Birthdays

The spiral of grief hits you like a eighteen wheeler truck. There is no way to avoid it. You can pretend it's not there. You can pretend that your birthday does not exist that indeed your loss itself does not exist. But it will not leave. It is permanently a part of just as your genes are. It feels almost as if we should give up, we should through up our hands in the eyes of grief and claim our defeat. Claim our aching hearts, I desperate need for that one phone call. I turn 30 tomorrow only about 7 hours until the hour I was born 30 years ago. Only 7 hours until the moment in time 30 years ago when my father held me for the first time. The first human contact outside of a doctors. How can I not be sad? How can it not rip my heart to pieces all over again? How Am I suppose to find joy in a day that represents his sudden immediate departure from my life?

Dad, pops what would you say to me tomorrow? I'm your baby girl and yet I'm at the age 30. Almost have my bachelors degree. I have struggled and fought my way through life only to lose you in the end. My cheer coach. You always knew what to say, even though it probably annoyed you that I was so sensitive and emotional. But it didn't matter you loved me fully and completely. What is the use? I feel like throwing my hands up. The spiral of losing you takes me down. Nothing else matters but the pain inside my heart. The pain that causes me to feel utterly alone with no one to turn to. Who could understand at my age what it means to lose a parent? And would you want me to be happy in this moment or would you want to feel? All i can hear is "if you can't do anything about it, don't worry" I'm not worrying pops I'm grieving the loss of you.

I googled birthdays and loss of father. What did it tell me? No miracle cure that's for sure. But that it renews our loss. I think there is a specific connection, a much stronger to my birthday than yours dad, because it is the day of my birth. It is the day that your genes and mom's genes came to full fruition. I was born, I was given life, I was given hope, and I was taught to live by two wonderful people. And now we are not together in the physical sense. Tomorrow I will look for you in the wind, I listen carefully for your laugh, I will see you in the butterflies, in the clouds, the trees, and all that mother earth has to offer. I know you will visit and you will whisper something like "now who's old" or some bad joke about me being over the hill, even though I'm not. Only to you I would be. You would laugh, try in your out tune voice to sing happy birthday, maybe you and mom would do it together, and I would listen to it later and laugh. It is killing that this will not happen. Perhaps one day we'll travel back to a middle world like in Harry Potter. Maybe I'll have my wish granted. Just one more conversation. It is so hard to know how final life is. Hold me tomorrow Dad. Find someway to send a birthday blessing. I miss you more than anything right now.

Spiraling Back Again

I can see the dark impeding cloud
Just out of the corner of my eye.
It's footprint begging to step upon my heart
AGAIN.
It's that time, I remember.
It's his birthday soon.
I feel it, I feel him looking over my shoulder.
The wound opens in the slightest way.
I'm still too dead inside to know what the pain really feels like.
I keep walking but I see the cloud.
I see the reminder of the TRUTH. 
I'm back at the beginning, I remember this seat. 

Our Mad World

I wonder what mad world we live in. What provokes each of us to believe what we believe? How long will we defend our position without listening to any other perspective? Some of us will defend it until our death beds. As I look carefully through the layers that exploded out of the ground this holiday. I wonder if some of us are too stuck in our ways to even merely communicate. I wonder if some of us are too different to hear one another. But as human beings we love naturally we crave connection. However, it's messy. So so messy. At times I'm unsure of what to think. Am I just behind the curve because it certainly feels as though you are trying to explain that world to me. That is not what I would like. But there is no way to express this without upset, without you feeling like you cannot be yourself. So to keep some peace I shut down and by default I no longer can be myself. Where is the middle ground? Where is the love? When you lose someone so suddenly it feels as though a hole has been ripped through the fabric of your life. There is no real way to mend it. All the old wounds that stood beneath the covers prior to your death are now devastatingly clear. It hurts knowing that being with family is the hardest task of all now. Not because we don't love each other but because we all hurt and have a difficult time communicating without you lighting the way. It's like trying to untangle a Giant's knot. There is just no simple answer. When I look into the mirror everything feels too big, too much. And wonder how will I make it through the forest unscathed. My answer is that I won't. But I will survive I haven't yet figured out how you survive this. But if I know anything about myself it is that I'm a survivor. I will find a way. In this moment the way is of confusion, mess, and delusion. I feel as if looking into the mirror only provides absolute confusion and illusion. Nothing feels quite like a breakthrough because I feel as though my strength and fire have plummeted into the earth. I'm looking in unexpected places to find them again. My calm resolve has dissolved. And I'm left with an aching pain in my heart wishing beyond hope that my father will give me a sign. Knowing if I could just drop back into who I am I'd feel him standing right next me. But even on the ski slope I found my attention elsewhere. Until my attention because centered around him, which really means around who I am without my father I will not feel his presence. It's a sad state that I find myself in. However, for those reading this wondering how grief works. Well I don't think anyone will ever know. It's unique. Some people can reach beyond themselves others stuff there emotions and explode/implode. I sit wondering how the universe will guide me to victory.

The Holidays

The holidays now contain a whole new meaning. A meaning I'm not sure I'd like to grasp. A meaning that almost escapes me. It is dread, despair, loneliness. It is no longer a meaning of joy and happiness. I'd like to blackout the holidays. Create a non-existing experience. Go do something else. It's darkest before the dawn. And I sit wondering where my reality begins and where it ends. I float into feelings and float out because they are just too painful. I'm not entirely sure I want to. I'm not entirely sure how to make sense of your death. It eats at me. It create a chaos I'm not sure how to approach. Journaling seems so impossible. So I write to the internet world knowing only a few actually may read my words. Are the words worth writing? Yes this as close as I get to feeling, expressing my truth. I sit looking remember the events of the last few days. Watching my friend cry for me and the anguish that created in my own psyche. Shouldn't I be crying for my loss? For all the synchronicity? And yet I've built a rock wall I only take down in private, because without my father life is so... difficult. Then there's today's story of a friend calling with an odd surprise. Do you want Owl wings? And I didn't hesitate of course I do! The wisdom emanating from above my bed reminding me to fly! Yes spirit you are there in the most amazing ways. And I sit crying wondering if this is the first gift from the universe during these holidays. For some nights it feels so dark I wonder if I will rise come daylight. If I'll barricade myself ignoring all that life is blessing me with. When it is darkest before the dawn I seem to be missing out on my life. This weekend a four almost five year old taught me that. Children can remind us what is important. And yet though I know I missing out on my life. I also feel as though I am grieving I miss my father. Esp. right now. And all I can do is hope I do not break. This all I want for Christmas is a healed heart.   

I Feel

This is I feel post. For it seems everything has built up to a point of no return. I feel angry. This a constant complaint, but really why shouldn't I be my father was taken away. All I want to say to people who complain about there's is at least you have one. All I want to say is if you hate your's so much give mine back! And all of this boils down to feeling irritated that my roommate cannot clean the stove, she makes me up talking on her phone, she left town while her pumpkin rotted to the nth degree.  And yeah it annoys me because it's disrespectful. And then I find it funny because she's thinks she's so very consciousness. Well that's being human right we see ourselves one way and the world perceives in a different light. Nothing wrong with that. What is wrong is how I feel inside? How I feel like dealing with people is unbelievably difficult. It's why I don't call. It's why it takes everything to have any fun at all. Because it feels easier to mourn alone. There are no human dynamics other than my own. Not that I can deal with those easier but it's simpler. I sit wondering how it is that I manage to be Dean's List student with close to a 4.0 each semester and yet my life is falling apart. I wonder if people notice. I wonder if I notice. Because sometimes I think it's all too much and I'm writing a dangerous edge and something is going have to give. I sit scared wondering how in the world I will make it through.
In group this week a woman turned to me and said wow that must have been horrible to have your dad die three days before xmas. You have no idea. I have no idea. Because I cannot go there. I don't want to imagine it. It's the same with a good friend of mine, "I don't even want to imagine it" yeah I know neither do i! But the problem is I have to live it. I have to face it. I have to go through it. No one, no one can do it for me. No one can scream for me. No one can really be there for me. And I think because of that I've just stopped calling. I've just decided it's easier if I stop trying to explain how I feel because it's too exhausting and yet somewhere I'll need. And it won't matter if they understand. It won't matter if they see me, if they hear me, but somewhere I need to stop floating.

Dad
Lost, Confused, and Frightened.
I see the glowing moon.
Reminding me your not far.
Giving hope to the broken hearted.
The trauma fades to the background
As I face the world.
One day at a time
One breath at a time.
For there is nothing worse than remembering.
And there is nothing better than remembering.
So I do both in order to face today.

Giving In

I begin to wonder at what point does the void and emptiness fade. At what point does my sense of self return. At what point does life feel a sense for normality. Or is this out of scope of normal. Is the idea of normal an illusion to the human mind? All I can do is sit and wonder. My heart filled with so much pain and anguish that it's difficult to do anything. I'm beginning to wonder if truly my avoidance in calling people is not because I need space but more because I don't know what to say. If I talk nothing makes sense and my confusion persists. It's easier to stay quiet and pretend that life is okay in my silence. It's not okay. I cry out for my father's voice, and I can hear it faintly. But all in all the emptiness of my heart is overwhelming. I sit wondering how people cope. How you ever learn to have fun again. It makes me feel so weak that I cannot seem to move in, that it take so much for me to cry. I am so angry but it will not leave. I tried hitting a punching bag, then the thought of explaining how I broke my hand caused me to stop. Life has become dismal and I wish I knew a way to cheer myself on. It's not as if I'm giving up merely giving over to the attempt to become unstuck. Giving over to the very fact that I am not the same as I once was. I am a fatherless daughter. And that statement alone provokes emotion so deep. I wonder how it is I will even maintain relationships, speak truth, when it seems I'm barely scraping by. Then I sit and wonder if perhaps this all just a game. I am strong, brave, and courageous I do not let people walk over me. Will I really give up, no not in a million years. I may however be falling for a little while. And all that seems possible is breathing, crying, screaming, and recognizing the intensity of this experience. Knowing that no one in my life truly understands my experience, no one truly can see how complex it is, though I desperately wish someone could recognize how hard this is. Remind me how well I'm doing, how much I'm doing, and that's it's a fucking miracle. Instead I'm left to tell myself at the end of the day, good job you made it through. Let's keep going, what needs to be done now. There is a deep desire, wish, that perhaps maybe somehow I could find a way to really laugh, to have fun, it feels so far away from my finger tips right now.

Wonder

Some days I wonder how it is I make it through. How is it that learn? I feel lost in every aspect of the word. My stomach turns unable to really digest my food, and wonder how long will this last. How long will I need basic self care? I want to run, I really do want to be happy again but it feels so nearly impossible. Even talking seems like a difficult task. I'd rather walk alone right now. Day in and Day out, it's not helpful to tell me to change my perspective or thought process. Call it what you will. I call it grief, I call out it burn out, I call it my path. Perhaps you call it control or resistance. By labeling it that I then feel a sense of doing this all WRONG. I want to do right by my father. I want to heal and yet it feels as though I'm scrapping my nails down the chalk board. I sit with the world spinning around me in every color imaginable, it's overwhelming, I do not have the energy to fight the stimulus. All I can do is hope that I don't drown. It's a feeble existence I just do not know how to cope with your death, Dad. It's overwhelming and I've lost track of my heart. My mind sends me through crazy trip after crazy trip. My body is screaming for relief. And all I can do is drop to my knees and pray I'll make it without something breaking before I cross the finish line. I believe and I do not believe. I want to be understood without a word uttered from my mouth, I want to be left alone. All and all I don't understand shit. Yep that's the bottom line of my fatigue. The unknown is so scary and all I want is a chance to say goodbye to you. Sometimes when I listen to the radio I resonate with these loves songs not because there was something romantic but rather because I cared for you that much. I miss you that much. However, weird that may sound. There is something soothing about listen to a song about heartbreak. Because I'm devasted, heart broken, and dying on the inside. With no other options than to pick up my foot and take a step. I was taught never to give up, yet it amazes me how much I'm hurting. One day I will let the world know, I'll stop hiding it on the inside. Because I deserve to live in reality and to stop pretending I am okay. One day I will be however it probably won't be today.

When I think of you dad, you are the glisten of the sun on the flowers. You are the love that grows my garden, you are what keeps me going knowing that I must share what it means to be loved with those around me. Thank you for teaching and helping me grow even beyond death itself.