dispatch from the edge
This has been a ropey weekend full of too much of my mother, too much nausea-inducing grief, and the strong desire to be dead. The weather has been made-to-order, cool, sunny, dry, lush. I brought the dogs up to my mom’s house (a.k.a. the house with the pink “whack me” pyjamas) and there was plenty of activity: attending a neighbor’s cookout (tiresome), buying plants and pots at 50% off (awesome), cooking (e.g. blueberry cobbler), watching stuff (Le Tour, Wimbledon, Johnny Depp’s Dillinger flick), hiking with the dogs (once getting lost and having to bushwhack), taking her wicked poodle out on the bike, trimming back her wisteria, and generally being fussed over and over-controlled by her.
Also, as she told me the story of her elderly friend who told the hospital their diagnosis wasn’t good enough and thus eventually got life-saving treatment for her husband, I spiralled off into a silent panicked freak-out. Because when they told me M was dead, I just stood there, trembling. I did not scream and raise the roof and say “That’s not good enough,” and demand to see their superiors and threaten to sue and insist they go back in there and revive him or transfer him somewhere that would. All this, I realized, he would have done for me. I did ask them if they were sure he was really dead, since he was still warm, but they told me yes, they were very sure, and I accepted this. He would have raised even Hell to bring me back, but I meekly accepted what I was told. Did I do this because I always suspected deep down that happiness wasn’t mine, that a huge tragedy would smite me because it always does when things are good? If I had known then what killed him (aortic aneurysm), I would have screamed and yelled and threatened and made their existence a misery until they sucked the blood out of the sac around his heart, put him on life support, and got someone in to fix it. Now, though, I can’t do this. I can never ever do this as long as I live. His body is ashes in the columbarium, and nothing can bring him back. I failed to stop the permanent ruination of his life and my own. And thus I want to go buy a bunch of sleeping pills and eat them. Really.
I am not doing this, however, because I believe it’s a sin, perhaps the only sin I’m unwilling to commit. And by sin I mean an active, willful rejection of and separation from God. So, to my atheist friends who silently wish I would get over my God delusion, know that God is the only reason I have not killed myself.
Today I drove by the house we were thinking of buying when he died last year. Someone else owns it now. We don’t. We aren’t raising our first child there. All the good things we were working to make happen are off the menu, for us, for me.
I’ve been reaching out a little bit to people in the tgi world (otherwise known as “The Scene”). I’m planning to go to the SSNY party next weekend, which will be the first event I’ve attended (save a brunch, with M, about ten years ago, hosted by a different organization). So, if you are going to the same party, find me and say hi! By all accounts, this is a nice group of people whose focus is old-fashioned spanking, which is pretty much my style. Reading Radagast’s recent posts about the nuances of communication with people in the scene (here and here) awakened all my social anxieties and insecurities. I think that at heart I believe that no-one decent would ever find me appealing and want to play with me. Certainly the only person who could ever love me is dead.
I’m sorry—I really am—for all of the depressing self-pity in this blog. I try to hold most of it in. I am certain it is unappealing to read. I wouldn’t want to read it. However, maybe there is someone who finds, or will find it helpful, for some reason. They say widowhood is the club you never wanted to join. I was not supposed to be this person. But since I am, friends (I can call you friends, can’t I, if you’ve read this far?), this is my dispatch from the edge. You don’t need to come here yourselves. I’ll tell you everything you need to know. And what you need to know is this: Love your people while you have them. Love them. Love them. Nothing else matters very much.
July 6th, 2009 at 6:19 pm
I’m never sure if I’m glad or not that I never met R’s family until the week he died. He was not my husband, and that week I found that I wasn’t even his only girlfriend. I had plans. We had plans. That was the week I was to lay everything out for him. I was going to see if he wanted to get that condo together we kept talking about, make him force the specialists to schedule his surgery.
I have nowhere near the loss you have, but it hurts when you talk of it, like a slowing healing wound, and I hope it helps me understand mine too.
cdm Reply:
July 7th, 2009 at 9:03 am
Lanyo,
I’m really sorry about R. I can imagine that losing a lover when things aren’t settled between you would be worse in its own way – so much unresolved between you. Actually, I don’t think you can rank grief. It hurts for everyone according to their heart. Hugs!
Thanks for posting.
July 6th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
Please do not let my angst encrusted angst make you feel that way. I am an overthinker by nature, walking through life like Woody Allen worrying about every single thing. If I, someone with shitty social skills, can survive in the scene then certainly someone as articulate as you can as well. I should be the poster child for a person overcoming shyness and social anxiety.
cdm Reply:
July 7th, 2009 at 9:08 am
Rad,
Your gravatar would look striking enlarged & blue-tacked to a dorm-room wall. Or maybe looming over the BQE, lol. Now all you need is a catchy slogan!
July 6th, 2009 at 7:45 pm
Casey,
Don’t apologise for posting. If we choose to read what you write it is because we like what we have seen of you, we are interested in you and we want, and pray, that you will find your way through this grieving process.
We have never met, but from what I have read of yours, I am certain that there are decent men out there who are only waiting to discover you and focus their love on you.
Bereavement cannot be trivialised, of course, and it will be life changing. However, you have the first year behind you and hopefully the next year will bring you to a better place. Please take some comfort that you are the one hardest done by, your husband is at peace and I think that you believe that he is aware of you and of your capacity to celebrate what he taught you.
Myself and my wife have sometimes discussed what we would do if one of us pre-deceased the other. We have always, independently, stressed our wish that the survivor would pay us the compliment of finding another partner worthy of our memory, rather than disappearing into a grey widowhood.
I don’t live in New York, and we have been there rarely, but if I were, I would be honoured to meet you, chat, listen to you, and even, maybe, play a little.
Peter
July 6th, 2009 at 10:44 pm
Dear Casey, I wish I would be here this weekend to meet you. I really love your writing and your honesty. It does helps others when you tell the truth like that. And I hope it helps you a little too. Don’t be nervous about the party. There are enough good, fun people there that you will have a good time. You seem smart enough — I don’t have to tell you that you don’t have to play if you don’t want to. I don’t know your play style so I don’t know who to recommend, I can only tell you my favorites (and I’m not going to name names here). Rad will also help you out with introductions.
Hang in there, keep talking, think about temporary meds if you haven’t already. Eventually it won’t be as sharp a pain.
Sandy
July 7th, 2009 at 12:50 pm
Dear Casey, I’m really sad when I read of your grief. I hope you do go to the party – you’ll see, there are plenty of gentle people who could be good to you. And there will be someone, somewhere, ready to love you too, when the time comes, when your heart recovers, (which it will.)
Grieving is a dirty business and it takes time. I hope that soon you will begin to see the glimmers of daylight. Until then, take it easy, and God bless you!
Best wishes from kannakat
July 10th, 2009 at 2:31 pm
Dear Casey,
I am sorry you feel these emotions and I wish there was some way to just will the grief you feel away. For what it is worth I have lost a loved one, and reading your posts have taken me back to my mourning as well.
But not in a negative way. I feel that by reading your words I am justified in what I once termed my self-pitying moments. I hope you find a peaceful place and know that the one you’ve lost and God are both very hopeful you will find joy and pleasure in life again. You deserve it.
Please keep writing, because yes I consider us friends, even if its only through our words.
best wishes and lots of kisses
frenchies
July 15th, 2009 at 11:18 am
Dearest Casey
Thank you so much for postings some of your thoughts. I think of you and Marky a lot ….
Much love anf hugs
Justinxxx