Riding Out the Storm - part two

The metaphorical storm.

How do the ones left behind carry on? I would love to continue our adventure but the prospect of doing these things alone makes it non-sensical. How do you find true joy in an adventure when you have no companion to share that joy with - the sharing IS the joy, and my companion is gone. All I can do is rely on the logic that other people come through this and so will I. I know this to be true, and yet it feels so impossible sometimes. Where do I find the strength, the purpose, the meaning of my future life that makes it worth striving forward? Some people say time is a great healer and you just have to sit it out. Others say that things will never return to the way they were and you just adjust to a new normal. And others still say that you never get over a loss like this, you just learn to live with the hole it leaves in your heart. Which of those people have suffered truly devastating, life changing loss and felt it to their very core? I guess you can never know; and a lot of people say what they think you need to hear, whilst some tell you the truth, or their truth, I suppose.

Whatever it is, I don’t believe recovery is a passive thing - it is not just sitting it out and waiting. I believe you have to let the loss flow through you and experience it in all its gory totality. I believe it has to destroy you in order for you to be able to really see and acknowledge all the constituent parts of it and work out what they mean to you. I believe it takes a long time to inspect each part, each feeling, each emotion, each memory, regret, longing, wish and decode the hold it has over you and why. And only then can you gather up the pieces and rebuild something, whether it is a new life, or a new self, or a new understanding. I believe it takes an immense amount of strength to be able to pick yourself up again and carry on whilst the temptation to give up is like an ocean lapping at your ankles, sucking you back.

I have been desperately running from it, filling my mind with reading, music, podcasts, work, puzzles, social media, only to turn around and realize I’m actually drowning in that ocean of grief without even noticing, and it suddenly closes over my head once more. I have tried really hard to think of happy memories to recall, rather than images of John whilst he was really poorly, and of his physical body after his final breath had been exhaled and in the chapel of rest. Those memories, thankfully, are fading although that fading is bitter-sweet because they are still part of him and his life and our time together, and they were the easiest to recall. As they fade I’m finding it harder to picture him clearly.

Whilst on my last trip to Leamington I went to mass at St James and it brought back some lovely memories that I had not expected to feel so keenly. I cried through much of the service as I found it was easy to picture John playing the hymns, padding out for communion in his socks, warming his cold hands in mine for a few minutes before returning to the organ, wishing me the sign of peace with a brief hug and sharing a quiet joke about a vicar announcing a wrong hymn, or if he had missed his cue. In that hour of peace and calm he felt closer to me than he had for weeks and it hurt like hell but it was wonderful. And I realized that I need to make more time to feel the pain but also the closeness that comes with it. If I hide from the grief I am also missing out on the wonderful moments of familiarity that I so crave.

I have not looked for a book about being the one left behind, although I’m sure they exist. I don’t know if there is a simple formula for how to process grief. I am sure that every person experiences and deals with it differently, and what works for one will make another angry or despondent or miserable. I am not sure anyone could even put into words an accurate description of the experience of true grief. It is so complex that it would take a lifetime to explain, and something I don’t believe you can ever understand unless you have been through it yourself. It is a curse, a cross to bear, your very own crucifixion and crown of thorns. You become a master at hiding it to spare everyone else your pain. You suffer but you hide your suffering for fear of becoming a miserable pariah, which would only make your suffering worse. You lie to your children so as not to burden them in their own misery. You keep dropping the bucket into the well of strength you thought had already run dry in the months of struggle before the death and find just a few more drops at the bottom. And you find that people’s kindness, if you let it, refills that well bit by bit and helps you to eke out another hour, another day, another week.

And so I can honestly say, as one who is ten weeks into trying to drag myself through the dark days, that it DOES get easier. Time with family and friends is good, I can focus on their chatter, I can laugh and I can feel free of the sadness for a time. Work gives me a reason to go out and a feeling of purpose that is good for the soul. It is the times I’m alone and the times that I ponder my future that are difficult. Sometimes I find I’m enjoying a song enough to jig along and sing and think, yes, I feel OK in this moment. And that is enough to give me hope that there will be more and more moments of simple happiness. The truth is that it is NOT time that is the great healer, but forgetting. The minutes of peace are the minutes in which I forget the trauma, forget the truth, forget John. The challenge will be when I move beyond the day-to-day and try to consider the bigger picture and how I find fulfilment and contentment going into the future without him. All I can say for sure is: time will tell…