helping others, helping me

Horoscope from yesterday was truly on-point:
You are in a stressful phase now and you may be feeling the pressure to choose between your home and your career. However, any lack of support you are feeling from the people in your life will slowly and surely force you to go through your own metamorphosis. Try not to go overboard; letting go of old habits is required before you can begin to develop healthier new ones.

I received the most amazing email yesterday. This person said "Scott sounds like an incredible man and though it sounds crazy to say, be glad a piece of you is missing -- that means he took it with him." I had never thought about it this way. It's intense, but it's the truth. Why I feel so wounded was because of the love that Scott and I shared. He will always have a piece of me and I will always have a piece of him. Loved this. It gave me a new perspective in this grieving process.

This person I speak of has also suffered severe loss and my blog helped her yesterday. It was so refreshing to know that I am helping others who are grieving. This gave me even more drive to want to help people who are grieving. To let others know that they are not alone, people are out there to help and I will make it my mission to be an advocate for other people who are suffering a loss. I cried tears of joy for the first time since Scott's passing.

So a special thank you to this person :)

And thank you to all of those who are reading my blog. I write from my heart, with no filter. I don't have much of a filter anyways, but this blog allows me to describe the intense feelings of my journey.

a black soul

I had a dream one night that Scott's soul literally came out from underneath me where I was sleeping. Where he died. The important piece of information is that the soul was black. I couldn't make sense of what this meant. Did it mean that I was letting him go? Did it mean that I hate sleeping in a place where he died?

I couldn't figure it out, until today in therapy. The black soul represents all the anger I have toward Scott for leaving me. Leaving me to live my life without him. Typically souls are beautiful and I remember very vividly that this was black. It was scary, it was dark.  I hope I was releasing my anger and that was a sign that I am no longer angry at him.

I want to find peace in him being gone. I would always lay in bed while he was still alive and say, "give me his pain. I can handle it way better than him." And, here we are. I am the one in pain, and he's at peace, or where he needs to be. He's where he's wanted to be, as hard as that is for me to say out loud.

Would I bring him back if I could and continue to see him suffer? No. I wouldn't. Call me cruel, call me whatever you want, but I know in my heart he's where he wants to be. No one saw him as sick as I did. No one has visions of him weighing less than 100 pounds, helping him use the bathroom and getting him out of the bath, or fainting when he got up. No one saw what I saw. It was ugly. It was heart breaking.

Should he have died from this? No. And knowing he was getting better, it's still a huge fucking shock.

I struggle with if he knew he was dying. I wish we could've talked about it more. I don't know what I think anymore. He told me he wanted to get better. He was getting better on some days. But deep down, I don't know if he was just going through the motions or what. I will never know. I just know that what I witnessed was extremely hard on both me and him. He is no longer in pain or suffering, and I always said that I would rather it be me. I was always the stronger one.

As much as I hate how I feel, I'm glad he's not sick anymore. I miss him. The real him. Not the sick him. I miss his love. I loved him more than anything in this world. A love that I never knew existed.

let's talk about grief

The definition: keen mental suffering or distress over affliction or loss; sharp sorrow; painful regret

hmm...that does not even begin to define grief for me. Not even close. Here lies the problem. There is a huge opportunity to define grief on a much greater level. I have not met anyone who has gone through what I'm going through (young widow is how I define myself), but I know there are people out there. 40% of all deaths in the United States are sudden. People ARE out there.

No one really knows what to do or say and that's okay. I don't know what to do or say sometimes. But the truth is that it all sucks. I would rather someone say, "I'm sorry Grayson, this sucks," instead of, "how was your weekend?" This is where the education part comes in, which I plan to do. It's very important.

I have an idea. I am going to be an advocate for grievers and friends/family of those grieving, when I'm ready. There is more to this, but I will keep it private for now. I do know there is a huge opportunity for change, and I plan to lead the charge and make that change. <insert Michael Jackson song here>

Grievers will not ask for help (well some might, but not a lot). I will not call someone and say I need this or that. It's the honest truth. Grievers don't know what they need, so how will they know when to reach out? I've struggled with this. I know people are out there, ready for whatever I might need, but I haven't asked for anything. No one can truly deliver what I need...Scott.

It's important for friends and family to enter and push themselves into my life, knowing that I will rarely come to them.

b-b-b-breakdown at work

It is so hard to describe how you function with this much emotion. I know that today I had a breakdown at work over something very stupid. It doesn't take much. It can all be so overwhelming to balance your emotions with the day-to-day life of functioning. Sometimes my brain stops working and I cannot remember anything, while other times I feel so engaged that I could do anything.

Each task seems more complicated than it needs to be and I know in due time this will get better, however the person that I am...wants it to be over with so I can move on. Ain't happening.

So I must learn to be patient with myself and others. Easier said than done, that's for sure.

I also noticed that while I am self-aware, work blurs that for me. While I was in Michigan at my mom's I was very in tune with myself and my feelings, however work sort of creates a distraction that makes it challenging to know how I'm truly feeling at all times. I need to work on that, which I will.