Tuesday, September 6, 2011
Just a brief summary of where I am in my journey.
I still cry. A lot. I am still furious with God for what he took from me. I still firmly believe that it was my fault for not following my gut reaction earlier that night. I am still apart from the rest of my world looking in- there is an unseen barrier between me and my husband, and sometimes even between me and my precious, vibrant ALIVE daughter. She is my only real comfort though.
I am still seeing both my therapist and my psychiatrist. Still on both anti-depressants and anti-anxiety pills. Still have days where I do not get out of bed or even out of my pajamas. Basically, if I do not have a reason to get up and out, I don't.
I feel empty inside. Believe myself to be more orthoprax than orthodox as I am not really sure that I believe in a God who could ridicule me so harshly. I am going into the chagim with no plans to go to shul. Before you ask, no tehilim or Iyov does not seem to help either. Yes I tried talking to a Rabbi or mentor, but neither of them really had the time for me.
Like I said, I cry a lot. Mostly in the middle of the night, but lets be honest, it can be pretty much whenever. A song can do it. A kids book. A family walking. A green stroller.
I had hoped going home to see my family would help. It didn't. I had no reason to really think it should. No matter how much other people may love me they can't fill the emptiness in my heart. I think they knew that too.
While I was home I had all sorts of people talk to me about looking at my brachot (I do- that still does not ease the pain of the loss or the lighten the burden of guilt I am left with.)
They talked about moving on- not even halacha prescribes a set period of mourning for a child- how can a person who has never been there? At the time it had only been 5 months since some man, who I will never know, buried my little girl in some place I never know. 5 months- less time than I had known her for and I should already move on?
The inside of my head is hell. I hate myself. Nothing ever completely breaks through the darkness that surrounds me. It is always there like a thin surface keeping me from the rest of reality. I think that is what the drugs are supposed to take care of. I guess they are not working quite the way they should be. I am using less and less of the anti-anxiety, but I suspect I need a higher dose of the anti depressant. The level of tears is going up weekly.
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Be easy on yourself. Grief is incredibly painful, but it's also a normal reaction to tragedy.
ReplyDeleteWhen I had my loss, one thing that made it worse for me was this pressure from those close to me to act as if I was "fine". I know they loved me, but they had no idea just how much emotional energy it took to shield them from the fact that I was still crying every day, even months after the fact.
I struggled with feeling like a horrible person because I hated seeing pregnant women or babies. I literally had to talk myself through it, saying "you don't hate them, you actually love them and want to be pregnant and have a baby, but you want it so much that they are a painful reminder of your loss". Later, when I finally found support boards for loss, I realized that these feelings were really common. I resorted to an extreme DIY de-sensitization strategy: watching tons of episodes of A Baby Story, since it contained so many triggers, yet was so repetitive.
If you can, find some good support groups - online and in person. I can promise that there are other women in your community who have been through similar losses, and that you'll feel better talking with those who won't judge your pain but will relate to it.
The drugs can help you to cope with the pain and find the strength to go on, but they won't eliminate the pain. All I can say is that you don't get OVER it, you get THROUGH it. You can't bypass it. You need to grieve, and it takes far longer than you'd expect. Yes, one day you will get to the other side, and be able to think about Gabbi without searing pain, but that point is still a long way off.
Keep track of the small things that ease the darkness. Just as it is okay to grieve, it's also okay to have bright moments and times that you feel good. Little things that helped me included:
- cleaning
- working
- getting together with friends who could make me laugh
- walking/exercise/dancing
- sunshine
- eating yummy stuff
- being with my husband
- taking a hot bath