Loss of connectedness

B occasionally used to say to me that I was a glass half-empty person, and I would reply that I was a realist! In fact, we could both be glass half-empty or glass half-full people depending on the context, and I would sometimes tease him, as well. Anyway, one of the things that popped up on my Facebook page last week was a free seven-day programme on positivity. It’s fascinating what seems to randomly appear! Anyway, I thought I would give it a go as, over the past week or so, it has felt as though I have been stuck in the doldrums. Nothing too dramatic, but I just seem to have gone backwards rather than forwards after that pesky anniversary. Perhaps, I thought, the course might help me feel more positive and, anyway, what was there to lose? So, I joined up and it was interesting and there were some helpful tips but, of course, I soon realised that it wasn’t going to make me feel less sad. I think it was just wishful thinking on my part and, if I’m honest, I didn’t expect it to, but it was worth a go! I know that it is not possible to magic away the sorrow of grief, and I also know that I have to grieve until I no longer need to grieve and that’s all there is to it. I do think, however, that trying, if not always successfully, to maintain a hopeful attitude has to be helpful. So, I try to remain hopeful, if not always positive. 

For some reason, this week, I’ve been finding it hard to remember happy memories of B and us (why??) and, when I do manage it, they haven’t been making me feel happy. Perhaps, I’ve just been trying too hard. I thought that if I recorded one happy memory in my journal each day it might help to raise my spirits. Well, it didn’t! What happened was that I would look at my journal page and think ‘I can’t think of a happy memory!’ I don’t understand this, I have lots of happy memories stored in my brain, it’s just that I didn’t seem to be able to retrieve them when I wanted to, and when I did manage to do so they didn’t make me happy! Yesterday evening, it came to me that perhaps I should think in terms of good memories rather than happy ones, acknowledging that positive (!) memories can still make me feel sad as well as happy and yet that doesn’t make them any less precious.

Another millstone, is that I seem to have lost the quintessential or ‘real’ B (again, why???). Don’t get me wrong, I know B is dead and that he is not here, but I feel that my mind / heart should be able to remember and hold on to the essential him and who he was, as well as memories of what he / we did. This did happen once before and, thankfully, it returned, but I find it very disturbing.  My mind was going full pelt when I got into bed on Saturday night, something to the effect of, ‘Why can’t I grasp you? Why can’t I get you back? Of course, I can’t get you back, you’re dead, but I should be able to remember, ‘feel’ the ‘real’ you. I knew you so well. I don’t know why I can’t do this. It scares me. Maybe I could let you go more easily if I could grasp and hold onto the ‘real’ you (??!!). It’s so strange, so wrong!’ I have to admit that I went through several tissues at this point and that I didn’t get to sleep until 2 am. What saved me, though, was looking at photos. I could see B and the expressions on his face, and the happiness that was evident and I could get glimpses of the quintessential him. If none of this makes sense, don’t worry, it doesn’t really make much sense to me, either, but I just know that at the moment this perception is missing. Of course, I knew B and who he was but knowing who he was is not the same as, and the only way I can think of to express this is to say, feeling who he was. It’s about an emotional connectedness, those little bits of eternity, as opposed to just an abstract notion of him. And, maybe, this is what death is but, if so, why did I have it for a while and now it’s gone? I don’t like it! 

Three weeks after the anniversary of B’s death, I was hoping that I might be back on a more even keel again but, clearly, that isn’t quite so. I am rather bewildered by the amount of time it has taken, as I had unthinkingly assumed that it would be like the other significant dates I’ve passed through, where the anticipation was worse than the day itself, the day happened, and then I was back to how I was before. I still don’t really know why this one was different, except that a year seems such a milestone. It still seems impossible that I have now lived a whole year of my life without B. Such a short time, and yet so long. And, perhaps, that’s the nub of it. I just don’t want it to be so long as I can feel him slipping away from me. It’s like a tug-of-war. My head knows that I have to move on and I do want to live a fulfilling life again, and that’s what B would want for me, but my heart just doesn’t want to let him go (that’s what it feels like, and it breaks my heart). And, I know that it’s probably just another one of those paradoxes of grief, that I will be able to celebrate what we had more joyfully if I can let go, but it still seems too hard, and anyway, I don’t actually know how to do it. I guess it goes back to that other paradox, the only cure for grief is grief. A year is a long time to be without B, but it’s not long enough for my grief to melt away. More of those grains of sand are silently falling away, but quite a big heap still remains…