Hi Everyone,
So I haven't written on here for a while. To be honest I haven't written anywhere, I haven't thought and I haven't felt. It feels weird and slightly stilted coming back here and trying to be honest with myself because I've been doing a really good job of shutting everything off. I want to talk about several things today, to see if can just get back in touch with myself, and with all of you.
When I say I haven't been thinking I mean - I have this new routine, I get up, I exercise, I work, I exercise, I socialise, I read, I watch films, I exercise. And as soon as something brings dad up, or death or cancer (say a storyline on the T.V) I make point out something loudly (e.g. how the puppy is sitting) in a robust voice, like I am worried that people might think that my mind has moved on to dad. When I mention dad it is lightly and in reference to something he did 'oh yeah dad would have been mad if I had done that at your age', like i'm over it. It has been the most bizarre two months of my entire life. In my friends eyes I am fine, I am happy and looking better than I have in about two years (I am on a new diet, focusing on something superficial) and trying to have fun and arrange fun, I have more energy and I'm not crying.
I know this isn't healthy and I know it's going to bubble up and boil over at some point, and that is going to be an ugly show. It's funny, I miss desperately the first few weeks after he died. The pain was so raw and fresh and everything was in free-fall and I often felt like death itself would be a nice respite. It was so truthful and natural and it felt like a right price to pay for loving someone so much for so long. But I think over the months, being so distraught and needing help and support put me in a really vulnerable position. My friends disappointed me, my cousin belittled my grief and said she couldn't support me because 'it wasn't right for her'. I have been so shocked by people's inability to show grace and empathy. I found myself in the position of having to explain my sadness and it felt so cheap, like I was having to sell my grief to people in order to buy some support; I just couldn't be in that place anymore.
And, I think, quite simply I was tired of being miserable, I was so tired of being so sad and seeing everyone else live their lives. So I covered up my sadness and have been happy, accepting invitations, waving away apologies of those who ignored me and planning my future. It's been quite nice but it's only been possible because I don't let myself for one minute be alone with my thoughts, even in the bath I perch my laptop on the windowsill and watch an episode of 'suits' or something.
But last night, I dreamt of dad for the first time in a while, it was so simple and my brain captured him so well (as always). Last night I think my subconscious took the time to sort some things out for me. He was there, and we joked about me being out late with friends and what he would do if I started wearing a lot of fake tan. He was ill, and it was like he was on loan, I knew he would have to go soon but he was there with me and hadn't gone anywhere yet. Then he kissed me on the cheek and it gave me such a thrill of happiness, just this one gesture of affection (which weren't exactly rare with dad but weren't bestowed abundantly when he was around). And then I woke up. I realised, quite simply that I still think he's coming back. That he's just away, or I'm away and I'll come home to him soon. And also how such a huge part of me yearns for his approval and his affection, and I don't know what to do with now.
I need his love and I don't have it anymore, I can't be loved by him anymore.
I met a storyteller yesterday. When he was 25 he lost his eyesight, just throughout the course of a bus journey his eyesight disappeared forever. It was the beginning of a degenerative genetic disease that then rendered him unable to walk. He then found that he had a talent in storytelling and now he works with blind children and tells stories, spins out these great yarns to a captive audience. He was telling us of his misfortune in chit-chat form in the upper-class living room of a woman who was hosting the event for private school children. She kept saying 'oh gosh' and 'awww' at his tale of desperation and incredible bravery. We were all quiet, not sure what to do with his openness in the social setting we were in.
And I realised my dad died, and I will one day soon, have to tell a half interested audience at a dinner party, and I'll keep the gory details to myself but I will admit it was hard with a sort of brave self-deprecating smile and people will say oh how awful and then go on chatting about nigella's cocaine habit. And then that's that. Then I have swept dad under the rug because death is an awkward subject and I don't want to inflict my grief on other people because it's not polite.
I am not ready for that yet. I am not ready for it not to be real and to stop holding people to higher standards. I've been hiding from myself because it's easier, and I have been saying it feels easier because I'm healing, but I'm not. I am downing painkillers whilst the wound festers, and I'm not really sure what to do about it.
I hope you are all doing OK. As ok as you can do.
Smallhands x
P.s. This song reminds me so vividly of a walk I took up to the downs in the pouring rain a few days before dad passed away. I had to get out the house and I listened to this song and sat on the hill in the downpour for a few hours.
