Grief is an Interesting Creature

Grief is an interesting creature. It has fangs and claws, it screams and cries, and yet has soft fur and kind of purrs sometimes. 🦁

There is a strange solace in grief. Mostly I feel a little detached, and a lot fuzzy. Forgetfulness and an inability to concentrate and focus are ever present.

It’s been just over a month since my father died, unexpectedly. Since I found out my first love had passed away three weeks prior. Since I got the diagnosis: Breast Cancer.

These are all things that I am grieving, along with the many fears that come with illness: will I be able to keep my job? If so, will I lose significant income? Will I be hit with huge medical bills? Will they find more cancer when they do surgery? Will I have to do things that don’t feel ‘right’ to me? Will my marriage suffer? Will my friendships suffer? Can I still be more than just my disease? 😢

I am not conscious of grieving most of the time, but the symptoms are all there, even when I say “I’m fine”. I had some of these things before this, but I’ve also been grieving my mom’s long, long, long goodbye for well over 10 years, and grieving my sister’s death last year. Here is a list (from griefwatch.com) of some of the physical, emotional, social, and behavioral symptoms I can truly say I’m experiencing right now. I deleted the ones that didn’t apply to me. There are still a lot of words here…

*Physical*
Feelings of unreality; Physical distress such as chest pains, abdominal pains, headaches, nausea; Change in appetite; Fatigue; Restlessness; Crying and sighing; Feelings of emptiness; Tightness in the throat

*Emotional*
Numbness; Sadness; Anger; Fear; Relief; Irritability; Guilt; Loneliness; Longing; Anxiety; Meaninglessness; Apathy; Vulnerability; Abandonment

*Social*
Overly sensitive; Dependent; Withdrawn; Lack of initiative; Lack of interest

*Behavioral*
Forgetfulness; Slowed thinking; Wandering aimlessly; Trying not to talk about loss in order to help others feel comfortable around them; Needing to retell the story of the loved one’s death / illness; Needing to retell the story of my diagnosis.

I’m in therapy (because I’m always in therapy!) and that’s helpful. It’s the only place I’ve truly mourned my dad, cried my eyes out and yelled about the unfairness of it all. The finality of knowing I will never get what I wanted from him. The child inside of me is wailing about feeling unwanted and unloved, never feeling good enough, never feeling like my dad and I knew each other. Knowing those things will never be fixed now. Even when I knew it intellectually before he died, the child in me hoped. That hope died with him. That’s really hard.💔

Therapy is also proving helpful for John and I to communicate better. He’s also joined a club he never wanted to join: Breast Cancer Husband/Partner/S.O. He’s joining me in some of my therapy sessions to help us communicate better. To help validate both of our feelings and identify where the rocks are that we keep stubbing our toes on. *Ouch!* is a common emotional feeling for both of us, because everything is just simmering below the surface and it doesn’t take much to erupt into an argument. Feeling selfish, feeling like the other is being selfish, feeling abandoned, feeling helpless. None of it is fun.

All of it is life. 👩‍❤️‍👨

Just keep swimming… 🐠