There are some things about this loss that I have yet to admit, even to myself. I can feel them in there, waiting behind a curtain or something, but they just don’t come to the surface. Sometimes it’s like I have an agreement like “I can’t look at that right now, please don’t show yourself.” Such as when I walk past Erin’s room, which I have to do in order to go upstairs or downstairs. I carefully avert my eyes from looking INTO the room, even though I am facing it in some cases, and I consciously think “I know you are in there, but it hurts me to look.” Heck, maybe she isn’t in there, but her energy is, and it hurts.
Yesterday during my therapy session I said something that I have been feeling, and that nearly came out prior to the session as I took work breaks and cried. I didn’t just lose my daughter, who I love and miss more than I can describe. I lost my family. I lost my life. I lost being a mother. I lost Erin’s friends. I lost so many more smaller things that I can’t put them all here. I am grieving all of those losses.
Before you, being well-meaning, tell me that I still have a relationship with her friends, that I am still a mother, that I still have a family, please consider this…while I may have those things in some form, they have changed. I don’t get to have the relationship that you might regarding having your child and their friends over to play, or taking them to movies, because I no longer have a child in the mix. I no longer have a family. I have a husband. It’s different. We don’t have a child now. We have memories of our child, which are painful, and so we don’t talk about her much for our own sanity. All of those family things we used to do, we don’t do anymore.
I lost TIME. I am grieving the loss of the time I had with Erin, and I wish I had more time. I wish I had spent the time I had with her better, paid more attention to her. I have many regrets. I’m not sure it is guilt, but it is definitely regret.
I have a viewpoint that ranges from “everything happens for a reason and I will one day see the value in this” to “I will never accept this and my child was taken from me.” I feel torn between to lovers so to speak, because in my heart both of those are true even though they conflict. I don’t believe in victims, I believe in co-creators of reality. So why do I feel so victimized? Was it because I didn’t see this coming and it has been so horrible? I think that is another article for another time.
I think I mentioned yesterday that I was given a task to learn about vulnerability. If I didn’t, well I’m saying it now. I found that in most cases I am vulnerable, but just now I am having an epiphany that I am not vulnerable with my Self. I need to admit this stuff that I am writing about to you, so that I admit it to ME. That way, I can meet and greet these feelings and then work on clearing them. Carrying the baggage doesn’t serve me, and neither does holding on to negative emotions.
So this has been productive and I made it through with minimal tears. Wish me luck on my last assignment out of my Grief Recovery book that I have to work on later today. It’s my “completion letter” to Erin, telling her everything that I wish I could tell her if she was here now. Oh, now I’m crying…
