It’s been a bit of a rough patch with a series of minor incidents that built momentum into a decent-sized emotional backslide. If I list them out it will lay out a privileged person’s complaint list but, what the heck, I’m going for it anyway:
Thursday – campus covid lockdown announced,
sudden transition to teaching from home. Super ugh. More pandemic turmoil, back
to absolutely no time for deep, focused thought while being home all of the
time. This is beyond old…
Monday – Zoom with grief group. Although
much good came of it for me as it always does, I carried a lingering sting from
its smack of reality that this solo parenting journey will NEVER end. Not ever!
There is no going back to the good old days, no light at the end of the tunnel,
only tough teenage years to weather without a co-parent and bittersweet
milestones for the kids to mark without a dad. I’m stuck doing this alone for
life. I just don’t know if I’m cut out for it…
Tuesday – brand new car dead in the
driveway. Yes. My newest baby, my biggest decision without Chris that brought me
so much relief from car worry, a shiny bright spot in my new chapter, my hybrid
RAV4 failed to start. Do I have a lemon? Will I ever not worry about a car? Why
me?!?! What the hell?!?! (resolved by AAA jump, not a crisis)
Tuesday-Wednesday – parenting/adulting challenges
that I will not lay out in detail out of respect for the privacy of the involved parties. Let’s just say that building a new life is hard for everyone, and
nobody wanted a new life, anyway, when the old life was so great.
Tuesday-Saturday – major anxiety over the election. Memories of the 2016 election came rushing back - watching the returns come in on the projector with Chris and the kids, with early excitement. Then the night took a disastrous turn as Trump was elected. That last presidential election ushered in personal bad news as Chris's tumor returned soon after. This year, as it became clear that Biden had actually won, the bittersweet nature of the moment was a bit overwhelming. I remembered a moment from Nov 30, 2018. We were in the ER and doctors were trying to assess how aware Chris was after his massive seizures so they asked him who the president was. Chris managed to reply Obama. The doctors and I all suppressed smiles, and Chris shook his head with a smile knowing that he had not connected the right name to the answer, but he remembered a fine president instead. What I would give to share this presidential victory with Chris...
Saturday – cleaning up a large yard of dead
leaves alone. Well, I had a tiny bit of help, but I sorely miss Chris and his
steady companionship and productive perseverance at tasks. Despair settled in further.
Will I be 80 and dumping leaves in the woods alone? Who is going to take care
of me when I can’t take care of me and this place any longer?
Ongoing – Chris’s birthday, holidays, and
his death day bearing down amidst skyrocketing covid cases. So, we cannot be
with people or go places we used to… Can’t we just cancel the holidays? What’s
the point?
This
all spiraled into a few huge crying meltdowns. At a low point, and this is no
exaggeration, the sobs left me with no choice but to collapse on the
(unvacuumed) floor and let them out. I could not do anything but cry into the
carpet over my losses for a good long while - for Chris, for the stable, 4-cornered
family life my children used to have, for my own personal adult life. Guiltily,
I implored the universe for a way out.
I
don’t want to live this way anymore. Please, take this cup away.
This
is the dirty little secret of grieving. It doesn’t end. While everyone might think
you are doing great and even you might declare that you have come a long way, these
spells of deep pain and despair still descend because it is literally
unbelievable that a beloved person can just permanently disappear. Life is irrevocably,
involuntarily changed, and not for the better. There are no easy fixes, no fixes
at all.
It
was in one of these terribly dark moments that I was compelled to ask my
smartphone the question that I do every now and then, always with an indescribable
mix of curiosity and dread when voicing the words:
How
many days has it been since January 8, 2019?
Usually
the answer elicits an equally indescribable reaction – some mashup of horror at the growing
distance from Chris and disbelief at having survived that ever-increasing
number. On this day, though, when I was crying and clawing for an escape from
this life, the answer to my question actually made me laugh out loud because the
most fitting, macabre number was returned – 666. Of course it was, why wouldn't it be?
I have a sneaking suspicion that only a widow can truly understand how that was funny...
This path is hell, 666 days in and beyond.
