MIAMI – What's the most difficult story to cover?
Someone asked me that this week, and the answer came easily. I have the toughest time covering stories about parents who have lost children. And this week, I am in the middle of two of those.
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We started the week in, Gainesville, where a desperate mother and father refuse to give up hope that they will see their first-born son alive. Then, these last few days, we are in a Miami courtroom, where a forever-heartbroken mother is sitting through the trial of a young man accused of the unspeakably brutal murder of her only daughter.
As it happens, in these same weeks, we are celebrating my own two daughters' respective teenage milestone birthdays. They are always on my mind as we cover the ordeals of the families enduring the murder trial and the missing person search.
I have not yet figured out professional detachment, how to block the deep and personal hurt for parents like Mrs. Osorio and the Aguilars.
There were the Ryces, the Goughs, the Melendis ... covering each of their heartbreaking cases is like discovering a parents' most profound pain for the first time.
If you are a parent reading this, you know that feeling of being potentially vulnerable to some cruel outside force suddenly ripping from you the most important thing in your life.