New Normal

I started reading some of my death books last night. I read one line which forced me to close the book and chuck it across the room. It said, “Suicide leaves the family with visions of doom enough to haunt them all the days of their life.”

Just fucking great. Like I needed a book to tell me that which I fear most. That I will never forget this and never get over this trauma. Not what I want to read. I think about all the other tragedies I have read or heard about in my life. I feel like people can go in two directions when the worst thing possible happens to them. They can fall apart and live in misery forever or they can look at what a wonderful life they can have, if they just try to move forward and work through the pain.

I want to be the latter. I don’t want to feel destroyed and miserable forever. I don’t want visions of doom to haunt me either. I want to work hard and make a better life for my children and myself and be the pillar of strength I never was. But just as I feel like I can be O.K. I have a vision of my husband or see a photo and hear his voice in my head - then my breath is knocked out of me and I am falling further from my strength than ever before. It is a winding roller coaster this thing called grief. These moments of strength come few and far between and I am grasping at them to keep from drowning.

I am trying to think about life in a different way. These past few months all I have focused on is how awful my new life is. This is not helping me at all. Today my sister and I talked about how my life is just a “new normal”. I kind of like this term. It doesn’t sound as depressing as how I have referred to my life previously. There is no before daddy died and after daddy died life – this is my new normal whether I like it or not, so I guess I better start embracing it.

I have yet to feel good about feeling the slightest bit happy. Every moment where I start to smile, every time I find myself laughing out loud, I want to chastise myself for having good moments. I feel like I should not be happy – not yet. But what am I waiting for? A sign from the grave to let me know it is time to laugh again. My marriage was filled with laughter – it was the foundation of our love. That is why it just feels so wrong to laugh without him. I think sometimes I just want it to happen naturally, to feel happy without immediately feeling regret. My emotions are all over the place and no longer controlled by me. I find I can be doing something fun with the children or my friends, then there is a little voice inside my head that yells at me – “Hey your husband killed himself and you couldn’t stop it – do you really think you should be laughing?”

Good times in my world – oh yes – good times.

Sometimes at night while waiting for the Ambien to kick in I look on-line at suicide websites. Last night I Googled “widows”. I found one site written by a woman who lost her husband after 33 years and she was giving advice to another woman who was complaining about losing her husband after 35 years. I thought they were lucky to have their husbands for such a long time. Their grief was real and sad, but their children were grown, their husbands died of natural causes and I was having a hard time feeling sympathy for them. I was married for seven years and am left with two small children. I guess someone else would find me lucky – but I haven’t met them yet.

This widow’s website gave advice on ways to keep you happy and distracted from your grief. She said to take walks in the rain and blow bubbles – um well today I walked in the pouring rain as I took my cranky children to school and there was nothing enjoyable, fun or happy about it.

Maybe it was because I forgot the bubbles.

Reds

I didn’t cry once today. Probably because yesterday all I did was cry, scream and have my own melt downs. Yesterday was one of those awful days that I hope the children won’t remember and I try to push far from my mind.

We had an early morning appointment and the children were not listening before we even left the house. They were cranky, fighting and needy and I was just out of patience. I promised to take them to McDonalds and though they were misbehaving – I still went. We walked in and before I was even on line to order one was running away while the other was flinging himself onto a chair and spinning around. I asked them to come back to me and no one even acknowledged me in the slightest. I said if you don’t come back now we are leaving – nothing. So I did what any insane mother of two children who lost her husband to suicide 13 weeks ago would have done. I dragged them both by their coats kicking and screaming out the door while every single person in the place glared at me.

I sat them on the stoop outside and reprimanded their bad behavior. They didn’t hear a word I said over their wailing. I realized at that moment they weren’t being so horrible, but I have a tendency to over react when they don’t listen and I am really hypersensitive to every little thing these days. I calmed down, got them to stop crying and we walked back in to try again. Everyone was starring at me and in my mind I was daring someone to say something out loud. I had the words rehearsed to anyone who dared to question my parenting. Fortunately for them, no one said a word to me. The kids ate and played and then we went home so I could cry and cry and get all my stress and anxiety out. It was a Saturday – I should have expected this all along.

There was a light at the end of tunnel for me though. Last night my three college roommates and I went into Manhattan for dinner. An event that is a rare treat as one of the girls lives in Australia. We are all redheads and have been friends over 20 years. I have lived with some of these girls almost as long as I lived with my husband. No one in the world knows me better and it lifts my heart just to be in the same room as the three of them.

We are also extremely bad influences on each other – but really, in a good way. When we are together no one in the world exists, as we are immediately transformed back into our younger selves trying to take over the world – one drink at a time.

We spent the night laughing like we can’t with any other, reminiscing about stuff we can only talk about between the three of us and making a scene like there is no one else around. We love to take pictures of the four of us together – to document our time out. We had an entire photo shoot at the bar making complete strangers take photo after photo of us and then changing positions, fixing our hair and lip glossing our way through it all. It would be embarrassing on a normal night – but when we are together there is nothing but us. Every problem is gone, every stressful situation and worry is out the window and we are just the REDS.

These girls have seen me at my worst and have been there for me every step of the way. They have come to my house over the last few weeks where we have sat and cried and talked. Tonight it was a relief not to talk about my dead husband. It was wondrous to be transported away from all my sorrow and misery even if it was for just a few hours. To remember for a moment who I was a long time ago; to remind myself that I used to be a normal person with a normal life. Even though now everything is just totally fucked up – I have friends who can bring me back to where I started. Maybe someday I will see her again on a regular basis, as I feel like that girl is long gone - but for one night it was fun to pretend to be me again.

As I sat with them at the dinner table I was a little bit sad. I have been a bridesmaid at each of their weddings and they at mine. They are all married with children now and we are all very different from our younger days; well maybe not so different. We just have more responsibilities and concealer. But it is hard to think of starting my life over again when everyone around me is just settling into theirs. It is hard to think about the future stretching ahead of me. I didn’t want this challenge of starting fresh. I was very happy being married and raising my family and living the life I had 13 weeks ago.

Today I made amends with my children and we played all day long; board games and dress up – we just played. I need to remind myself that though a lot has changed in my life, many things have not. My children still love me and need me to care for them and make their lives fun and enjoyable. All my friends new and old are here for me, love me and want the best for me.

I have no choice now but to embrace this life and make the most of it - for better or for worse.

Underdog

My six year old cried himself to sleep tonight. This time it is my fault. He wasn’t listening to me and was talking back, so I took away his flashlight and wouldn’t let him read books in bed. He went hysterical and had a melt down, the likes of which I have not seen in years. I feel terrible beyond belief and almost gave in – but I held onto my convictions and just let him cry till he passed out. This is the first night he went to bed without telling me he loves me – it was painful.

This single mom parenting is so difficult at times. There is just no way around it. I feel like right after my husband died I gave into their every whim. I didn’t punish and didn’t yell – they have truly been taking advantage of the situation. I have started to pull in the reins so to speak and insist they abide by house rules and at the very least stop yelling and speaking snotty to me.

I miss my husband tonight because I feel like I am the underdog when I deal with the children. I am out numbered on a daily basis and there is no one else to turn to when I need help dealing with a four and six year old. Forget the grieving for a moment, that our lives are completely turned upside down and that the future holds more questions than answers. Just dealing with our day to day lives is exhausting and stressful and difficult.

Just being a parent is an impossible, never ending, thankless job that my friends and I all deal with and share together. Being a parent has never been easy, but sometimes I just feel like I am failing miserably.

I wish my husband was here with me to share the highs and the lows. I am tired of missing him so much. I am sad being all alone and just wish he was alive. The children need a father and now he is gone and I am struggling daily about how to keep the children in a happy place in our home. I am trying to be a good mother and not sad all the time. It is exhausting being a parent, it is exhausting to grieve and mourn and it just feels overwhelming to be me.

Last night, however, my six year old son was a pillar of strength. At bedtime we started to pray to G-d and when it came time to say “please bless daddy in heaven” his face scrunched up and I thought it was going to be a tearful night so I stopped talking. He looked at me with his huge brown eyes and whispered, “Mommy, don’t stop talking, just keep praying.”

I started to cry a little and he just looked at me and said, “It is O.K. mommy – just keep praying.” I was amazed at his inner strength, he is so sad and yet he is building up a tolerance to the grief. I asked him if he wanted to talk about anything or cry about anything. He sighed and just said, “I can’t believe our first daddy died.”

I asked him what he meant about his first daddy. He just said, “I can’t believe the first man you married died!” I almost laughed out loud at the awful statement. I said, “No kidding, you are telling me!”

Then he asked, “Do you really have to kiss someone on the lips when you marry them?” I replied, yes and he made a gagging noise. Then thankfully the conversation spun itself into something completely different.

As I kissed him good night and left his room he said to me, “Mommy, I am still really sad that daddy died – goodnight I love you.” But there were no tears from him and none of the usual drama that can accompany nights like this. He is so strong and smart. He knows how to be sad and grieve without letting it get the better of him.

Some nights I idolize his strength. But nights like tonight I want to scream and cry right along side him and make this madness go away.

I wanted to go to the cemetery today, but I didn’t. My heart was tugging at me all morning and after a short fight with the car, that seemed to try and take me there – I just didn’t go. I had a choice this morning – to go to your grave and cry and cry and cry or get caught up in my life. Today life won.

I know I should not let bad times like this get to me. I must remind myself that sometimes all I need is a good nights sleep to make the sadness not feel so sad and embrace the children’s crazy behavior. They are after all just little kids thrown into a big fat mess. I am trying to see the good in the world, regardless of the blackness that follows me.

I wish I could just fast forward these next few months. I want to envision the children and I in a happier time and place. Where there isn’t any yelling and crying and the sadness is at a minimum. I don’t think I am asking too much.

Just Horrible

I have been putting this post off for days now as I hate to upset people. But then I remember that this blog is supposed to help me get things out of my system – so here it goes.

Maybe because I am on day four of being home alone with sick children – maybe because we are smack in the middle of winter – maybe just because – but there are awful images in my mind that just will not go away.

I could be washing my hands in the sink or walking up the stairs; just being in some random mundane moment that allows my mind to wander even for an instance and I see your face.

Let me be more specific and more horrific, as is the case with me.

I think about the day I walked into the house and found your note. I think about how I ran to the garage calling your cell phone, begging you to pick up. How I heard the motor running inside and started to throw myself into the metal door crying and screaming your name, while simultaneously speaking to the 911 operator trying not to sound like a lunatic. But I was utterly and completely insane.

I am so haunted by this day that I don’t think I will ever, ever forget it. Maybe the pain of losing you will someday subside – slowly ever so slowly. But that day and everything I experienced – it is so truly horribly X-rated that I feel like I am scarred for life. This is coming from someone who can’t watch commercials for scary movies. Yet I feel like I have lived the scariest and worst thing I could ever witness in a movie first hand, real life and all.

I find myself constantly thinking about how I threw myself against the garage door until some random strangers came and pried the door open. I saw you lying there and ran in without another thought and pulled you out onto the sidewalk – someone must have helped me, I don’t remember. Then I was lying on your body screaming your name, and though I have taken CPR and know all about First Aid – I did none of this. I just clawed at your shirt screaming don’t be dead over and over – then someone pushed me out of the way to start mouth to mouth - I didn’t know who. Not until he knocked on my door a week later to tell me how sorry he was that he failed you.

My beautiful amazing friend was there with me – moments after I pulled you out and I just remember her gripping me in her arms as she and I lay on the wet rainy sidewalk. She held me so hard it helped me focus on her and not the utter madness we were witnessing. She said lets pray and I know she said something meaningful but all I remember is whispering then screaming, “don’t be dead please g-d please don’t be dead” till I couldn’t see or talk anymore. I was crawling on the ground back and forth wanting to see what was happening to you and then just wanting to get so very far away. Then the ambulance came and the fire trucks and the police and all I remember are people standing around me as my friend and I lay on the wet ground sobbing and screaming and just praying that you would not be dead.

I don’t remember any more specifics – that moment blurs through my mind – just the crowd of people, the noise and lights and the ambulance workers taking you away. I really just recall my friend gripping me even tighter – keeping us both aware of the other so we didn’t have to be aware of anything else.

I am sorry that she was there with me to experience this terrible moment that haunts me and I know it haunts her too. She is just as sorry that I was there at all. This is the love of good friends – when you wish the other person didn’t have to experience the most awful of horrible moments.

I think about your face that day and just your body lying helpless on the ground and the images just don’t go away. Later that day I spent waiting in my kitchen for the police to come, to tell me what I already knew, that you didn’t make it. Sometime it feels like I was watching the entire event unfold from somewhere else. That it didn’t happen to me and though I saw it all, it didn’t happen to me. But these lasting, haunting memories that follow me where ever I go are a reminder that I did live through this, that it is real – every single moment happened and I can't stop thinking about that day - I just can't.

I don’t think any amount of therapy can erase what is burned into my mind. Sometimes I think maybe I want a vampire to glamour me or a magician to hypnotize me to make me forget what I lived through. Because I hate the things I see when I close my eyes and then when I open them – they are still there.

Maybe this is what the doctor meant when he said I might have post traumatic stress. Maybe I just need to get out of the freaking house, breath some fresh air and push forward like I do everyday and really hope that this all will just somehow go away.

24

It is amazing to me how one bad night can make the world seem so bleak. Maybe it is the rain. Maybe it is an ear infection that kept my six year old up and screaming all night. I can’t decide.

Today I feel a million years old and unable to focus on anything. I am feeling the enormous pressure of being a single mom and the helplessness that comes with the job. I could not even run to the pharmacy without calling someone for help. Thankfully my wonderful neighbor was home to sit with the kids for ten minutes so I could go alone. But before I called her I was panicking. Do I really have to get the kids dressed and bring them out, sick and miserable, to make a two minute errand? I feel incredibly frustrated that I must rely on so many these days. I am used to being able to deal with my own problems on my own and now I just can’t. How am I supposed to do anything at all by myself? How can I possible raise my two children properly all alone and expect that we will all be just fine – I just don’t know.

Tonight I am so tired that the weight of the world feels heavier than usual. Everything looming ahead of me seems impossible and scary and awful. I am feeling sorry for myself again and I blame it on the lack of sleep. But still, I am missing my husband and really could have used his help last night and he was nowhere to be found – just gone!

More importantly I don’t know what to do about 24. Jack Bauer and I have come a long way together and my husband was the only man who got between us. It was the one and only show my husband and I could agree to watch together. Otherwise he was knee deep in politics while I am totally into vampires – but 24 brought us together.

Tonight is the premier and I am taping it as I don’t know if I can actually watch it. I want to but feel like I will be looking over at the empty seat on the couch wondering if ghosts can watch television with me – and really just missing him even more.

I know this sounds absurd – but in my world it seems easier to obsess on the most ridiculous than focus on what is really going on. I can’t believe my husband killed himself without knowing what was going to happen to Jack. If anything would have kept him going – I truly thought this would. He used to pretend that Jack was giving him secret messages through the TV and that he was a secret agent. I know if you knew my husband you would understand – he only wanted to be Jack Bauer. So tonight I must decide; do I honor my husband’s memory and watch alone or do I erase the past and leave 24 with everything else that causes me sorrow and grief.

I should probably not even dwell on this tonight and try and catch up on sleep. But as is the case with me on most nights – despite how utterly exhausted I am – sleep will elude me until much much later.

I can only hope that we all sleep through the night and tomorrow is a better day. Maybe I will just go to bed and start reading the many books of mourning that lie untouched waiting for me to start the healing process. Books like “Why Me G-d, a Jewish guide for Coping with Suffering” or “The Jewish Way in Death and Mourning” or “How do we tell the Children?” or “Remember my Soul.”

On second thought – Jack Bauer is starting to look better and better to me . . .

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.

Therapy

This has been another rough week. I am a mess. I cried all week no matter what I was doing. Making breakfast, taking the children to school, brushing my teeth - it didn’t matter. Salty tears marked my face and no amount of make-up could hide my grief. I seriously challenged my waterproof mascara and it lost.

I have not been getting enough sleep and wake up not ready to face anything. My children are not happy and I realize it is mostly my fault. If I am stressed and cranky they are doubly so. I am my own worst enemy this week and it sucks. It is very hard to reel your emotions in when dealing with small children. I tried not to lose my temper and let my stress and sadness get the better of me. It is hard to be everything to everyone and still maintain some semblance of yourself.

Wednesday morning was the worst. I cried and cried out of frustration, anger and annoyance with myself. I am just stressed and sometimes even the simplest things seem so impossible these days.

Driving home from New Jersey to start the second half of my crazy day, I remembered that group therapy started tonight. I really did not want to go. No really. But it only meets once a month and I didn’t think I could take another month just on my own. Not if the days are going to be like today. I really wanted to wait till February – but I realized I owe it to my children and myself to take a different route than the one I am currently on. I called one of my friends who was more than willing to come over and put my children to bed.

I left the house with enormous knots in my stomach. I was worried about the children being without me at bedtime. I was worried about so many things. I tried not to think about where I was going. I was so nervous; I really thought I was going to throw up on the subway. Walking in Manhattan was upsetting to me. At 6:30 p.m. everyone is going to dinner or meeting for drinks. Everyone but me. I kept thinking that none of these people are going to a strange room to talk about their dead husband. Just me.

I didn’t want to go, but I went. I wanted to walk into a bar and do shots. I wanted to do anything but where I was headed. I pushed myself and walked in. I almost walked out. I didn’t. I learned that the rules of therapy are like Vegas. What is said in therapy stays in therapy. I very much respect these rules, so I will just talk about me.

This group is only for people who have lost loved ones to suicide. Some have lost close relatives, some spouses and some lost children. As we went around the room saying our names and who we lost, I was already crying. I said my name, that I lost my husband 11 weeks ago and that I cry a lot. That was all I said for a long time. I just listened to everyone else. It was almost as painful to listen than it was to speak. It was very difficult listening to the parents who lost children to suicide. I have decided that is the worst thing ever. Losing a spouse is awful of course, but a child, there are just no words.

I didn't expect to be so unnerved by everyone else’s stories. I think I was so consumed by my own grief and anxiety, that I never even thought about what brought other people to the room that night. I just never once thought about anyone but me. This small room full of sorrow and despair put me in my place. I am not the only one.

It was awkward and awful listening to other people’s pain. The words and feelings pouring from the group scared me. Everything they all said I have thought and written about as well. It is oddly comforting to know that I am not crazy or depressed. That every emotion I feel is being shared collectively in this room. Just to hear another person say out loud my worst fears and my guilt and anguish makes it seem more real but possibly more manageable. I never expected to feel connected to a complete group of strangers – it was very awful and very nice.

The moderator was very helpful. I didn’t talk for a while as I didn’t know what to say or where to begin. After a while he started asking me questions. Then others started asking me things. It was easier to talk when I had a direction. Then of course I would just cry.

Sitting there listening and talking may have been one of the most difficult things I have ever done. It was almost harder to hear other people talk about their pain and misery. I have been living with these feeling for almost three months now and I am saddened that other people feel like me. It is just unbelievably painful.

They all said it doesn't get any easier and this bothers me. I think it would have been nice to hear something positive. I don’t know what I was expecting as it is a freaking suicide group. I guess I can’t expect miracles right away.

I left quickly, totally exhausted and anxious to get some fresh air and home to my children. I didn’t look at strangers on the street and think how no one else feels my pain or is grieving like me. I didn’t feel sorry for myself at all. I felt more connected to the world than I have in a long time. I have seen the faces of others who deal with their pain day by day. I don’t feel so alone.

I am just truly thankful this group is only once a month.