Becoming One with the Grief.

Grief is a funny thing.  It's been eleven years since my little girl died.  I've work hard in the past to get to a place where I didn't let grief control me.  At some point, as much as I wanted to cry, I stopped letting myself cry.  Not because I was afraid of what people were thinking, or anything, but because it was giving me headaches, my asthma was worse, the crying itself was making me sick. 

So I tried not to cry. It got easier as things went on.  I learned to feel when I was headed into the place in my head where I would start crying, and I would tell myself to think of something else and eventually, I could.  During this process I also felt guilty for doing this, but remembered that she would hate that I was upset all the time. 

That seems easy, you know?  It's so easy to say "just change the way you think".  But it is literally all I did.  Much like when I gave up sugar, I just stopped eating it.  Sounds so easy, but the work behind it was much, much harder.  Both things would be easy to give into.  I love bread.  I love thinking about my daughter and what she would have been like and her hugs and her laugh.  It is work to "put them away".  It is work to decide make a choice on whether or not you want to let yourself have the bread, or the feelings.  And honestly, the work to put away the feelings has been much, much harder than giving up bread ever could be, but I wanted to give an example that you could all relate to. 

I don't love her any less, I just know that she would want me to really LIVE and that was really hard to do when I was crying myself into sickness all the time.  She would be proud that I can put the feelings away and that I have a little control over how deep I wanted to wade into the sadness when those feelings came up.  Like this morning.  I'm not sure what triggered it, but I was sitting there, and one thought lead to another and suddenly, I was thinking of how much it all completely and utterly SUCKS that this happened to her and to our family.  My youngest daughter was in the backseat and I said, "gosh, this feels like one of those days that I could cry all day."  I mean literally, in that moment, I was completely back to 11 years ago and feelings of complete despair.  I let myself have that moment and I thought to myself, "I can't do this to myself, it's taking nothing from Emerald's memory to choose a different outcome." She is still my daughter.  She is still loved.  She is still very much missed.  But instead of crying for a couple hours, I can go LIVE in her honor. 

This isn't to say that it's wrong to cry.  Sometimes, we have to.  Sometimes, especially at the start, you just don't have any control over it.  We have all had days where we are thinking of something else then suddenly a song plays on the radio and we can't shake the sad.  Most of us who have children die have this happen.  My grief hasn't ended.  It's just changed.  It's part of me.  Almost welcome now.  I can visit the feelings without letting it ruin my day, it's not making me sick.  It allows me to be more grateful for everything in my life.  For the people in it, no matter their role or where they were in the story. 

I just wanted you to know that it's OK if the sad doesn't control you.  Don't feel guilty when you get to this spot, it's a victory. You can see more of the big picture. It's living. <3

Year Eleven and the Return of the Grief Train

I think people forget.  They forget that I am broken inside.  They forget that I lost a child.  Not literally. I mean, they know.  They just get used to me being me the rest of the year.  The woman who tries to live life anyway. The woman who works to have positivity.  In the past this time of year has caused me great distress.  In the past 10 years I have become more at ease when it comes to the loss of my child.  It still hurts.  It will always hurt.  But it is as part of me as my hearing loss or the fact that I have two arms or that I have 5 kids.

So this time of year even when I don't see it happening at first, the darker side of me comes out.  Little things start to show up kind of subtly.  My sense of humor gets darker, my frustration level goes up as triggers for my daughter's death become more and more apparent.  Maybe you know people like this.  Maybe you are one of those people.  These are just coping mechanisms.  December... January... February... March... then finally I can breathe.  I've worked hard to identify and acknowledge and decide if I want to deal or not deal with a particular trigger.  To get to this spot was a lot of work.  In the past, this time of year was just a free-for-all of emotions.  This past year, I've felt that I've really grown as a person.  I can usually see what is happening and I try to make a choice on how and if I am going to let it affect me.  Sometimes, it still catches me off guard, but I try to back track through it, and see how I can find it faster the next time.  I know this probably seems foreign to some of you.  But crying every day for 4 months and just letting out that dark side of me without any thought to what anyone else thinks or how they are affected isn't an option. That scares people. Truthfully, it scares me, too. There is no freedom in feeling flooded with emotion. There is no safety in feeling crazy.

This year, even I forgot. Here it is almost diagnosis day and I've been filled with emotions. I couldn't put my finger on it. Other events have been going on and I thought it was just that. My friend Cary, lost her daughter to a brain tumor and it's a lot of PSTD feelings we go through, especially when it's someone "close" in our journey. I've work really hard not to cry. I've lost that battle several times. But certainly not as bad as it could have been.  I've had people come up to me and tell me "they are concerned" and now my friend posted that I've seemed negative lately.  Yeah, maybe a little.  Nothing like I've been in the past.  In the past, I'd be so stressed that I wouldn't be able to do anything but lie in bed and watch netflix or sleep or yell or eat.  Just knowing this day was coming.  The cycle was beginning.  Leading up to Emerald's birthday.  This year she will be gone longer than she was alive.  I can't even type that without tearing up.  But as another friend suggested, I don't have to allow those feelings to bounce around in my head just because they are there.  I can allow them in when I want them in and I can tell them to go away and come back later.  I do have control over that. The fact, that I didn't connect Sofie's death with the beginning of Emerald's journey this year is both kind of liberating for me as I work down the grief journey and at the same time (only other people who have been in this place will understand) I sort of feel guilty for forgetting about Emerald, like it wasn't important. To get off track a little, I don't think Emerald would mind.  She quite literally wanted me to be happy. She said so. So yay?  "Finally!" she is probably thinking.

This whole grief thing has been quite a journey.  It's not over.  It won't ever be over.  Be gentle with me.  Like I've learned to be with myself.  If I'm a bit impatient or seem frustrated and it doesn't seem like me, then realize that it IS actually me.  It's me coping with a pretty shitty event in my life.  And please know that I've come a really long way in finding happiness and trying to make sense of it all.  Because it's my life.  Oh and if I make a post that's kind of obnoxious and I'm trying to be funny... Well, that's just who I am.  <3