I've always been a person that isn't easily offended. I typically take things people say with a grain of salt and have an astounding ability to remember that everyone has a unique perspective and background that causes them to say the things they do, act the way they do, etc. With the exception of blatantly racist or misogynist comments I tend to assume people mean well, and even in those cases I usually assume they do not really know what they are saying.
So, when people started telling me about all the stupid things people would say to me after Emmy died and how much they would hurt, I assumed I would be immune to this particular form of hurt. After all, I'd always been able to blow things like that off before. So, imagine my surprise when even the most mundane of comments sends me whirling into anger and despair. A comment as simple as, "I'm not ready for my 12 year old baby to be starting puberty" makes me seethe with rage about how I would give anything to be watching my baby do just that. I realize that other people are allowed to have their feelings. Hell I still have my own feelings, though I am just as hard on myself about feeling ungrateful as I am on other people.
It sucks because I want people to be normal around me. I try to not let on that I'm upset when someone starts talking about how they think their relationship with their sister is the most important in their life, but I'm not very good at hiding my feelings. They show on my face and in my body and rarely, in my tears. And then on top of feeling hurt I feel like a clod, like I've just pushed my grief onto someone else, like I've just knocked them down and discounted their feelings. Basically it makes me feel like shit.
Just another example, I guess, of something I am tired of yet powerless to change. So far as I can tell, there is no light at the end of the tunnel of this grief journey. There is no end in site. The thought of continuing to feel these things forever, to feel so unlike myself is so tiring, so crushing.
Friday, May 14, 2010
Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Life Lessons
I've been watching a lot of TV lately. Between that and screwing around playing mindless games on the internet it's pretty much all I have the energy to do. Normally I watch pretty trashy tv; mindless, reality drivel that is all, in the moment, and not so heavy on plot or theme. But every once in a while I watch an actual scripted show. Something trying to have plot and a point and trying to move the viewer or teach a lesson. And what lesson have I learned? I've learned that my life is the lesson.
I suppose there are other lessons that appear from time to time, but by far the most prevalent thing the shows like to teach is that you should appreciate what you have, that things could always be worse, you could like have a sick, dying or dead kid or something.
So what's a person supposed to do when everywhere they turn they are reminded over and over again that they are living everyone in the whole world's worst nightmare. What lesson am I supposed to learn from that, where am I supposed to find hope. I know things could be worse. I do know that. I have much to be thankful for in my life. But the sad fact is, I had much more to be thankful for before M died. And I was thankful, truly I was. I had learned the lesson already, believe me. I had watched plenty of TV even before I was left in a stupor when my baby died.
I suppose there are other lessons that appear from time to time, but by far the most prevalent thing the shows like to teach is that you should appreciate what you have, that things could always be worse, you could like have a sick, dying or dead kid or something.
So what's a person supposed to do when everywhere they turn they are reminded over and over again that they are living everyone in the whole world's worst nightmare. What lesson am I supposed to learn from that, where am I supposed to find hope. I know things could be worse. I do know that. I have much to be thankful for in my life. But the sad fact is, I had much more to be thankful for before M died. And I was thankful, truly I was. I had learned the lesson already, believe me. I had watched plenty of TV even before I was left in a stupor when my baby died.
Monday, May 3, 2010
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
This is probably going to go down in history as the most self absorbed whiny blog post ever written, but here it goes.
This sucks. It's not fair that my kid died, I wish it had never happened and I'm tired of being the woman with the dead kid and the person who loses her temper at the drop of a hat. I'm tired of everything that having a dead kid entails. I'm tired of having to figure out how to parent a not dead kid and how to be a wife to a man with a dead kid and I'm tired of thinking about the fact that my kid died every single moment of every day. I'm tired of the guilt, I'm tired of the guilt I feel when I momentarily don't feel the guilt. I'm tired of being the person that people thinks now understands their grief. I'm tired of being strong, tired of being weak. I'm tired of trying to figure out what people think about every action I take. I'm tired of caring, I'm tired of not caring. I just don't want to do this anymore. I don't want to have a dead kid. I want it all to go away. And right now if that meant that I had never had her, I might just, maybe think that would have been ok, because this is all just too much. Too too much. And that makes me feel like shit. But I feel like shit most days, so I guess that's all I can hope for anyway.
This sucks. It's not fair that my kid died, I wish it had never happened and I'm tired of being the woman with the dead kid and the person who loses her temper at the drop of a hat. I'm tired of everything that having a dead kid entails. I'm tired of having to figure out how to parent a not dead kid and how to be a wife to a man with a dead kid and I'm tired of thinking about the fact that my kid died every single moment of every day. I'm tired of the guilt, I'm tired of the guilt I feel when I momentarily don't feel the guilt. I'm tired of being the person that people thinks now understands their grief. I'm tired of being strong, tired of being weak. I'm tired of trying to figure out what people think about every action I take. I'm tired of caring, I'm tired of not caring. I just don't want to do this anymore. I don't want to have a dead kid. I want it all to go away. And right now if that meant that I had never had her, I might just, maybe think that would have been ok, because this is all just too much. Too too much. And that makes me feel like shit. But I feel like shit most days, so I guess that's all I can hope for anyway.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Despite all my Rage
I don't know what exactly I expected when the death day passed. I know I still don't know what to call it, but that it is as distinct a day as her birthday is. What I didn't expect but what has happened is that I find that the suffocating sadness does lift at times, for moments. Unfortunately when it lifts it does not reveal happiness and joy. Instead it reveals unfocused anger and rage.
I spent the first year wondering about this "anger" stage of grieving, watching my husband clearly struggling against the anger with every fiber of his psyche and body and sometimes giving in to it. I rarely felt it. In the first months I felt very little, in the next months I felt like someone had wrapped sadness and despair around me like a blanket. What I didn't feel was anger.
But now. Now I wake up in the morning and when I remember that my beautiful light is gone I feel a fury roiling inside of me. I'm not angry with or at anyone. Just enraged. Not at the unfairness of it all. Just, enraged. It's a physical reaction, it makes me feel sick to my stomach and makes my chest feel tight and it just sits there with no hope of ever being dispersed because there is no one to be angry with, and even after a brief outburst it just comes back again like the next ocean wave. A regular force of nature, continuously swelling and breaking with no rest, no hope of ever breaking the cycle.
I envision punching things, walls, people. I envision throwing things through walls and breaking dishes or vases. I think that maybe I should join the boxing gym to try to channel this anger into something productive like loosing that 10 lbs the emotional eating has added to my body. But in the end I don't really think any of those things will stop the feelings from coming back, so I don't do them. Instead I just push through the pain. Try to keep moving even though the waves of rage come at me with a regular frequency. At least I am starting to get used to the roiling and feel less crazy than I did.
So far the second year is just as shitty as the first. Possibly worse. My psychic defense mechanisms are starting to break down. My brain is finally willing to admit defeat, admit that M really isn't coming back. My brain can see far enough down the road to know that not only am I going to live with the pain of this loss for my whole life that other people are going to forget or not know about it. The sheer length of time I have left on this earth is overwhelming.
I spent the first year wondering about this "anger" stage of grieving, watching my husband clearly struggling against the anger with every fiber of his psyche and body and sometimes giving in to it. I rarely felt it. In the first months I felt very little, in the next months I felt like someone had wrapped sadness and despair around me like a blanket. What I didn't feel was anger.
But now. Now I wake up in the morning and when I remember that my beautiful light is gone I feel a fury roiling inside of me. I'm not angry with or at anyone. Just enraged. Not at the unfairness of it all. Just, enraged. It's a physical reaction, it makes me feel sick to my stomach and makes my chest feel tight and it just sits there with no hope of ever being dispersed because there is no one to be angry with, and even after a brief outburst it just comes back again like the next ocean wave. A regular force of nature, continuously swelling and breaking with no rest, no hope of ever breaking the cycle.
I envision punching things, walls, people. I envision throwing things through walls and breaking dishes or vases. I think that maybe I should join the boxing gym to try to channel this anger into something productive like loosing that 10 lbs the emotional eating has added to my body. But in the end I don't really think any of those things will stop the feelings from coming back, so I don't do them. Instead I just push through the pain. Try to keep moving even though the waves of rage come at me with a regular frequency. At least I am starting to get used to the roiling and feel less crazy than I did.
So far the second year is just as shitty as the first. Possibly worse. My psychic defense mechanisms are starting to break down. My brain is finally willing to admit defeat, admit that M really isn't coming back. My brain can see far enough down the road to know that not only am I going to live with the pain of this loss for my whole life that other people are going to forget or not know about it. The sheer length of time I have left on this earth is overwhelming.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
A year ago
A year ago today, is the last day that M was healthy. It was the last time most of her friends saw her.
A year ago today, M woke up early and was excited to go to school to take CSAPs. She came home chipper and energetic, excited about volleyball practice. She practiced for two hours and at the end of practice was beside herself with excitement about finally getting a real volleyball jersey instead of a t-shirt. A year ago she chose to stay at the gym to play more volleyball with a friend while her sister practiced.
A year ago, the only slight indication we had that M wasn't well was that she said her chest hurt when she swallowed while eating the Wendy's salad that I initially told her she couldn't have, in addition to chicken nuggets and a baked potato, but ordered for her anyway.
A year ago, I walked into the restroom at the school where they practiced volleyball to find she and a friend in bare feet on a bathroom floor covered with water. For a year I have wondered if maybe that is where she picked up the MRSA that would kill her.
A year ago today, M woke up early and was excited to go to school to take CSAPs. She came home chipper and energetic, excited about volleyball practice. She practiced for two hours and at the end of practice was beside herself with excitement about finally getting a real volleyball jersey instead of a t-shirt. A year ago she chose to stay at the gym to play more volleyball with a friend while her sister practiced.
A year ago, the only slight indication we had that M wasn't well was that she said her chest hurt when she swallowed while eating the Wendy's salad that I initially told her she couldn't have, in addition to chicken nuggets and a baked potato, but ordered for her anyway.
A year ago, I walked into the restroom at the school where they practiced volleyball to find she and a friend in bare feet on a bathroom floor covered with water. For a year I have wondered if maybe that is where she picked up the MRSA that would kill her.
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