Six Months of Wibbly Wobbly Timey Wimey Stuff

It's been six months since my husband died.  In some ways it feels like forever, in other ways it feels like yesterday.  We were both huge Doctor Who fans and one of our favorite quotes was "People assume that time is a strict progression of cause to effect, but actually, from a non-linear, non-subjective viewpoint, it's more like a big ball of wibbly-wobbly... timey-wimey... stuff."  That's what this feels like.  I've grown so much emotionally that it feels like a very long time must have passed.  But when I sit & get quiet, the loss wells up inside me like it was yesterday.  

Grief is weird.  And until you experience, you have no clue.  I didn't.  

A couple of weeks ago I went to Grand Junction to the arts & crafts show.  Sometimes I know something is going to cause the grief to surface, other times I'm totally not thinking & clueless, until "Bam!" it gets me.  Driving to GJ, I felt the sorrow surface.  I've learned to just let it, let the feelings surface, let the tears flow.  I exited the freeway and there I was, sitting at the longest light in the world in front of the hospital where the worst week of my life happened, where the last week of my husband's life happened.  I sat there and stared at the window of the room he was in.  The trickle of tears became a full fledged storm.  I drove a few blocks to where the arts & crafts show was, pulled in the parking lot and the tears became a deluge.  We had been in that show for the last 12 years.  I went into the show and it was a painful, but healing experience.  Our artist family gathered around me.  They let me know they missed Jim and missed us being there.  They listened while I talked and hugged me.  They gave me unconditional acceptance and gave freely of their love & affection.  I cried my way through the show, sometimes laughing at the same time.  More letting go.  More acceptance.  Walking through the grief.  Gratitude for those that hold my hand as I walk through the rough patches.

I haven't been able to watch Doctor Who yet this year.  Or Fringe.  Or Survivor.  We watched them together and even when our marriage was pretty much over, we still watched them & talked about them.  

It seems to be a continual process.  Every time I confront something with a ton of memories entwined, another layer of denial is destroyed.  I am reminded that he died, he's no longer in this world.  And the pain is as fresh as it was the first day.  Either the pain has gotten less intense, or I'm just used to it now.

It wasn't only that he died that day.  I died too.  The whole picture of my life shattered.  I now know how tenuous, how delicate the balance of our everyday life is.  I spent so much time looking for  security, for safety.  Now I know those are only illusions.  There is now and my connectedness with now and that's pretty much it.  A lot of my fear has been removed.  I'm being more me than I ever have and living life the best I can.

Life can't hand me much worse than it did this year.  But I also think of this year as the year I discovered I'm a phoenix.  I was incinerated and a new me has risen from the ashes.  A stronger, more me, me.  A me that knows I can pretty much handle anything.  I am a bad ass warrior phoenix.  Who cries a lot.

Death Has Destroyed Me, Defined Me & Strengthened Me

Today a friend posted the quote "When something bad happens you have three choices: You can either let it define you, let it destroy you or you can let it strengthen you."--Unknown 

It got me thinking (one of my favorite activities).  And all three are true.  So get rid of the "or" and replace it with "and". 

 This year has destroyed me - the old me.  The me of innocence and naivete.  The me that thought if I could do everything "right", I could control the Universe.  The me that thought everything happens for a reason.  It stripped away the "nice" girl, the people pleaser.  It tore away my masks, my routines, my dances that let me hide from myself.  I was and continue to be, so raw, so tired.  I don't have the energy to don the old masks, to dance the old dance.  So yes I've been destroyed.  Maybe it's the ego got mortally wounded and all I can do now is be.  So the me I had been was destroyed.  

It's defined me, or maybe redefined me.  Letting myself feel how I feel at any given moment.  Being okay with sorrow, being okay with joy.  With all my barriers stripped away, I've been able to feel love in a way I never did before.  When I wore masks there was always doubt "Do you love ME or the act?".  Today I know that the people who love me, love ME.  The real me.  And I've been able to love and accept myself in a way I've never been able to before.  I haven't had a choice, really.  It's either accept myself or go crazy....  My logical mind can't control my emotions any longer.  The losses seem to have short circuited the wiring.  And so I'm left with just being okay.  It feels horrible, devastating sometimes, but it's okay.  Through all this, my heart has grown.  I have new knowledge, new experience, new knowing.  I really had no idea of the how painful death is for those of us left here.  Now I know.  It's given me more compassion, more love, more clarity.  I'm a new me - closer to the me I was created to be.

As for strengthening me....  Being able to keep walking through this without drinking, without crawling into bed and giving up on life, giving up on love - I am one bad ass warrior.  Every time I hear the saying "That which does not kill you, makes you stronger" I think that by this point I can bench press a semi with 3 trailers....  It gives me the ability to face each new day.  I've made it this far, I can keep putting one foot in front of the other, show up and walk through this.  It's strengthened me enough to be able to let go of things I need to.  To sit with the empty spaces and not try to fill them up.  To create the life I want deep in my heart & soul.  To know that sometimes doing the "right" think, the thing in alignment with myself & god, will cause pain to myself and others.  We can choose to grow from the pain or try to avoid it, but I've realized pain in inevitable.  I now have the ability to go deep inside & find my truth and the strength to face the consequences.   Because all I have left after everything has been stripped away is my connection to the Universe that created me.  All I can do is do my best to act in harmony with my purpose.  It takes a lot of strength & courage to do that - and this year has given me the clarity & strength to leap into the unknown.  Most of the time I have no map, it's all uncharted territory.  Sometimes I sit on the floor and cry, it's so unfamiliar, so scary.  I wish I could turn back, but I can't, I can only go forward.  So I get up, or ask for a hand up and continue the new exploration.  Because when you get down to it, life really is just the journey.  Things will always change.  We will always be required to change.  Sometimes we find a comfortable spot & get to sit, rest, enjoy the view.  We will never be able to stay there.  The greatest sadness I have about my husband and my father's lives is that they each wanted to avoid pain.  They tried to find a comfortable spot to stay in, they decorated their ruts, built fortresses to protect themselves.  They died carrying the baggage of the past, but couldn't, wouldn't see it.  They were so isolated from themselves, they were never able to fully connect with others.  I feel such sadness that they were never able to fully live.  So today I choose life, even when there's so much pain I don't know if I can bear it.  Because there's also joy in embracing the pain, the changes, the not knowingness.  I choose to stay open, to be me, to make mistakes, to venture into new territory.  Because I know I can survive anything life has to throw at me.

Into a New Land

So it’s funny - I seem to tap into a completely different part of my brain when I type versus when I write by hand.  My handwritten journal is freeform, random thoughts, stream of consciousness.  Mostly though, handwriting seems to let my feelings stream forth, unrestrained by logical thought.  It works well for me letting my real feelings emerge from the subconscious, unfurl onto the paper and then have a chance to recognize, own and accept them.  When I type, it’s a more contemplative, thoughtful writing.  I think, I connect, I communicate with others.  

Last night I was overtaken by grief over the loss of my old life.  It was triggered by missing Athena.  I have a new dog now & she is a sweetheart.  But she’s not Athena.  There will never be another Athena.  Athena was the dog I had dreamt of all of my life.  And after 2 years together, she was able to read my signals with a precision that constantly astonished me.  Nala, the new girl, is still adjusting to me and I to her.  We’ve been together 2 1/2 weeks now.  She’s 9 months old and needs lots of training still.  And sometimes she brings up how much I miss Athena.  

From there, I just went into how much I missed my old life.  I guess what I really miss was the predicability of it, even when it sucked.  My husband and I were heading for divorce just before he died.  I wanted more from him than he was able to give.  We were in process of trying to let go of our old relationship and see what was left.  So it’s not like my life was terribly “stable”, but between my husband, my father & then my dog dying, I’m just don’t have any illusions of security anymore.  Even when Jim & I were fighting, I knew him, I knew us, there was that familiarity that 16 years together brought, even when it sucked.  So many connections to who I was, severed.  Thank the Universe that I still have most of my friends (oh yeah, I lost a few friends in the midst of the losses), I still have my home, I still have my store.  But on a deep, core relational level, I am adrift.  

I’m in a new relationship.  Didn’t plan it, didn’t look for it, it just happened.  Kinda freaked me out, but after writing 10 pages, the Universe told me to get over my “plans” and go with it.  So I’m trying.  I’m trying to practice new behaviors and learn from the lessons of past relationships.  I’ve spent the past few years moving out of codependency.  Looking back, I was doing it not too gracefully and inflicted a lot of emotional damage on my husband.  So I’m doing my best to do it different.  And I have no fucking clue what I’m doing.....  I’m in a new land with a new man and I’m trying to find my way.  And I don’t have a map!!!!   

So I’m a stranger in a strange land.  I’ve changed so much in the past four months and everything in my life has changed.  I’m little by little emerging from the fog, gaining clarity, but sometimes it’s so damn bright that I can’t see and just stumble around.  

And some days, I just miss the familiarity, even the familiarity that sucked.  I guess that’s part of grief too.  

It's His Birthday - and He's Still Dead....

I'm feeling contemplative tonight... Three months ago today, my husband Jim died.  Tomorrow is his birthday.  He would have been 54.  Things had been rough with us for several years.  Looking back, hindsight being 20/20, I can see how his diabetes (undiagnosed & unknown) affected him and us.  Little by little, the compassionate, loving man I had loved disappeared; to be replaced with someone increasingly intolerant, impatient, and rigid.  It was a slow, gradual process of erosion of love.  I tried and tried to figure it out, to fix it.  There would be hope and then everything would go to hell again.  Until I was exhausted.  We were in the early stages of divorcing & letting go.

Luckily I was finally able to hear him, how he just wanted peace and calm and for everything to be okay.  What he really, really wanted was to avoid pain.  In my quest for growth & development and confronting pain face on, all I had done was inflict more pain on him.  I kept trying to get him to hear me, but I didn't listen & hear him.  When I finally did, I was rocked to my core.  I was able to see my part & set about to do my best to make amends and heal the harm I had caused.

To this day, I am so grateful I had come to that place about a month before he died.  I realized that what he wanted & what I wanted were mutually incompatible, stellar opposites.  There was no way to remain married and happy.  Any way I looked at it, at least one of us would be discontent.  Most of the time, both of us were miserable.  And so we were letting go.  There were still so many connections - we had been together 24/7 for 16 years, completely intertwined in both our business, creative & personal lives.  There were so many filaments to untangle, and to see what bonds remained that were healthy.

So there we were, disengaging, while I did my best to heal the wounds I had wrought on him.  And then he got sick.  And I was able to be present & loving... most of the time.  As he got sicker, he said more hurtful things.  And in my head (and sometimes to others), I would say "Fuck him." and be ready to walk away.  But there were still these connections and feelings.  Shortly before he got sick, he told me "You're my best friend.  You know me better than anyone ever has.  Sometimes you know me better than I know myself.  I don't want to lose you completely from my life."  I replied "I know.  I wanted you to be my best friend and you can't, or won't.  I don't know what we'll have after the hurt has healed."  I couldn't walk away.  So for the last week of his life, I focused on doing whatever I could.  It wasn't much, he was intubated and unconscious.  But I stayed on top of what was going on in the hospital, Googling like crazy to understand his health.  I was able to, actually encouraged, to bring our baby Athena, our tiny toy poodle, into the hospital.  I read healing meditations & visualizations, I used every suggestion from energy healers.  I tried to will him back to life.  I threatened him with the thought that if he died, he'd be stuck having to listen to me talk about my feelings, non-stop, for the rest of my life.  Whatever I could come up with to reach him, deep in wherever he was, I tried.  I just wanted a divorce,  I did not want him to die.

And then he started failing and I could feel him slipping away.  I grasped, but I could feel him going.  And then he was done.  And he died.  I know he's in a better place, whatever that may be.  He wanted to avoid pain, and he did.  I've been left with the Mt. Everest shit heap of pain to face head on.

It feels like I'm through the major upheaval & confusion.  I've emerged from Zombiehood.  A friend described death & grief like going over a waterfall.  For awhile, I didn't know which way was up, I couldn't breathe, I couldn't think.  The waters are still tumultuous, but I'm finding the currents.  Sometimes I bash against a rock & the breath is knocked out of me.  I'm swimming.

I was in process of letting go of a marriage, untangling and releasing the rotted connections.  And then, boom, those connections are severed.  It will take time for me to sort out this new reality.

I've learned so much.  About myself, about others.  So much has been stripped away, leaving me with clarity.  My people pleasing was brutally ripped from me and I've never felt so loved in my life.  I must be doing something right to have received the breadth and depth of love that was my lifeline.  I've discovered who loves me as I am with no mask, no pretense.  I've discovered what I'm really made of, how solid the foundation that I laid when I quit drinking 27 years ago is.  I'm rediscovering parts of myself that were put aside during my marriage and building a new me.  I've rediscovered joy and fun.  I'm seeing someone romantically, which was quite unexpected.  It began as friendship, and has become something more.  And instead of trying to control it, I'm just going with the flow....

And sometimes, today, when I feel great joy, I also feel the sadness.  About what was,  what was lost.  I lost him twice.  I'm grieving both.  I lost the man I loved slowly over time, without knowing how & why.  And then he died and I lost him forever in any way shape or form, in this plane at least.

So here I am, 3 months later.  The pain doesn't ravage me the way it did early on.  I'm still searching for my new reality, my new me.  I'm still grieving & releasing.  And today, I'm just sad....

Overdosed on Advice

Here's the thing about grief - it's exhausting.  Physically, emotionally, deep in the gut, into the soul exhausting.  Each day that I get out of bed is a major triumph.  Making coffee, showering & going to work are major accomplishments.  Anything more is bonus.  Most days by 3 or 4 pm, I just want to go home and zone out; watch tv, play computer games, anything to not feel anymore (unfortunately those old standbys - drinking, drugging, shopping, eating & sex - just don't work for me anymore....).   Sometimes I try to make plans to go to dinner or walk with a friend, but most of the time trying to juggle schedules fries out my brain circuits.  I just don't have the energy or patience to deal with even minor frustrations.

So add to the exhaustion all of the well meaning advice and I overload.  During the best of times I have low tolerance for advice, especially of the "should" variety.  "Should" ALWAYS feels like criticism.  I'm doing it wrong and you know better.  Advice is a gentler variety of "should", but to me it feels like criticism disguised as helpfulness.  I usually feel like I have to explain myself, that I've already thought about your great idea for me and have decided not to do it for a reason.  In good times, I've learned to just say thanks and change the subject.  But these are not good times.  As people give me advice, I feel my already tight chest constricting further.  The tension rises.  If I'm lucky they leave before I hit my limit.  On several occasions, I've put my hand up and told them they need to stop immediately.

I'm struggling minute by minute to maintain my balance.  It's very fragile and precarious right now.  A friend described it perfectly; I'm standing on a disc on top of a ball.  It's a constant dance to stay on the disc.  And then someone comes along with advice.  Now I have new weight added to the disc and it's very easy to TILT.  And when I TILT, it's huge.  It's flight or fight time, baby.  Since I don't like to cause wreckage that I later have to make amends for, flight is my favorite.  In person, I bolt.  Fast.  Or on the phone I abruptly end the conversation.  And then I break down sobbing hysterically.  Or sometimes I just go for immediate hysterical sobbing.

Last Monday I ended up in the ER.  I thought I was having a stroke.  Luckily it turns out to "just" be migraines with aura.  Mostly brought about by high blood pressure.  I think I overdosed on advice.

I realize that most of the people with advice love me & care about me.  They hate seeing me in pain and/or it makes them uncomfortable.  But there's so much conflicting advice.  Exercise.  Rest.  Keep busy.  Feel your feelings.  Take antidepressants.  And on and on.  Right now I don't have the emotional fortitude to deflect the barrage of advice.  It overwhelms me.  "How can I do all of that?"  "Oh fuck.  I'm not doing it "right"." "What I'm doing isn't enough."

The people who are helping me the most right now are the ones that tell they're proud of me.  I'm doing an amazing job.  They're impressed by me.  One friend told me I'm a rock star.  And it's not people I'm trying to impress.  I pour my guts out.  I babble.  I process.  I'm raw.  When they tell me I'm doing great, it feels true & real.  It gives me the strength to continue on one more day.

My father died on Wednesday.  I think it's a bloody fucking miracle I'm at all functional right now.

I Can't Stop Crying

A couple of weeks after my husband died, an acquaintance emailed me condolences and then said "I hope everyday gets better.  I know first hand that it actually does. "  I'm glad that was her experience, but it is most definitely NOT MINE.  At that stage, the numbness & shock were wearing off and I felt worse, much worse.  It's all a rollercoaster.  Some days I'm functional, sometimes I'm actually productive, but some days I'm plunged into grief and sorrow so strong I can barely walk.  Today is one of those days.  I managed to get up, do my morning writing, take the car in for repair and go to work.  All this while crying.  In grief I've developed a new cry - the steady moan cry.  Previously I've had the silent, streaming tears and the deep hiccupy sobs.  This one is new.  And it just keeps going.  I want to stuff it down, stuff it back in, but it insists on coming out.  


I finally stopped crying enough to open my store & be personable with customers and then someone, a man, tried to tell me something I "should" do about my signage.  I crumbled.  After he left, I locked the door and fell to the floor and just wailed.  I often wish we were back in the Victorian Age with their Mourning Etiquette.    Mourning clothes as a display of inner feelings.  Plus it alerted those around to your mental and emotional state.  And while I used to think that a year or two of required mourning for the widow was excessive, today I'd love to have the luxury of that time and the patience of those around for the grieving/mourning process.  I'm raw.  I'm fragile.  I'm also strong, strong enough to make it through.  Sometimes I'm so exhausted, I don't want to go on.  What keeps me going is not wanting to inflict the pain I'm in on the ones I love.   I don't want anyone who loves me to suffer the pain of losing me one minute before it's my time to go.   So today I cry.  I cry until I wonder how many tears I have in me.  Everything hurts.  Everything aches.  I cry some more.  

One Month Ago Today

Today is especially difficult.  It's been a month since my husband died, it's the 4th of July and the Higgs  Boson particle was just discovered.

Recently I was ranting about how much the phrase "This too shall pass" pissed me off, especially as a response to my grief.  If I'm supposed to feel my feelings and be in the present, how exactly is "This too shall pass" an appropriate response?  It's not, but it allows other people a way to dismiss and avoid my pain.  A friend asked if the pain was in the future, thinking about things down the road.  I replied that grief is in the moment - more than any other feeling I've had when I feel my loss it is in the now.

Grief is a series of realizations that the person you loved is really, truly dead and gone.  The first 10 days, it was a series of shock waves.  Everything felt surreal.  I kept thinking "This is just a bad dream and I'll wake up."  And then I'd realize it was real and be struck with a tsunami of loss, pain, grief.  Every time I run across a connection and realize anew that he is dead, I'm struck with a sharp, debilitating pain.  I'll cry, I'll call someone and talk, I'll do whatever I need to do to survive it.  And then I pick myself up and move on.

So today, I woke up at 5am.  I seem to have PTSD - a month ago, I got a call at 5am that he probably wouldn't last the day.  Ever since, I wake up at 5am.  Sometimes I'm able to get back to sleep, but mostly I lie in bed in that region between wakefulness and sleep, and my brain thinks about the reality that he's no longer here and my life is irrevocably changed.  This morning I just kept thinking "It's real. It's been a month."  Holidays suck right now.  Celebration is the furthest thing from my mind.  Just getting up, working, taking care of myself is challenging enough.  Sometimes I even have moments where his death/my loss aren't at the forefront of my mind.  So tonight I'll hide out and avoid the celebrations.  As for the Higgs Boson particle - he loved science.  He would ponder gravity and black holes and share his thoughts with me and we would have lengthy discussions about science and spirituality.  When I saw the stuff about the particle, I wanted to email him links to articles, and then one more time it struck me, he's gone... forever.  There won't be any talking about the particle with him.  He won't drive me crazy talking incessantly about it for a week.  And even though it could be irritating, his enthusiasm was contagious.  He kept my mind sharp.  And I learned far more than I realized with him in my life.

So I'm crying again.  I've already cried several times this morning.  And now it's time for me to pick myself up, get ready for work and keep moving forward.