Abandonment & Holidays

It's the second day of fall, and the first day that it feels like it. I'm sitting here wearing a fleece jacket, jeans, and my favorite fall slip ons (the ones that I forgot give me a blister every time I try to walk in them) and I'm chilly. Blessedly chilly after such a long spell of 90 degree days.

It's been a hard week. One of those can't-stop-crying weeks. The kind where I want all of this to not be real. For G to be back. For him to be healthy. For us to be newlyweds and 22 and done with our first walk-in camping trip and picking out apples to make home-made applesauce with.

But I'm 37, and G is gone and with him went our traditions. He was sick for a long, long time too. walk-in camping ended a long time ago.

I would push off these holidays indefinitely. Skip them all together. Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Years. This long, long stretch of celebrations when I don't want to celebrate. These memories of traditions, this hole at the table. And laced throughout them are the horrible days in 2020 that led to his death. The Halloween when he slept while we trick'or treated. The Thanksgiving that landed him in the hospital only 1 day after his 10 year transplant anniversary. The Christmas Eve I tried to skip because the day before we had had his viewing. The day our pastor came to talk with us after he died. The night of removing gifts from him from under the tree. The Christmas where we forced the fun for P's sake but none of us were very joyful. The pile of gifts for him and from him, left unopen and hidden in my closet. The New Years Eve that we gathered and buried him. The New Years Day that marked the first day of a new year - a year that his life on earth never touched.

But two years later, it seems I'm supposed to be okay. Go with the flow. Join in the family. Ditch our traditions and memories. Act like G was never here. Like our hearts don't break when we decorate the tree alone or try to say what we are thankful for on Thanksgiving when what looms biggest in our thoughts is what we wish we could have - who we wish we could have.

So what do I do??

I need to make the holidays special for P's sake. I want to be home. I don't want to be alone. I don't want people in my space.

And UT and UN have dropped the ball (in my opinion), making plans with their significant others' families and not thinking how it might affect us. When will they care as much as G did about P's heart? Well, the truth is never. He is my son. G's son. They are uncles. Without children. They don't get it. Moreover, they can't get it. As close as they were to him, it's different. It's just different.

I don't know how to navigate these things. These big feelings that are still here. That aren't going away just because the earth has gone around the sun one more time. And should they? Could they?

Time doesn't heal. And healing is slow. And it's not complete in this lifetime. My grief will ache as long as I live. As a wise older woman who has been widowed for over 33 years said to me this week, I will never not need my husband.

We need him every day. But we really need him during the holidays. We miss him every day. But we REALLY miss him over the holidays.

I wish people got it. I wish my people understood. Gave space. Accommodated. Cared.

Okay, too far. They care. But they can't carry it. I can share but they can only look at my grief from a distance. They can make plans and invite me but they can't understand why it's so hard for me to reciprocate with an answer, much less, with gratitude.

And really, even I don't understand my heart, my grief, my pain. Even I cannot predict what will wound and what will heal. When I will cry or when I will laugh. When I need to take a break from grief and when I need to just let the pain wash over me.

All I seem to have is un-answers. All I seem to do is things that don't work.

Maybe this isn't the year when I figure it out. Maybe this continues to be the year of "data points", as A would say. Of learning but not reaching a conclusion. Of eliminating things along the way. Maybe we make the best of the worst and keep going, not expecting that the holidays will - or could feel good- but knowing that there can be moments of joy and peace even then.

And ultimately all these holidays are a longing anyway. Life is an advent - a waiting for what is to come. As grievers, who cannot be wooed by yummy treats, special gifts, and days off of work - we feel it more. We know this world isn't all it's meant to be. We wait for more.