Still standing. Still waiting...

I don't really know what to write. All that I have to say has already been said I think. My feelings to this whole situation have not changed. The pain and the hurt hasn't changed. Nothing has changed. It's all the same. Everyday is the same battle and the same fight. The only difference from day to day might be the events that cause me to stop and lose my breath.

Recently all I see is Luke laid in that room. I just see him laid there not moving and everything hurts. I find it hard to breathe. How is it possible for someone with so much life to end up so still? How is that even possible? I just wanted him to wake up. I can't grasp how it is possible for life to end so suddenly. Where did he go? I mean seriously, where did Luke go? All that love, fun and kindness and laughter. Where did all of this go? I hope Luke didn't know what was happening. I hope he wasn't aware of the seriousness of his injuries. I hate the thought of him suffering or being scared because he didn't deserve this. I wish I had been there with him. The people who attended to him all had time to contact me. I could have been there. I could have been there with him when he needed me the most. But instead he died and I wasn't there with him. This is really hard to come to terms with. I should have been there. I could have been there if someone had told me. But no-one told me until you were already gone. But I could have been there Luke and I am so sorry I wasn't. I just didn't know. I didn't know.

I've had 6 dreams with Luke since he died. But none of the dreams are of past memories. None of the dreams are of things we have already done. None of the conversations are any that we have ever had before. They're all new. They're all places and things we haven't done together. And in the dreams we both acknowledge his death. We both acknowledge what has happened but then continue to talk about him coming home and what we're going to do. In a couple of the dreams though he has been very distant and I can't get to him. I stood right next to him but I couldn't connect to him. I couldn't reach him. I don't like those dreams. They are very confusing. It makes waking up even harder. I just want to get back into the dream. Even the dreams that don't feel so good, I just want to be back with him and talking to him. I'm not sure why this happened.

Mornings are not any easier. They are horrendous and hard. Waking up every morning with that first moment that everything is ok and then to remember all of it, just shoots an describable pain all the way through me. This happens EVERY SINGLE MORNING. Every morning, I have to fight through that first day all over again. Every morning is like that Thursday. Every morning is like this. Every morning I have to work through the emotions of shock and disbelief and the sickening overwhelming pain. I have to work through the morning routine while balling my eyes out like an uncontrollable idiot because nothing I do can stop the tears. Every morning I have to remind myself that I don't need to sneak about quietly because...well...who is there to wake up? Luke isn't tucked up in bed sleeping off the night shift. He hasn't left his pants on the floor after getting ready for the morning shift. There is a complete haunting emptiness and there is nothing that I can do to alter this. But every morning I have to fight through this. When will this end? When will I be able to just wake up and get on with the day? For the rest of my life I feel that I will have to live like this. I feel as though this is the path that has been set and I'm not sure how to fix it. How do you fix something that is lost forever?

Today I just wanted to hide under my duvet, so I did for most of the morning. I felt that I had a little more energy and a little more oomph to take on the rest of the day. So my day started this afternoon and it started sloooowly. I made a cup of tea. Then I put away some clothes. This was more than enough for the day, so I needed to just sit down because I was done. I actually spent ages just sitting the day out because today I had had enough. I hadn't done anything of any great substance but I'd had enough.

As I was still feeling like absolute crap, I decided that I'd take a different approach. I'd attempt the taking on the world approach. I cleaned out the guinea pigs and sorted the fish tank (which took a couple of hours as I hadn't done it for a while. Sorry Luke!) Did I feel better after doing this? No I didn't. Did it distract me? No it didn't. All it accomplished was a clean guinea pig cage and a clean fish tank. What's the bloody point? I think that I need to stop thinking that the things I do will make me feel better, because the blunt truth is that nothing makes me feel better. And it's just such a disappointment when I feel exactly the same.

I don't want to be with anyone else. I don't want a first date with anyone but Luke. I don't want the hassle of dating all over again, always trying to second guess if the guy is genuine and worth it. I don't want the heartache of things ending all over again. I don't want to share my time and love with anyone but Luke. I don't want to be left and say goodbye to someone all over again, because I'm not sure if  have it in me. I have had to say good bye to far too many people in my life. And I am fed up and tired of it. I'm fed up of losing the people I love and care about. I'm tired of people coming in and out of my life. I hate change at the best of times but at this time it hurts so much more and I can't focus on anything. I can't think straight.

I don't want anyone but Luke. I can never love anyone like I love Luke and I wouldn't fit with anyone as well as I fitted with Luke. He just knew me. He knew how to handle me (apparently I'm high maintenance and hard work/demanding and intense?? I call it having standards and high expectations but there ya go!) and I knew how to handle him and his lad-ish ways! We just fitted so well together. We bounced off each other and we loved being together and with one another. I looked forward to him coming home. I can't give all of me to anyone else but Luke. But at the same time, I don't want to be a 65 year old woman all on my own. So what am I supposed to do? I just want Luke back. That would solve everything. That would make things all ok again...just like in my dreams. We'll acknowledge that he died but that he is coming home to me anyway. I wish this dream would come true.

I just don't know what to do anymore. Nothing I do makes this any easier. Nothing distracts and even when I'm smiling and laughing (which does happen) I don't feel it like I used to. It's all cloaked and masked in an overwhelming feeling of wanting to burst into tears. It's all cloaked with the feeling of wanting to throw up at the thought of never seeing Luke again and my stomach knots so tightly it's everything I can do to remain standing upright and not to hit the floor in a heap. How is that possible to smile and laugh yet feel that way inside and to be battling with that suffocating feeling? I've yet to feel okay and by okay I mean...fully and really okay. The sort of okay that I had before Luke left. I haven't had one second...not even one second of this okay. Oh no wait. Yes I have...every morning when I first wake and then SMASH! Welcome to a new shit ass day without Luke. I'd rather not feel that particular okay in the mornings. Maybe then I'd make it to work sooner.  AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. What the actual f£$%^&*(*&^%$£$%^&*ck!!!!!!!!!!!!

I have loads of things I want to say but it's nothing new to what I have already said. Thoughts just go round and round repeatedly. Why didn't you just take the car???


I miss you Perryman. My life changed for the better the day I met you and it ended the day I lost you. I just want you back. We're supposed to be cuddled up on our sofa. But instead I'm left with an empty space where you should be. I should have you. This isn't fair. You didn't deserve this. You didn't deserve to die. I wish it had been me xxxxxxxx

The longest week has yet to end...

"Go back to work. It will be a good distraction." they said. "Do something and it will take your mind of it." they said. "Return to a routine, it will do you good." they said. Well I have been back to work and this has been the longest frigging week of my life. THE LONGEST WEEK!! and it's only Wednesday. (Well technically it's Thursday as it is 1.07am) but still. Only half way through the week. This is shit. This is all shit. All around me people are moving on. All around me people's lives are continuing. Our life has stopped. It's just stopped and I don't feel angry yet. I haven't met angry yet. I've been agitated and frustrated at myself. But I haven't hit the anger stage yet. Oh wait...I just googled grief. This is hilarious in a not so funny way.

So according to this model of grief I am at the anger stage. I am irritated when people try to make small talk and attempt to make me laugh because they don't pick up on the signals that I don't want to talk. It's not my fault if you can't cope with silence. Stop talking to me. I don't feel like laughing. When I want to laugh I will. If I want to sit in silence, I will. Stop talking to me. If this makes you feel uncomfortable please leave and come back later when I am going to be more talkative. Maybe. It doesn't mean I don't appreciate your kindness or your friendship. It just means I don't want to talk. I don't have the energy to engage in a meaningless conversation.

I am also, according to this, in the depression and detachment stage. Trust me to have more than one issue! Lack of energy and as I have just read on a different diagram it's the,"It's all meaningless" stage. I certainly feel like that. I also find that I'm in the Dialogue and bargaining stage as I write this blog. Does that count as reaching out to others? I don't know. All I know is that life is shit and I am up writing this instead of sleeping. I tried to sleep. I drank some camomile tea (ergh) and turned the t.v down low and tried to relax. But tonight is a night of no sleep and it's a night of missing Luke. Every night is a night of missing Luke. How can he be gone?

I think it's crazy how you're not offered help until 6 months after the event. 6 months. If I was any less than the person I am, I could have topped myself by now. 6 months is an awfully long time to just be left to deal with it. I am exhausted but not sleepy. What is going on? I am supposed to be up and at work in the morning. I haven't made it in before 10am yet. My body just doesn't work. Sometimes I am wide awake when the alarm goes off and other times I appear to fall back to sleep. There is no consistency. I thought going back to work would alter my routine and make me sleep, but it hasn't. It hasn't helped. Worked hasn't fixed anything. I need to work though because I keep buying shit and I have bills to pay for.

It has been 4 months since I gave Luke a kiss and a cuddle. Still only feels like yesterday. This evening my mind is filled of that night when I was called to go to camp or go home. Tonight all I think is, "I should have been there for you. I should have been there to hold your hand. I should have been there with you." But I didn't know. I didn't know you were in trouble because nobody told me. I didn't know that you were fighting for your life, while I sat in the staff room for the staff meeting. They wouldn't let me see you. They wouldn't let me hold you. I just got ushered into the chapel on camp. They wouldn't let me be there for you. I should have been there for you. I should have held you. I wish they had let me go to you. They wouldn't let me. They wouldn't take me to you.

Tonight I remember sitting in that room. Waiting. I remember being taken to the chapel. I remember wanting to see you and wanting this to all be a mistake. This sort of shit shouldn't happen to us. It should happen to someone else. Not us. Not you. It's almost 2am. What the hell?

I had to go shopping tonight. It was shit shopping without you. I didn't want to be shopping and having to choose things for one. I'm suppose to be a two. I am suppose to be yours. I still haven't worked out what I am now but I know what I was.

I don't have any great words of wisdom or advice. I am still fighting. I am still choosing to live without you Luke, even on the hardest of days. I wish I could just curl up under my duvet and just wait for you to return. I don't understand why you took your bike. I don't understand why the van had to be there. I don't understand why they couldn't start your heart again. I don't understand any of this and I probably never will. How are we all suppose to carry on? How are we suppose to move forwards?

There is no man on this world that can come anywhere close to you. You just need to come home. You need to walk through that door. You need to be home with me. You need to be here. It isn't fair that you've left me to live our life without you. This is not our story. This should not be how our story ends. So bloody come home!


xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

I've lost you. xx

What have I learned over these past few weeks? Time is NOT healer. This will not get better in time. Luke has been gone for four months. FOUR MONTHS!! Nothing has changed. I have not changed. This feeling has not changed. This loss and pain has not changed. Nothing has changed. Actually no that's a lie. It's gotten worse. Things that I could deal with before I can't deal with now. They stop me from breathing. I am trying so hard to carry on; to pick myself up and to carry on. But all I think is how unfair it all is. Luke deserved to live. He deserved to be here. He really was the kindest man ever and he made me the luckiest girl alive. He should be here. I wish it had been me that was taken and not Luke, because he deserved to be here. He deserved to be happy and to live. God he deserved to live! Luke lost his life in an accident. An accident that shouldn't have happened and it certainly shouldn't have ended how it did. Why Luke? Why us? Why has this happened to his Mum and Dad? To his sister and Gran and Grandad? This should not have happened. But it has and I don't know how to go on from here. I don't even know if I want to.

We should be so happy right now. We should be laughing and joking and loving each other. Luke should be getting up to mischief and buying more random things from ebay. We should be creating more silly little sayings that only we understand. We should be together. We deserved to be together. We deserved to be Mr and Mrs Perryman. Luke deserved to live. If I had to lose Luke I would rather he had left me and walked away with someone else. Because at least he would still be alive. He would still be here and he would still have the happiness he deserved. (Although I would probably have wanted to kill him myself if he ran off with some hussy! But still...I rather that than this.

This week I went to Amsterdam. It was suppose to serve as a distraction. It was suppose to give me a break from everything. It was suppose to help me escape this whole life. But it didn't. It was gutting to know that not even a holiday to a different place can act as a distraction. Running away to an alternative place didn't leave the nightmare at home. I thought about Luke all the time, wishing he was there and imagining what he would be doing or saying. I imagined what we would be doing and I so desperately wanted him there. I wanted to sit and eat breakfast with him instead of sitting in that room on my own. I hated breakfast on my own. It just served as yet another smash in the face that Luke was gone and that ultimately...I am on my own. 

Amsterdam and doing things did not serve as a distraction because you can't distract yourself from a feeling. And that is what it is. I'm not miserable because I have thoughts of Luke all the time. Sometimes I am thinking of something else (like make a cup of tea, go and shower, shit I'm late for work...again, organise a meal for Luke's friends) but despite thinking other things, that feeling remains. The feeling of complete despair and loss. That feeling that this is wrong. This feeling that life has ended and it will never be the same. That feeling of utter panic of having to live the rest of my life without the one person that made life worthwhile. And it's this feeling that suffocates my every breath. It's the feeling that suffocates my every thought. It's the feeling that makes everyday things so fucking hard. It's the feeling that I have to hide from others because they don't get it, or because they're over losing Luke now and have moved on. It's the feeling that doesn't dissipate no matter what I do and no matter what I am doing. 

How can I describe the feeling as something you could see? It's heavy...really heavy and if it had a colour it would be a thick, dark, black smoke that encases and damages and harms everything it touches. You can't hide from it. You can't shut the door on it, because even if you can't see it, you would be able to smell it. It chokes you with each breath you take and you can't see clearly through it. In fact most of the time you just have to feel your way through the dark and hope for the best. Sometimes you stumble and can't get back up. Sometimes you get back up only to be hit with it all over again. It wouldn't matter if you were doing something because that smoke, that feeling is always there and it sticks to you and every part of your life like hot tar. You don't have to be thinking about it to know that it is there. If you try to pay it no attention, it gets heavier and darker and more vicious. it can't be outrun, it can't be tamed. I guess I just have to become stronger at fighting my way through it.

So distractions don't work. They haven't made this week any better. They haven't made life any easier to handle. It's just reconfirmed that there isn't a solution to this. I just have to stumble and fall and try to keep getting back up. But if I want to stay down for a while to catch my breath then I will, because that's all I can do. 

Since coming back from Amsterdam everything has been harder. I don't know why. Mornings are the hardest they've ever been. Night times are sleepless and restless and I can't stop the tears. I can't control it. I can't do this anymore. The simplest task of getting up and dressed is almost impossible. It takes so long. I have no motivation. I have no desire to begin yet another day without Luke. I have no desire to live another day without Luke. I have no desire to live without him. It all just sucks. I just don't see the point anymore. And before you tell me to try...I am fucking trying. I am trying every single bloody day. When I interact with you I am trying to be motivated and interested in the conversation. I am trying to be engaged with life. I am trying to do every day things that once upon a time were so easy and I just took for granted. 

I miss coming downstairs and the smell of chorizo and egg and Luke's cafetiere on the side after he'd had breakfast and a cheeky coffee. I miss being able to open the fridge to see that Luke had nibbled at the left overs. I miss his bagels in the freezer. I miss hearing the squeak of his motor bike boots. I miss being able to go out of the house and look at his car without feeling pain. I miss being able to drive past motorbikes without any weighted feeling. I miss being able to fall asleep with that comforting knowledge that he'd be home soon. I miss having to guard my crisp packet when Luke was about because he always tried to steal them. I miss being able to make a cup of tea without wanting to cry. I miss being able to clean my teeth without knowing that Luke will never use his shaver that sits in the cabinet. I miss being able to move his stuff without feeling incredibly and indescribably guilty.  

I miss being able to walk into the bedroom without that feeling of, "Shit...it really did happen." I miss being able to sit on the sofa without this feeling. I miss looking at his clothes and having no feeling of hurt and loss. I miss being able to talk to my best friend. I miss being able to write notes to Luke and looking forward to my replies when he was on night shift. I miss so much. I miss Luke. I miss everything about him. I miss the life we had. I miss the hope and the promise of the life we were going to have. I miss Luke. 

I wish there was a solution to this. I wish I could move on like others because this pain hurts. Everything hurts. I wish my Dad was here because I am sure he would know what to do. Dad would fix it. I don't know how he would fix it but he would because that's what my Dad did. He fixed things. He always helped to fix a broken heart. There's nothing that fixes a broken heart like a Daddy's hug. 

But my Dad isn't here and I don't know how to fix this. I don't know what to do. Distractions don't work. Going to work doesn't work. Getting up doesn't work. Looking after a dog doesn't work. However, hiding under my duvet has worked pretty well and has gotten me through many days, but this isn't a very sensible solution, so ultimately...that doesn't work either.

I don't know how I am suppose to keep going. I don't know if I have the strength to keep fighting through every second of every day like this for the rest of my life. I don't want anyone else. I want Luke. I don't want anyone else to be near me like Luke was. I just want Luke. But I can't have Luke, so what is the point?

Miss you Perryman xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

A path untouched...

So my last blog spoke about my return to work. I did return to work last Monday and it was so fucking hard. Somehow, by complete fluke, I got there on time. I sat through the first morning session interacting with the children and the adults. Although this is all a blur to me. I don't really recall the conversations. Just the feeling of being very disconnected to everything and thinking...is this really happening? And it took a lot not to drift towards thoughts of Luke. By lunch time I just wanted to go home and hide under the duvet and just ignore the rest of the world and the brutality of it all. But I didn't. I stuck it out.

My first day was a full day and I should have felt so proud and felt so pleased and good about myself because I had done a whole day at work. But I felt nothing good. I felt numb and as though the whole day hadn't really happened. I had a sense of, "This is all wrong." I didn't feel any sense of achievement. I didn't feel as though I'd made any great step forward. I just felt lost and deflated and discouraged. Is this how the rest of my life is going to feel? Nothing feels real and everything feels so detached. Life feels detached. Like I'm not really part of it anymore.

I went home to an empty house and no hope of Luke coming back from night shift. I went about the house doing what I used to do when I got home from work but stopped half way through and just broke. This isn't how things should be. Why on earth am I going about everyday life things when Luke isn't here? Why am I carrying on when Luke can't? Why am I doing this?

I shouldn't have been cooking a meal and then saving the rest in the freezer for myself to eat later in the week. I should have been cooking a meal and saving the rest in the fridge with a note on it for Luke. So that he has something to nibble on when he came home from night shift and so he had something for his lunch the following day. But I can't do that anymore. So why am I doing anything at all? What is the point?

Auto pilot may kick in and put me into an 'old' routine but even an 'old' routine must be altered and changed. I will never again save left overs for Luke. I will never again plan my evening meals to ensure Luke has some for his lunch the following day. Never again will a routine feel OK. And all of this..it was still only Monday. Still only the first day.

After Monday everything went downhill. I didn't make a full day again and in actual fact, I barely made it in for the afternoons. I was hoping that returning to work would make me so tired and exhausted that my body clock would re-adjust and that I would fall asleep before midnight and then be able to get up on time. But this didn't happen and again I felt very frustrated with myself. How hard is it to go to sleep and wake up?!?! I also felt deflated because what I was hoping to happen and what I wanted to happen were so very different to what actually happened.

I am learning this a lot and many times over. I have always been used to getting what I want. If I have wanted to do something, I have worked hard and got it. I have always managed to do what I want. I have always been independent. But since losing Luke, I am learning over and over again, that what I want to do and what I am physically and realistically able to do are at completely opposite ends of the scale. They aren't anywhere near close to each other. What I want to do and what I can do are two different things and it's out of my control. I don't like being out of control.

For example, today I was going to do a full day at work. So last night I went upstairs to bed before midnight in an attempt to get a good nights sleep. I didn't sleep though but at least I gave it a try. So back to today...today I was going to put one foot out of bed when my alarm went off for work and stick out the other and walk into the shower. I even had my towels ready in the bathroom. Then I was going to walk into the dressing room to get dressed (I had my clothes ready). This would be followed by going downstairs and putting the green bin out. (I deliberately didn't put it out last night so that I would definitely get up this morning to do it.) Then I was going to have breakfast and drive into work.

But here is how my morning actually went. The alarm went off. Then everything was a bit of a blur and time passed and I found myself still laid in bed staring, wide awake at the ceiling. All the time telling myself what I was going to do (read above paragraph), Actually I was just telling myself to stick foot out of bed (small steps and all that). At the same time of doing this, I was also reminding myself that the bin needed to be put out so I needed to get up. I also needed to get up to be at work on time. I also needed to get up because this behaviour is just plain insane and crazy. It's not that difficult to get out of bed. But my body didn't move and the duvet may have been pulled up over my head. Time kept ticking. Then I heard the bin man truck. I thought, "I can make it. If I run now I can get the bin out and make it." But my body refused to move and I was left with the thought of, "I should have put it out last night because now I have a full bin. Brilliant."

I wanted to get up. I tried to get up but nothing was working. My body didn't move and for me everything slowed down but time sped up. Before I knew it, it was 11.45am and I hadn't moved. I don't know what I had been doing. But it certainly wasn't getting up. I eventually dragged myself out of bed at 12.15pm. I showered and broke. I got dressed and broke. I did my hair and broke. I cleaned my teeth and saw his toothbrush and broke. Cleaning your teeth and breaking is very hard. I then ended up sitting on the top step of the stairs and broke again.

I can see the man room from that step. I can see the talc on the floor that Luke left that morning that he never came home. I can see his man room just as he left it. How is this happening? I can see our bedroom and I just want to crawl back under the duvet and pass the day away. I can see the sleeping pills. I could just take one and then I really would pass the day away. I sit on that step, hugging the rail, broken for a very long time. I realise my head is resting on Luke's towel. The one he used that morning and it all hurts all over again and I break all over again. I look at my watch. The school day is almost done but I need to make it in. I am suppose to be at work. I am suppose to be taking on the world. I am suppose to be surviving. But right now, just breathing is taking all of my effort. Just trying to stop crying is taking all my strength. I decide to focus my efforts on just taking that first step downstairs towards the day. Getting back into the bed is not an option I want to take. But I still don't move. I drift back to the times Luke sat on that step waiting for me to get ready and the conversations we had and the looks we gave each other. I drift to the times I saw him upstairs and try to imagine him back here. All the while, there is the back thought of, "I should be in work."

I did somehow manage to take that step downstairs and from there it was all a blur. I did about 2 hours in work. I am suppose to do a full day. What a failure. I achieved nothing that I wanted to do. The bin isn't emptied, I didn't get up on time, I didn't make it into work on time. It is almost 1am and I am still wide awake. I feel emotionally drained and exhausted but sleep doesn't happen. I am awake when my alarm goes off, so it's not even as though I'm getting sleep in the mornings.

My life died with Luke. It's not me being dramatic. It really did. I am suppose to be Mrs Perryman. I am suppose to be Luke's wife. But I am not, and I never will be. That life, that path was killed and died with Luke. The path that I was suppose to take was stripped away and there is no way that I can ever get back on that path. Who I was suppose to be died with Luke. I have no idea who I am suppose to be now. I do not know what life is suppose to be now. Because it can never be what it should have been.

If it had been a friend that had died it would hurt but eventually my life would have returned to the same path and in the same direction it was always intended to be. The plans I had for the future would remain the same, except I would carry the loss of my friend along that journey. But I didn't lose just a friend. I lost my very best friend, my life and my everything. Luke was my life and he was my future. Everything that was planned was planned with him and it was planned as an 'us' not a 'me'.

I don't have any plans to return to because they don't and cannot exist without Luke. I cannot continue in the same direction as before because that direction was determined by being an 'us' with Luke. So I am not just adjusting to losing the most amazing man ever, I am trying to adjust to losing my life that I should have had with Luke. I am adjusting to losing our future together. I am trying to adjust to losing who I should have been. I have to attempt to overcome and understand what I will do now. Who am I going to be without Luke? I can't be who I was before Luke because I am not the same person. I cannot be who I was with Luke because I need Luke for that. I cannot be who I was going to be with Luke because I need Luke for our future. So what do I do?

My entire life stopped when Luke left. The door of that life was slammed shut and locked from the inside. It will never happen. And this is all so hard to grasp. And at the same time of trying to work out where I go from here I am trying to grasp the loss of Luke. I am trying to survive that pain and overcome the total disbelief that this is happening. I am trying to hold everything together. I am trying to hold onto Luke. I am trying to be a good friend to others and to hold onto friendships that aren't so easy. And now I am trying to return to work. I am trying but just seem to be failing on every level. But despite all of this. I am still breathing. I am still here. Tomorrow I will try again. Tomorrow I will go through all of this all over again. Tomorrow is another day without Luke that I will somehow fight through.

It is 1.23am and it appears that time has done it again. Tomorrow is already today. Shit. xxxxxxxxxx

Taking on the world...one breath and smile at a time

It's half 12 at night and I find myself sat in front of this screen again. Absolutely lost and not sure what to do or where to turn. Many of the people who were around me at the beginning have filtered away. Some good ones have remained and others have just drifted. I think if I had to do this again, I would be more wary and choosy with who I allowed into my very new and vulnerable world. I would be very wary of who I trusted with my friendship. Perhaps if I had done this, I would not have to be redefining friendships and my bubble all over again. But never mind. I am a survivor and I will survive this new shift and new path in my life.

I am beginning work on Monday again. It is very scary but I am not going to think about it. I'm just going to do it. I'm going to tackle work and the daily tasks of life like I handled Luke's funeral and the days that immediately followed losing Luke; on auto pilot and smiling while attempting to focus on the practical things that need doing. I'm going to take each moment as it comes. I'm going to take on each event and situation as it arises.

Don't believe for one second that this is going to be easy or that I will find it easy. Don't believe that I am over Luke or over losing Luke. Don't think for one second that I am not thinking of Luke and us and of everything we are and were. Because that is all I will be thinking of but I will cover all of that with a smile. I will be fighting with all my strength to just put one foot in front of the other. I will be fighting with every breath to hold it together through the endless questions of, "How are you doing now?" Still not sure how to answer that. I'm doing no differently to how I was doing when that woman told me the news about Luke, in a room with no warmth. I will be fighting to retain my focus and I will be fighting to breathe through my return to a 'normal' that was before Luke. But I will do it.

So as I said above...I am not going to think of the whole day. I will take each small moment and deal with that bit. Then I will deal with the next bit and so on. I am not taking on the whole day at once. Just the small moments that piece it together. I hope that Monday is a good day for me. I haven't had a good day yet, so maybe Monday will be my good day.

I have had moments in the day when I have thought, "I can do this. I am going to take on the whole fucking world." And then something will happen and I think, "Bollocks to this." But I am going to continue to try to take on the world and I am going to cut loose the people that are no longer a positive in this life and in this moment. I'm going to cut the unhealthy friendships that don't make me feel good anymore because life is hard enough as it is without having to deal with shit selfish people too. And I am going to smile. I am going to smile my way through the moments.

xxxxxxxxxxx

There is a lot of time to pass...

Tonight I sit here trying to sleep, yet again without you next to me. This evening my memory is filled with your funeral. I do not know how your mum, dad, sister and I made it through that day. I do not know how we did it. It is all a blur and yet I can remember a lot of the day in explicit detail. I know how I was feeling at each part. I know how much it hurt. That pain is still very real. When I think back to a specific part of the day I feel the pain and gut-wrenching sadness I felt at the point on the day. The only way I can describe it is when a familiar smell takes you to a time in the past and you remember everything about that time. Except it isn't a smell that takes me back. My memory is doing that all on its own this evening. I mainly remember sitting on the front pew, looking at your coffin. I remember walking in behind you and the faces I saw. I remember feeling sick at this point. I remember looking at your photo trying so desperately hard not to cry and break. Just thinking, this cannot be it. This is not happening. Just breathe. This cannot be real. But it was real. It is real. And it hurts.

I was thinking of all the things that needed to be arranged for the funeral. I have no idea how I did it. Luke and I wanted to take 18 months to plan our wedding, so that we could have everything just right (and because Luke wanted 18 months). But still...in 18 months we spread out the planning. But for Luke's funeral it was planned within 2 weeks. If someone told us we had to plan a wedding in two weeks, Luke would have gotten the sweats and I would have gotten excited and then we would have panicked that there was no way we were going to get everything done. But someone how a funeral can be planned within this time.

A wedding is easy to plan because there are two of you and you can discuss what each of you like. You can bounce off ideas and you know that the wedding will be what you both love. But a funeral you have to make the decisions on your own. You can never be certain if they will like what you are doing. You can never be 100% sure that you are doing what they want. That is hard. It is the most important thing you can do for them now that they are gone and you are left to do it without them. You are left to do life without them.

I have tried many things to ease this pain. I have tried to be busy. I have tried to sleep through it. I have tried to sit it out. I have tried to be drunk and forget in every way possible. I have tried to be positive. I have tried to go out with friends and keep living. I have tried.

But the problem with these coping mechanisms is that time will bring a new moment straight after and in that moment is the pain all over again. There is no permanent fix to the pain or the loss. Time is everlasting and time just keeps coming. I can try to keep busy but I can't be busy 24/7 for the rest of my life. I can try to sleep through it but I can't do that for every second of every minute for the rest of my life. I can make plans and go out to pass time but what does that do really? It just delays the pain that is there constantly. It doesn't remove the feeling, it doesn't replace the feeling. It just delays it. I would like to say to wake me up when it is all over, but this will never be over. This will never be done. Luke is gone forever and so I will feel his loss forever.

I am learning that it does not matter where I am or what I am doing. Luke is who I'm thinking of. Luke and the loss of Luke is always there. There is no rest. All I can hope for is to become stronger each day so that I am better at handling these feelings. I can only hope that as each day passes I will be better at knowing how to adapt and cope with the situations that arise, because at the moment I am not doing so well. I am not being particularly strong at the moment.

I look at Luke's photo and I think back to being stood outside the crematorium waiting to go inside. How did it come to this? How did it come to Luke being gone? I am back outside the crem listening to the music; trying to blank out what is happening. Just counting and breathing. Just breathing...in and out. I remember having to tell myself to breathe. It's as though my normal auto pilot was busy doing other things and had forgotten to instruct my body to breathe. This is not happening. I see the plane fly over and hear the command for the gunfire. I hear the shots ring out and then suddenly there is a jolt that runs through my entire body. If it could be a visual jolt, I would imagine it would be like standing in a room of a thousand mirrors and having all of them smash and shatter at once down to the floor, catching you with the shards of glass as it does it.

Shattered...that's how I feel. That's how I am in every way.

This is not happening. This life is not our life. Our life is as husband and wife. Our life is planning the garden and hot tub. Our life is going away together. Our life is laughter and fun and love and silliness. Our life is not this life. It is not this way. God has got it wrong. He has definitely gotten it wrong this time. Our life is together as one. Not apart. It is suppose to be love not pain. It is suppose to be laughter not tears. It is suppose to be closeness and fulfilling, not distance and emptiness. It is suppose to be US not me.

I know I say this a lot but Luke really was my soul mate and my everything. He really was perfect. He really was the reason I laughed so much and smiled so brightly. He really was amazing and I really was so lucky to have been chosen by him. I miss him every second of everyday and this has not gotten any easier to live with. I am not use to this. Time is not healing.

I love you Perryman. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

A Path Pre-mapped?

Oh My Days...I'm here again. Everyone is going to be getting bored of reading these but it helps me so here goes. My day today was a very odd day and a very hard day. I slept on the sofa as sleeping upstairs was something I just couldn't do and remained under my blanket until after 1 in the afternoon. Then decided to shower and go to check out tattoos in town. But it was shut and then I felt a little lost and not too sure where to go so I ended up at work. I didn't stay long and then went home. I have felt very out of sorts today. I have felt very lost and very not in control. It's a little like a foggy daze. Nothing is what it should be and I feel as though I'm just drifting in and out of reality.

There is a huge black hole; a massive void that is all around me. Even if I turn away I can see it. I can feel it. If I close my eyes it just suffocates me. I can feel the panic begin to take hold. I try to climb out of it but it just drags me back in. I try to fill it with other things but it just makes the void greater and heavier. There appears to be no reprieve, no release, no escape and no break from this. How the hell do other people do this every day for the rest of their lives??

I look at photos of Luke and I feel angry. I feel so incredibly angry. How can he be gone? How can this have happened to Luke? This sort of thing happens to other people. This stuff happens in films. It doesn't happen to people like Luke. He was the kindest, most genuine, most loving perfect man I'd ever met. No other guy had ever come close to making me feel the way Luke did. I had never loved a man like I loved Luke. And because I loved him so much, because my feelings were so different for him from any other guy I'd been with, I thought this was the real deal that would last forever. And it was the real deal! It just didn't last forever. I thought that if you can feel this way about someone then this is going to last, because nothing could break this feeling. But life is a bitch and will break whatever is good and amazing and perfect. And we were perfect. Luke and I had the life that many others would envy.

We had each other and loved to be with one another. We laughed and joked and made the most of being together. We had good jobs and a beautiful house. We were getting married to be together forever. We were making plans for adventures to come and looking into doing married couple things and just looking forward to an amazing life. We didn't need money. We didn't need anything. We were just so happy and content with our life. We had the life. But it's all gone and all I am left with are material possessions.

I am left with 'things' that don't make me laugh or smile. I am left with 'things' that cannot hold me when I am happy or sad. I am left with 'things' that cannot dance with me and make me feel butterflies in my stomach. I am left with 'things' that I cannot share a life with. I am left with 'things' that I cannot joke with. I am left with 'things' that I cannot tell my secrets to. I am left with 'things' that I cannot whisper "I love you." to and hear the reply of, "I love you too." I am left with 'things' that do not matter. I am left without you.

I never imagined that I would lose my entire world. I never imagined that this pain could exist. I never saw myself walking this particular path. Yet I am. (Well actually I'm kinda crawling along it at the moment and often just sit out on the side but I'm on this path!) My Dad use to say that if the bullet has your name on it then there is nothing you can do. If it's your turn to go then you will go,no matter what. I am beginning to think this may be true.

I used to believe that we chose our lives. I used to believe that we had a say in how our lives mapped out and I used to believe that we chose the paths we would walk. But I am learning more and more that we are not in control of our lives or our journey through it. We cannot control the actions of others or the reactions and chain of events from a source of change.  It is nothing like a ripple in a pond because that is predictable. But life is not predictable. We are not even fully in control of our own reactions to events or the effect they have on us. Many people (and me included before all this happened) say that it's how we handle a situation that defines us and not the situation itself. It's how we react to an event that is important. But we are not in control of how we react. We might know how we WANT to react but it is not that easy, as I am discovering each day, because how we want to react and how we are actually CAPABLE of reacting are usually two entirely different things.

Luke's (no idea which word to use here) was an accident that should not have happened. There was no reason for the accident. It was just an accident and Luke was extremely unlucky with the circumstances that followed. But that's what sucks and that is what is so hard; acknowledging the fragile state in which our lives are suspended. Because our lives and circumstances are fragile and they can be altered and forever molded into something unimaginable and unrecognisable. How can a life come down to luck? How can life be so violently snatched away by an accident? He should have walked away. He should have survived. But he didn't and we are all left with this void and darkness. We are all left like things in a room.

They say love hurts. I disagree with this to an extent. Loving Luke did not hurt. In fact it was a lot of fun and very easy to love Luke. It was the most amazing feeling ever. However, losing love hurts. Losing Luke hurts. It is said that grief is the price we pay for love. It is said that grieving is the last act of love we can show. I guess in that instance, love does hurt. A LOT! But I wouldn't give up loving Luke to avoid this pain. I wouldn't wish to have loved him in any other way or to have loved him any less, just to avoid this feeling now. Instead, I will take this hit of pain if it is a consequence of loving Luke with every part of me. I will accept this pain but not as a sign of love but as a sign of loss. Because love should not and does not hurt. Love is love and is good. Loving Luke was and is good. Every second of loving Luke made my life worthwhile and I would not change that. But losing Luke is painful; and that I would change. I would bring him home so I could love him more.

It is now 2.24am and I should attempt to sleep I guess. I don't like sleeping because it invites another day that I wake up without you. I miss you xxxx