Supposed?

It's been 37.5 months since Brian died; 40 months since the doctor told me he would die. I'm supposed to be ok with this new "chapter" now. The pain is supposed to be a thing of the past.

Who made this declaration about how I'm "supposed" to be? Not me. Probably not anyone who watched their 48 year old husband die. Certainly not someone who watched their 28 year old husband die. Probably not even someone who watched their 78 year old husband die. I don't think that anyone who watched their spouse die would tell someone else how their grief is supposed to feel.

Want to piss me off? Tell me to move on. Tell me to get over it. Tell me not to live in the past.

Clearly, I'm not living in the past with Brian! Clearly I have moved on. And that's the problem! I'm living in this new reality that I hate. My happy reality ended when I was told that my husband would die of a rare cancer that we couldn't fight. I was told that without chemo he could live for nine months. I was told that with chemo he could live two or three years. Neither of those things happened. He died three and a half months later. He died without ever coming back home. He died without ever again feeling the sun on his face. He died without ever enjoying another real meal. Without ever again petting his cat or walking his dog. He died without sleeping another night in his own bed. He died without ever dancing with me again. He died without enjoying the things that he had previously enjoyed.

I have moved on. I am still alive. I held him as he took his last breath. I held our cat as he took his last breath. I held our dog as she took her last breath. I packed up our things by myself and sold our home.

I'm still here. I'm still alive. I live in my new home with my new dog. I get up in the morning and go to my new job. A home, a dog and a job that he never knew.

I live in the present, and that is the problem. This is not what I ever imagined. Brian and I imagined growing old together. We planned to be that little old couple who held hands and kissed in public. We planned to be happy together.

That was my past. None of that exists in my present. I would love to live in the past, but I can't.

We were there for each other. We took care of each other. Nothing could have kept me from him those three and a half months that we were in the hospital or in hospice house. There was so little that I could do for him, but I wanted to do anything that I could for him. I'm grateful that I could do those things for him, though even as he died he did so much for me. He still took care of me.

I survived his death. I planned a memorial service for him. I planned a burial for his cremains. I designed and provided his grave stone. I needed to do all of that. The only thing that could have been right after that was for me to go to sleep and never wake up. It is so unfair that I am still here and he isn't.

I don't live in the past. I live in the present. I'm sad and lonely, and I have tried so hard to change that but I'm not able.

Roller coaster

Long before I met Brian I knew that I wanted to be an administrator in a university setting. It wasn't until almost three years after he died that I actually got the job. The pay sucks, the benefits are great, and for the first time ever, I really like my job.

I am the program administrator for a summer program. Yesterday we had orientation for out instructors. Today was the first day of classes. It was a crazy busy day, but an exciting one. At lunch time I had to escort a group of students to get ID cards. The sky was bright blue, it was warm but not humid. Campus was in bloom. As I addressed the students I felt happy to introduce them to our beautiful campus and to share their enthusiasm. I felt really proud to contribute to our program. I was up, smiling, excited and feeling like I wanted to celebrate - and just like that it all crashed. 

I wanted to go home and dance. I knew that if Brian were here we would have. We would have gone downtown for dinner, sat outside, and had a great evening. I could picture the smile on his face as I told him about the students and the instructors. I could hear his laughter in sharing my excitement. As quickly as I imagined that, I was fighting to hold back the tears. I can't share any of this. It felt so good for a moment, and then the moment was over, and I was alone.

I don't have anyone to celebrate these moments with. I no longer have someone who shares my joy, excitement and accomplishments. I finally have the job that I wanted, the job that he wanted for me, but I don't have him. Without him, the joy is stripped.

I am proud of myself for all that I have learned so far in this job. I am proud to contribute to this program. I am glad to finally have a job I enjoy. But I am so hurt by this roller coaster of feelings that makes bad days bad and good days lonely.

This is not how it should be.

Dreams

So many widowed people talk about seeing their loved ones in dreams. I almost never dream of Brian. I wish I did. Perhaps I don't because I don't believe he exists anymore in any concious form. Last night I had my most vivid dream of him, and it wasn't good. I still feel sad an shaken. Like my loss is fresh again.

In my dream Brian came home and told me he was leaving me. There was no fight, no anger, no love loss, but we were over and I couldn't understand. I asked if I had done anything wrong, if I had angered or disappointed him. I asked if he stopped loving me. No. Nothing had changed, but he had to go and we were over. He was sad and I was sad and neither of us wanted that, but there was this horrible surrender to some terrible reason why we couldn't be together. 

In the dream I was so broken. There was no begging or pleading, just this horrific feeling of losing my marriage. And he was sad, but he wouldn't stay. We both knew our marriage was ending, and we both hated it, and there was nothing to talk about. Just this gut wrenching surrender to a "divorce" that neither of us wanted.

I woke up really sad, and have been fighting tears all day. In the light of day I know that the dream was about his death. It wasn't a divorce that neither of us wanted. It was a dream about how fate ripped us apart. How cancer made us both accept that our lives had been hijacked.

I am typing this with tears flowing. After all this time I finally have a vivid dream about my Brian, and it wasn't about our love and life, it was about his death. Somehow now the loss seems new again and the pain is raw, and I want to scream about how unfair life can be- how unfair it has been. The quiet resolve of the dream doesn't exist in the real world. I can't quietly accept the reality of my loss. I can't imagine a life that seems even half full. It will always feel, at best, half empty. The thought of spending the rest of my life in this state of private pain and loss is heavy, and I wish he could help me bear the weight as he always did in life.