You know the famous aversion therapy scene from A Clockwork Orange when they stretch Malcolm McDowell’s eyelids wide open with a pair of clamps and force him to watch ultraviolent images? That’s what I thought of when I sat down on the couch to watch home videos of Rob a week or so before the unveiling of his headstone. I chose not to play Beethoven’s Ninth.

The last time I had watched these blasts from the past was a few days after Rob died, when we were all miserably hanging out at my ex-wife Caryn’s house in Long Island. I remember how we were crying and laughing at the same time, which isn’t that easy to do, and finally had to shut it off because we just couldn’t take it anymore.

As I braced myself for another viewing, I wasn’t sure why I was about to put myself through this time-travel torture again, but now I know that it was nothing more than my last great leap on the road toward healing.

I popped in the first DVD (I had digitized our old videotapes a few years back), poured a glass of Syrah, and pressed play. I was fully prepared to enter Guinness World Records as the world’s tallest puddle of tears.

Watching our old life flash before my eyes, almost a year later, was different right from the start. The first thing up was Robbie (it was always Robbie and........

© Psychology Today