Friday, February 26, 2010

Vomit

Things are moving faster than I ever imagined. I might have to move sooner than I thought. I was worried and upset over the past few weeks, because I didn’t know when I was going to have to move. Now I almost know. Now I want to vomit more than I did yesterday.

I looked at an apartment today. It is maybe 15 houses from my home. Same block, same neighborhood. The same and yet very unbelievably different. I told them I would take it. I barely care. I should probably go look at lots of places. I don’t have the strength or the will to do so. This fell into my lap and I am just going with it. I actually just don’t care. All I know is it’s not my house and not my own. Nothing else seems to matter. I tried to picture us living there and wanted to vomit even more. I hate change. No I loathe change. Change seems to be the only constant there is in my life. This is too much. I can’t breathe. I must remind myself to take breaths, because otherwise I may just forget.

My friend came over today and helped me pack. She was amazing. I just sat there and watched. Now there are boxes everywhere and I am suffocating. I almost told the children we are moving. Maybe I will tell them tomorrow. Another miserable Saturday. Maybe tomorrow I will put on my game face and tell them the truth. We have to move because I see your dead father everywhere I look. This is partly true. I won’t actually say this. I promise.

I feel like telling them is a great hurdle I must face and I need to get it over with already. I lie in bed at night worrying about everything. Now I have new things to worry about. Because there just wasn’t enough to think about last night; now I will wonder how my furniture will fit. How will I take apart their bunk beds and will my son be allergic to the dog upstairs? I can’t breathe again.

I am not sure how I am supposed to do this all. There is no time in my life for everything as it is. How am I supposed to fit this major move in? I just don’t want to go and I want to leave tomorrow. This house is golden handcuffs. I see my dead husband everywhere and stay away from some rooms because I can’t bear it, yet this house is my foundation. The one constant I have had all these months. The house is my sanctuary where I can hide from the world. It is comforting to me and nothing else feels right. I am so tired of not being normal and the world is upside down and it is all out of my control.

I hate change and want everything to be the way it once was. But this is just not possible. Nothing will ever be the same again and it seems to be going on and on this way. Change and more change and I just want my life back. Please just let me have my life back!!!

To say that I am overwhelmed is almost funny. I just want to vomit. I just want to feel human again and wonder when this happens. I wonder how he thought we would be better off without him. How my husband thought his death was any kind of solution. I know I shouldn’t dwell on thoughts like these. I know that this thinking gets me nowhere. But I can’t help it. I just wish I could have done something different so life would not be what it is right now.

Change and chaos – that is all I am living in. I still feel like this is happening to someone else. That I am going through the motions but none of it is real. That I will wake tomorrow and all will be as it should. Everything is happening so fast and I can’t catch up. I am ten steps behind my life. I fall further behind every single day. This sucks.

I hope I am making the right decision. I hope my children can be happy in this new place. I hope that for once in my pathetic life change will be for the better. I hope I just don’t vomit.

Wednesday, February 24, 2010

Pinball Wizard

This is really funny. I am trying to pack. This is freaking hilarious. I am trying to get my house ready for other people to want it. I mean this is really the funniest thing I have said all month. If I didn’t think this was so funny, I would be crying too hard to type.

I drove to work this morning in the pouring rain and blasted “Black Dog” as loud as I could take it – hoping you could hear it in heaven. I was playing you a song to drown out the sobs and curses that were spewing from me the entire trip.

Please G-d - please don’t let this be real. I just don’t know how much I can take. This has been the most overwhelming few months and I can’t breath. The anxiety might actually have gotten the better of me. I am back to being a shell again. I am going to work and taking care of my children, but I am so numb and so stunned that I just don’t know. I just want this struggle to be over, but really I just want you to come home and tell me to stop packing.

Yesterday I tried to start. I felt like a pinball moving around to different points in the house for brief moments. I would get overwhelmed looking at something and move to a new spot, get upset again and move to a different spot. This went on for hours – I packed nothing. Sorry T.

I started with the books. I thought this will be easy I can get rid of his books. But then I thought, what if my children would someday want their father’s books, I can’t get rid of these. They are so personal and tell so much about his likes. So I moved on to the movies. I thought this will be easier. But I can’t give away his movies. In ten years when the children will be age appropriate to watch them, they will want to know their father’s favorite movies. I can’t get rid of them because what if in ten years I can’t remember what is favorite movies were and they will be so angry I don’t know these things. I left the movies alone. I went looking for his cd’s and remembered blissfully that I already gave everything to his eldest son. I found four cassette tapes. I threw out two.

I felt so much better after I threw out the two tapes I moved on to the filing cabinet. I found all my honeymoon photos and maps and receipts waiting to go into a scrapbook that is half done. I pondered what to even do with this stuff. I put everything back into the filing cabinet.

I read every single Birthday, Anniversary and Mother’s Day card my husband has ever given me. I saved them all over the years. They all have poems in them – most of the go like this:

Roses are red
Violet are blue
I love you
Even though you are covered in vomit and poo

I didn’t just cry when I read them – I wept for hours and hours. I put everything back in the filing cabinet exactly where I found them.

So I pretty much spent all day wandering around the house and threw out two cassette tapes.

Not a bad start.

All week I can feel the start of something. I can sense the Fab Five are going to soon take over. I can hear them somewhere out there arming themselves for battle. They will come quick and sure and get my butt in gear. I feel bad for them – I plan on putting up quite a fight.

Word of advice to my Fab Five – good luck and bring tissues. Oh and beer.

Monday, February 22, 2010

Freak Out Girl

You can’t possibly know the freak out occurring in my brain these days. I am trying to fight the freak out and some days calm me is able to rationally keep my other evil self at bay. But lately freak out girl – she is on a roll.

I am going to move. There I said it. I am going to leave my home for the last five years. The only home my children have ever known and the place where I see my dead husband wandering around daily.

This may not seem like such a big deal to some. Maybe someday I will read this blog and wonder why I was freaking out. But today, I have several hundred reasons why I find this acceptable fodder for freaking out.

I have moved 20 times in my life. Yes, 20 times I have packed up all my stuff and moved somewhere else. When my husband and I finally bought this house all I thought was - I will never have to move again. Since I am 7 years old and the constant exodus began, I have only wanted someplace to call my own. Moving to this house was my husband’s 21st move. He never wanted to move again either.

There are two things I never wanted my children to experience that I did as a child. Living in a house without a father and moving from place to place. I am officially two for two. I feel like I have failed my children on so many ridiculous levels it is mind blowing. I have now literally given them my horrible childhood and even gone above and beyond the horrors any child should know. I should get a trophy.

The worst part about having to move, well I am not sure yet, but I have a list. It starts with not being able to paint the walls black, worrying the children will break something that doesn’t belong to me, never feeling like we are really home and not ever wanting to put pictures on the wall; because when you start to move from rental to rental - you just never stop.

I wish I could ask my husband what to do. I wish I could cry to him and tell him what is happening to us. I wish he were here to help me pack. I hate packing and I hate looking around at all the objects I have accrued through this marriage and wonder what am I supposed to do now.

I have not told my children yet. My mother warned me not to say anything too soon. If I told them today they would be asking me for the next few months, “When are we moving? Are we moving tomorrow? Where are we going? How many more sleeps?” I have no answers for them.

My mother also told me to make the move sound exciting. Every time we moved she made it sound like we were going on an amazing new adventure and we couldn’t wait to move. I need to get rid of freak out girl before I tell the children. I need to keep a huge smile on my face and look excited. If am crying while I tell them, they are never going to believe me when I say this is going to be great. I certainly don’t believe this at all. So I will wait until I can control my emotions; until I have a clue as to the where and when.

The whole world is open to us now. I could close my eyes and point to a place on the map and say we are going there. I could really go anywhere at this point. But the truth is, I just want to stay in my neighborhood. I am surrounded by the familiar and friendly. I love this place. I love the people and I love the strangers. I love not having to explain my daily tears and the comfort my children have from living in a warm and friendly environment. I may be losing my house but I will not let us lose our home too.

So for now I will try and fight my misery. I will push the thought away that sometime soon I will have to hand my dream house over to another family; for their dreams to flourish while mine are crashing to pieces. I will try and not think about the wonderful times we had here and how much I love my house.

I will try not to think about all that I have lost these past four months. My husband, my dreams, my joy and now my house. Everything I thought was important I have lost. All I am left with is my inner strength which is being taken over by freak out girl.

My children are the most important thing and I need to remember this when freak out girl is winning. I will remind myself over the next few weeks that this house is just four walls. All that matters is my healthy, amazing, happy family. What is in between the four walls is the only thing that is really important.

Sunday, February 21, 2010

Tooth Fairy

I am so done with this all and am ready for you to come home now. The joke is over – it is not funny anymore. Please come home now.

This really cannot be possible. This cannot be true. You cannot be dead. It feels so terribly wrong and part of me is just unwilling to accept it. The longer time goes on the more unrealistic this all feels. I actually dug your note out today because I think this is all one big freaking joke and totally can’t be happening. But your note is a harsh reminder that this did happen. You are truly dead and not coming back ever. Somehow this happened without any warning and I feel very small and sad and the what if’s are just terrible these days. Just plain awful.

Yesterday I woke up in battle mode. I was ready to take this Saturday on and not let it get to me. I didn’t cry and I didn’t wallow in misery – at least not right away. I took the children to the earliest movie I could to battle some demons, “The Tooth Fairy”. There is no father in this movie, which I was kind of happy about. But the mother does have a boyfriend, who proposes at the end. So after the kids were done trying to pry their teeth out for money, they asked me when I was getting a boyfriend to marry. I suggested we go to the supermarket and buy apples to work on prying their teeth out. They left the boyfriend question unanswered. I am seriously done with the movies forever!

At the market this crazy old lady approached me to tell me how lucky I am to have a beautiful boy and girl. I smiled politely, thanked her and moved away. She proceeds to follow me saying again and again how lucky I am. I am nodding and smiling, but after ten minutes of her going on and on and on I just want to turn to her and say; “Lady, my husband killed himself 17 weeks ago – luck is for other people.” But I didn’t. I went to the next aisle and started looking at rat poisoning instead and she left me alone.

The rest of the day was fine. Just fine.

Today is another story. Today was a beautiful day and I stayed inside the whole day. I just did not want to see the sunshine. I did not want to feel warm air on my face. I keep thinking that come spring I will be better. Come spring when the icy world defrosts and everything will be reborn again, so will I. That come spring I will be in a better frame of mind. But what if I am not? What if I stay icy and frozen inside as the world blossoms? I couldn’t risk the world smelling like spring when I am still a total mess. So we just stayed inside and hid.

I can’t even write about what is really bothering me and keeping me up at nights. But soon I will have to get it out. I can’t freak out on my own without my blog. I may just need to vent big time – but not now.

Tonight I am just still bewildered. People I know don’t kill themselves. People I know don’t go through this. I feel like I am living in a bad Hallmark channel movie and am waiting for the director to come in and feed me my lines. I don’t know what to do next and I don’t know what the future holds. I hate this.

Maybe tomorrow I will buy the children caramel and we will really get those teeth out; anything to distract me from reality. I hope it snows tomorrow.

Friday, February 19, 2010

Dreams

Tuesday night you finally came back to me, if only for a moment. I dreamt of you, peacefully, for the first time ever. I believe I only remembered the dream, even partially because I woke myself up crying – thanking you for visiting me.

What I do remember is how good you looked. Healthy, handsome and happy; the way I really remember you and always will. We were standing in our bedroom and you were packing. I was not packing – just you. You were folding your clothes and putting them into a suitcase. I remember standing there watching you – not sad or remorse. Just truly happy to be in your presence. There was a scrapbook on the bed and I opened it. Inside was a single newspaper clipping about your suicide. I remember thinking I had so many questions to ask you. So much I wanted to know, but I never found my words.

All I did ask was, “Do you ever think about that day?”

You told me yes, everyday.

“Are you sorry?” I asked.

Yes, you said to me – everyday.

Then I woke up crying.

Do I feel better? No. Do I feel at peace? No. Maybe I will dream again and be better prepared.

I was away with my children for the last two nights on our first ever family vacation. It felt terribly odd to be going away to a family resort – with a piece of the family missing. I was determined not to feel sad and miserable. I was determined to have a good time. I was determined to just not be me for a few days.

The children had a blast. They went swimming and ate ice cream at every meal. I taught them both how to ski and they were amazing. We stayed up late and jumped on the beds. I never said the word NO. Except when their independence got the better of me and they wanted to ski down the huge mountain from the very top without me.

It was very bizarre to be in a place where no one knows about me. Oddly comforting and yet difficult too. I was the only single parent that I could see and trust me; I was looking out for others like me. When the kids were swimming and I was sitting by myself surrounded by couples, I often wondered what they thought of me. I would chuckle to myself because I wanted to walk up to them and say, “Whatever you are thinking my story is – it is worse much worse than you can ever imagine”. But I didn’t. I didn’t have to explain my husband’s absence; I didn’t have to talk about death or suicide for three days. It left me feeling empty and longing for my computer so I could write about it.

I tried not to think about my dead husband while we were away. But there were moments I just couldn’t help it. I wanted him with me to share the experience. I wished he was there to witness the children coming down the mountain solo for the very first time. I saw him at every meal there was an all-you-can-eat buffet. He would have been thrilled. I saw him at night when couples were playing ping pong while their children played. I held a racket in my hand and tried not to cry. Envisioning how he and I would play ferociously both thinking we could out maneuver the other.

The only time I really cried was when I would watch children run away from their scolding mothers into the arms of their smiling fathers. That was so painful to witness I would have to look away in tears. I missed him so much this trip even though I tried very hard not to. I missed his sense of humor and just having him to rolls his eyes at me when someone said or did something ridiculous. I missed having him there when his daughter peed her pants as we were about to go skiing and was left on my own to deal with stressful parent stuff.

I guess deep down I didn’t do a great job at keeping the ghosts away. But like everything, I did the best I could.

I didn’t dream about him while we were away. I didn’t talk about him while we were away. I made new memories with the children and they only know what a wonderful vacation we had. They never said, I wish daddy was here – maybe they were just thinking it like me.

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Google it

This is what I know. My life has forever been altered with an all consuming sadness that has engulfed my children and me. This is what I don’t know. Everything else.

Late at night when I can’t sleep I search the Internet for people like me. I hope sometimes I will stumble across a website that will have the answers I seek. Though to be honest, I seek without even knowing the questions.

Suicide websites are too much for me. There are so many of them and they all make me feel worse than I already am. I read the many stories of others who are dealing with this awful situation and none of them bring me any closer to understanding anything. The only connection I feel is their pain.

I Googled young widows thinking maybe that would help refine my search. The first site that comes up is a band. Who knew there was a band in New York City called Young Widows. I have no idea why they came up with that name or what their story is. All I know is that Googling did not help. Other widow sites that come up are about dating a widow and to watch out. Nausea creeps across my soul as the word dating goes into my mind and quickly exits. Not now, not ever I think.

The next site I come across is for windows. Apparently the genius who makes Google thought widows and windows are the same thing. Well I do feel made of glass sometimes and feel like everyone can see right through me – maybe not such a bad match after all. I am now an expert on windows – go ahead ask me anything.

I am thinking about not blogging any more. I can’t deal with the side issues that have erupted due to this blog. In other words my family. Maybe I need a secret blog so I can complain to myself about my family. Maybe they should all just stop reading it. This bog is all about me. ME! This is where I come to when I am feeling my worst. This is where I get to put down all the feelings inside of me so I don’t go crazy. This is my outlet for pain and misery. It makes me feel better to write that which I cannot say. It helps me process the feelings and emotions that I need to some how deal with.

Yet when I am upset on this blog, you are all worried. When I pour my heart out on-line you worry. You should worry when this blog stops because then I have truly lost myself. It has only been through writing again that I have found the me that I lost many years ago. I need this blog and I need you to stop focusing on everything I am not doing. I need everyone to leave me alone.

Apparently when I am sad and miserable I need more therapy and drugs. When I am not sad and miserable, I need to be doing more to fix my life. I am dealing with my dead husband after four months. I am trying to raise my children and figure out the rest of my life. Need I remind you that I see my dead husband everywhere and relive finding his body day in and day out? I am trying to do the best I know how. And if my best is horrible that is still the best I can do.

I am not going to a one on one therapist. I don’t need someone to tell me this was not my fault. I don’t need someone to tell me I am strong and someday I will get past this. I don’t need someone to tell me that my husband made his own choice when he took his life and that I need to carry on living. I know this is all true. It doesn’t make the here and now any easier – even if the person saying it has a P.H.D.

I don’t want to take anti-anxiety drugs. I am sorry if you think drugs are the answer. I am sorry if you think I yell at my children too much. I am sorry if you think I loose my temper and am too stressed out. What if I take drugs and still act this way – are you going to suggest electro shock therapy?

This is also all I know. I am doing the best I can. I am trying to not be miserable all the time. But all I want to do is be miserable and maybe I deserve to be this way right now.

Maybe I will give the children guitar lessons and we will start our own band. We will sound so horribly depressed we will make Morrissey look like Elmo. Just Google it.

Saturday, February 13, 2010

Four Months

Wow – has it really been four months. It sounds like such a long time. But then I think that it has only been 16 weeks, 112 days; it doesn’t sound like such a long time anymore. It certainly doesn’t feel like you have been dead very long. It feels like you died today. I continue to feel raw and horrible inside and am still amazed that this is real - that you are actually gone. It feels like no amount of time is ever going to make me feel any different.

My children wake up every Saturday way too early. Like 5 am too early. Of course yesterday I was dragging everyone out of bed to get ready for school. But today when we can all sleep in, they are up at 5 am. It seems to make the start of every Saturday that much worse.

We drove to a birthday party this morning. On the way we passed a cemetery. For the first time in his life my son noticed a cemetery. He pointed to it and asked me if daddy is buried there. I said no, that daddy is buried in a different place. That was as far as the conversation went. We went to the party, which incidentally is five minute from “the” cemetery, and I thought maybe after the party I would take the children there. I figured it is four months, tomorrow is Valentine’s Day - maybe we would be ready for this.

The party was fun – the kids had blast and then we left the party with three heart shaped balloons. I had this image in my mind that we would go to your grave and tie the balloons to your sign and the kids could see where you are. I got them into the car and said, “We need to go to Trader Joe’s, but what if we go to the cemetery first?”

My son looked at me and asked, “Will there be games and rides there?”

I felt like someone had slapped me across the face. What was I thinking even contemplating taking them there? Why did I have this imagine in my mind that we would get there and everyone would be cool with it? That leaving their balloons would somehow make the moment not so awful and they wouldn’t be horrified by the idea that your body is buried deep in the earth under rocks and snow.

How did I even think I could go without hysteria taking over every ounce of my being? How did I even entertain this notion for longer than a second? Maybe I just miss you and want to see you so badly that I was willing to risk my children’s sadness and my own mental health for just a brief moment in your presence.

Going to the cemetery this early on with the children - bad idea. Just bad. Maybe the worst I have had in a while. Why did I want to go? Because every time I visit I think maybe you will be standing there waiting for me, to tell me it has all been a horrible mistake and you are alive. This is probably what my children would be thinking too especially if I said – “Let’s go see daddy!” They don’t understand fully where you are - I certainly don’t either. It may be four months but this is all still too new, too soon, too unbelievably painful to think about. They cannot go to the cemetery yet - I can’t take them – not yet – just not yet.

This all went through my head in about two seconds – then I looked at my children and without a moment’s hesitation said, “Hey, let’s go to Trader Joe's and buy lots of snacks!” And that is what we did.

They never realized how awful a mistake I almost made. They never asked again about the cemetery. I never even answered him about the rides and games – thank you awesome goody bag for that distraction.

We got home and I opened the mail – just love opening the mail. There was a letter from a monument company stating they heard I might need their assistance. I started to laugh. What kind of a letter is this, I am thinking. What kind of sick stupid person sends out these letters. Then I stopped myself; maybe it was a sign from G-d, my husband or even the universe – who knows. Telling me that at the right time I will have an unveiling of your tombstone and that is when your children will visit your grave.

Definitely not after four months with some red hearts balloons – sometimes I think I am going crazy. Sometimes I am thankful I catch these crazy moments before they go into action.

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Frozen

Therapy was cancelled yesterday, along with the rest of the world. I hear the collective sigh and oh no from all my friends as I write this. But I am relieved. I didn’t want to listen to the sad stories that await me and didn’t feel like telling my own. Trust me; they will be readily available next month.

I am fine.

I have trained myself not to look at the photos on the walls which cause me sadness and grief. My car is buried under a mountain of ice and snow so I can’t go to the cemetery any time soon. I am fine.

Though I still wake everyday making too much coffee – I just drink more of it now. I still wake each morning looking for you to help me with the morning routine. Looking for you has just become part of the routine and I guess I have grown accustomed to the looking and not seeing you.

The days and nights drag on and on through this awful winter. I stopped counting the weeks, but I suspect four months is soon approaching. I don’t care about Valentine’s Day. I never have and won’t feel sorry for myself on Sunday. All I ever cared about concerning Valentine’s Day was the 50% off candy on the 15th.

I have lost some enthusiasm for this blog. I can’t deal with writing every night about nothing. My children and I haven’t talked about daddy for a few days. I have just pushed him back inside my head, far away so that I don’t cry. It is hard to accomplish anything with the frustration I feel – so I have pushed it away for now. I am just on auto-pilot these days. I just go and do and try not to cry. This is it.

My children are growing and learning and thriving. I am eating but still not sleeping. A pattern of normalcy has taken over our lives and I am just going with it. Our lives are littered with good moments and those that are terrifyingly awful. This is life now – we must make the most of it.

I am trying to read these grief books with an open mind. They are chock full of advice. One book said that people fall into two categories. One group that has experienced the pain and sorrow that I have and one group that has not. I am extremely enlightened by books like this; they seem to tell me that which I did not know. Sigh, I have got to get to the library and get some new vampire books. Maybe they have a book called “death for dummies” – anything but what is on my nightstand.

The books about G-d and death do cause me to think deeper than most. I have evaluated my relationship with G-d many times over the past few months. I am not angry with G-d and I don’t blame G-d. But when the books tell me that all death is G-d’s plan – I don’t believe it for a moment. Not this death, not this way. I guess I have more thinking to do – but not now.

I feel like I am living in the Arctic. Everywhere I look there is ice and snow. Everything outside is dead and cold and the world just reflects exactly how I feel inside. I find that I care about very little these days. My only concern is for my children – everything else – I feel nothing. The goings on in the world, the dishes in the sink – I just don’t care.

The children are off from school next week. I wish I could stay in bed and hide from everything. I have no enthusiasm for anything. But I can’t hide. I must go out and face the day, like I do each and every morning. Sometimes I am overwhelmed with being a single mom – sometimes I am thankful for being a single mom, because it is the one and only thing that keeps me going. Being a mom is the most important thing in my life – it really seems at times to be the only thing in my life.

Even on the bad days, when there are lots of tantrums and crying and complaining and homework and dinner and drama; when I wake up exhausted and spend the day dragging and then lie awake at night worrying – it could always be worse I think. It could always be much, much worse.

Tomorrow is Friday and I will wake up tired from today. I will not sleep well again tonight. I will lie in bed and worry about everything. Eventually my children will crawl into my bed in the wee hours and I will awaken with them kicking me, grinding their teeth and stealing the blankets. But I will wake up next to two beautiful children who are my very own and in the end that is all that matters.

I will be just fine.

Monday, February 8, 2010

The Nile

I know I say this almost every night – but what a bad fucking day today was. The worst part was that it started out so well. I had us all up and out without too much drama this morning. I thought for a Monday I was doing pretty well.

Then I got totally frazzled at work. There are so many things I am bad at that I am just frustrated with myself. I started to cry as I drove home. I just wanted to pick up the phone and call my husband. I wanted to talk to him and tell him about the day. I had funny stories to tell him that only he would truly appreciate. I miss being able to call him.

Then I had to deal with my true reality as I drove home and tried to compose myself as I returned phone calls. Then I forgot what day it was and what time I had to pick up my son. My friend called me ten minutes after I was supposed to be at school to tell me she grabbed him for me. As I ran up the street frazzled again, I just thought my mind is gone. Thankfully I have an amazing friend, and her brain works better than mine, and my baby didn’t have to sit in school, wondering where is mother was. In fact, he never even knew how I screwed up. I however, have been angry with myself since.

Then we were off to pick up my daughter and I rushed him to get to her school, only to realize I messed up the timing again and we were half an hour early.

I just sat in the car while he did his homework wanting to bang my head on the steering wheel. What is wrong with me? Why can’t I remember the simplest things anymore? Really, just what is wrong with me?

After we got home and I figured out what terrible meal was for dinner, I opened the mail. I dread opening the mail. Every single letter addressed to you is painful – every time I see your name it just hurts, each and every time. Today an AARP card came for you. Once upon a time I would laugh hysterically and would wait with anticipation for you to come home so I could hold it up and tease you for hours. Now I look at it and just cry. I tear it up into teeny tiny pieces but it doesn’t make me feel any better. I hate the mail.

I have a melt down after bath time and start to yell at the kids, but instead I leave the room and just cry in the bathroom till I have calmed down. The day has just taken a major toll on my patience and I get so frustrated with them, me and just everything.

After I tuck in my daughter into bed, I read with my son. His book tonight from school is called “Bill and Pete down the Nile.” Bill is a crocodile who learns about Egypt. Page two talks about how after the Pharaohs died they were buried in Pyramids and blah blah blah. My son stops reading and looks at me. “Is daddy’s body buried,” he asks?

Crap! Crap! Crap! Is what I am thinking. I tell him that daddy’s soul, the very special part of him that made him daddy is in heaven, but yes his body is buried in the ground. He looks at me with these huge brown eyes and whispers, “I want to go see him.”

I explain that you can’t see his body anymore, but we could go to where he is buried. The bile in my throat is rising at a rapid rate. “I want to go there,” he says “and then I want to dig him up and hug him.” He starts to cry and then of course I am crying.

The worst part for me is that I totally get my six year old son. All I want to do is dig him up and hug him as well. But I don’t say it. Instead I run to the bathroom and throw up.

My son is still crying as I sit down next to him and put my arms around him. He starts sobbing and says that he doesn’t want to die. I tell him he won’t die for a long, long time. “Well what if someone comes over and sticks a huge sword in my stomach?” He asks. I tell him that it just won’t happen. No one is going to stick him with a sword. (Thank you Peter Pan) Then he looks at me and says, “Does daddy’s body look like this?” He closes his eyes and sticks his tongue out. I actually start to laugh and say that it probably does look something like that. I keep laughing because I am afraid I will throw up again.

He stops his crying and I toss the book to the floor and suggest he go to bed now. I tuck him in and he asks to read a little more in bed. I find the nicest, simplest and least thought provoking book I can find. I hand him his flashlight and kiss him goodnight.

Fucking crocodiles going down the Nile – stupid mail – why can’t anything just be easy anymore?

Saturday, February 6, 2010

Strangers

Everyone is starting to look like you. Cars drive by and I swear it is you, or I will see someone on the street from behind and think you have come back. The rational part of me knows it is not you. But I am not satisfied until I have caught up with the car and see a stranger driving or walk up to the person and stare them in the eye. Chasing after strangers is not so good for me. They see a woman with no wedding band giving them an odd look and who knows what they are thinking. I am sure if I said, “Oh excuse me, I thought you were my dead husband,” that would stop them in their tracks. But I don’t say anything and usually just run the other way.

Maybe my subconscious is just so desperate to see you again that I am envisioning you everywhere. Maybe this is just part of the grieving process. All I know is the disappointment I feel when none of these people end up being you.

I woke up today so very unhappy. Each and every Saturday my first thought is that you killed yourself on a Saturday. I wish it wasn’t the first thing that goes through my mind, but it is. I don’t know how long this goes on for. I feel like every Saturday I wake up and relive your death. I stand in the shower crying until I turn into a prune and even then I don’t want to get out. To face another day without you – the pain just goes on and on.

Today should have been better than it was. We spent the day at a birthday party, a play and with all our wonderful friends. Yet I feel nothing – just numb and cold. I don’t even know how many weeks it has been since you died; thirteen maybe fourteen, I can’t remember. Keeping track of the weeks wasn’t helping, but forgetting seems almost worse. It feels like an eternity since you died. If feels like it just happened. Today is simply another day I try to get through without you. This is all I feel.

I sat in the middle of the play at 4 pm. I knew exactly when it turned 4 without ever looking at the time. I knew it because all of a sudden I started to get anxious and tears rolled down my face and I had to actually think about taking breaths to get the moment to pass. I looked around the room and saw everyone from my community and though it was filled with friends who love and care for me; all I really saw was that you weren’t there.

Life is just beginning to get even more complicated – I can’t really get into it now. There is so much on the horizon, so much in limbo that I don’t know how I am going to get through this. To be honest, I just don’t want to deal with any of it.

I want my old life back. When I look back I wonder what I even cared about or worried about, before death became the central focus of everything. I wonder how I could have ever complained about anything when I had it so freaking good. Why didn’t I appreciate my life a few months ago? Why didn’t I think I had it all?

I am tired of being unable to sleep and lie in bed at night worrying about every little thing. I am worried about my children and that I am not good enough to do this by myself. That someday when they are older they will blame me for everything that has gone wrong in their life. I will probably blame myself too.

No one has mentioned daddy all week. I used to complain about the crying every night and now I am worried when it stops. I know they don’t feel what I feel – I go through moments of feeling nothing and then I feel everything all at once.

I am consumed with guilt and sorrow and stress and more sorrow and I hate this person who I am right now. I hate feeling so bad all of the time and so tired and so very, very, very lost.

Sometimes I want to scream at the world for killing my husband and stealing my children’s innocent childhood. But who this tirade is intended for, I am not sure. I am just looking for someone to blame other than myself – other than my husband. I am looking for some way to make this insanity all go away.

I have been trying to look forward and not look back or even look at the present, but even this seems impossible. I guess I hope and pray that there will be a moment in time where I feel all the pain I am supposed to be feeling and then it will go away.

When I do feel your absence it is awful. When I suppress my reality it feels worse. The only constant in my life right now is this freezing cold weather that numbs me inside and out and I am just tired of feeling lost and out of sync with myself.

I just keep hoping the next person I stop on the street will be you.

Wednesday, February 3, 2010

Tears

I woke this morning dreaming about pounding on the garage door. It was an awful way to start a day and left me feeling empty but for the aching in my heart. I lay in bed for a moment trying to get the image of your face to go away. It still hasn’t.

The day continued on a downward slide. I brought my six year old to school and just as he was about to walk in the door he looked at me and said, “I am sad that daddy died.” Then he disappeared through the school doors. I stood there in the snow looking at the door, wondering what to do next. He didn’t come back out. So I left, with the pain in my heart now growing. My four year old cried when I dropped her off to school. She never cries about school – never.

For reason unknown we were all on the same awful wave length today.

I sat on the bridge for twenty minutes while they cleared away an accident. Someone cut me off and the next thing I know I am sobbing uncontrollably, yelling at the steering wheel - please don’t be dead, please don’t be dead! I don’t know where it came from. I just could not stop crying. The tears just continued with the day. I cried at work and then again on my way home. I just have not been able to shake the sadness or the tears today.

Yesterday I wasn’t even half this bad. I took my daughter to the eye doctor for a check-up. The waiting room was filled and I noticed after a while that many were children with special needs. Some young children and a few teenagers were there with both their parents keeping a watchful eye on them. I saw the exhaust and frustration in the parent’s faces. I share that same look but for a much different reason. I saw how much work it took just to keep them calm and under control in a waiting room. My heart went out to them as I watched my daughter sit quietly playing with toys or sitting on my lap snuggling. I was reminded at how lucky I am. How life could be even more difficult for me. I have two beautiful, healthy children and I try to remember how good I have it on many other levels.

I occasionally do have these moments of clarity, when I realize I need to take stock in what I do have and not what I have lost. I try and tell myself this when I am freaking out on the bridge – but sometimes logic gets completely lost in sadness no matter what I say out loud.

I think about how far I have come in three short months. How much I do everyday and realize once again, I am blessed I have so much help. I would still be in bed if it weren’t for my family and friends.

Every morning when I walk my son to school I usually see at least twenty people I know. Now you all know why I wear mascara at 7:30 in the morning. Regardless of what kind of day these people are having, they always make sure to send a smile my way. Personally, I have given up trying to hide when I am having a bad day. It seems ridiculous to even try.

I used to try and hide my tears during the morning walk. I am so over this. I have done so much crying that I don’t even bother to wipe the tears away anymore. I don’t care who sees them. No one ever has to ask me why I am crying and I almost love this. Not having to explain my tears is the greatest gift my friends and neighbors have given me. Tears are just a part of my life now and they probably will be for a long time.

Therapy is in a week. I am dreading it. I am anxious about it. I am kind of looking forward to it. I don’t think I will have anything to say this time. Nothing new has occurred. Grief and I are at a standstill. I am not growing as a person and not falling apart – well except for today. I am trying to prepare myself for what I will have to listen to and worry about saying something stupid.

The only thing that doesn’t worry me is crying. I am not afraid of the tears that I know will show up. I will bring them, use them and then they will come home with me.

My four year old has 102 fever tonight – so that at least explains her crying. Me – I have no other excuse except for grief.