Mostly I just feel like shit.
I feel old, tired, ugly, disillusioned, sad and angry.
Don’t tell me to see a counselor. Just don’t. Because there is nothing anyone can say to make anything better.
Unless his or her child died. Maybe then we’d have something to talk about. Otherwise no.
Yes, I have lots to live for, yes I know she’d want me to keep going. I’m SAD for fuck’s sake, not stupid.
I want a week off to stay in bed and do nothing.
I want a pity party and no one is invited.
There is NO right way to deal with this. There is no choice. There is just day, after day of words, and events. Some of those small. Some of those bigger.
Games pull me out of it a bit – online interactions with people in virtual landscapes who can’t see me make faces at them when they irritate me, or can’t see me cry when they trigger me, but who can really make me laugh even though I feel empty inside sometimes. I can log off when it gets to be too much.
Church has helped too. Theologically I’m not in agreement and I don’t much give a shit. It’s the experience. The motion in my heart. And knowing that I’m in a place where I could probably cry and it would be okay. I can stand and listen to the voices singing and chanting and just lose myself in the moment.
Maybe there’s a theme. Losing myself. But intentional losing myself, unlike the disassociation that occurs when I walk down the street and I feel the breeze and suddenly wonder if any of this is real.
I love my kids. That is real. It is so real it hurts. I love them each so much. I wish my daughter wasn’t dead. But she is. My sons are not. They are alive and I love them just as much as their sister . That is worth living for.
In the Wind 
Oh Birch, I think of you and yours every time I look out my front window and see the big and the little birch tree, side by side, waving in the wind with their little, bright green spring leaves coming in.
When the freezing rain splintered and broke many trees here, the big Birch was bent over all the way to the ground, it’s branches looked like glass that you could just shatter. It was bonded to the snow in a frozen arc for a long time.
One sunny, warm day the ice ran off in streams of water and branch after branch rose up from the snow.
And then, with a jolt, the whole tree straightened up sending a spray of melting ice through the air. It was amazing that it was still whole.
I hope I can live up to my tree name. Some days Im a bit more bent and broken than others. But then things still happen that cause me to spring up at least halfway 🙂
I think we lose a pieces of our self with such a huge loss. How can we not? Our children are part of us. Perhaps there are pieces we find again later. I think so. And sometimes we find things we didn’t expect to find. It is such a horrible, tragic journey. I understand your frustration and pain. I understanding wanting that time to just be left alone. I know how surreal everything feels. I hurt for you reading this…. I am glad you have your sons. I love your friend telling you about her birch trees. Wonderful image. peace to you always
Thank you. I’m not sure why I didn’t respond to your comment before. I think often I mean to do things, and then sit with that thought, distraction finds me and I never get back to it. I am so easily distracted. In some ways its good because there is less time spent sitting in a puddle of sad. At the same time, the days sort of rush past me without me being very present in them. ❤
I truly understand. I found myself the same way – doing those same things. Now years later I know I am still easily distracted – more easily than the before time. Perhaps not being very present is a way to be insulated. A way to buffer certain things out and allow some kind of tentative scaring over. This one thing is so big and so deep we couldn’t cope if everything was vibrant, loud, real, tangible. This one thing takes everything we have. Everyday means another day away from. Wishing you peace always ❤
Yes – exactly. This fog could be a blessing in disguise. At the same time, it buffers some of the joy that is likely floating around me almost unnoticed. Maybe.