I’ve written so many posts that I have deleted or just left in draft form recently.
Posts about my hard.
Posts about my anger.
Posts that served as a massive vent for me. Putting the words in my head on paper (as such).
I haven’t hit publish because I didn’t think it served anyone except me to get it off my chest, and it also had the capacity to insult or alienate people who I care about simply because we are at different places in our lives in different circumstances.
I’m not proud of the jealousy with which I listen to people who are handing over their kids for a period of time with a former spouse and then lamenting how exhausted they are, and how much they need a break … because this is my lot and I love my children and they aren’t hard but it’s been a long year and I just need to work out a way we can all wind down and decompress with the way OUR life is structured, instead of being jealous.
Also I don't want them to stop telling me - I love my friends and they DO need a break and having their kids away from them is hard, too!
I don’t understand the anger with which I react to people who, simply by going on with their lives and doing what is important to them, but which leaves me continuing to drown in my reality… because this is not their fault and other people’s lives can’t stop or be put on hold because ours is hard, it’s not their job, I have to work out a way to manage with what I have.
Also I'm usually happy that people have that thing they need to do in their life, for them!
Jealousy and anger are two emotions that pop up on that stupid 5 stages of grief chart that gives grieving people the idea that it’s both linear and something to work through stage by stage and then at the end, you have completed all the stages and ‘ta da … fixed’ at the end.
I have never ever been angry about Pete dying. I still am not.
But the things people say to me makes me angry.
Of all the things I have had said to me - and there have some been some absolute crackers - the words: if it was important enough to you, you’d make time for it, is the cruellest of all.
It implies that the thing, or the person, isn’t important to me.
When often, they so very much are, or I know they are.
But I have so much on my plate, so much juggling I have to do to keep everything moving forwards and not coming to a screaming crashing halt, that right then, I cannot make that one thing that is important to them or me, the priority.
Right then, right when I have to make choices between lots of important things and people, I have to make a choice because I cannot do all the things and be there for all the people.
And then, when I make that choice, and people question that choice. Whether that really is what I needed to do? Were those people really the most important to see?
Which not only makes me second guess what my choices are, it undermines them, it diminishes the difficulty I often have in making the choice I did with a lot of conflicting emotion and brain explosions of trying to make the ‘right’ choice.
Because what a lot of people don’t realise, is often I might want to make a different choice but I’m forced into a decision because of the circumstances presented immediately in front of me.
Sometimes it’s short term pain long term gain, sometimes it’s what needs to alleviate an issue I have right here, right now and the longer term impact can’t be dealt with right this second.
Sometimes I make a choice and then something happens and that choice has to change.
This can be anything - it can be choosing whether I see people or not when I go back to my home town, it can be making a choice to complete a work job, it can be that I absolutely need to go for a walk but I’ve just had a child ring me in tears because their day has been horrific.
And so when people say: if it was important you’d make time for it…
What I hear is: I don’t think you aren’t caring about the right thing / you made the wrong choice.
But how do I say: sorry kids you’re emotionally unstable, needing dinner and to get to bed with a parent showing you that you are loved… I’m off for a walk.
I already spend most of my time thinking I’m not meeting the needs and expectations of my family and my work, and when people say something like: if it was important enough you’d make time for it; it implies I’m then not meeting their expectations of what I should or shouldn’t be doing.
People generally have no idea that if I am having a complete and utter breakdown in the shower, or a panic attack thanks to something triggering, and I absolutely need to deal with that and try and get myself ok ... and a child walks in and needs something, or the kids are arguing, or it's time for a sports game, or I'm at work and I have a meeting, or deadline, that I will put myself aside and do that thing that is presented in front of me because it's more time sensitive than what I'm dealing with in myself, it has to wait.
And so while words like: you are not his family, we are, you are just a branch of it; and we are grieving more than you; continue to haunt me even nearly 4 years later for the deep pain they inflicted; telling me - the one person who is trying to juggle life with a dead husband, four grieving children, a job, a budget, pets, friendships, obligations, commitments, kids education, that I need to make something else a priority?
Well, all that does is make me feel like I’m failing at what I’m doing or I'm doing it wrong.
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