I have made it one year without you. A year we should have had together. I live in a new place, and I'm in a new relationship.
I worry that people have forgotten, but it turns out they haven't.
The trauma of the end has faded, and now I'm just left with sadness and the dichotomy of missing the life we had while liking my new one quite a lot.
Monday, September 9, 2013
Friday, March 8, 2013
On the Road
I had this idea you see... this idea that I would go on the road. That if I left my life and my friends for a time that perhaps there would be a deepness to my grief that had eluded me. I thought that if I put myself in the hardest situation I could imagine, that I would be tested and broken and would come out the other side stronger.
You need to understand that there were days when my son was small that I wouldn't go to the grocery store because it seemed too much of a bother. That leaving the house was too much to cope with.
And now I have no house. I have my car. I take my son wherever we want to go.
I feel sometimes that the road is my friend, that it is this metaphor for my journey. That the long difficult stretches force me to be alone with my grief and my sadness and my loss.
Some days it all feels very much that way. But sometimes it feels like I'm just running away from what needs to be done.
He never could have imagined the me that exists now. Even though I think he tried to. He would have been impressed. He loved me, but sometimes he thought I was frail emotionally. He always said how impossible it would have been for our situations to be reversed. I secretly thought the same thing, but we both had to face the impossible truth. That our life together was ending, that we would have to leave our love for each other behind and move on. His job was difficult, but mine was mine, so it seemed more difficult.
I regret feeling that way. In the end, I think dying was hard for him. I think he was scared, and he wasn't ready, and I felt so at a loss for how to help him or comfort him. He was in more pain than I wanted him to face. He had everything stripped from him. There was no real goodbye. It was all so horrible and unsatisfying. In the weeks that followed, I walked around terrified of my own death. Even as I accept it as inevitable, I am still sort of terrified. He wasn't ready. He wanted to go to Disneyland. He wanted to go to the movies at eat popcorn. He wanted to hold his son. He wanted to enjoy sex again. He wanted to eat a meal. He wanted to laugh with friends. All such reasonable, small things, and none of them were possible. I was more prepared when I was oblivious. Now I am informed, and the truth has forever changed me.
You need to understand that there were days when my son was small that I wouldn't go to the grocery store because it seemed too much of a bother. That leaving the house was too much to cope with.
And now I have no house. I have my car. I take my son wherever we want to go.
I feel sometimes that the road is my friend, that it is this metaphor for my journey. That the long difficult stretches force me to be alone with my grief and my sadness and my loss.
Some days it all feels very much that way. But sometimes it feels like I'm just running away from what needs to be done.
He never could have imagined the me that exists now. Even though I think he tried to. He would have been impressed. He loved me, but sometimes he thought I was frail emotionally. He always said how impossible it would have been for our situations to be reversed. I secretly thought the same thing, but we both had to face the impossible truth. That our life together was ending, that we would have to leave our love for each other behind and move on. His job was difficult, but mine was mine, so it seemed more difficult.
I regret feeling that way. In the end, I think dying was hard for him. I think he was scared, and he wasn't ready, and I felt so at a loss for how to help him or comfort him. He was in more pain than I wanted him to face. He had everything stripped from him. There was no real goodbye. It was all so horrible and unsatisfying. In the weeks that followed, I walked around terrified of my own death. Even as I accept it as inevitable, I am still sort of terrified. He wasn't ready. He wanted to go to Disneyland. He wanted to go to the movies at eat popcorn. He wanted to hold his son. He wanted to enjoy sex again. He wanted to eat a meal. He wanted to laugh with friends. All such reasonable, small things, and none of them were possible. I was more prepared when I was oblivious. Now I am informed, and the truth has forever changed me.
Tuesday, February 19, 2013
Certain Strength
There is a certain strength and confidence that I have now. I know I can endure great pain. I know I can do things that are hard. I may be damaged, but I know I can watch someone I love die and hold them and wish them well while I do it. I know I can laugh after crying.
I try to let the moment that defines me be the one where I looked at our bed, the one where he had died, and thought "I'll bet if I don't sleep here tonight, I'll never sleep here again. And I really like this bed." Because that was the me I wanted to be. Alone but brave. Practical and romantic. A keeper of the past but a believer in the future. I knew if I could spend that night, that first fucking night, in the same bed where we had spent our last, and where I had watched him draw his last breath, that I would be all right. That I would be as strong as I ever needed to be.
There are times when it all seems such a blur. Such a movie of a horrible thing that happened to nice people who couldn't have deserved it but must have, as that's how movies work. But I also felt it all with a clarity that was a gift. He was so strong and brave that I didn't notice how hard he was working to breathe. We were both trying to hard to be normal that we overlooked how very abnormal we were. I have no regrets, but I do sometimes wonder if I could have done it better. He would have scolded me for that though.
My grief is not beautiful, but it is real. It isn't what I thought it would be. My strength is beautiful. It surprises me, and I am proud of it.
I try to let the moment that defines me be the one where I looked at our bed, the one where he had died, and thought "I'll bet if I don't sleep here tonight, I'll never sleep here again. And I really like this bed." Because that was the me I wanted to be. Alone but brave. Practical and romantic. A keeper of the past but a believer in the future. I knew if I could spend that night, that first fucking night, in the same bed where we had spent our last, and where I had watched him draw his last breath, that I would be all right. That I would be as strong as I ever needed to be.
There are times when it all seems such a blur. Such a movie of a horrible thing that happened to nice people who couldn't have deserved it but must have, as that's how movies work. But I also felt it all with a clarity that was a gift. He was so strong and brave that I didn't notice how hard he was working to breathe. We were both trying to hard to be normal that we overlooked how very abnormal we were. I have no regrets, but I do sometimes wonder if I could have done it better. He would have scolded me for that though.
My grief is not beautiful, but it is real. It isn't what I thought it would be. My strength is beautiful. It surprises me, and I am proud of it.
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