Letters: 300 Days Later

Thirty years of Thanksgiving dinners that you are forever part of.

Good morning Sweetie,

My very first post I wrote 17 days after you died--the day before your 30th Birthday--as I contemplated what to do, how to “celebrate” with Mom when we both hurt so badly that you would not be with us. I’d already filled half a notebook handwriting my thoughts and stowing away memories I was terrified to lose. When we carried you back to San Diego I began to panic as my mind was so obsessed with dissecting the most recent month(s) and I had a hard time recalling the little memories of you. I was afraid it would get worse.

I never wanted to forget how it felt to have your arms around me and your chin on my head when you got off shift, crawling out of bed to help get your fleece or uniform off as I asked how it went or helping you get ready to leave for your 24’s or day 12’s, making sure I was up so you wouldn’t leave without a kiss and a “Be Safe”. In order to rest your chin comfortably, I had to be barefoot and you had to still have your boots on. So I wrote it out. All those little details and feelings as many as I could remember until my hand cramped. And I kept writing. I described that happiness to  myself so it would never be lost. I have lost the smell I wished so desperately to hold onto. I washed the last load of your laundry this morning. I hadn’t touched it since January hoping to hold onto that memory but the reality was it has been long gone; it was time to finish that task.

I also wanted to see what my journey would look like in retrospect. So I began writing out my feelings too. I never expected anyone to read it---who would want to experience pieces of this journey, tidbits dredged from a fragile mind? I’ve gone back and looked a few times to remember what it really did feel like at those times. You are present daily in my heart, so you already know these: nearly every emotion under the sun, entering my life at unspecified times and for unspecified lengths. There is no linear progression, as those who haven’t known a devastating loss might believe. When I look at my past self I see my ups and downs. I see resolution through agony. I also see despair.

Today, oddly enough, on Thanksgiving, I hit 317 days without You. Three hundred whole days since I penned my first sloppy jumble of thoughts. One year ago today I was prepping Thanksgiving dinner with my family. I was looking over at You smiling because we were going to tell my parents that we were getting married this year. We had the house, we had the puppy dogs, Thailand was already decided but you wanted to be respectful to them and share that information yourself. I was poking you earlier that morning to wake up, get out of bed, and come join everyone for breakfast because you’d thrown the blankets over your head trying to catch a few more Zzzzz’s. Ryan, your name will forever be on my Grandmother’s white tablecloth that holds 30 years of family present on Thanksgiving Day. We will remember you every year for many decades to come.

I have wondered and come to the conclusion that no one, not even my future self, could have explained to that shocked and numb girl, even in her own words, how 300 days will change her. I’m going to change over, Sweetie, and talk to her now.

Always Yours, Sweetheart,

Stephanie

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Hey Girl,

Oh boy, well, people will tell you that it gets “better” with time, Darlin’, but first it will get much much worse. The shock that allowed you to do things that had to be done when your brain really could not comprehend what was happening--that will eventually begin to lift. When it does, you will not be prepared and it will hurt like hell.

Remember sitting in the back of the SUV at the airport, telling Sam “When she gets here, you need to focus on taking care of his mom, not me”? You knew, just hours later, that you were about to mean nothing, that you would have to be granted permission to try and make his funeral the best way to honor and remember Him. I know you knew at the time that to Ryan you were #1 out of 7 billion. He told you. It still hurt, though, to be handled as second-class.

You do have value, even though so many days and weeks you will feel like you don’t. Even now, those thoughts intrude. Recognize them, acknowledge them, but Darlin, do not let them trap you.

When you think you can’t breathe, take a step, go to work, feed yourself, or open your eyes any longer then repeat over and over again “You can….Stay here. Make a difference. Do it for Him.” It worked. You’re still here, as sucky as that sometimes is, 10 months and 13 days later. Right now, I’d like to think that repeating those words will continue to work. Because you are a fighter just like Ryan. That’s why you love him. You found the man that both matched and also improved you – don’t ever forget that.

You are granted permission to do or say anything and everything you feel. The people that called him your “ex”, the ones that questioned how well you really knew him, the ones that told you a month later that it was “God’s will” or “Don’t worry, you will find someone else”, the empty consolations...It is your right to be enraged over those insensitive and unnecessary utterings. Some come straight from the mouth of an asshole and others from people that Just. Don’t. Know. They have no idea what is ok and what is not. They are blessed to have an ignorance of this.

You will scream to release pain you are terrified to leave inside. Do it. You must. I’m going to insert humor at this point and say that, realistically, try not to do this in front of other people, please? It’s pretty f*ing scary to see and hear.

You’re not going crazy. All those people that stopped calling or the ones that never called, the promises that were not kept – Dear Girl, know that it is not a rejection of you. A friend will tell you later that even if for only the 30 seconds it took to make that promise, they did truly think they were capable of supporting you. They were not, and that is ok. Yes, it’s complete BS that when you had just your fingertips left holding onto this world, that people left your lonely cries for help. When you asked ”Coffee?”/“Make you dinner?”/“Want to go for a run?”they didn’t respond with “I can’t” or “Not tonight but I can tomorrow” but instead with complete silence. It will make you feel worthless and abandoned but please, you must learn to just release these people.

Because, beautiful girl, remember this: Linda stayed. Jodie stayed. Gina stayed. Ben & Matt stayed. Marc helped you. That 1 angel left here in Austin, she kept you alive. And you cannot see it now but eventually you will meet some absolutely phenomenal people. They will amaze you with their capacity for help and empathy, if even in the middle of their own disaster. And they will always come into your life at just the right time. How this happens, I cannot explain to you, but it will:

A stranger at Fado will buy you another pint, even though you can’t even open your mouth to thank him because your brain cannot comprehend what your eyes have seen. He sees someone he doesn’t even realize is having one of the worst day of her life and offers kindness.

TCSO will ask if you need to be escorted home, when you’re pulled over for a headlight out. That officer will show you compassion in the middle of your heartbreak.

You will meet the framer at Joann’s who will tell you about her nephew, also a medic, whose death 10 years ago was also a suicide. She will promise you she will wait until she can give all of her attention to framing Ryan’s uniform for his Grandmother so that it is done perfectly. She will ease your mind.

His coworker will drag you out of the house on multiple occasions to show she genuinely cares - to watch you and try to keep you from feeling so isolated.

You will meet strangers-turned-friends, who you will share the most intimate things, even though you’ve never met--because they will “get it”. This will come at a time when you so desperately need to not feel alone. They will become your rock on the bad days.

A woman at the farmer’s market undergoing chemo will give you your first compliment in months when she looks at you, post-run sweat and mud caked to your body and legs and will say “Wow, you’re so pretty” It will happen when you really need to hear that. Go to the car and cry. You’re allowed. I know you wanted to hear that from Him, not her.

You will meet neighbors you two never got to know. One in the middle of their own grief, even. You will meet running buddies with their own stories. You have aged beyond others in this experience and so many people, generations older than you even, will not be able to relate. You will find times to be gracious to them over that and you will be angry and rude, because you’re too tired to care about another person’s feelings. Don’t hate yourself for this - remember it’s not who you are--simply try to hold your tongue when it hurts the next time. While losing a spouse at some point is a likelihood for much of the population, widowed in your 20s will leave you nearly a pariah. You can still find empathy from those without experience; it is just rare.

A woman at the airport bar will hold you as you’re leaving New York and tell you that she is a widow too - she will share about losing her husband of 33 years. She will know components of your pain without you saying anything. Once again, this will come at the perfect time, when you are returning home, worn out and emotional after letting go of pieces of him that you never wanted to release from your hand. She will take your number and will reach out to you when you return from spreading just the smallest fragment of ashes in a city he always wanted to visit. You had to take that trip. It will not be easy but you must. You have to prove it to yourself that you can get on a plane alone and you have to honor him.

You will read. A lot. Devour these words from both blogs and in primary research, from books and personal posts. They will expand your mind. You will grasp to profound sentences and these will become a set of mantras critical to your healing.

Embrace the good. Look above where I said “You are allowed to do or say anything and everything you feel”? This also means that you can have “New-Good” Days, not just “Not-Bad” Days. It means you can recognize that you felt happy. I  know you will wait for the other shoe to drop, but don’t. There will be days when you thought something was wrong with you because every cell in your body was in pain but you couldn’t cry. When you watched in 3rd person wondering “What is wrong with you?” Your heart carries him every moment; you know you still miss him and it both aches and stabs. Crying doesn’t prove you miss him, it just provides an emotional release.

Your heart will always be sore, even in times of great happiness. 

You have graduated into yet another shitty "club" where you begin to know others not by their favorite drink or their weekend plans but through their souls and life stories. You have been given a gift. You will not see that at 17 days and you will not truly understand it at 317 days. Logic will simply frame it for you to consider in the future. Though the thought has come to your mind, you will wish every day that this stupid f*ing "gift" could be returned and you could retreat into your previous level of naiveté. Stephanie, you must grasp to the opportunity in this as you did the pain of a decade ago because your life is a journey...It's an exhausting, bullshit, unfair, journey that seems to shatter your heart nearly every time you wake up to an empty bed and come home to an empty house. 

Darlin, you cannot bring him back. You can only share him going forward and craft a legacy for him and for you. You will love him forever, and you will realize that yes, perhaps one day will cross paths with someone who lets you love Ryan forever because that's the only way they could love you. I'm getting ahead of myself--baby steps--just recognize that you don't have to give him up.


I can tell you these things 300 days later, not because you are looking down the road and setting a goal to be at this place by this time. 

You're used to doing that, Silly Girl, but Life doesn't work like that right now (and perhaps ever) and let's be honest with each other, you're not in the position to do much thinking anyways. You're going to take some steps forward and then get pushed back down. I am going to take some steps forward and then wind up a mess just as I thought I was doing "better". That has been my experience this week. It's ok.

Even now I know nothing of what 300 days from now will hold - whether we will be better or worse, stronger or more desperate. I know there are some bad ones coming up; I see them from miles away but our goal is today. 
You will do your best.
You will forgive yourself for your worst.
You will wake up tomorrow and do the exact same thing over and over and over. 
You will make a lot of mistakes, do a number of foolish things, but all you can do is try.

You won't understand this 17 days in - not even if you could read it from your own mouth... Some of the things I'm saying you have read, but they are incomprehensible. You cannot understand what the heck "new normal" really means. You cannot understand what it is like to hide feelings and thoughts and reactions so that you appear to cope around others. You cannot understand a feeling of carrying thoughts and memories but having to push them aside to function because you're not capable of that right now. Just allow yourself to be wrapped in peace in those shortest moments, on that good day. Indulge in "numb" because it gives your brain a break. Over the next 300 days your life depends on fighting and hurting more than you have your entire life. It's going to be awful, but you can. It hurts - a LOT. But you will make a difference.