Eddie Diaz's struggle of being sad and missing his son in 9-1-1's eighth season

In last night's 9-1-1 episode Masks (season 8 episode 5) there was this really sad scene of Edmundo "Eddie" Diaz looking at an old picture of him and his son Christopher (pictures posted below). The picture was of their first Halloween after they had moved to Los Angeles. And to add to it was the voiceover of Evan "Buck" Buckley saying how “I can’t imagine anything more painful than going through life alone”. Because at that moment, Eddie was most likely feeling like he truly was alone.

Currently in 9-1-1's eighth season, Eddie and his son Christopher's relationship continues to deteriorate. Eddie is trying to keep communication open by continuing to call his son. However, Chris is still holding on to his anger after seeing Eddie with Kim, who is a look-a-like of Chris' mother and Eddie's late wife Shannon. And since then, he doesn't seem that interested or enthusiastic with talking with his father. It's been shown that Chris will talk to Eddie but their conversations seem to be short and superficial. With all the months Christopher has been gone temporarily living with his grandparents in El Paso nothing seemed to have dimmed his anger towards his dad.

I can't help thinking that his grandparents, Helena and Ramon aren't in any hurry to help Eddie and Chris reconcile. Especially now that they finally got what they wanted, Christopher. This is something they have been trying to do for the longest time. It's so weird, Eddie is their son but since they did a terrible job of raising him by putting so much pressure on him. While they also parentified him, by making him be the "man of the house" when he was only 10 years old. They never seem that supportive of him. I guess Helena and Ramon figured they could get a do-over by trying to take away Eddie's son and raise him as their own. I really hope they are not being manipulative by fueling Chris' anger in hopes of getting him to stay with them permanently. But I wouldn't be surprised if they were.

I know Eddie feels guilty about the Kim incident which is why he didn't trying to stop his son from going back to El Paso with his grandparents. He wanted to give Chris time and space to deal with his feelings and emotions. But it's been months and I think Eddie is going to have to fight for his son. He needs to have a serious talk with Chris and really affirm that what happened with Kim was something that came from grief. He also needs to explain that although Kim looked like Chris' mother Shannon, he had no romantic interest in her. He missed Shannon and seeing someone that looked like her lead to him making the poor decision to hang out with her. However, he ended things between them as well as told her the truth about his interest in her which was that she looked like his late wife Shannon. Unfortunately, she took it upon herself to use that information and the image of Shannon to try to force a closure for him. Which is unfortunately when Chris came home and saw them together.

Hurting Christopher was something Eddie never wanted to do but he inadvertently did. Which is why I hope that the writers have a good plan for Eddie and Chris reuniting and that it will be heartfelt and emotional. Because with the way it's looking so far it doesn't look like those two will be reconciling any time soon. So right now, Eddie just continues to be sad and missing his son.

(9-1-1 season 8 episode 5: Masks)