Yesterday's Grief, today

There are days when I have no idea how I will stop crying, because grief is an abyss from which I've never returned. Then I turn the shower off, get dressed and smile for my children, because they need me, and I have to keep going.

There are days when it feels almost normal.  I smile, I laugh, I try to be in the moments of my life and be genuine, which can be a range of emotions, with this underlying distance.   I have hollowed into myself again, an extroverted introvert who got confused for a moment, but retreat is my normal.  

Grief brings me inward.  I keep expressing a need to connect, but the synapses are not firing on how and when.  It takes all of my energy and focus to make it through every day.  I don't make it through the evenings.  I am irritated and fatigued, every night.   My family sees the worst in me, and I want to change this.  Time is too limited to be upset all the time.  

I miss so many people.  I will find a way to be there again, with the people I love.  The Blind Pig always reminds me of the people I cherish in my home, and it was nice to have a late night pop-out to celebrate with Nickie P, Bianca, Rhett, Harlin, Leanne, Jessie, but many folks were missing.  

This is a common theme lately -- I am trying to be present and with my kids, with my family, with my friends, but too many people are missing to be fully in the joy.  There is a semi-translucent partition between me and true happiness.  

I know that I will figure this out, but the process of grief is so debilitating.  I hate that everyone has to feel and know this at some point in their lives.  That so many feel it all at once on days like today.  I hate that my children know a faded version of their mom, and want to be the version that felt complete.  Faith doesn't give me much comfort on some days.  I can think about seeing someone in the next life, but it doesn't feel less far away.

Most of all, there is no time limit, shape or way that this should look.  I try to love everyone I can, everyday, because my time, too, is not promised on this earth.  

RIP kobe bryant and gianna bryant. As I write, I hate that another mom and wife is feeling the gutting pain of grief that I am clawing to get away from.  I hate that this happens all over the world, everyday, to good people, without reason.  Life can be so vibrant and beautiful, and yet so terrible and unfair.