They say that doctors and nurses make the worst patients. I'd be willing to admit that as a doula, I made an overthinking laboring mom. I can't help but think that grief counselors may not be the best at grieving. Or maybe I'm super, super good at this and that's why I'm feeling it all.
I find myself "therapizing" (my word) myself. I understand all of this. I can see the grief from the outside. I know that if I was sitting in front of myself in my office, I could see it all and it would all be normal and just fine. But from the inside...it hurts...and I don't like it. And I know neither do my clients. And this gives me more empathy. Not that I didn't have it before, but feeling it so strongly like this again makes that empathy grow.
Lessons.
Life is all just a bunch of lessons.
I'm super angry. I can see that when things hit me. I get mad. And boy, did I get mad this weekend as Olly and I cleaned out dad's apartment. The human in me wonders if I'm going to get out of this without anger management classes. The grief counselor knows this is completely normal.
I always knew that one day when my dad died I would feel lost. I have been my dad's secondary caregiver for the last 3 years, and for the 3 years before that, I was still very involved in his life. I have talked to him nearly every single day for the last 6 years.
"One day" is here and I am lost. And the grief counselor in me knows it's normal. But wow...it's going to take some time to break the habit of calling him every day. I know it's only been a week but every night, I still have a moment when I think, "Oh...need to call dad" and then immediately am reminded that I don't ever get to call him again.
On Friday I was at a coffee shop and I had to get a code for the bathroom. The barista said, "It's 1937". She didn't say it's "one, nine, three, seven". She said, "It's nineteen thirty-seven". I actually said out loud, "Of course it is." 1937...the year my dad was born.
I say out loud that I am not Okay. But I'm not always Not Okay. Sometimes, I'm just fine. Other times I am REALLY not okay. I'm okay in the confines of my office. My safe place. I'm okay when I'm wrapped up in Olly's arms. I'm okay at various odd times during the day. And then other times I am so very NOT okay.
And that's okay.
And it's important I say it.
It's what I'd tell my clients to do.
I won't pretend my way through this grief.
I will feel every single ounce of it.
Even when I don't want to.
Even when I want to run.
But my body won't let me. And I will listen. I told myself I was going to start working out again this week. That would make me feel better. But my body is telling me differently. It's telling me to sleep. Even though sleep is often filled with dreams and nightmares and lots of wakings. But walking seems hard. I told Olly today that it's as though my heart is saying, "Hey...we're kind of broken...and I know you'd like us to pump extra hard, but we just don't have it. Sit down. Rest. Give us time to recover." So, I will. I'm going to give myself November. Perhaps come December, I'll be ready. I hope I will. But maybe I won't. Maybe the holidays will take a lot of energy. So, I'll take it one day at a time.
Because that's all I can do. I won't ask any more of myself than I would ask of anyone else. One day, one moment, one breath at a time.
I've got this. Right this moment. Maybe not the next one. But I will be okay in the end. Until then I have to keep putting one foot in front of the other as I walk myself through this journey of grief.
Thanks for sharing the journey with me.
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