My feelings from the start have not altered. They haven't lessoned. I feel as shit today as I did back then. I feel the same brokenness now, as I did then. I had some strange pre-conceived idea that by this time I wouldn't feel better but that I would find things easier. I believed I would be able to do the normal day to day things with the same ease prior to losing Luke. I believed that by now I would be able to get through a day without it being a constant battle and struggle. I thought by now I wouldn't have to live through the same daily fight of trying to find a point in living and that I wouldn't still be having to fight to choose to do another day without Luke. I thought I would be able to rebuild my life and piece things back together, because I had a pre-conceived idea that by this point, life would have fixed itself and that I would be able to manage life with the same ease as before. But I am wrong. This pre-conceived idea was not realistic and does not match reality in any way, shape or form. How do I feel about that? Disappointed, frustrated, confused. hurt and very concerned!
I'm concerned because this feeling has remained the same. The struggle and the battle have remained the same. The same lack of love for life has remained the same. The same, "What's the point?" feeling has remained the same. Which makes me question whether it will ever alter and be different. Telling me it will get better in time offers no comfort to me and unless you're in this position how could you ever know? How do you know that time will make things better?? They're just empty words and promises. They're just your pre-conceived ideas of how this should work and your pre-conceived ideas of how grief works. I'm as guilty as anyone for having these ideas but actually they don't help. They just offer a gutting disappointment when, in reality, the feelings remain the same and the daily struggle to continue through life remains the same. Telling someone to give it time just adds pressure to this whole process of surviving. It's like putting a deadline on something that actually has no end.
It makes you begin to wonder if you are doing something wrong because things haven't gotten better in time, like people tell you it will. So please don't tell me to give it time, because I am learning that time takes on a very different meaning to those that are grieving and it doesn't work in the same way. Time does not offer comfort and it doesn't appear to pass at the same normal rate. It's been 9 months today and it doesn't feel like I have survived 9 months without Luke. It's gone so fast and so little has changed. Time is a different shape to the bereaved.
So where does all of this leave me now that it's been 9 months? The same place I was when it had only been a few minutes after losing Luke. Completely broken, just placing one foot in front of the other and hoping I don't crash into anything. Part of my struggle is that I believed I should be able to take on the world by now and that I would have somehow started to rebuild my life. I also never believed that I would make it to 9 months without Luke. I never really thought about the future without him and so just expected that it would work itself out. (Not sure when I actually thought this would take place because I've not currently got the energy to do that and I've yet to want to create a new normal without Luke but I guess I thought it would magically happen. Note to self- shit like this doesn't just happen!)
I need for my own sanity to stop trying to rebuild a new life to a design that I don't have. I have no idea what my life should look like without Luke. I have no idea what my life should be without him. At the moment I don't see the point to it. But I know that's a dangerous place to be. I know that I don't want a life with any other man. My life was supposed to be as Luke's wife and nothing will ever match that. I don't want to settle. I want Luke. But I can't have Luke, so I need to rebuild with what I have. I need to take it step by step and place the rebuilding into 'phases'. (Cheers lady!) I've spoken about how I expected things to be easier and because they're not I feel like I'm failing. This is partly because I'm still at the point of needing to take things day by day, hour by hour. And it's ok to be at 9 months and need to do this. Apparently 9 months is no time at all and still very early. It doesn't feel like a long time to me but it sounds like a long time. And because it sounds like a long time I have placed the pre-conceived idea on myself that I should be achieving much more by now. But actually I shouldn't. This is reassuring to know. So the first phase is to give each day a purpose. No matter how small.
Creating a purpose for each day. Even if I don't want to. Even if I don't want to engage with other people or take part in life. I am going to put one thing down that I need to achieve on that day. I am going to go through the motions of existing and of taking part in life even though I don't want to. Because to see no purpose in life and no point to living is not a good or healthy place to be. It may be as simple as make dinner or go out and meet a friend for coffee. (I realise this is something you can all do without even thinking about it, but it's a massive thing to someone that should be sharing their mealtimes with their special someone. It's also exceptionally hard to choose meals because there are some meals I can not eat, as they were mine and Luke's favourites. And meeting a friend for coffee requires me to start yet another day and to interact with someone when all I might want to do is curl up on the sofa in Luke's hoody and cry.) So I just need to write down one thing for each day that I am going to do at some point. (Right now it's go and make a cup of tea!)
Some of you may wonder why I would choose to do these things just for the sake of doing them, even when all I want to do is curl up and vanish from this world without Luke. Well it's because on the days when I stay on the sofa and push the day away, I feel like shit. I haven't achieved anything and I am left with the feeling of 'well I survived another day but I'm doing a pretty shit job and I feel like I've failed.' I no longer view surviving a day as an achievement, even when it is the hardest thing I will ever have to do again in my life. But on the days where I force myself to take part in life (even for a little while) I feel like absolute shit but slightly less of a failure. According to my lady, I need to stop beating myself up.
When everything first happened I was able to organise so much. In the first few weeks I actually got a lot done. I cancelled our wedding and organised Luke's funeral. I interacted with people. But now I don't want to do anything. The lady suggested it was because I organised things that were for other people. I did things for other people. But now life requires me to exist and to do things for me. And I don't see the point, which is also a reason why everything is so much harder. I've lost my purpose. By beginning to do one thing each day, even when I don't want to, isn't going to improve how I feel. It isn't going to make my life easier or the daily struggles easier. My feelings will probably remain exactly the same but my life will start to take a new shape. And this is apparently one way of rebuilding a life with no design or plan.
I'm not really sure what I am supposed to do now. It's all just so surreal. This is not what our life was supposed to look like. :'(
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