Grief

Grief. A five-letter word that brings with it an avalanche of emotions, feelings and thoughts. It feels like someone is constantly pushing down on your chest; like the walls are closing in on you and there’s no fresh air in sight. It feels like time, just like your body, heart and soul is frozen and you’re stuck in that one state. You’re stuck in that moment when your heart was broken.

As a child, most of my experiences with grief were related to my dad who unfortunately was never there for me, or my mum, when we needed him. When he cheated on my mum was my first ‘big’ experience with grief. It was a big moment of change for nine-year-old me and I’m still emotionally traumatised by the custody battle that followed for years on end. My second moment of grief was when my thirteen-year-old german shepherd cross Zara died in my arms and on my lap in the back of the car on the way to the emergency vet. That was first time in my life that I wailed. It was the first time in my life that sounds these possessed, extraterrestrial like sounds came out of my mouth and I felt like a part of me was lost. I never in my wildest dreams thought that the person who was holding me, who drove straight over to me as soon as I told him what had happened, who promised me that he'd love me forever, would make me feel this way again.

Over two weeks ago, the boy who I love(d) a tremendous amount broke up with me and these past two weeks I’ve let myself drown in grief’s arms. I felt numb, I felt lost and I felt like I’d been swallowed by something by a dark, colossal being. I had planned my future with this person and in five words, those plans and that future had just vanished into thin air, like they’d never been there in first place. Maybe if I had closure then it would help but maybe it wouldn’t. I unfortunately don’t know. I just know that something must have gone wrong that from one point of view can’t be fixed and that’s honestly the worst feeling.

Since he broke up with me, I’ve been waiting for him to suddenly appear in the corridor, to hear his footsteps walking up the stairs or to see his car (our ‘yellow submarine’) parked in its normal spot. But the footsteps I hear in the corridor are never his, nor are the footsteps walking up the stairs and the car parked outside is a different colour. All I want is for him to call and say that he made a mistake, to take my hand again and dance to Ed Sheeran’s Perfect like we did on my 20th birthday. I never thought that he’d make me feel like this. I never imagined that he would be the one to break my heart; to break his promise of ‘forever’. We’d even talked about what we’d name our kids. It all seems rather silly now. It didn’t help that two days what I thought was the love of my life, broke up with me that I had a massive surgery. If you don’t already know, emotional pain tends to aggravate physical pain so needless to say, it wasn’t the best combination. It still isn’t.

The only thing that’s kept me from drowning is that my ex-partner led the break up with the words ‘I always want to be in your life, as a friend or watching from the sidelines’. That’s what I’ve been holding onto, and what my ex and I have been practicing. What’s it’s like to be ‘friends’. When someone leaves such a profound impact on your heart and your life, you don’t want to let them go. You want to hold onto them for as long as you can, in whatever form.

Despite him breaking up with me which I guess is a bit contradictory to what I’m about to say, he has the loveliest, most compassionate and caring personality. He’s been checking up on me a lot, as I have on him. We even made a contact calendar, so that we could work on giving each other distance and time, but it didn’t always work. Sometimes there were slips, mostly in my part but he never made me feel bad it. He embraced them, just like he's always embraced me.

He was there for my operation and after I’d been discharged. We had our first friend hang out last Sunday and apart from me not realising that I’d grabbed his hand and me watching him walk away through the shopping centre without me at the end after he’d said goodbye, it went really well. And I feel proud of myself for having the strength and the courage to meet up with me, despite the hurt that was still burning in my heart. We can still talk on the phone for an hour, but there’s awkward silences. Moments in which we would’ve said I love you or I miss you or when am I seeing you tomorrow. And those silences are difficult. It is in those silences that I’m reminded of what’s happened and of who are now. It is frequently in those silences that I softly cry, hoping that he won’t hear me. I still don’t know if he does or ever did. I’ve just had to keep reminding myself that ‘this is really awful but I’m trying my best’. I’ve also had to learn to embrace that my heart isn’t going to heal with a snap of a finger and that it’ll me weeks, maybe even months, to find myself again. But I think I’m finally okay with that and I think I finally am starting to believe that I can get there, that I am getting there and that I’m a lot stronger than I thought I was.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still haunted by his ghost. I still see him everywhere. I still can’t sleep in my bed unless his side of the bed is covered by my plush toys. I still wish he was here, holding me, wrapping me in his arms until I fall asleep. I still think about him a lot, he still appears in my dreams.

However, it’s starting to hurt less looking through old photos and videos of us. Whenever I think of the love we had; of the cuddles, the kisses or the smile he uses whenever he’s with me...I don’t cry as much anymore. Sometimes, thinking about those memories help me fall asleep. Ours was my first ‘big love’ and I don’t ever want to forget the memories that we shared or the way he would hold me and it felt like time would stand still and everything was alright in the world. I’ve stopped crying when we talk on the phone and I’ve finally started to stop fearing that he’ll disappear as a friend because over these past two weeks, he’s proved time and time again that he’s still there for me.

Grief is a five-letter word that brings with it an avalanche of emotions, feelings and thoughts. It feels like someone is constantly pushing down on your chest; like the walls are closing in on you and there’s no fresh air in sight. It feels like time, just like your body, heart and soul is frozen and you’re stuck in that one state. You’re stuck in that moment when your heart was broken.

This is really awful but I’m trying my best.