Nailed It

I've copied posts from the folks at What's Your Grief? before and ran across a moderately humorous but spot on "Grief & Loneliness" post which really needs no additional commentary:

The shift caused by significant loss can lead you to feel more isolated than you’re accustomed to. While you try to adjust to life in the wake of major change, it’s business as usual for those around you and it’s easy to feel cut off from family and friends, left out, alienated and misunderstood.  Not to mention, many people intentionally isolate due to feelings of anger, sadness, mistrust, helplessness, anxiety, and depression.  Grief and loneliness go hand in hand for a number of reasons but I’ll name just a few…

• The person who died was one of your closest confidants or best friends.

• Your friends stop calling because they feel uncomfortable and don’t know what to say.

• Your partner has died and everywhere you go you feel like a 3rd, 5th, or 7th wheel.

• You don’t feel like those around you are tolerant of your grief.

• Every interaction you have is filled with superficial condolences.

• You don’t want to leave the house because you’re tired of making everyone else feel better about the death.

• You don’t want to leave the house because you’re tired of having to reassure everyone you’re doing okay.

• You don’t want to leave the house because you’re afraid something will trigger your grief and you’ll become emotional in public.

• The things that used to seem important now seem pretty unimportant.

• You don’t feel like you have anyone to really talk to.

• People are pushing you to feel better and you don’t want to admit you still feel bad.

• You don’t want to admit you’re lonely.

• You don’t care.

• You’re struggling with anxiety or depression.

• An illness or disability makes it difficult to get out of the house without your deceased loved one.

• You can’t possibly think of where you would go.

I think so many people are also confused by what grief actually is such that seeing an emotional release or agreeing to go out, even if it's the only time the entire dang week, leads them to believe that you're "doing ok". This awfulness (for lack of any real word) - it's not an event or a single place in time. It's this modification of all things life - from staring at a wall at 2:45 in the morning to begging your phone to show a missed text or call from him to realizing the only thing I've eaten is a thing of yogurt and not really caring anyways. To hurting every. single. time. I go out and do anything or getting reminded of what no longer "is" by triggers throughout the day. It's the thoughts and feelings inside your head that sometimes stay trapped and other times manifest. It's knowing that it's bad but knowing that it will get worse. It's a loss of his life and mine. Looking back on the previous weeks and recognizing that even attempts at self care were pointless: I go for a run and am overwhelmed with hopes that a car will jump the curb and I won't have to worry any more, it's buying a ticket to a concert and then having a break down the night before and selling the ticket on Craigslist because there's no way I can go, it's leaving a movie early and deciding to never go back because there's too much to deal with in a 2 hour movie that should have been "safe". It's lying every single day that things are ok.