Saturday, January 16, 2010

Three Months

Today is three months that you are dead. I know we are all thinking about it. I know because everyone I called today the first thing they asked me was, “are you O.K.?” My answer, “I am fine.”

Your dad had a small stroke yesterday and I am worried. He is in the hospital in Florida and I feel helpless. I need him to get better soon for so many different reasons. Mostly I want him to get better for him; I also need him to get better for this family. I don’t think any of us – my brother-in-law and I - can take any more stress right now. We have more than we can handle as it is.

Last night I talked to my father-in-law’s new wife. She called to update me on his condition. My first thought as I got off the phone was I needed to call my husband to let him know what I learned. My second thought took my breath away. Still after three months I go to call, forgetting for the briefest of moments that he is gone. It still just doesn’t feel real, not his death, not his absence, not this life that I am living.

I took the children ice skating today. I feel the need to do something every Saturday to make the day seem not so awful. I tried not to look at the clock all day. I tried not to have an anxiety attack when four o’clock came round. I try not to think about the day you died and how nothing has been the same since. I am trying.

I have been thinking about therapy a lot. Trying to get a handle on what I heard people say and how I feel. One man, who lost his wife and found her body, told the group that he is haunted by her face the day she died. I too share this feeling of being haunted. I try not to think about this moment – but it comes to me every Saturday no matter how hard I try.

Today I read your note again. I read it sometimes to make these feelings seem real. Today I realized how matter of fact the note is and how sure you are that you made the right decision. I have been so angry over these past three months. Angry that you left your three children and I to battle lifelong demons and despair. I realized today after reading your note again that you really didn’t mean to cause us pain. Deep, deep down in your soul you thought you were doing the right thing and you thought we would be better off.

My anger seems to dissipate over time. I don’t blame you for your actions. I am trying not to blame myself. Everyone in my therapy group feels responsible for their lost loved ones. Everyone feels like they should have known what was coming and not a single person did. We discussed how when a person says they want to kill themselves, it is a cry for help, they want to be stopped. The people who actually commit suicide without any forewarning – they were the ones who made up their minds to do it and nothing was going to prevent it.

Does this make me feel better – no not really. Does this make me feel less responsible – not yet. Over time I feel like I will eventually put to rest my own demons, but right now they sit bedside me, lingering for a while.

I look forward to a Saturday when my first thought is not - today you died. I wonder how long I have to wait. Three months have gone by and there is still so much unsettled in my life and the children. Three months and there are still monsters in their closets and monsters in my head.

Three months is such a short span of time and yet it feels like you have been gone for a long, long time. You have just missed so much life in three months. I wish you were here every single moment of every single day. A part of me is scared and sad for wanting that to go away. But it is painful – wanting you around. It is an awful dichotomy of feelings enslaved inside me.

I will miss you forever and love you forever – but the pain – I want it to go away forever too.

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