On Grief

So I need to write about something and if you actually know me in person, you do not want to find out about it via my blog.  So if you actually know me–Nick, Colette, I don’t know who else reads–do not read this blog until you talk to me.  DO NOT READ IT.  CALL ME, I’ll tell you what’s up, and then you can read the blog.  Otherwise, I guess, read on.

How ironic that in my last blog I wrote, “I have never experienced the death of a loved one.”  My dad is sick.  With cancer.  My dad has cancer.  And not the Lance-Armstrong-still-kicking-after-six-years variety.  The there’s-only-a-twenty-percent-chance-he-will-be-alive-in-a-year type.  He probably won’t live to see another Christmas.

It’s just, so, ridiculous, so surreal.  I mean, what the hell?  Cancer doesn’t even run in our family, I mean, his grandmother is still alive, both his parents, and his brothers.  Why did it have to be him?  He’s only fifty.

When I found out last night, I cried for like 2 hours.  There is just so much pain, so much loss, so much, it’s like a bottomless well.  An ocean of grief, bottomless, over-powering, so so deep, so so infinite.  Because death is like the pain that keeps on giving.  I mean he’s going to be gone.  He’s not going to be there when I get married.  He’s not going to be there when I have kids.  I’m not going to be able to call him for advice when my kids are sick or misbehaving or I don’t understand why my husband is acting weird.  And at each of those milestones I will miss him again.  Each of the big days will cause me the grief of losing him all over again.  Every Christmas.  Every birthday.

I am closer to my dad then anybody else on the planet.  I am far closer to him then my mom, or my best friend, or my siblings, or anybody.  And he’s going to be gone.

You know, I always wanted to live a nice long life, into my 80s.  But now I think it might be nice to die in my fifties.  Because surviving 30 years with out him?  I think I could do that.  But 40?  50? 60?  Please no.  I don’t think I can ever be totally happy again.  I can never reclaim the innocence I had yesterday morning.  I can never be complete after he dies.  Only once I am reunited with him in the next life will I be complete again.

And can I say this?  I am already sick of everyone saying to me, “You’ll see him in the next life.  Families are forever.  You are sealed to him.”  Blah blah blah.  I FREAKING KNOW THAT PEOPLE.  But that in no way changes the fact that I have to make it through the next 40-60 years without him.  Alone.  Never able to call him and get his advice or hear his voice or give him a hug.  SO SHUT THE HELL UP.

Me and my dad have just become so close in the last two years.  And now he’s only got a few months left.  And I guess I should be glad we had that time.  And I am.  But a little part of me isn’t.  Because if we had never become close, I would never know what I was missing when he dies.

I am also sick of people asking if the diagnosis is “really that bad.”  Yes it is.  The doctor really said, 80% of people who have what you have will die in a year.  Most likely you will have 6 months to a year.  At most two years.  Those are the facts.  I am trying to accept them, so don’t give me any false hope.  Just sit with me, and let me cry.  Don’t tell me a miracle could happen.  I know a miracle could happen.  But I also know that this life is a life of trials, and pain, and suffering.  And I think this is mine.  So just stop.

Now for some optimism:

“The deeper that sorrow carves into your being the more joy you can contain. Is not the cup that holds your wine the very cup that was burned in the potter’s oven?”  -Kahlil Gibran

Photos of the Day: