Carry on Castle: Living with Grief

I didn't go to therapy this week. We are trying this fun new thing where I only go every other week. This is the first week of not going.  I'm still not sure how I feel about that. Plus that takes away like half my writing material right? My therapist without saying the word 'better' because she is a smart, good therapist and knows better, said she thought I could go down every other week. Uhhhhhhh if you say so lady, your the expert. The implication of course is that I am indeed doing better, I don't need to go in every single week and cry about my dead husband, every other week and crying at home will do.  Baby Girl is in a good place, a really good place and that takes away a good 50% of my stress if not more, to not be constantly concerned about her. So every other week. "How do you feel about that?" my therapist asks me. I looked her straight in the eye, "I think your probably right and that really pisseses me off" So much of this grief st...

The death of Dan, my husband, my soul mate, my best friend, is by far the most catastrophic thing that has ever happened to me.  My whole world was ripped apart, ruthlessly, bloody, messy. My life laid in pieces all over the places I called home.  I couldn't go anywhere without seeing it's wreckage. I couldn't understand how my heart kept beating without his next to it, but it did.  I couldn't see how Baby Girl and I were going to make it, it's still up for debate. In the before I would volunteer at Baby Girls school all the time. I was a volunteering mom, I was a PTA mom.  I feel like everyone at the school knows me, even if they don't know be by name, they know who I am. We are that family with the "tragedy." Baby Girl in her own right is not one to be forgotten easily. Tragedy struck hard and fast when Baby Girl was in second grade, she was only 7 and her daddy just died out of nowhere.  A lot of the volunteering lapsed after Dan died.  It's r...

I am a little obsessed with the play "Hamilton" right now. I haven't seen it yet but it is coming to town soon and I'm stalking the website for when tickets will be on sale.  In the meantime I listen to the soundtrack almost constantly in my car.  Remarkably, what with it being about a war and all, there is a lot of death in "Hamilton".  One line repeats itself in several songs "Dying is easy, living is harder" Pretty sure the writer of Hamilton is familiar with grief because that line just says so much. When I go to the Doctor for my anti-depressants they always make me feel out this 'how is your mental state form' One of the questions is: have you thought about death or dying in the last week? uh yes, I always mark yes. I thought about death or dying within in the last hour if not the last ten minutes. I always think about it.  But I don't want the Dr to get the wrong idea so I always write off to the side, "But not mine, Dan...

What did I talk about in therapy today? My brain can barely remember. It was one of those days. The one where everything feels rushed, when you're trying to do 10 million things but nothing gets accomplished, when you've wanted to go to bed ever since you woke up. When your kid tell you your the worst mommy in the world because you're taking her to the dentist instead of aunties to play with the new baby kitten. When your brain is so worn out it actually hurts. When you feel like everything that occurred today is all because your husband is dead. Well maybe that one's just me. I don't know all that many people with a dead husband although I must say way way more then I knew two and a half years ago when he died. I haven't had one of these days in awhile, and really had have very few of them all summer. I guess I'm 'healing' or whatever.  It makes your brain foggy, it makes it hard to remember what you are doing from one moment to the next. It makes...

I was talking to my friend today, I love her because she always shows me a different perspective on things that I haven't thought of.  "Is this all there is?" I asked her. It goes back to my basic question of what do I do now? What do I do without Dan? What am I going to do with the next 60 years of my life?  60 years would put me at 97 and frankly I don't want to live that long, 90 is just fine by me, so I guess that's only 53 years, not nearly as long. What am I going to do for the next 53 years?  She stole a line from my therapists (my friends do that a lot because I have smart friends) "Well I think your doing it, you just keep on living every day."  I can be pretty snarky with her because she loves me anyway, "Really? if this is all there is it's a pretty lame existence." This is a pretty lame existence, what the hell is the matter with me? I have a great life, I have a great family, friends, child, house, job, I have everything goin...

So I was talking to my therapist today. We were talking about my dead husband, sometimes it seems like she's the only one who doesn't mind that I still talk about him. I guess thats what shes for.  Thus this was our topic of conversation today. who do I talk about my dead husband to. According to Facebook I made 40 new friends this year.  I think probably most of them don't know Dan. That in itself makes me so sad, how can I actually be friends with people who didn't know my husband.  Unless they are complete idiots (and then I wouldn't be friends with them) they do know that I had a husband, once upon a time, he did exist. He was my soul mate, the loss of him hurts every second of every day.  Also because of the type of job I recently got, because I had to get a job because my husband died, I used to be a stay at home mom and loved it.  Anyway in order for me to still take care of Baby Girl and make some income I started an in home business. Thus a lot of peo...

My sister posted on face book the other day " Miss you all the time. Some days are worse than others. Today is one of those days." along with a picture of her and Dan.  I meant to ask her what made it so hard that day but I never got around to it. It could have been because Baby Girl had hung out with her all day. It could have been because they went to a charity walk for another friend that died years ago.  It was likely a combination of the two. Or maybe she just thought of some smart ass remark Dan would have said to her.  Dan really loved teasing her, she was 8 when Dan and I started dating and was very much a baby sister to him as well as me.  I miss Dan all the time too. Yes some days are harder then others. I am astonished to hear myself say that I think the really bad days, the days when you can't even function, are getting less and less. I can make it through most days most of the time now.  That in itself hurts like hell. I can't imagine my life with...

I went to therapy today (for real everyone go to therapy)  It was kind of intense. I wasn't planning on it being so intense when I went in. Many times in therapy we will talk about the same subject over and over i.e. my dead husband. You have to re address a topic several times (or thousands) before it can really sink in. I was telling her about how I had gone to coffee with a friend and I was telling the friend how I was feeling better. "Really I feel better then I have been in the last two and a half years"  Better in that I feel more present in life, more there. I can see the world going on around me now.  It hurts. I'm gonna be flat out honest with you (cause thats like my MO) I couldn't see the world before. In this case meaning before like today not before Dan died.  I was so/am so all consumed with grief that I literally had no room for anything else. All I could do was worry about Baby Girl and I surviving. I was psychically  in the world but not reall...

Baby Girl lost a tooth last night. A molar, that sucker is huge. People call it a twelve year molar because most kids lose them when they are about 12. Baby Girl is 10, she really likes doing everything early.  She was 5 when she lost her very first tooth.  I was completely taken by surprise because the dentist told me not to even worry about it till she was 6. hmmm.  Baby Girl said "tell me the story about when I lost my first tooth" she really likes this story, instead I said, "would you like to here what daddy said when you lost your first tooth"  "YEA" she exclaims.  "Well daddy was at work when your tooth fell out, so I texted him and said 'your never going to believe what just happened' he texted back 'what' 'guess' I said. Then he started guessing, but hes daddy right so all his guesses were crazy like, 'there's a cougar in the back yard' 'someone gave us a million dollars' 'A horse just pooped...

In case you didn't know its the new in thing to have a "why" these days. As in why do you do whatever it is that you do. If you are at a job interview you will most likely be asked what your "why" is. Why do you want that job. I think they like to here better answers then "I need money" They want you to tell them why your passionate about that particular job. (I'll tie this into grief I promise)  If your in college you will likely have to write some sort of paper about your "why" why are you studying this topic why are you passionate about that.  I think the point is you will do better career wise and be happier if you are passionate about what your doing. When Dan and I were trying to adopt a baby (long story that ends badly) we needed a "why" it was pretty easy to come up with one.  When I started working in a retail business a few months ago the owners wanted to know my "why" Well I have an answer with all the r...