Embracing heartbreak with humor
If I don’t call my mom, I won’t have to know if anything else bad has happened, right? But then I leave her there, with her pain and her pile of work and worst of all, my father.
I never know what I’m supposed to do. Live my life? Live her life? Move back and help her? Move on and help myself? Call? Don’t call?
I so often choose not to call. I know. I’m the worst.
Does it get easier?
Day 121 – So tired
I am avoiding talking about all the real things. If I talk about the thing that makes me paralyzingly sad, I will be too sad to function. Duh. But really. It’s true. If I talk about my favorite TV shows and ice cream and the dumb thing I did today, then I can keep moving and breathing and getting out of bed.
I write this to be cathartic, but I don’t often use it that way. I talk about my relationship. I bitch about work. I drool over a cookie I ate today. I write about politics and then delete it because it just makes me angry and instead talk about my dog.
How the actual fuck do people survive devastating things without annoying everyone around them or collapsing into an immovable ball of tears or both?
Day 115 – I…Sad.
It happened. Half his stuff. In the house. The move-in was actually pretty seamless. But then we got in a fight about… something. I can’t really remember. It seemed important.
He didn’t want me to put dishes away. I wanted to put dishes away. That was the fight.
For the record, I put the dishes away.
Day 112 – First day fight
Tomorrow he moves half his stuff in. Only half. Baby steps. Sort of. Then one big step. ONE HUGE STEP.
I managed to get rid of two pairs of shoes for him. Oh, and some t-shirts. That should be enough space, right?!?
Day 111 – I’m not freaking out; you’re freaking out.
I spent the day helping my friend move. He has helped me move no fewer than 4 times. I have helped him move 0 times. (He’s never moved…calm self.)
I hated every damn second of it. When I moved, I had approximately 1,000,000 things to move and he helped me do it without complaining even once. He had: a bed, dresser, box of clothes, some little knickknacks, shoes in a suitcase, a few board games, and a bookshelf. You would have thought based on my annoyance and exhaustion that he had as many things as I have. Not even close. AND we had help. AND I barely did anything. I complained when he asked me to make his bed while he carried in other items from the U-haul. I sighed and moaned when I had to take the clothes out of the garment bags, and not just leave them there. I almost hyperventilated when he asked me to go through one of the boxes when I was just uselessly sitting on the floor pretending to be useful. How dare he?!?
My instinct is to blame how overall tired I am from being sad all the damn time. Sadness takes a lot out of you. I imagine it’s similar to hatred/anger. I wouldn’t know, because I feel them both simultaneously, so I can’t tell them apart. It is exhausting to be wrecked from sadness, though.
I have almost no patience for anyone or anything. I get upset when people ask things of me or expect a normal level of participation/help/being present/caring/showing up. So I “helped” my friend move but really I wanted to sleep in the corner and believe I was anywhere else, living someone else’s life.
Not moving that stupid, heavy dresser with its stupid, heavy clothes and its stupid, heavy expectations that I be normal.
Day 97 – Just be normal
A Year to Grieve 