hi

it’s me on a sunday writing as i promised myself. this was a sad week and a bit heavy but you know i am just reminding myself that it’s only been 7 months and his birthday is coming up and these things are just heavy. it all started with a break down at costco. we drove in and i’m driving and i’m staring at the entrance and all of a sudden it’s november of last year and i am visiting my parents. my dad chose costco because it has the motorized carts that he could drive. it was harder for him to walk at that point. it’s pouring rain and I’m helping him into his truck and a man helps us. we say thank you and i package my parents up and i kiss them good-bye and they hug me and kiss me back and give me a nod as if to say “until next time” and they go on their way and i go on mine. and to remember him at such a point in his illness in such a vivid way is heavy. it just makes me have that thought where i wish i could have done more and that it didn’t end the way it did and that vicious attack of grief just blasts in. it obliterates me every time. it does help that i was able to untangle the sadness versus previous depression and it is fucking painful so i can see where it was mistaken for my previous depression and what a relief it is to remind myself “we are just sad and we are missing our dad and we are okay.” i have been tracking this grief and trialing new ways of managing it and the management of it is all over the place. at first, i thought it coincided with my period and then there was a time where i wasn’t as active and it felt like it hit harder then. i have come to find out that working out helps me. there’s something about challenging my body and noticing my body become stronger that makes me feel capable with the little daily grief moments and then i’m uncertain if maybe i’m just holding all of it together because i have to until i just can’t anymore. that’s the thing about life, it keeps on going. we must go on. and as far as the timeline on my grief it seems as if every 2 months or so i break down. for 2 months i am doing good. in those 2 months i know he is at peace and this is life and what will be, will be but then it’s as if my body gets tired and after 2 months i find myself can’t believing this is real and how can he be gone? and what now? and it feels like this slow crumble until i have to just stop and i end up curled up into myself with very loud sobbing because it physically feels like i have an entire hole in my body, like something was slowly being scooped out over the 2 months and somehow it patches itself back up and we start another 2 months somewhat whole and it is heavy. it is, in fact, the heaviest thing i have yet to feel in my life but i think we’re managing. every other week thereapy is still in progress. i am attempting to figure out what it is i want in this life. i have gone back and forth on drinking and have made lots of progress and i think my new thing will be i am not drinking if i don’t want to drink and if i want to drink then it’s a 2 drink limit on my outings. i have come to realize i need no more than 2 drinks. i am perfectly fine at 2 drinks. past 2 drinks it’s harder to listen to myself and honestly it’s a lot of unnecessary drinking after that point that i’m just doing it because it’s there. so i’m a 2 drink limit gal. i’ll keep you posted on how that goes. for now, i’m going to enjoy my 2 good months and i hope everyone else is finding their own good moments and enjoying the shit out of them. 

l, js