Of Grief and Other Things

It has been four months and counting since Mom passed on.

The only thing that keeps me alive sometimes is the idea that it could be worse.

People ask me if I miss Mom. I’ll be honest: no. When I wonder if I should begin to miss her, instead I become resentful of the things that she didn’t prepare us for, of the wasted assets that could have gone to so much more.

I become more tetchy towards unsolicited advice; People tell me to miss her (see above), or People say that I shouldn’t regret the things I haven’t told her. What if I feel, honest-to-goodness, that I told her everything I felt? Both good and bad? Would I be accused of being in denial?

People tell me to relax. I don’t know how. Close family friends sympathize with this, and have always told me that what I’m dealing with now is not usual for the someone in her mid-twenties. Well, story of my life, I’ve always had to grow up faster.

But aren’t Mica and I strong? Mixed bag there. We get by on the things we HAVE to do. I guess that’s our strength when all else fails.

I have grieved–or would it be more accurate to admit that I am grieving? Not for the person per se, but for the new normal we have to define. For the extra work involved that we would rather, as “normal kids” do, declare to do on their own.

Depression runs strong in my family, and it comes out in the most mundane things. Mom worked her butt off. Mica stays up for days at a time. Just when I think I’m fine I get hit with hyper acidity and I find difficulty holding my meals in.

This is a profile of Mia in depression. I admit that this entry got triggered by the death of Dobby in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows part 1. What was first normal cinema tears turned into unstoppable weeping, all over a CG character. Good movie by the way, I’m actually glad I watched it ahead. I don’t think I can bring myself to watch that again for a while though.

I have been functioning, but I have become even more sensitive to things: A little rejection here, a callous remark there. The idea of huge groups make me a panic. I can chatter on and put a smile on my face for hours then suddenly my mood will shift, and I can’t explain why.

I have goldfish moments. I think this is best exemplified by the start of ‘Garden State’, when Zach Braff zones in and out of his work at the Japanese restaurant. It feels like an out of body experience, when everyone slows down and talk, noise, is muffled out. It feels like autopilot, like I could prop my body on a huge-ass stick and be pre-programmed to mingle or something.

Work is good. Work THRIVES when I’m at rock bottom for some reason. What I lack in social skills or in relating, I make up for with productivity.

Why am I writing this? Because while I had same vague idea that all this is totally normal, no one else talks about it. I rarely read of anyone who writes about it being this way, it’s usually a fluffy carrying on of a torch of memories with a flurry of doves or something.

Friends tell me they miss me. I miss ME most of all.

There are the stages of grief. I just never really realized that it is actually a cycle.

I know this too will pass. I wish that time would come in…now.