Monday, June 15, 2015

SOS Matthew Can you hear us . . . can you see us?

 A DAY AT THE BEACH FOR NIKKI & THE KIDS—LOVING MATTY

SOS Matthew Can you hear us . . . can you see us? We are beyond 5 months and my heart is trying to find my voice because it is screaming in pain. Breathing does not feel instinctive. It’s shallow. It’s opening a door and letting my anxiety come in with a force. There is a tape in my head that keeps repeating Matthew . . . Matthew . . . Matthew . . . Matthew. Every minute of every hour of the day and night. I seem to be having difficulty finding words. My mind is racing but my body is reacting in slow motion. Insanity? Sanity on the edge? Grief? Mourning? Yearning? What is this????? Going backwards again. I feel like I’ve ridden the rollercoaster and it has taken me to the top and bottom as much as it can on my single ticket ride. It’s dropped me off and placed me in line waiting to buy another ticket . . . just so that I can try to get to the top again. I like the top. I feel like I can breathe at the top. Life seems clearer. I can find joy. I have hope. Lesson learned—buy a season ticket because it’s easier to stay on the ride.

I have experienced that in addition to the FIRSTS, if too many are concentrated into a short period of time your heart becomes equivalent to a construction zone—emotions must maneuver orange barrel season but your reaction time has become too slow. Faced with daily detours and the possibility that the abyss is lurking too closely, I ask myself what choices to I have here? This thing I’ll call Merciless Months has forced me off the road to Lighter Days where the pain of losing you was finding its way of fitting into my daily life and instead has me gazing directly at Confrontation—confronting the truth that the tragedy of your passing has created this time warp of In-Between. It’s not black, it’s not white, and it’s not even gray. It’s not now, it’s not then, it’s not will be. It’s undefined. Wreaks havoc with focus, rationality, energy, motivation and minutes, hours, days, weeks, months as we know them. It’s ugly. It’s scary. It’s new. It’s a roadblock. It’s a detour without any signage. I’m waiving the white flag. SOS Matthew. Can you hear me? Can you see me? Can you help me?

Merciless Months—April through June. We’ve faced your Wedding Anniversary, Mother’s Day, missed Jason’s & your combined Birthday dinner, celebrated your Birth Day, Nikki’s Birthday and Father’s Day to come next week. That is a tsunami of emotions to get through. We gather, we hug, and we cry, we laugh — yes still laughing but our bearings remain off kilter. Yet we continue to come together and we try, try, try to make this life without Matt work. We celebrated Nikki’s Birthday Friday. Auntie and Elouise came up from NY. Steph’s moving and we are saying another goodbye, safe trip, see you at Christmas. Life keeps moving on and I feel like I’m running like crazy to catch it. Going through the motions, not too much makes sense. I need to make sense of this In-Between.

Why/What now? I believe it is closure. My mantra “finding joy while living with the ache” seems fitting as the final link to moving forward in the grieving process. If this is the final link, what is the first, second and every other link that comes in-between? I seem to have jumped right to the end, certainly a good new mission but perhaps sprinkled with a bit of naivety as to the difficulty of this path. Working backwards I need to discover the missing links. It begins with closure and accepting the fact that there is no closure to your passing. There is no closure because there is so much love attached to this tragedy. Your body is dust. Your Spirit lives. The love I have for you is alive. Love is forever; a forever energy. How can one experience closure with something so alive as LOVE; love for you? The mantra is a journey holding many lessons I’ll be learning on the way. Understanding is the beginning of healing. There are missing pieces to this puzzling process. Reflection is the board we use to try and fit all the pieces together. Will I and your ‘Collection of People’ feel whole again? In the end, I am again reminded that it all comes back to love. The joy, the heartache, the starts, the stops, the in-betweens will all be buoyed by love. Loving you, loving our memories and loving each other.

What are my choices? There is only one. Wipe away my tears and really examine the detours. Expect them. Dig deep when they surprise me. Accept that there will be no closure and excavate the elements that make “finding joy while living with the ache” a daily reality.

I need to speak your language right now. I need to experience your special, right from the heart kind of love. Your language—your Bear Hug. Please can we hug? My memory feels alive. Close your eyes my Dear and I will close mine. I feel your arms around me, do you feel mine?
Love you so much – forever.

Mom 


FOLLOW US ON FACEBOOK CLICK THE LINK: VOICE OF GRIEF

No comments:

Post a Comment

Thank you for sharing your thoughts, resources and experiences.