I can already feel the ball of grief getting bigger in my stomach. How quickly has it come around, it was only the other week that it was your brother's birthday and I am now turning my attention to the fact you are going to be 8.
8 years old. I have been on this rollercoaster of motherhood for almost 8 years. Unless you count the 9 months you were in my tummy.
I always say you are the best thing to ever happen to me. Your death was the worst thing. Being your mummy is the greatest role I could have ever have asked for.
I often read the stories about Madeline McCann and I draw parallels from their journey into mind. Except, I know you are dead and I have somewhere I can go to be with you. Kate wrote how she still buys Madeline birthday and Christmas presents and they are piled in her room, for when she comes home. She has the belief, the want and the desire to believe that she will come home one day and see how much she was loved in the 10 years that she has been gone.
And then I look at my life and I wonder would you and your brother see the same. I know you both can't come home. You have lots of different homes. You live in the cemetery, where your bodies are buried. Your souls fly free and I hope are always with us. I imagine you live in my Granny's house, with the field next door and its nothing but sunshine, rainbows and happy days. And of course, there is the home that is buried in my heart and soul.
Just like the famous lines from E.E. Cummings... "I carry your heart with me, (I carry it in
my heart), I am never without it..."
My therapist recommended a book to me, its entitled 'Overcoming Grief' and the title gripes me.
Can you ever overcome grief? Do I want to overcome it, surely is the question...
I explained to her that for me, everything is entwined in one. The good memories, the bad memories, the positive and negative emotions. The flashbacks, the pain, the anger... I don't want to let the negatives go because it is entwined so I feel I am also letting go of the positive. Which means letting go off them.
One of the bereaved parents I am very good friends with, is deservedly, feeling a lot of anger at the moment. I felt his pain, his anger, the way he blogged to make people understand that it wasn't about them, it was about his child who died. I don't have the raw anger anymore and told him I feel more passive about everything. Emotionally numb is probably the right phrase. I am past the raw anger stage, I have the why me anger instead.
I saw a powerful quote the other day which summarised what it is like to be on this 'journey' so to speak...
"Grief is not a nuisance, an obstacle or a mess that can be easily rectified. It is a way of life. It is everything you never thought could happen but did anyway"
We all live in this bubble where we believe that things will never happen to us. I never thought that I would be writing this blog about how the deaths of my two sons, shaped my life and the highs and lows it brings since their deaths, since their sister was born and my mental health struggles since.
Social media allows us to be open, without having to be open. I struggle to say outloud when I am having a bad day or I am struggling... be it mental health, grief, loss, life in general but it is funny how sharing a post, or a meme can tell the world that life isn't great at that point, or it can tell them that life is okay.
So this is me, saying life is okay but its not. In 12 days time, I am celebrating another birthday without you.
But it is also the start of 142 days worth of memories of you.
You were real.
You existed.
You lived.
