If I Go, Will They Miss Me?
- Natasha Parker
- 18 hours ago
- 3 min read
Have you ever taken the time to reflect on the “if,” “ands,” and “buts” that consume your inner thoughts? Have you ever had regrets that made you ask yourself, What if? Why? Maybe… or Should I have? Or have you ever simply accepted that fate is fate... that the universe is unpredictable and sometimes God tests His strongest soldiers to see whether we will take those challenges as lessons to learn from and overcome, or allow our environment to consume us and eat us alive?
We’ve all come across films that stop us in our tracks and demand our full attention. The kind of films that, in one way or another, snatch us up like we’re watching the most dramatic scene in a movie where the main character is grabbed by the shoulders, shaken, and forced to reckon with reality.
If I Go, Will They Miss Me?, written and directed by Walter Thompson-Hernández and starring Danielle Brooks, J. Alphonse Nicholson, and Bodhi Dell, does exactly that.
Danielle Brooks via IMDB J. Alphonse Nicholson via IMDB Bodhi Dell via IMDB
The film takes us on an emotional roller coaster while forcing us to sit with uncomfortable truths about our realities. More importantly, it makes us pause and have that personal heart-to-heart with ourselves.
How do you envision your life?
What does happiness look like for you?
What does a healthy relationship look like for you, and what does it look like for your children?
And perhaps the hardest question of all: How far are you willing to bend, sacrifice, or compromise for someone else’s satisfaction?
If I Go, Will They Miss Me? sheds light on the struggles of being a product of your environment and the damage that being your own worst enemy can do to you mentally. It shows what happens when you refuse to rise above it all because, somewhere in your subconscious, you’ve convinced yourself that you will never be more than what you are. You continuously sell yourself short because you believe you aren’t deserving of the right kind of love even when you have a wife who has held you down for years, children who yearn for your love and attention, and, especially, an older son who literally sees you as a Greek god.
The film also sheds light on mothers like Lozita, who bottle up their emotions and constantly set their own needs aside for the “good” of their family. But the reality is, you cannot pour from an empty cup. At some point, you have to ask yourself, Who has been there for me when I’m down? Who is pouring into me?
Love doesn’t always look like keeping the family together for the sake of the children. Sometimes love looks like separating yourself from a toxic relationship that no longer serves you. Sometimes loving your children means showing them that choosing yourself, establishing boundaries, and walking away from something unhealthy can also be an act of love.
If I Go, Will They Miss Me? also reveals something beautiful about the way our children see us. Our children often see the good in us even when we can’t see it in ourselves. They see us as their superheroes. And no matter how much negativity we may carry about ourselves, we shouldn’t project those same beliefs onto our children.
We shouldn’t be so afraid that our children will turn out like us that we discourage them from becoming exactly who they are meant to be. Because imagine the greatness they see reflected back at them when they look at you. Imagine what it means for a child to look at their parent and see possibility, strength, and someone worth becoming.
And perhaps one of the biggest lessons If I Go, Will They Miss Me? teaches us is that sometimes you have to lose it all to truly understand what you had. Sometimes loss forces change. Sometimes it forces you to look in the mirror and finally see what everyone else has been seeing in you all along.
Sometimes loss is inevitable, but there are lessons within that loss.
Lessons that teach you to want better for yourself.
Lessons that remind you not to allow the next generation to experience everything you endured.
Lessons that show you that your environment may have shaped you, but it does not have to define you.
And lessons that remind you that mistakes happen,but you cannot allow those mistakes to continue changing the trajectory of your life.
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