Getting out of my head...

It's been harder and harder to get out of my head lately.  I think that's par for the course, sure of it actually.  I guess what makes this whole thing so hard is the inability to get traction.  It's all the little reminders, and the big ones, it's the tears that seem to reside right at the corner of my eyes every day.  They don't even threaten any more they just do what they please like some gang that has taken over the turf of my emotions and just doesn't really care. 

That's the thing about what's going on in life.  When something as big as this happens there really is no playbook that tells you the right way to deal with it.  There are other people who have been stuck in the same place and they have a playbook, the one that works for them, and they can share that and it can have things that are helpful but when something is this personal and raw you realize that there is no real universal way to deal with the feelings and thoughts and emotions that you cycle through not just on a daily basis but on a minute by minute one. You notice that I said feelings and emotions, as if they are separate.  I guess to me they are.  Feelings, to me at least, are the result of emotions.  Its why we can have our feelings hurt, we don't have our emotions hurt.  Psychologists seem to agree with me on this.  The way one article from Wake Forest University puts it is like this, I am of course paraphrasing,  Feelings are experienced consciously, emotions on the other hand can be experienced both consciously or subconsciously.  Which is probably why there are times that we know something is going on in our mind or heart or soul or whatever, but we can't really figure out what it is, we can't name it we just know it's there.  That's emotion, at least that's what I'm thinking at this point.  Again me being able to really identify much in the way of emotion and feeling beyond sadness, or anger, or loss or well yeah you get the idea, right now is highly suspect.  

Still I need to get out of my head sometimes, if I stay in that space for too long I find myself moving from it's okay to not be okay but it's not okay to stay that way, to I'm just not okay, I don't think I'll ever be okay and for that matter I don't want to be okay.  I want to be where I am I want to wallow in the mess that is because well it makes sense.  When I am able to get out of my head, even if it's for a short amount of time, those moments are the ones that a bit of light breaks in and I can see the fingers of God at work in the world in positive ways.  They are in the baby birds that have grown up where I walk the dog, they are in the flowers that grow and bloom, or the way that my dog barks and is happy when I get back or when I pet him.  They are in super moons, and stars that move across the sky.  They are in Snaps from Thing One from Jump School or hugs from Thing Two, or the touch of a hand as we watch TV.  They are in playing games with friends across the miles on Xbox, and Facebook posts and encouragement that come from others.  All of those things help all of those things can come though when I'm out of my head for a bit.  The problem is I have to go back eventually, and when I do it can be a fight to just want to breath. 

The problem with a thing like this, the problem with dealing with this type of loss and death is that its not one that really makes sense or that you can really wrap your head and heart and soul around.  It's the senselessness sure but it's more than that.  It's the bottomless pit of loss that yawns in front of you.  I've talked about the things that remind us of Me Me and they are everywhere and that's what's hard how do you avoid everywhere?  You can't and so getting out of your head for a while lets you at least not deal with everywhere for a bit, even knowing that you have to come back.  

Each time I come back I find boxes of memories waiting to be dealt with.  There are the good ones, the fun ones and the ones that I wish were not there.  The times I said wait a minute, or we will do that later, or after you get this done.  Nothing wrong with those things at the time, it's the regret that comes after the loss that makes me question how important was it to bug her about that kitchen stool being left in front of the sink, or where the cupboard was?  Why did I waste time with a nap on Sundays when I could have been doing more with her.. .with all of my family for that matter.  I can come up with loads of reasons for things being what they are and while I logically know that they don't matter in the long run, in the short term they sneak into my mind and heart and poke at the emotions laying there making me feel things that are not really reasonable to feel. 

Two weeks before the big ugly Me Me and I sat on My bed playing Super Marios Odyssey, she was the cap I was the plumber...I asked if she wanted to switch and she said yes lets switch, only to decide after about 3 minutes that we should go back to what was.  That's how her and I were together.  We knew how we fit and if you ever get to see some of the pictures that we have of us together, which I will eventually be able to look at without losing it, you'll see what I see.  The thing that I have had with all three of my children, a familiarity and a trust that is born from being together and knowing where we fit and how we work best together.  

For instance... Thing 1...

My "I'm gonna try anything and probably be good at it."  If I want to ride a roller coaster she's it, if I want to go white water rafting she's the one that will jump in the boat.  We hold a special bond, I have a pair of joggers from her gotcha weekend and I still wear them sometimes.  She's currently learning how to jump out of a perfectly good air plane and I couldn't be prouder while being terrified all at once.  

Thing 2...

My no nonsense, things are what they are and right now you're being rather silly dad kid.  To say Z is literal would be the understatement of the century.  Creative, artistic, smart all of those things sum this one up.  We share the ability to make all sorts of comments during movies and shows that tend to drive others in the family a bit nuts but hey it works for us.

and of course...

Thing 3...

She would try anything, anything at all at least once, even if she wasn't sure, as long as I said it was something to try she would give it her best. Sometimes she loved it sometimes not so much but she would try, and after trying she would make sure I understood if we were going to do that again or not so much. 

To be crystal clear every one of them is special, every one of them has a link with me that is unique, I love every one of them.  I'm blessed to have had them in my life as I have to have gotten to live with and learn with and grow with them.  Right now I'm kinda stuck on thing three and the hole that's there but that hole could be worse, so much worse.

See what most people don't know is for the last 18 years I have had a recurring nightmare.  It's always the same.  It started with just Joyce and Amberly, but soon grew to add Z and Josie as well.  In this nightmare there is a knock on my door, it doesn't really matter the time, but it's always the same, there is a knock on my door and the person that is on the other side tells me that I need to sit down, and that they are sorry to tell me but there was an accident and that there was nothing anyone could do and suddenly that's it from family to none in one ugly messed up moment. Which makes what happened on May 16, 2021 so messed up in some respects because as I was drifting into my nap after a long Sunday there was a knock on my door and it was my uncle and as we all know dear reader, there was an accident.  Which makes things even harder to deal with because, even though I know that it's not the truth, I know that we don't manifest things, and I don't believe in clairvoyance or any of that stuff, I have to wonder did all those dreams finally somehow push into the real world, a self fulfilling prophesy in a way that robbed us all of this amazing precious thing.  

Now you can see why it's so important for me to sometimes get out of my head.  It's pretty messed up in there.  It's full of all kinds of scary things that all lead to the same place and well that place makes no sense and probably won't any time soon.  So I like those times I can get out of my head, away from the things that I can't change, that make no sense and that won't ever make sense.  

What I know is, what I wrap into at night as I pull that stuffed panda bear close is the fact that for the foreseeable future there will be a lot of sad, a lot of messed up anger and angst and emotions and feelings and all of it, but I also know and realize how much larger that hole could have been, because I've had the very real nightmares to show me and while I never really understood exactly what that loss really would feel like, now that I do I can tell you I know the hole could have been a lot bigger, and a lot harder to even come close to dealing with.  This one is so much more than I can deal with and well here we are dear reader, me trying to work it out the only way I know how and you reading my thoughts and feelings in their basest form.

Thank's for your time...

A