Grief

I often have conversations about the people I have lost in my life. Many of whom you already know about. In 9 days will be the 53rd birthday of one of the most important people I lost ( that I had with me on this planet). My mother was absolutely everything to me, as you can see from the posts where I talk about her. She is the reasons I am who I am and do what I try to do. In one month and 6 days it will be the 5th year that she will be gone. The 5th year I was torn apart and the 5th year I am still trying to piece myself together.

I talk to people about my loss, my love for, and my heart ache of losing my mom and it amazes me that they expect for me to be over it. They expect that I am no longer saddened or cry about losing the woman who loved me first; the woman who gave me everything she could. I know that in the past five years the pain and numbness has lessened and I am able to think about her now without immediately bursting into tears but, my heart is still broken and I have yet to really begin to mend. 

A lot of times on FB I share things that seem important but, this post really resonated with me to the point of spurring me to action. For those of you who where on our Facebook page ADVENTURES before coming here you may have seen the picture that inspired this post. For those of you who haven't I will write it out here in sections. 

"The reality is that you will grieve forever.you will not 'get over' the lost of a loved one;you will learn to live with it." This is essentially what I just wrote about above. Even after five years my heart is still mainly shredded and the pain is still there. I may not burst in to tears as much anymore but, that is mainly due to the fact that I have had to stop so I can live as normal of a life as I can. If I had the option I probably still would be laid out in bed crying and going over home videos and pictures of my mom and family. However, I did and do have to work, be social and pretty much continue living. Is it hard having new firsts and not sharing them with my mother; yes. It is hard having a tough day and not having her to go to. It was hard getting married and not having her there to support me. Its been hard going through these health issues and not having her here to talk to them about and ask for advise, to not have her go to the doctors with me and help me understand. Yes, I am going to be 24 but, I still wish my mommy was around to go to doctors appointments with. 

"You will heal and you will rebuild yourself yourself around the loss you have suffered. You will be whole again but you will never be the same. Nor should you be the same nor would you want to."

I am most definitely not the same person I was 5 years ago. Yes, partly cause I have grown older and with age a person changes. I was not the same a month, two months after my mom passed. I know that it cost me friends and it cost me family. At some points I even tried to pretend I was the same but, it didn't work because I wasn't. I wasn't happy, I didn't see the world in the same light, and honestly I was a lot quicker to just ignore someone. My mother had kept me grounded and kept me in my family. She was the root that entwined me with them. When she left, as much as I loved and love them; it just was not the same. Their words and criticism were a lot harder to bare, their happiness harder to watch. Every occasion, every interaction with people became either suffocating or not enough. Even after all this time I am still different and not whole enough to deal with many things I used to. 

The loss of a loved one, of a significant person is soul crushing. The loss of a father or mother you are close with; the loss of a child (full term or miscarried); the loss of a loved spouse. These can and do break us down and apart. It makes it hard to pick up the pieces and resume a life that often we do not want anymore. After my mother died, after the loss of my children I didn't want to be around many people;I didn't want to be in the same school or area. I wanted out and to be away. I wanted to take on things that would change me more. I wanted to move to a place where there was no memories of her, cause remembering hurt too much to bare. 

So the next time you talk to someone who has losed someone so deeply apart of them, remember let them be. Do not tell them to get over the pain; do not tell them it's been a long time they should have healed. Grief and pain has no time limit. Healing has no time limit.