It's been a few days since I have written on here. I've had a lot going on this past week and no time to really process it. My sister got married this past weekend and I had to focus to make it through the weekend. It was actually a pretty good weekend. My sister was beautiful. We go to see lots of friends and family and do lots of dancing. I gave my maid-of-honor speech. It was on the fly, but not too bad. I even had one person comment that I was like a professional speaker, pretty good considering that I have a huge fear of public speaking. It was a weekend of focusing on each and every moment so I wouldn't get overwhelmed by the collective whole. I made it through.
On the flip side, there were all kinds of other things going on in my head. Things I have had to shelve for a few days so I could concentrate on my sister and her wedding.
Last Thursday, I received an email from a complete stranger who had read my last post, "Who's in Your Bucket?" I have to admit, at first, I thought, "Is this a joke?" As I kept reading though, it touched me deeply. It brought me to tears, I had to close my door at work and just cry for a little while. I haven't responded to the email yet, but I intend to. I want that person to know what her words meant to me. She has volunteered to get in my bucket and she doesn't even know me. I have friends who won't even talk to me about my bucket (or even talk to me), let alone offer to hop in.
Today I received two more emails. One I believe was a comment and the other one was from a woman who lives in the same city. She is interested in starting a Faces of Loss, Faces of Hope support group here as we don't have one yet. I think I would like to be a part of that. I don't have an email address for the other one but I would like to try to find out how to respond to her as well.
I'm honestly in awe of these women. I don't know that I would have the courage to reach out to a complete stranger. I'm also in awe that anyone has actually read my blog. I don't consider myself all that "deep" or even a very good writer, so I am surprised that anyone has taken the time to read through this. To those who have, thank you. Thank you for taking time to learn more about my son Alfy and me.
It's strange to think that I have been more moved and felt more cared for by strangers than I have by those I considered my closest friends. It's new territory for me. I have no idea how to navigate these new waters.
Both of my "friends" who have avoided my bucket have done things in the past week that I think is their way of reaching out. One sent a text and the other one left me a voicemail I haven't listened to yet (got it while I've been writing). I'm just not sure where they fit right now. They weren't there when I needed them most, they had given up because I was "too hard" or "too complicated" for their happy lives. That is how they have made me feel, whether they meant to or not, and it sucks.
I really don't know how to respond to them. This might seem repetitive but I just don't know what to say or do or even think. There is large part of me that just wants to say "F--- you. Where were you when it was hard?" Another part of me misses them. It feels like a never-ending internal struggle, old vs. new, before vs. after, then vs. now and I don't know how to create balance.
So, I am extremely grateful for the emails I've been receiving. Someone is listening. Someone thinks I'm not too hard or too complicated. Someone is not afraid of me.
On another note, a colleague of mine told me of her pregnancy the Saturday before last. Let's see, she is at 15 weeks this week. I am very grateful that she had the courage to tell me in person, but it hurts. I had been reaching out to her for support and learning about her pregnancy felt like some kind of betrayal. I don't know where to go with this either. She is pregnant, but she has been more brave and supportive of me than most people I know and I don't want to lose that. It's so incredibly valuable and hard to find. But I can barely think of her being pregnant without crying.
There's been a few other things as well that I'm not ready to discuss here, soon, but not today.
So, it's been one of those kind of weeks. As Hannah puts it, I've been navigating my way through a mine field and I'm on the losing end.
Will it ever stop being so hard?
Oh and I've lost track of my pregnancy count, but I think it's somewhere over 40.
Wednesday, September 26, 2012
Wednesday, September 19, 2012
Who Gets In Your Bucket?
I feel the need to write tonight, but I'm not sure what. I should really be working on my maid-of-honor speech for my little sister's wedding, but just can't focus. Hannah read a wonderful article with me today, "Who Gets In Your Bucket?" by Doug Manning. If you're grieving or know someone who is read it. (I typed it below because I find typing to be strangely therapeutic) I don't think she could have picked a better day to give me the article.
I am once again at a point where my bucket is full and overflowing. There are other times it has been full and overflowing, but it was slowly receding, I would say mostly from evaporation. This week, some people came along and dumped in a few more cups. I didn't have room for them, but they're in there now - the "safe" person who announced her pregnancy and the "lost friend" who had a healthy little boy today.
Really, I think I would like to move to an island, away from everyone I know here, restricted access. No, that would probably be to much of a hassle for me and I hate fish, but it would be nice if only for a short while.
Who Gets In Your Bucket?
by Doug Manning
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
The best way I know to picture how we receive help from others in grief, is to imagine you are holding a bucket. The size and color doesn't matter. The bucket represents the feelings bottled up inside of you when you are in pain. If you have suffered a loss, hold the bucket and think through how you feel right now.
What is in your bucket?
Fear. Will I survive? What will happen to me now? Who will care for me? Who will be with me when I need someone near? Most likely your bucket is almost full just from the fear. But there is also:
Pain. It is amazing how much physical pain there is in grief. Your chest hurts, and you can't breathe. Sometimes the pain is so intense your body refuses to even move. There is enough pain to fill the bucket all by itself.
Sorrow. There is devastating sadness; overwhelming sorrow. A gaping hole has been bitten out of your heart and it bleeds inside your very soul. You cry buckets of tears and then cry some more.
Loneliness. There is no lonely like that felt when you are in a room full of people and totally alone at the same time. Loneliness alone can filly any bucket ever made.
I could go on, but that's enough to get the idea across, and hopefully get you started thinking through your own list. What is in your bucket?
Now pictures someone like me approaching you and your bucket. I also have a bucket. My buckets is full of explanations. I am armed and ready to explain why your loved one had to die, how they are now better off and how you should feel.
I am also well equipped with new ways to look at your loss. In politics they call that "spin doctoring," but most human beings seem to know this skill by instinct. I have almost a bucketful of comforting words and encouraging sayings. I can also quote vast amounts of scriptures. I seem to favor the ones that tell you not to grieve.
So we face each other armed with full buckets. The problem is, I don't want to get into your bucket. Yours is scary. If I get in there, you might start crying and I may not be able to make you stop. You might ask me something I could not answer. There is too much intimacy in your bucket. I want to stand at a safe distance and pour what is in my bucket into yours, I want the things in my bucket to wash over your pain like some magic salve to take away your pain and dry your tears. I have this vision of my words being like cool water to a dry tongue. Soothing and curing as it flows.
But your bucket is full. There is no room for anything that is in my bucket. Your needs are calling so loudly there is no way you could hear anything I say. Your pain is far too intense to be cooled by any verbal salve, no matter how profound. The only way I can help you is to get into your bucket, to try to feel your pain, to accept your feelings as they are and make every effort to understand. I cannot really know how you feel. I cannot actually understand your pain or how your mind is working under the stress, but I can stand with you through the journey. I can allow you to feel what you feel and learn to be comfortable doing so. That is called, "Getting into your bucket."
Anyone want to join me in my bucket?
Yeah, I didn't think so.
I am once again at a point where my bucket is full and overflowing. There are other times it has been full and overflowing, but it was slowly receding, I would say mostly from evaporation. This week, some people came along and dumped in a few more cups. I didn't have room for them, but they're in there now - the "safe" person who announced her pregnancy and the "lost friend" who had a healthy little boy today.
Really, I think I would like to move to an island, away from everyone I know here, restricted access. No, that would probably be to much of a hassle for me and I hate fish, but it would be nice if only for a short while.
Who Gets In Your Bucket?
by Doug Manning
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
The best way I know to picture how we receive help from others in grief, is to imagine you are holding a bucket. The size and color doesn't matter. The bucket represents the feelings bottled up inside of you when you are in pain. If you have suffered a loss, hold the bucket and think through how you feel right now.
What is in your bucket?
Fear. Will I survive? What will happen to me now? Who will care for me? Who will be with me when I need someone near? Most likely your bucket is almost full just from the fear. But there is also:
Pain. It is amazing how much physical pain there is in grief. Your chest hurts, and you can't breathe. Sometimes the pain is so intense your body refuses to even move. There is enough pain to fill the bucket all by itself.
Sorrow. There is devastating sadness; overwhelming sorrow. A gaping hole has been bitten out of your heart and it bleeds inside your very soul. You cry buckets of tears and then cry some more.
Loneliness. There is no lonely like that felt when you are in a room full of people and totally alone at the same time. Loneliness alone can filly any bucket ever made.
I could go on, but that's enough to get the idea across, and hopefully get you started thinking through your own list. What is in your bucket?
Now pictures someone like me approaching you and your bucket. I also have a bucket. My buckets is full of explanations. I am armed and ready to explain why your loved one had to die, how they are now better off and how you should feel.
I am also well equipped with new ways to look at your loss. In politics they call that "spin doctoring," but most human beings seem to know this skill by instinct. I have almost a bucketful of comforting words and encouraging sayings. I can also quote vast amounts of scriptures. I seem to favor the ones that tell you not to grieve.
So we face each other armed with full buckets. The problem is, I don't want to get into your bucket. Yours is scary. If I get in there, you might start crying and I may not be able to make you stop. You might ask me something I could not answer. There is too much intimacy in your bucket. I want to stand at a safe distance and pour what is in my bucket into yours, I want the things in my bucket to wash over your pain like some magic salve to take away your pain and dry your tears. I have this vision of my words being like cool water to a dry tongue. Soothing and curing as it flows.
But your bucket is full. There is no room for anything that is in my bucket. Your needs are calling so loudly there is no way you could hear anything I say. Your pain is far too intense to be cooled by any verbal salve, no matter how profound. The only way I can help you is to get into your bucket, to try to feel your pain, to accept your feelings as they are and make every effort to understand. I cannot really know how you feel. I cannot actually understand your pain or how your mind is working under the stress, but I can stand with you through the journey. I can allow you to feel what you feel and learn to be comfortable doing so. That is called, "Getting into your bucket."
Anyone want to join me in my bucket?
Yeah, I didn't think so.
Sunday, September 16, 2012
Who You Gonna Call?
Sigh...I'm not sure where to begin tonight. I need to get some things out of me, but they are hard and angry and complicated and I don't want to sound like someone just spewing nonsense, but I suppose I sound like that most of the time already.
I've been really struggling lately with the feeling of loneliness and just plain old being forgotten. I don't know how many times I've heard from people that I haven't seen in a while, "I know this is a difficult time and I just wanted to give you your space." What a crock. I think it is really code for "I'm too lazy to put any real emotional effort in to our friendship/relationship."
I understood some space in the beginning. We were headed into uncharted territory and I did need some space. I wasn't yet comfortable with the emotions I was feeling let alone comfortable enough to share them with someone else. My confidence and self-esteem had been shattered like a broken mirror. I no longer recognized who I was. But that's been changing. I have surprised myself with what I've been able to do lately.
And with the new found confidence (albeit small amount) comes the anger, if you didn't get that already...It has slowly seeped into my every pore. There are times I feel like it will just come oozing out like the pink slime on Ghostbusters II. If that really happened, there would be quite the pink slime river under our house. My in-laws had a punching bag in their garage. It now lives in my garage. I bought some training gloves on Friday so I could start using the bag when I feel the anger is about to explode out of me.
I've also been hearing about how others think it's so hard to know what to do. Really? You think trying to figure out what to do with me and Tony is hard? Seriously? Try delivering your first child, knowing that he or she isn't going to cry, isn't going to feed, isn't going to grow, isn't going to be coddled and passed around and ooooed and awwwwed over, isn't going to give you their first smile, isn't going to celebrate a first birthday making a mess of a cake, isn't going to laugh, isn't going to learn to crawl, isn't going to learn to walk, isn't going to call you mommy, isn't going to give you a hug, isn't going to give you a kiss, isn't going to say those three little words, "I love you." Try letting the nurse take your child out of your arms, for the last time. Try knowing you will never physically see your child again. Try burying your child. Try that and then tell me that knowing what to do with me is hard
I was thinking of all the people that have recently made me angry and a quote from the stoner movie Half Baked came to mind, "F#ck you, f#ck you, f#ck you, you're cool and f#ck you, I'm out." That pretty much replays over and over and over again in my head these days.
I'm out.
I've been really struggling lately with the feeling of loneliness and just plain old being forgotten. I don't know how many times I've heard from people that I haven't seen in a while, "I know this is a difficult time and I just wanted to give you your space." What a crock. I think it is really code for "I'm too lazy to put any real emotional effort in to our friendship/relationship."
I understood some space in the beginning. We were headed into uncharted territory and I did need some space. I wasn't yet comfortable with the emotions I was feeling let alone comfortable enough to share them with someone else. My confidence and self-esteem had been shattered like a broken mirror. I no longer recognized who I was. But that's been changing. I have surprised myself with what I've been able to do lately.
And with the new found confidence (albeit small amount) comes the anger, if you didn't get that already...It has slowly seeped into my every pore. There are times I feel like it will just come oozing out like the pink slime on Ghostbusters II. If that really happened, there would be quite the pink slime river under our house. My in-laws had a punching bag in their garage. It now lives in my garage. I bought some training gloves on Friday so I could start using the bag when I feel the anger is about to explode out of me.
I've also been hearing about how others think it's so hard to know what to do. Really? You think trying to figure out what to do with me and Tony is hard? Seriously? Try delivering your first child, knowing that he or she isn't going to cry, isn't going to feed, isn't going to grow, isn't going to be coddled and passed around and ooooed and awwwwed over, isn't going to give you their first smile, isn't going to celebrate a first birthday making a mess of a cake, isn't going to laugh, isn't going to learn to crawl, isn't going to learn to walk, isn't going to call you mommy, isn't going to give you a hug, isn't going to give you a kiss, isn't going to say those three little words, "I love you." Try letting the nurse take your child out of your arms, for the last time. Try knowing you will never physically see your child again. Try burying your child. Try that and then tell me that knowing what to do with me is hard
I was thinking of all the people that have recently made me angry and a quote from the stoner movie Half Baked came to mind, "F#ck you, f#ck you, f#ck you, you're cool and f#ck you, I'm out." That pretty much replays over and over and over again in my head these days.
I'm out.
Saturday, September 8, 2012
Tears
In the past month or two, I have been putting myself "out there" for the world to see more and more. I've been returning to activities that I had completely shut out of my life, like family dinners, work, social functions with a few friends, you get the idea. I've noticed a common theme in those situations that I have been mulling over for a while.
Inevitably someone asks, "How are you doing, like how are you really doing?" Or, maybe it's a variation of that like, "It's good to see you" followed by a hug that lasts longer than it once would have. These moments usually bring me to tears, which then invokes the response, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you cry." I always say, "It's okay, I don't mind." I don't think people realize I really mean that.
I have come to the conclusion that tearing up or crying at times like those are the best way I know how to share Alfy with others. He isn't here for them to hold, hug or play with. I can't give them that, but I can give them my tears. They are all I have left to physically share with others. It's not easy sharing tears. Tears make people uncomfortable.
Tears are interpreted as signs of sadness and hurt, but there is so much more to them than that. We fail to recognize the beauty behind them that accompanies our grief. Those tears are not just about the sad moments that occurred, at least not for me. Those tears include the moments that made me smile, like the first time I felt him kick and actually knew that it was a kick because I could feel it on the outside of my belly or the first time Tony and I heard his heartbeat and saw his "heart flap" on the ultrasound.
So, the next time you bring tears to my eyes, please don't be sorry. Just know that I'm taking an opportunity at that moment to share my son with you.
Inevitably someone asks, "How are you doing, like how are you really doing?" Or, maybe it's a variation of that like, "It's good to see you" followed by a hug that lasts longer than it once would have. These moments usually bring me to tears, which then invokes the response, "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you cry." I always say, "It's okay, I don't mind." I don't think people realize I really mean that.
I have come to the conclusion that tearing up or crying at times like those are the best way I know how to share Alfy with others. He isn't here for them to hold, hug or play with. I can't give them that, but I can give them my tears. They are all I have left to physically share with others. It's not easy sharing tears. Tears make people uncomfortable.
Tears are interpreted as signs of sadness and hurt, but there is so much more to them than that. We fail to recognize the beauty behind them that accompanies our grief. Those tears are not just about the sad moments that occurred, at least not for me. Those tears include the moments that made me smile, like the first time I felt him kick and actually knew that it was a kick because I could feel it on the outside of my belly or the first time Tony and I heard his heartbeat and saw his "heart flap" on the ultrasound.
So, the next time you bring tears to my eyes, please don't be sorry. Just know that I'm taking an opportunity at that moment to share my son with you.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)