Dear Grief: You are an unwelcome part of my being. You are a constant.
I feel your presence with me every day, hour, and sometimes minute.
We’re not friends, not yet.
I’ve heard the sayings, “You’ll look back at that time in your life and think about all of the lessons you learned.”
That’s not you and me; I’m not ready to make friends yet.
I hate what you’ve done to me.
I’m a hollowed out shell of the person I was before.
You make my face into a mask day after day so that I can keep going.
You wear me down.
With every week holding you becomes heavier and heavier, each day slinging you onto my back until a day when I can’t do it.
That day the leash I’ve been holding you on breaks.
The tears fall, the anger, the pain – all of it crashing down like a dam bursting at its seams.
I give up that day; I cease to exist at that moment.
Grief, I feel like you know you’ve won on those days.
I wake up and notice you’ve started building the dam again.
Like a peace offering.
You’ll let me live again for a little while.
I can put the mask back on and at least make myself try.
I’ll engage in the world around me.
Grief, you don’t let me stay here long.
I still hear you whispering “He’s gone, your baby, gone.”
I feel you day by day getting heavier and heavier.
I know that this will be our dance forever.
You’ll be with me until I die –
but I wish you were someone else.
——-
About the Author: Emily is a mother of 4, with two daughters in her home, and two angels in her heart. Her son Oliver passed away in October of 2017 from HLHS, a congenital heart defect. She also suffered a miscarriage in December of 2014. She lives in Iowa with her husband and their two daughters.
One very broken hearted Mom to another. I feel your pain, I feel your grief & I include all who have lost a child in my prayers.