I haven’t cried in a while.
There is something luxurious and indulgent in crying.
I feel sad, and I feel my eyes want to cry a lot; they prick and itch, but that’s all it is. It happens to me a lot, but I don’t say anything because I don’t want to cry anymore.
I get stuck in my head a lot. I think and think and think, and sometimes the words I want to say just dry up in my mouth, and I keep everything inside. It’s not that I actively choose to not talk about it anymore, I just can’t express myself.
I just don’t want to carry on hurting. I have spent so much time crying. I just want to be happy. I don’t think I’m alone in this thought, because I think this is commonplace amongst young people, especially at the minute with regards to mental health.
Yet at the same time, I can’t just ignore everything. How many times does this blog remind everyone to talk and feel? Yet here I am, a hypocrite in a young woman’s clothes.
I think the problem is that I’m afraid to open up. The last time I cried, I was in front of someone else, completely vulnerable. A new person who I was afraid to let see me like this. I want to be seen as ‘Evee’. Not bruised, troubled or someone you have to tiptoe around.
So, recently, I have been in my head. The skull of safety, the cranium cradle, the place where I can feel without fear.
Whilst Katie and I slowly traverse these new fields of happiness, sun and laughter, we need to set aside times and areas where we can still talk. I am afraid to feel grief. I haven’t even been writing privately for myself. I think I’m perhaps seeing myself, in a way, as in ‘recovery’, and I can’t feel lost, or scared, or upset because, hey, I just told everyone I feel better.
And, as I bottle things, inevitably, I start to have night terrors again. But the cycle continues; I don’t talk about it because I don’t want to be a burden, or for people to inwardly groan at me.
The truth that I have been ignoring is that I am feeling better, despite my mum not being here. I feel guilty for that. Even though right now I can hear my mum saying “don’t be so silly, Evee.”
So, if I were to be honest with my feelings…
Katie graduated from Swansea University with a distinction in a Masters of Translation and Interpreting. When she walked on that stage, I was so proud. She did it, my sister. She’s an ‘adult’ now (whatever that means). I felt like Mum partly got her there.
And in a selfish sense, I felt so alone. Whilst I was choked with emotion for Katie, I imagined my graduation. Mum has seen Katie graduate once before. I hope she still sees mine, but I feel the familiar ebb and flow of sadness as university draws nearer. My university is beginning to call my name, and I’m feeling like I’m holding onto Mummy, whilst reaching out for my new life. Before I was on my ‘gap year’. I was healing from the trauma, and now I have to get geared up for this next step.
And, here’s something I never thought I’d say, I don’t want it. Yes, of course, I’m excited, and it is everything I’ve strived for. But I want my mum to be there to come home to. I was meant to do this with my mum here by my side.
I have to accept this new future, but I also have to let go of the future I thought I would have.
There was a point in my life where I didn’t think I would have much of a future. I thought I wouldn’t be able to carry on living. That’s the brutal, unfiltered truth.
I’m feeling so overwhelmed with the fact that this future is here, and that I want it, but don’t want it.
This has been a really difficult post for me to write, and its made me begin to realise how easy it is to sweep your emotions under the rug, forget they’re there and fake a smile occasionally. I hope that right now, wherever you are, you take a look and ask yourself what you are really feeling. We don’t have the answers, but if you want to comment, you can just to get it all out of your head. It is so much better to talk than to worry in silence.
“I should stay strong but I’m weak, and what’s wrong with that?”
AJR, Weak
Evee
Copyright © 2019 The Grief Reality. All Rights Reserved
Beautifully candid eloquence; a pleasure to read, dare I say?
☺️ thank you
I identify with so much of what you say here. How we’re supposed to be better now. How we actually feel somehow cleansed when we cry but also want to be happy. But most of all how we feel robbed of the person we lost and just want them by our side, experiencing our lives alongside us. Thank you for expressing so eloquently. 🙏❤️
I agree so much. It is always an amazing feeling to be able to relate to someone on a topic like this 🙂 thank you for sharing ❤️
Everything you write here is so very normal. You are not alone. I can relate to grief in my own life, my sister passed away very suddenly last year.. In time you will be able to talk about it. In the UK, if ever you want you can email me, just google my name and you will find a way if you want. I’m aa psychologist, not that you need one.
Thank you, hope you are coping well.
I am indeed. My blog helps and I have my friends. I lost quite a few fake ones along the way.
Yes, grief shows us who we are to treasure 🙂
Well everyone in our lives should be valued but it is not until we have a crisis that we realise how fake some people are, they are not able to support us or show empathy at that time. If we are not prepared to love others and be vulnerable we cannot fully enjoy our relationships even though some of those will walk away when things are tough for us.
Your response is completely human. You are not alone. ❤️
Thank you ❤️
At times I felt weak and thought I hit rock bottom. Then I hit rock bottom two more times and lost everything I had including all meaning for life. When I truly FELT weak at that moment I didn’t and couldn’t speak even a peep.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that sometimes life gets difficult along the way, a few bumpy roads here and there that might not suit or whims or needs. Sometimes you’ll truly hit rock bottom and it’s not like how you ever imagined it would be like. It gets so unbelievably hard so much so that you have no energy to scream or just feel sad anymore.
And I just wanted to convey: it’s okay. It is okay to feel the way you feel right now; it’s your experience after all. This is the path you are on. You know you have the strength to get through this and where to find it.
You just got to keep at it. Just know that things have the capacity to get better even if we don’t know when or how.
And live by what my mom and gran always used to say; “No matter what, when or how, just keep at it and don’t ever forget to pick yourself up and dust your shoulders….
…Do good, be good, speak good….be kind every day, every second of the day to yourself and everyone….and amazing things will happen to you. It’s guaranteed.”
Sorry for the long comment. But please do know that not only are you not alone…it’s really more than okay to feel this way and go through it. Just don’t forget to smile for YOURSELF each day 🙂
Cheers,
The Random Bangalorean
Yes. My sister and I used to have a joke that we kept falling through rock bottoms trapdoor. We never gave up and I’m glad, because rock bottom turned out to provide the foundations for a lot of beautiful things. There were so many times I had no idea how life was going to carry on, and had no energy to even be worried or confused. But all I can say is, look at my sister and I now 🙂 out of pain we created this blog where we bring people together and we help others, yet they help us too.
Thank you so much for your kindness, it means a lot to hear it, just on a day where things seem a bit blue. 🙂
Please don’t ever be sorry for a long comment! I love talking to new people and hearing their perspectives on life 🙂
I hope you can find a smile for yourself too 🙂
Thank you,
Evee
Thank you. I pray things get better too, just waiting for my light at the end of the tunnel now…
But it really makes me happy to read about how you and your sister turned your grief into a positive outlet. It never fails to motivate me everytime i feel low. And I must thank YOU for your kindness now…
You and your sister’s openess and vulnerability will take you really far ahead in life.
And yes, i’ll try to find my smile. But you should smile too, now and everyday if possible. Because its so easy to be blue so let’s go the opposite way this time instead 😀
Thank you. Have a great week ahead. Be strong; you are strong. Take it from this stranger.
I will pray for you also. The light will come, friend.
I agree 🙂 I hope this week turns up for you, I hope that good things are coming :).
Be strong also. From one stranger to another! ❤️
I’m still trying to recover the visions of a future. I had intertwined futures which just died. I suspect I would see a future if I let myself. Still doesn’t feel right. But you have to make the most of this life. Sooner day I will force myself to dream. But living the day is a start. That’s something which I didn’t do for quite a while.
Yes for sure, we’ll get there one day 🙂
I started to read your post for I am trying to sort out feelings from a tsunami of grief. I was just at the point of your words: ‘So, if I were to be honest with my feelings…’ when my eyes went straight to ‘Swansea Uni’. for that is where I did a years study of Medical Science and Humanities a few years ago. It made me realise your more real (if you get me) as things that I read about other people’s feelings just feel like words, only words… and this made you become real and actually perhaps walked where I walked (in more ways than one). Peaceful wishes.
Thank you for commenting. I’m sorry that you’re going through grief at the minute, but I hope you feel peace and comfort soon enough. Reading comments like yours fills me with joy ❤️ peaceful wishes x
I do this often. I stomp my emotions down, deep inside myself. I stand tall and act string, but inside the truth is I’m crumbling just wanting someone to make me feel safe to say how I feel! Thank you for this post. Sharing how you feel is brave and strong!
So true 🙂 I believe there is so much power in vulnerability x