Grief is fickle and confusing. The word itself brings to mind only one thing, loss. The loss of a family member or loss of a loved one. Hell, I've grieved my fair share of jobs whether I left them by choice or by force. I grieved the loss of my physical ability. It pains me more than I can speak aloud that my children will never get to experience being picked up by me. I will never rock them to sleep as I carry them to their rooms after a long day. My disability is my reality, and I have had to come to terms with that regardless of my pain. Moping over the things I cannot change only serves to make me feel worse at the end of the day anyways.
I thought I knew what to expect with grief. You can never truly be prepared for loss, not really, but lose enough in your life and the feeling becomes familiar in its agony. Its a whole new world grieving that which you have not lost. I have grieved friends and family, grandparents and pets. No amount of death could have prepared me for this.
In two weeks we will have passed a year since my husband's last suicide attempt, and for once, I am at a loss for words. The pain gnaws at my innards, leaving my organs bruised and the space where my heart should be, a hollow cage. My dear love is alive, healthy, and in a better place than I could imagined us being less than a year ago. I should be happy. I should be over this. I shouldn't be crying in my car to music that claws at my very soul. The body remembers what the mind forgets, and it only took one reminder for me to be swept off of my feet, back in the place where my love is breaking on the bathroom floor and I cannot take the pain from him. I can only hold his crying form tight in my arms as my heart breaks in tandem.
You can recover and still hurt. Our house has been sold (for better or worse) and our new beginning has found its comfortable rhythm. Even so, There is not a passing day that I am not keenly aware of how easy it would be to lose him. Even on a good day, I often find myself humming along to the music on the radio, my internal mantra repeating in syncopation the torturing reminder of I could lose him, I could lose him, I could lose him...and I could. A car crash, a heart attack, there is no shortage of ways I could become a widow in my twenties and that fact haunts me night and day. I cannot keep crying. My eyes look bruised and puffy. My sensitive skin has been made red and speckled from the salinity of my tears. I have a migraine. My voice is choked and cracking. I have to keep it together. I have to be there for him. I have to succeed at work. How can I do all of that when I am holding my heart together with poorly tied sutures, blood and sorrow leaking from the crevices? I don't have an answer, and I feel like I should. He is the reason I wake up every morning and the warm presence that carries me to sleep. He is the love of my life and the father of our future children. His loss is one from which I would never recover, but I cannot allow myself to dwell on it too long.
I am his happy, sweet, giggling wife. I cannot be any of that in this state and I will not bring him down into those dark places again. So I will have my time to cry alone in my car. My sobs would be almost identical to laughter if not for the tears cascading down my cheeks. I will have my space to grieve, then once again I will smile. I will be strong. I may not be able to carry my dear love's darkness on my soul, but I can be a source of light to the best of my ability. I cannot afford to break down. I can't.
I fully do not expect anyone to read this. I just needed it off my chest
National Crisis Hotline: 800-273-TALK (8255).
I thought I knew what to expect with grief. You can never truly be prepared for loss, not really, but lose enough in your life and the feeling becomes familiar in its agony. Its a whole new world grieving that which you have not lost. I have grieved friends and family, grandparents and pets. No amount of death could have prepared me for this.
In two weeks we will have passed a year since my husband's last suicide attempt, and for once, I am at a loss for words. The pain gnaws at my innards, leaving my organs bruised and the space where my heart should be, a hollow cage. My dear love is alive, healthy, and in a better place than I could imagined us being less than a year ago. I should be happy. I should be over this. I shouldn't be crying in my car to music that claws at my very soul. The body remembers what the mind forgets, and it only took one reminder for me to be swept off of my feet, back in the place where my love is breaking on the bathroom floor and I cannot take the pain from him. I can only hold his crying form tight in my arms as my heart breaks in tandem.
You can recover and still hurt. Our house has been sold (for better or worse) and our new beginning has found its comfortable rhythm. Even so, There is not a passing day that I am not keenly aware of how easy it would be to lose him. Even on a good day, I often find myself humming along to the music on the radio, my internal mantra repeating in syncopation the torturing reminder of I could lose him, I could lose him, I could lose him...and I could. A car crash, a heart attack, there is no shortage of ways I could become a widow in my twenties and that fact haunts me night and day. I cannot keep crying. My eyes look bruised and puffy. My sensitive skin has been made red and speckled from the salinity of my tears. I have a migraine. My voice is choked and cracking. I have to keep it together. I have to be there for him. I have to succeed at work. How can I do all of that when I am holding my heart together with poorly tied sutures, blood and sorrow leaking from the crevices? I don't have an answer, and I feel like I should. He is the reason I wake up every morning and the warm presence that carries me to sleep. He is the love of my life and the father of our future children. His loss is one from which I would never recover, but I cannot allow myself to dwell on it too long.
I am his happy, sweet, giggling wife. I cannot be any of that in this state and I will not bring him down into those dark places again. So I will have my time to cry alone in my car. My sobs would be almost identical to laughter if not for the tears cascading down my cheeks. I will have my space to grieve, then once again I will smile. I will be strong. I may not be able to carry my dear love's darkness on my soul, but I can be a source of light to the best of my ability. I cannot afford to break down. I can't.
I fully do not expect anyone to read this. I just needed it off my chest
National Crisis Hotline: 800-273-TALK (8255).
