Gone

Looking back at the moments following Michael's death, I think I felt like I was in some surreal bad dream that was an episode of ER or Grey's Anatomy starring me.  I was overwhelmed by pretty much everything besides breathing. And, as I was dialing the phone to call my parents, I kept thinking, I wish this would just be over.  It was just too much to take it.  Too hard.  Insurmountable.  As the phone began to ring the realization hit me...., "Oh Beth, this is only just beginning".

He is gone.  Sometimes it still takes me by surprise.  How, after all these months, I am not sure.  But there are times when I am running or driving, or I look at a photo and I think, "he is not coming back",  and it just seems crazy.  I mean really crazy.  This is my life, are you sure?   Really, just gone, just like that?  How can it be?  There are arguments as to whether it is easier to lose someone suddenly or to have to watch them linger, but at least be able to say goodbye.  I can pretty much say, I don't think there is an easy way.

For the first few months following Michael's death, we had a lot of company and activity, which is wonderful and helpful beyond measure.  I was living something like this: "if I can just make it until school is out", "if I can just get to vacation", "if I can just get to basketball camp".  And so on.  My life was broken into lots of small, necessary, compartments.  It made it "easier" somehow.  I am not sure if easier is even the right word.  It made it do-able.

When I started my job in late July,  I closed my house to houseguests.  I knew we had some "grief work" to do, and compartments, while helpful for a while, were not reality.  I felt like we had to transition into the new normal in a more real way.  Lessons, sports, a new job, yard work, housework, laundry, cooking....and just me (and an army of friends and neighbors). And while I expected it to be hard, as with grief period, it is just never how you think it will be. 

As a part of this "grief work" I have forced upon myself, I have crossed some rather dark days.  I can't always explain them, I just feel dark, gloomy, mad, sad, frustrated....I don't even know.  Sometimes I feel that with the passing of time I feel worse, instead of better.  Reality.  It's hard.  This is not what I want.  This is not what I signed up for.  This is not the story we were writing.  It's just not.  It's hard and tiring, and while my life still has so many very good and happy things, it's just hard.  It's hard to go to lacrosse and see the other dads with their boys and know my boy's dad will never be there, ever.  Or, dinner.  We were an eat dinner all together, please pass the salt, put your napkin in your lap, eat at the table every single night kind of family.  We almost never sit at the table anymore.  Or we eat in shifts, so the empty chair doesn't seem so empty. And that is just the tip of the iceberg, as they say.

When I am more rational, I look at it and I think it is just reality settling in.  It is definitely a shifting of my mindset, how I think, what I need to do.  And sometimes, I fight it.  And I know it's stupid and I feel like a petulant child all the while, but I do it anyway. I never allow it to go on for too long.  But, sometimes I feel like one of my children when they whine, "it's not fair", because, it's not.   And maybe I am entitled to a little pity party every now and again as I forge down a new, rocky path otherwise known as my life. 

A wise friend told me, you eat an elephant one bite at a time.  I guess this is one of those bites that are more difficult to swallow than the others.  Or just harder to grasp in my head.  Life.....forever changed.  Forever, not temporarily.  Not for this year, forever.  Especially for my children, but in so many ways for me too. In fact, there is really nothing that hasn't been impacted by this.  Even mundane things like taking out the trash (previously a boy job at our house) is different.  Birthdays, holidays, special events.....they will forever be bittersweet.  I feel like I do a really good job of teaching the kids that life can still be fun, and good, and wonderful.  But, it doesn't change that there is a hole there. And while we can love, and be loved, find joy, and hopefully share joy, there is just a piece that is gone.