I have been battling with odd moments of anger and irritation for a few days and much of it has been directed towards Ray.
This man has been the biggest, best and brightest source of love and light in my life and yet I find myself snapping at him for trivial nothings. At times my heart almost bursts with love for him and yet I feel I want to be away from him and he won't leave me alone. I feel he isn't grieving enough. I feel he doesn't say George's name enough. I want him to cry with me and I search his face for sadness. When he gets irritated with something I want to tell him that it doesn't matter, the worst thing in the world has already happened, how can anything else upset him?
But of course he already knows that the worst thing in the world has already happened, it happened to him too and he hurts too. We're not secretive about our feelings and we are helping each other to feel whatever we need to feel. We never leave even minor irritation in the air and we both always apologise if we get snappy and I hate that I've been feeling like this. We don't fight and we don't argue with anger: what's the point, we talk about our feelings and we don't bottle things up for long. If one of us is sulking, the other wants to know why. Ray never tries to stop my tears and has spent hours just holding me. I don't want to tell him that sometimes I feel like this. I could not, would not, will not hurt him. I know that anger is natural and a normal part of grieving but bloody hell, it's quite distressing to find it directed at the one person who really understands my pain. (and no, he doesn't read my blog, but he knows about it.)
Sometimes the act of writing out this negativity dissipates it. I organise my thoughts, type them out, edit a little and try to understand myself a little better. I can feel my mood lifting as these words appear on the screen.
This afternoon he's been visiting his buddy who has just split with his girlfriend after years together and Ray has been telling him that it's ok to feel bad and grief takes a long time. He knows. He understands.
This evening I told Ray that I was feeling irritated and on edge with the world and I was sorry if he was getting the brunt of it. I got hugs. He understands.
And all that negativity has gone.
This evening I'm feeling loved, accepted and a little more peaceful.
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This is exactly what started happening to us about 3 weeks after we got home from the hospital. The most reasonable thing that I can conclude is that we have been watching each other so very closely for signs of each other's pain that sometimes it just gets too close. I want to feel better so Alan feels better, but I can't always, and then I get irritated at myself for not being better "for him" and at him for watching so closely. He is grieving and in pain of his own, but wants to be strong for me, so he doesn't express everything that he feels. And we are grieving so differently- so if he's not feeling what I'm feeling in the exact way I'm feeling it, I jump too quickly to wondering if he's still sad. Of course he is- but if he is, then why isn't he the exact same kind of wreck I am at the exact same time? And then he throws a completely uncharacteristic fit in the bathroom because we're out of dental floss, and I think, "Oh, yeah- he's still sad." Bleah.
ReplyDeleteI read early on something to this effect: Two people trying to comfort each other after a miscarriage are like two people who went blind on the same day trying to teach each other Braille.
Which I took to mean that you can muddle through it together, but nobody's quite got it together enough for things to go smoothly all the time. Which they wouldn't anyway, because love is like that.
So after a week of this, we finally talked it out with lots of hugs, and decided that sometimes Alan needs to be out among the normals doing the regular things from his life, which is part of how he heals. This leaves me free to be all-out miserable for a couple of hours at a time, which is part of how I heal. And then we're much better able to be loving with each other later.
And so it goes on...
Hugs to you and Ray.
I think it just come from a general state of uber-frustration. at life, at death, at everything.
ReplyDeleteand the one who is closest, who we feel most comfortable with, sometimes catches it.
That makes so much sense Danielle.
ReplyDeleteWe've had talks like this before and we're very accepting of our different needs in this grieving process. I do need time to be sad and cry and Ray needs to get out and see those "normals".
Just a few of those crappy worse rather than better days.
Yes, it's total frustration and he's a great catch Ya Chun!
we do grieve so differently. i think sometimes simon isn't sad enough, then i look over to him on the couch and i see a few silent tears flowing out. i don't need to say anything then. i know. it is enough. he feels it. not quite the same as me and he doesn't express it the same way but it always hurts him. daddies are supposed to keep their little girls safe.
ReplyDeletethinking of the three of you.
Norm and I went through this and are still struggling through. Hang in there.
ReplyDeletei think its unavoidable that these conflicts will arise, i know they do with us. we're different people, on different timetables, even if we're grieving the same dead son.
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