped from my life. It feels cheap or insensitive. But this is soothing me, so if you found it distasteful, please know that sharing it with you, my online journal and those who have been sweet enough to follow it, is one of the very few things that bring me any sort of comfort. My love to you who read and comment, with so much sincerity.

For facts: He and his brother Jordan and their dad, Ron, took off from Jerome Idaho at 11:00 a.m. Friday. The plane broke apart mid-are, most likely after a sharp right turn in violent weather. He's a flake, we know this, who doesn't respect the unforgiving nature of phone batteries, so to not have heard from him for a couple days didn't alarm me. But it alarmed his family, and when they called me Monday morning, I knew something was very, very wrong. It took 12 hours from the first phone call to get the final one. It was the longest and most tortured 12 hours of my life. I anticipate worse is to come, but the day of not knowing was living everyone's worst nightmare.

How his mother and other family must be feeling right now, must be unspeakable. All three men in their family, gone with no goodbyes. Crews were not able to access the wreckage site until last night, via ATV only. I heard they couldn't remove the guys until this morning, but have since heard otherwise. It broke my heart to think of the crews getting there, seeing it, confirming it, and then hopping back on their 4-Wheelers, leaving the three of them alone to spend one more undignified night in a mangled plane. I hope that wasn't the case. So many layers of this break my heart, over and over and over. What were his last thoughts? At around 12:00 p.m. on Friday, mine were certainly of him. They were of how many days were left till he got home. How will I ever stop this heaving of tears? I can't imagine it ever ending.

If you would like, you can read a little about what happened here, and follow some of the thoughts others are having about him. Bless you for reading.

http://www.vitalmx.com/forums/Moto-Related,20/Rest-in-Peace-Jed-Mingo,588913

http://www.motonews.com/index.php?option=com_fireboard&Itemid=4&func=view&catid=4&id=&id=153033&catid=4

http://www.newstin.com/tag/us/138220175

option=com_fireboard&Itemid=4&func=view&catid=4&id=&id=153033&catid=4