Freakin' Tired!

UGH I am tired today.  it’s a combo – not a happy meal, a cheap-ass combo that you really don’t want but it’s the only available option that you can afford – of things.  I think I overdid it yesterday with the caffeine and sugar, in an attempt to stay awake after not sleeping the night before I screwed myself into a rebound/detox situation today from all of that stuff.  Lovely.  And that is something no one tells you – grief and the act of grieving is freaking EXHAUSTING.  No one tells you that. No Social Worker at a hospital warns you – or at least she didn’t warn me when I told her there was no “discharge plan” for my mom, no person that asks how you are gives you the heads up, no one.  I am beat and I am here to tell you that you will be exhausted from it and the things you do to try and survive it or make it better – eating a whole pint (or quart – whatever works, no judgment here) of ice cream before bed, eating chocolate all day, sucking down a bottle of wine with dinner, blah blah blah will all exhaust you, too.  It sucks the life right out of you and it’s your job on this journey to find your strength, find your energy, find the will and ability to get out of bed in the morning without killing yourself in the process. You didn’t interview for the job and if given the choice, I would bet dollars to donuts that no one would accept this job or this trip, for that matter (even if I won this through Ed McMahon and Publisher’s Clearinghouse, I would toss it right back at Ed, pop his balloons and close my door).  This morning, I said at least once “but I don’t WANNA get up” just like a little kid does when woken up for school.  I was so freaking tired this morning, but I had to get up.  I have to get up every day and take care of my daughter, get her ready for school, get myself ready for work and get us both to our destinations safely. That’s my job.  And that’s one that I can’t quit or, sometimes unfortunately, get fired from.

There are days when I have to peel myself out of bed, almost literally.  Those are the days that I want to spend under the covers, alone, away from the world.  Those are tough days, to say the least.  But no matter how hard it is, I do get out of bed and I get on with my day because I know that I have to.  I know that if I let the grief control me THAT much, I will lose.  I will lose myself, I will lose the battle that I fight every day to stay civil and sane and ‘normal’ – whatever that is.  I don’t know if people still look at me like “oh, poor thing, her mom died” or if they look at me and think  “God, she’s still upset?? Get over it already.”. I don’t know and I don’t care; if I’m having a bad day because my mom is dead, they will have to deal with it and I have come very close to telling people why I’m in such a crappy mood on those days – people around me should consider themselves lucky that I can and have bit my tongue on a number of occasions.  But it’s under my control as to how I deal with the bad day.  I do my best to be ‘normal’, although I do fail miserably at it sometimes, and I try to acknowledge those bad days and I sequester myself as much as I can so I don’t get myself into any trouble.  No one tells you that you have to put yourself into a proverbial cave in order to get through some days without landing yourself in the pokey or in your bosses office, whichever one would be worse depending upon your situation.

Yesterday did not suck!

Yesterday, although it started before the sun was even contemplating coming up, was not too bad.  I don’t know how I remained conscious and that state seemed in flux all day long – whenever the caffeine wore off things got hazy and my desk suddenly became an inviting place to lay my head– but as of right now, I’m feeling not too shabby about yesterday as a whole. 

I think Monday was my first opportunity to really think about and process the memorial on Saturday and what it meant to me.  It brought me back to when my mom died and that hurt. That hurt a lot and I didn’t expect to feel the way that I did; I need to talk to my sister because she hasn’t been to the cemetery since the funeral and we’re supposed to go this Saturday for her birthday.  My sister needs to go before then so she, too, can process what it feels like to see it so finalized up on the wall.   I was alone in my office yesterday, thankfully I have a door that closes for those times that I need to cry a little bit, and I was able to deal with the feelings that hit me like  a ton of bricks.  I wasn’t prepared to feel the way that I did; I don’t think I’m any better prepared today.  But I’ve discovered, on this journey, that I need days like that where I just cry.  I am sad, sad through and through, and I can’t hide it.  I have to cry in order to get through it and to get past it as well as I can.  I hate it; days like that suck the energy out of me and when I am with other people, I am horrible to deal with.  I try to not speak harshly but it is hard some days, it really is.  Challenges are one thing, but this whole experience….I don’t know.  I’ve always heard that God doesn’t give you more than you can handle; most days, I believe that there is a God or something like the idea of God that I was taught in my 12 years of Catholic school.  If that’s the case, God must think I am herculean because there is no way a regular human being can go through what I’ve been through in the past three or four months and come out unscathed.

Grief changes who you are, there’s no doubt about that.  When my friend from college died, it caused all of us to get closer and to hold onto each other a little tighter; a hold that really hasn’t loosen much in close to five years.  Grief reminds you of how precious life is; in my case, I lost both Donna and my mom with little to no warning. Donna died in an accident so there was no warning there, just the phone call.  My mom, I knew she didn’t have much time but I didn’t think it would be so short.  Grief has made me look at my own life and how fragile it is, the life of my dad, the life of everyone around me that I love, and I hold on just a little bit tighter to each of them so that they know how important they are to me and that I would be devastated if I lost them, too.  I hug my daughter constantly and I am always telling her I love her; she’s too little to remember it years from now, should something happen to me, but I want to instill it in her now so that when she’s older and able to retain the memories of us hugging and cuddling, she’ll have it to look back on when I’m gone and she’ll know I loved her and appreciated her for all that she is.

Navigating the journey

Grief, in and of itself, is very isolating.  Regardless of if someone you know has gone through the same exact thing, everyone’s experience is different.  How I view things, how I handle things or feel about things, is totally different than my friend who lost his father less than two months before my mom passed or my friend who lost her mom when we were 22.  Grief makes you feel very alone.  No one can ever really, truly understand your pain or what you endure every day.  No one knows what you feel when you look at a calendar and see your loved one’s birthday, anniversary, your own birthday, other events like holidays that you shared with them;  no one else understands just how it feels to see your loved one’s name, date of birth and an end date on a head stone.  No one else will ever really understand what it feels like to be in your shoes.  Grief makes you feel like you are alone in a sea of people who don’t or can’t see you, who you really are, and the pain you’re in every day.  You can go to counseling, you can go to group therapy sessions to listen to how other people are doing it and going through ‘the process’, but everyone’s journey is their own.  I may decide to toss a letter into the ocean to try to communicate with the other side, while someone else may choose to throw themselves into work so they can pretend the death never happened.  Everyone is different – I like ketchup and mayo on my cheeseburger, someone else may think that’s disgusting –this is a process that is individualized at its center.  No matter what I say to someone, they don’t really know what it’s like to be in my head and in my world every day.  It’s a process that you have to work through on your own and, although there are resources some might find to be helpful, in the end everyone dictates what they do along the road to make it as bearable a trip as possible.  For me, the journey has been a dark one with little spots of sunshine along the way; today, I feel like I lost my map and I’m just meandering around, lost, not sure of where to go next, feeling like I’ve seen that metaphorical rock/tree/bush before.  This is just a repeat of what I went through and I thought it was a part of the journey that was over, but apparently I’m just traveling around in a circle. (You know that part of the movie National Lampoon’s European Vacation – “look kids – Big Ben!  Parliament!” that’s my life right now.)

A Memorial

Saturday, I went to a memorial service with my dad. The cemetery where my mom, and brother, are buried holds a service before Easter and before Christmas. I feel bad for the Jewish or Hebrew families; I hope they get their own services. I think what I sat through was overly Christian and not even close to non-denominational, which was what I was expecting.

Her name is on the crypt now; it's a good & bad thing. It's good to have it done but its also that confirming visual that you, or at least I, don't want to see. We sat by her for the service and I kept envisioning her sitting next to me; they served coffee, donuts & cookies but apparently they used to serve sandwiches so I could hear her in my head saying "crappy donuts, where are the sandwiches? They used to have this (insert sandwich description here) but oh well, I guess just eat this donut" -said with this scowl on her face that was almost comical but mostly annoying. I spent most of the service trying to not look at her name; it just made me want to cry more than I already was.

There was a female minister that spoke, very heart-felt words, and clearly that was the purpose of her sermon. She spoke about her own grieving process for her daughter and her 20-year old grandson. She said the words that she says to get through it, and wanted us to repeat them although I couldn't do it through my tears. She said "say their name - if I had know our time together was coming to an end and I would never hear your voice again, I would have cherished your voice more....if I had known that was our last hug, I would have held on tighter. " it was very hard to hear those words; it was if she was speaking directly to me. When I left my mom's hospital room that night, I thought I would see her in the morning. I thought I would hear her voice, see her face and crazy hair, hear her tell me she loved me. But I was wrong. And I wish I had known because I would have stayed a little longer, I would have been more patient and I would have been....I don't know, more attentive and maybe I would have acted more concerned instead of leaving because it was snowing and I didn't want to drive home in it, get home too late to put my daughter in bed. How many nights between then and now have I done that? Gone home to my family, snuggled with my daughter, looked at her as she slept peacefully in my arms. I would give one of those back in exchange for one more night with my mom. I only had one last night with my mom, being able to have a conversation. I wish I knew then what I know now.

The Bitch is Back

From my own observations, it would appear that I am turning back into the uber bitch that I was a few months ago.  I have no patience and I don’t know why; where the little bit ran off to, the little bit that I got back probably only about a month or so ago, I wish I knew.  But I just can’t keep my temper under any type of decent control these days.  I yelled at Emily this morning because she got mad that I wouldn’t let her run around in the grass before we got in the car; we were already running late, I told her no once, I had to pick her up to put her into the car/get her off the lawn and I yelled once we were in the car because she was pitching a fit. She’s a toddler, fits happen constantly but yet I couldn’t hold my tongue and I yelled and then felt guilty and horrible for doing it just moments after the fact.  Yesterday it was because I took away her crayons.  She threw one at my head, after I told her two or three times to not do it.  I think it was an attention getting act but it doesn’t matter why – she did it and I told her if she did the crayons would be taken away.  Well that caused the end of the world to come, now didn’t it? When she wouldn’t stop whining, I yelled.  Did it do anything at all for either of us?  No. Well, nothing positive.  I’m fairly certain that it made the tantrum last longer which really wasn’t the result I was looking for when I raised my voice.  When did I become a mean mommy??

Augh, I hate myself like this.  I really do.  I had started to get myself back – I was able to laugh and smile and let some things roll off my back again like I was able to do before all the shit hit the fan – but now that ability seems to have left the building and is nowhere in sight.  I hate when I get upset for no reason at all and then, moments later, I realize that I lost my stuff and yelled or got snippy over something stupid and then I feel guilty; this morning I felt like such a horrible mom (and still feel like one over an hour later).  Like the toddler tantrum; she’s going to tantrum when she can’t get her way and I know this.  I should have given my typical speech (in a lower and not so mean tone), “I’m sorry you’re upset but you can’t go and play in the grass because we have to go to school.  Mommy told you we had to get in the car and that we needed to go to the car and get off the grass.  You didn’t do that so I picked you up.” And just let her cry/whine it out until she was done.  But my insane control freak kicked into high gear and went nuts – I yelled to get her to stop crying, which never works but that’s why I did it.  I got so frustrated, so fast, that I just yelled because I felt like I had to in order to gain control. That’s what happens when, even if I don’t know it, I feel like my life is out of control.  Which, apparently, I do right now.  She’s gone, there’s nothing I can do about it; no matter how angry I am or how sad I am, I can’t bring my mom back.  I’m sad and I can’t change it; my mom is dead and I can’t change it.  My dad is sad and cries all the time and I can’t fix it for him.  I just want everyone to be okay again and we’re not, and I can’t change it.  I hate that I can’t change it.  It’s my job to come in, figure out what needs to get done and then do it so everyone else can be okay and worry only about themselves while I do all the work and all the worrying for the whole bunch.  It’s what I do.  No one, to my knowledge, except for maybe Rob and at least one of my closest friends worries about me.  I’m independent and reliable and they know that they can lean on me; I don’t lean on anyone. I’ve always been like this for as long as I can remember.  I don’t know if it’s just who I am or if it’s who I was raised to be. But I wish I could.  I wish I could just go home and cry on his shoulder or call up a friend and cry but that’s just not who I am. I’m trying to get better at it and not choke back the tears when he says something that just makes me want to turn into a human fountain.  But usually I cry alone – in the car, in my office (although I try to avoid that whenever I can), in front of her grave.  I’m sure that I seem aloof or standoffish these days, and it’s only because I’m just so sad and I’m stuck in my head alone, trying to sort out how to get through all of this.  I know that I will, I always do, but it’s just a matter of how and when.

There’s this part of me that, after seeing her name up on that wall on Saturday, feels like she died all over again.  A part of me is in total denial (although, does it count as denial since I’m admitting that I’m in denial?  Huh….), and seeing her name and her birth/death years just makes it real.  Seeing the numbers there, under her name, brought me right back to the day I stood there with my family and watched them wrap up the coffin and put it in the crypt – or drawer, as she affectionately called it.  Her name being up there makes it permanent, for lack of a better word.  Real.  Visual.  Affirmed.  Official.  She’s really in there, I didn’t just imagine it all, it didn’t happen to someone else.  That’s my mom’s grave where her body is.  I don’t know if other people experience this when their loved one’s grave is marked by a headstone or some other marker; it’s like now, there’s no way to ignore it and there’s no way to deny it.  It happened, she’s gone and what you’ve got left – in my case – is a slab of marble in a great big, empty hall to talk to and to cry to.  And the memories of a time when you had so much more than that.  It all happened so fast and I wasn’t ready for it to happen when it did or how it did – yet another stab to my control freak core.  I sat by and watched, trying to control what I could and trying desperately to handle all that was going on around me that was totally out of my control.  And here I am, yet again, feeling like there’s so much out of my control and so very little under it that I don’t know what to do with myself sometimes but just sit and cry.

Letters to the sky

I’ve heard that, if you write a letter and burn it, it’ll get to where ever its supposed to go – the universe, heaven, whatever.  I’m willing to give it a try if it helps to make me feel just a tiny bit better. These days are hard, harder than I think I anticipated.  I didn’t think that it would start weeks before her birthday; I guess seeing the date on the calendar get closer was enough to start it off.  I thought the week of, or the week before would suck royally but it’s been the whole month, really.  Oh well, I guess I can mark April off as “Month of Much Suckage”.

I started writing the letter to my mom yesterday – I think mostly out of frustration and sadness, but partially for selfish reasons.  I just need to clear my head of all the things I wish I could say to her but can’t.  it’s so hard to suddenly not have her here.  Imagine that, someone you love is taken off to a far-away country that you have have never seen, can’t find on a map and there are no pictures of so you can’t imagine what it’s like for them there.  You don’t really get to say good-bye, either; they’re just taken from you. You can’t call, you can’t email or text and you can’t send a letter to an actual address because you don’t know where they are exactly.  There is  no way to communicate with them, you just have to somehow trust that they are okay and safe and happy and they are with other people that they know and care about who have also been taken there.  Sounds like a movie.  But it’s not, it’s reality.  I want to tell her to not be mad at me because I did what I did out of concern for her; but I know she didn’t see it that way.  I want to tell her that she’s missed and I wish more than anything to know that she’s okay and that she can see us – some sort of signal or sign to say that to me would help me more than I think I can accurately express. I am keeping my fingers and toes crossed that I get something from her on my birthday.  It’ll be a hard enough day to go through without the annual call from her; if I don’t hear from her on that day, I don’t think I ever will.

Today is just a sad day and in 9 days I’ll celebrate what would have been her 80^thbirthday, and I’m just  not ready to do it yet.

Opening an envelope of pictures

Last night I found the envelope of pictures from my mom’s funeral that I took to London with me; for some reason I opened it and started looking at them.  I thought that I just needed to do it; the reality is that I should probably do it more often. It’s strange, I can’t really remember her face and it feels like she’s been gone for an eternity – to the point that it feels like she was never here to begin with, which I really can’t explain at all.  Maybe it’s because it feels like she doesn’t exist anymore, maybe it’s because my brain doesn’t want to remember her face because that will make it harder, I don’t know.  But looking at those pictures, some from my wedding, some from my baby shower and from the hospital when Emily was born, made me remember her face and made it harder to feel like I was “okay” (for lack of a better word).  Daily, I struggle with keeping the grief at bay.  Some days it’s not too hard, as long as I don’t think about her. Some days it’s next to impossible to keep it away.  And the images I have in my head, those with her in them, are fuzzy.  I can’t really see her face and it’s hard for me to hear her voice in my head, too.  She still had the Brooklyn accent as if she had just moved out of the state; we’ve been in Jersey since I was an infant so her and my Dad’s voices are pretty distinct to me.  I can’t really see or hear her and I don’t really get why.

I’m afraid that, when I do finally see her face in my head that it will be too much and I’ll cry and cry and I won’t be able to stop.  Days like that scare the crap out of me.

Recently I’ve been debating, toying with the idea of seeing a psychic.  I know, a large part of me thinks that whole thing is a bunch of crap and none of it is real. But, there is a small part of me that wonders if I could actually get something from it and that’s the part of me that is grasping at straws.  Just to know that she was okay, that she could see us and that she’s with us would be so wonderful and helpful for me to know.  I’ve been waiting and looking for signs from her and still I’ve gotten nothing.  Friday it will be three months, which I can’t believe is possible because that sounds like such a long time, and I still haven’t gotten any inkling that she’s here which is hard.  Very hard.  It’s hard to one day have a mom and then suddenly within days feel like she’s just gone.  I felt it in the hospital and I still feel it now.  I felt stupid sitting next to her bed, talking to her, because I was talking to a body that was empty.  She left long before everything got turned off and her body stopped working.  She was responsive for one day after being placed on the machines, which I think was her opportunity to communicate with us and let us know that she was still in there. But as soon as she was unresponsive, which was less than 48 hours later, she was gone. It all went so fast – 19 days after we found out what was possibly wrong, she was gone. 9 days after she was admitted into the hospital she was gone. I just wish I knew that she was okay and in a safe place and not trapped in that hospital because she doesn’t understand that she died and she’s wandering the halls….oh I watch too many ghost hunting shows, I really do.