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I Grieve

How are you doing?  A question asked by loving, caring people with a genuine concern for my well-being.  How do I answer?  I’m doing okay.  I have ups and downs but move forward day by day.  It’s the easiest response to give.  I do share a bit more with certain people who know how to read me, but it too is a watered version of my reality.  Honestly, I don’t want to burden them with my pain, nor have them worry about me.  There isn’t anything they could do to help me through this.  It is a journey which I must take alone.

I’ve decided to capture these thoughts, my pain, in words – an attempt to release some of weight of these emotions and allowing me to move forward.

How am I doing?  I just exist.  No desire.  No drive.  No dreams.  No direction.  Numb.

Each morning I dread waking to a new mediocre day, wishing to stay safe within my dreams.  Daily tasks are draining. The hours drag even though days go by so quickly.  Each day is repetitious, meaningless.  I don’t want to feel, think or speak.  I just want to withdraw, to hibernate.  This is not living.  What I experience now is colourless, empty, repetitive, meaningless.  This is grief.

It comes in waves – some just ripples, others so strong they practically take my breath away.  When a wave hits, I feel pain, despair, anguish, and a tightness grows in my chest, almost suffocating me.  Other times, it’s a memory which triggers a longing, a yearning for what was; or a moment where emotions like sadness, heartache, loneliness swirl deep inside me.  He was my anchor.  My anchor is gone.

I’ve experienced loss before – family members, friends, and my mother whom I loved so very much.  What I’ve found is that with each loss, we grieve differently.  With losing my love, my Walter, it’s all-encompassing – felt in every aspect of my life.  He was a part of me, and I a part of him.  In his arms was where I belonged.

Shock doesn’t even remotely describe what we felt when we found out Walter had terminal Cancer.  The months he had left went by so quickly.  I wanted to protect him, care for him, cherish him for as long as I could.  No matter what I did, I couldn’t stop the inevitable.  We watched our hopes and dreams fade away.  The life we planned – gone.  He was robbed of his passions, of his family, of his future. 

I dreaded seeing his long locks fall to the floor because of Chemotherapy.  I watched this big strong man weaken; and saw the sadness in his eyes when he’d come to me to open jars.  As the Cancer spread, he became frail. He couldn’t keep weight on, was so terribly cold; and needed help showering.  I saw how tired he was. I felt so helpless – I couldn’t fix this for him.  I saw his spirit begin to wither. I watched him slowly fade away.  All I could do is give him kisses, hold his hand and tell him how much I love him. When his heart stopped, mine shattered.  A piece of me went with him that day.

I strain to remember as many things about him - as many details that I can.  I want to burn those images in my mind, in my heart, forever.  There are times where I question what I should have done better to help him, to lessen any burdens, to ease his pain.  Other times moments just play in my mind over and over.  The person who would comfort and assure me everything will be okay is gone.  It was him.  He was my calm.

Everywhere I look, there are things which remind me of him.  I touch them, looking for echoes of his touch.  On his nightstand sits his phone and the water bottle I filled for him the last night he was home.  I can’t bring myself to remove it.  His lips once touched the bottle – it’s the closest thing I have to ever touching his lips again. 

Our bed feels so cold and empty.  We called it our island.  A retreat impenetrable from stresses or worries.  Where we would talk about our day and our dreams.  Where we could be vulnerable but know we were safe.  Where we lay in each other’s arms and would drift off to sleep.  Five months later and I still have difficulties getting comfortable and falling asleep.  I strain to remember how it felt to have him lie next to me.  To hear his breathing which would lull me to sleep.  

So often I close my eyes, trying to feel his arms around me, wanting to hear his voice.  At the kitchen sink, at doorway, in the hallway, where he would envelope me, kiss me, then we would sway together, dance to the beat of our hearts.  I miss holding his hand, random kisses, and all his cuddles.  He filled me with such tremendous love.  Now I feel hollow, empty, without him.

I find over the past five months, his loss has become more real, as the numbness begins to fade.  It’s still there, but a little bit less.  They say it all takes time.  I find that moving forward is a slow process – an intricate dance – not just two steps forward, one step back, repeat.  Emotions of heartache are still just under the skin, easily released; yet emotions of happiness; of normalcy are weak, not ready to move forward. 

Every step forward is bittersweet.  It’s a step toward healing, yet a step away from him.  I find it difficult to make plans, to dream – because he won’t be there by my side.  Every milestone has changed to a first year without; and brings a memory of last year with.  I enjoy a moment, an event, yet I feel his absence and that saddens me. 

I find that it gets easier to fake a smile, to act normally as if everything is okay; even on the days where I’m drowning.  At times I feel people forget how recent his loss was.  Or they forget the magnitude of the love, of the grief I experience.  Some may think that five months has been a while so I should be further along ‘the grief process’.  I’ve surprisingly heard there is some magic equation for grief – something like it should take x months after loss for x years together.  Trust me, there isn’t.  Time does not equate to intensity of emotion. And there aren’t step-by-step directions to go through the grief process. 

Externally, I appear a bit stronger each day.  Internally, I continue to live with waves and ripples of grief.  I know time will soften the intensity enough that those moments will be filled with sadness, not pain.  I’ll once again be able to feel, to laugh, to dream.  I’ll strive to live my life with vibrancy, with purpose.  As he took a piece of me, he gave me a piece of him which I’ll carry with me until we meet again.  It just takes time.



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