I Swear You Will Be Fine

Grief gets very exhausting at times. It takes up a lot of my energy and space in my mind. It’s all I think about – and when I think about it, I feel the loss and absence of you so much more than I already do. So, I try my best to distract myself. I try to distract myself so much that it exhausts me even more. I try to fill up every minute of my day. I have to plan – what I am going to do tomorrow, if there are any gaps where I have nothing to do, if I have a book to read, a show to watch. I try so hard to fill up my days that on top of full-time studying at University, I’ve taken up a part-time tutoring job, two additional research projects, started learning driving, started exercise classes at least once a week… I’ve picked up so many of these extra projects in order to fill up my entire day, that I can’t even remember everything I have to do. I’ve got a sticky note on my wall listing all the projects I’ve taken up, to remind myself of all I have to do. It’s almost like I’m scared of being alone with my thoughts. I’m scared of having to deal with the grief.

I try to go out as much as I can – and I never liked going out and you didn’t too (we loved staying home so much and just spending time with each other, that your mum had to ask you to take me out. When you asked me if I wanted to go out, my response was “do we have to?”), but now I try to run errands; try to kill time by going out. If I’m ever alone in my room, which is inevitable no matter how much I try to avoid it, I’m either studying, reading, or working on one of my projects. I’m mentally and physically so occupied that at the end of the day I only have time to cry for a bit before I’m so exhausted I’m drifting off to sleep. I schedule time for myself to cry and feel all the pent-up emotions so that I can still function. I can go on like this, like a robot, for weeks and weeks. It’s almost like if I stop for a second to think or breathe, I might just realize how shitty life has become and break down. And if I break down, I don’t know how long it’ll take for me to get back up.

This busyness works for a while. Until the day that it doesn’t. One day I just realize the absurdity of it all – why am I walking the dogs without you? How did we get here? It has to be a dream, right? Where did all of my happiness go? It’s been more than six months? And then I break. I break my routine of functioning like a robot and cry for hours or multiple times a day. I don’t know how, and I don’t know why, but it always takes me a while to get back up. Sometimes hours, sometimes days. I become this walking dark cloud until I find a way to accept that I still have you – your spiritual being – with me, and the cycle continues.

How awful, isn’t it? The endless cycle of busying yourself until you crumble and hope you get up and busy yourself again and crumble again and get back up and busy yourself… One could lose their mind, almost.

Was this how you sometimes felt too? Is this only a fraction of the intensity of the misery you felt? Is this only a minor version of your endless cycle?

I still can’t comprehend certain things. When I read texts from days before the 31^st I wonder how this could have happened. I get so immersed in our texts that when I look up from my phone it takes a moment for me to realize that you’re not physically here anymore. And I struggle to comprehend that. I really just can’t understand it. You seem so near. You were just here a second ago. So how, and why?

I find myself feeling so exhausted lately – I get dizzy a lot, I look tired, it takes much more effort to move and talk and function… Grief really does take a toll. I don’t think there will ever be a “getting over” grief or “moving on” from it, I think we’ll just learn to live with it. I read a grief-related question recently that asked, “What would you tell someone who is new to grief?” First, I think I would give them a big hug. Then, I’ll tell them that as sad as it is, grief is here to stay – I think the quicker we get used to it, the easier it’ll be. Not sure how much that’ll help though. You have always been more empathetic than I am.

I can’t wait to see you again. I love you more, always, and forever.

Love always,
Sha