On most days my grief feels like a prison. I feel trapped and isolated. I want to get out but I don't know how.
I am this new person and I am trying to find my way in my old life. Its like I am a ghost floating through my life seeing how things should be and trying desperately to make my brain realize how things actually are. Experiencing the trauma of stillbirth is a really hard thing for your brain to deal with.
My safe place is at home with Britt. Being here is the one place where my mind feels safe enough to recognize the reality of my situation. Where I can think about things and acknowledge my grief. Everywhere else I feel like a shell of a person just going through the motions of life.
I believe if you go through the motions of life for long enough, one day you will wake up and realize that you are living your life with out the conscious thought and effort...that you are naturally doing it all on your own. I look forward to that day.
All of these thoughts surfaced this afternoon because I got my picture taken. It was 80's dress up day at school and we were taking a group picture. Unless you are living this life you probably don't realize that thats actually a big deal and a milestone. To pose and smile like everything is alright when its not. I wonder how I will look in the picture. Will I appear to be a normal happy person, or will the emptiness shine out of my eyes and be captured by the camera?
I wish I wasn't in this prison, I wish I was going out tonight with my work friends to a concert I have wanted to go to for years. But here I sit trapped in my prison in the one place that I feel safe, waiting for my best friend, my safe person, my love to come home.
This weekend marks one year since Emma was conceived, and so begins a long year of milestones to be confronted. I hope in this next year I will learn to navigate my way out of this prison, and that I will find a day when I smile in a picture and actual happiness shines back at me.
The anniversary of Luke's conception date was a big day for me too. It was hard to be thinking about that all day while no one else even realized. Instead they think of his "birth date" which was actually after her died, if they think of any date at all. I know what you mean about grief feeling like a prison and I'm in it too. But I know we will be on the outside of it someday.
ReplyDelete