It's been one week and three days since his funeral and burial.
Today is the last day of his Novena and the pain and sorrow is just as strong as it was the day he died.
No...not true, the pain and sorrow is greater because it's finally hitting me that he is gone. That he's not here anymore. That I can't just pick up the phone and call him, I can't get in my car and go have a chat with him, he's not here anymore.
I feel like I don't even fit inside my own skin anymore. I just want to leave my body and be somewhere where there is no loss, no pain, no sorrow, no anger, no resentment!At times the hurt overwhelms me and I don't know where to turn or what to do. I just sit and stare. I can't seem to focus on work or television shows or books. When I'm alone I want to be with family and when I'm with family I want to be alone.
I have moments when I think I'm better and then grief knocks me on my ass and blankets me with a heavy shroud of sorrow and I feel like I will never be able to lift the weight of it off of me again.
I have to remind myself that this is normal, that this is going to hurt, that it's going to take time and that I will recover. I have to remind myself that I'm not going nuts, that nothing is wrong other than I am grieving for my daddy and that while I will always miss him, someday the hurt won't cut as deep and I will be able to breathe again.
You are so blessed to have had such a loving relationship with your father. That is what you will always have with you and his loss will hurt because of it. The flip side is what I went through. A self center, self righteous verbally abusive father who I didn't miss when he died. Your father's legacy is so much the better and therefore the loss so great.
ReplyDeleteI am truly sorry for your loss, but also happy to know of the wonderful relationship you shared with him. That is something that lasts forever.
Well I guess I fall into the middle ground between Rebecca's and your experience. I had a very complicated relationship with my mother in life, and sometimes it is complicated in her death. I grieved for my mother and yet I could and can be pissed off at her to a degree that just amazes me--I think for the wasted opportunity.
DeleteThe old saying of live each moment in life to the fullest is probably a line of BS. We would get exhausted, but on the other hand we can't live our life to the lowest either. Life deals you a hand and you play it to the best of your ability.
Grieving is rotten and it is black and it hurts like hell, but it is also necessary. Embrace it and let it run its course. You will never stop missing your father, but at some point it will no longer be the knife in your heart that is slowly twisting right now. I don't believe that it is simply time that heals, it is the experience of grief, that loss of love, the absence of the the person, the emptiness and the Soul grinding blackness of it all that rips at the core of your being ... it is that horrific experience that becomes a process that gradually heals us. I don't think there are any shortcuts. I found grieving comes in waves and you hit the nail on the head...it knocks you on your ass. It can slam the breath out of you. But it will lessen. Embrace it for now, but don't let it become a habit. When it is time to quit hurting, you will know, and then it is time to let the grief go.
Alicia, my heart aches for you. While I have experience grief, I don't believe that I have experienced like you are. As bad as it hurts, it is a measure of the love that you and your father had for each other.
Alicia, I am so sorry for your loss. Each of us grieves in our own way, but you will eventually heal. He must have been a wonderful man to generate such devotion. I will keep you in my prayers. Blessings...Mary
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