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Key points
- Even years after a significant loss, we are still adjusting.
- Happiness is possible, even with a side of sadness.
- Part of acceptance is accepting that the pain, to some degree, is forever.
I recently passed the four-year mark since Tom died. This harsh reality is becoming woven into the fabric of my life. In some ways it seems like he’s been gone forever, in some ways it seems like he was here just yesterday. I’ve been saying that since it happened (I’m sure I must have already said it on this page somewhere) and will probably say it forever.
I finally cleared (most of) his clothes from his closet, which was in the guest room. It helped tremendously that I was able to donate them to a charity that focuses on the neighborhood in which he lived all his adult life and loved. It has taken me this long to be able to go into that room without anguish—until very recently, I could still smell him in there. (In a good way.)
I moved his dresser from where it had always been in our—now my—bedroom to accommodate another piece of furniture in the general rearranging of the house. I wasn’t sure I would be able to bear that (I could still picture him standing in front of it in his underwear, rummaging in a drawer for socks or a T-shirt) and promised myself I could move it back if necessary. So far it has stayed in its new spot.
The little shrine I set up right after he died—photos of him, his wallet and keys, his ashes, and various significant bits and bobs—has moved and changed, but still stands. I still sleep on my side of the bed. I still talk to him often, share our inside jokes, tell him I miss him. And I still cry. Not hard, not long, and it usually hits me suddenly with a memory or a pang of longing, then passes.
Living with the pain
Some things haven’t changed but, slowly, many things have. I have fun these days. I enjoy my friends. I enjoy my dogs. I live a good life. I like to say I’m happy with an asterisk. I’m happy but... I don’t foresee that changing any time soon. Or ever, perhaps. I can’t see the future. All I know is that for now, the sadness of this loss remains a significant part of my life.
And so be it. I’m not great at maintaining a meditation practice, but this morning I turned on one of my favorite meditation podcasts and the message seemed custom-made just for me, for this moment. The topic was “When it doesn’t get easier” and the gist was that some things never get easier, strictly speaking, but it can help to just accept that they’re hard. To just allow them to be hard.
This is how it is
This is, I think, part of the acceptance we hear about. Not only accepting the fact that our loved one is gone and isn’t coming back—and admittedly, this comes and goes for me; I still sometimes feel like there must be a way to reverse this that I just haven’t thought of yet—but that it is always going to hurt. Never in the same way, and we will build up our muscle to bear the pain, but there’s no point to fighting the pain or waiting for it to go away. We simply have to let it be, let it exist, and keep living around it. The thought is now considered trite, but as an affirmation, "It is what it is" has its uses. Or, as I said early on when people asked how I was doing, "Sad but functional." That still holds—although considerably more functional even as the sadness remains.
You can't make what's hard easy
I’ve been watching the Olympics these past two weeks, as I always do. Here we have the fastest, strongest, most agile and well-trained, highly conditioned athletes in the world. But at the end of a race, even these elite athletes double over, panting. Some fall to the ground. And weightlifters can lift more than I can imagine ever hefting, but they still grunt and strain with the exertion. Yes, certainly these superhumans can push themselves harder and longer and with greater skill and success than we mortals, but even they feel the pain of exertion. Even they get exhausted. Hard is hard.
And what we are doing is hard; the hardest trial we face as humans. We can’t change that or will it away or skip the hurt or numb it. The pain is as real as the loss. Even as we grow stronger and start rebuilding a life that feels shattered, we are doing it around the loss. I can successfully distract myself from the pain, and my life is growing over the wound like scar tissue, but the wound is still there. When I allow myself to fully feel it—or when it blindsides me, as it will—the pain is no less than it ever was. I miss him deeply, and that hurts. No point in fighting it. All I can do is accept it and soldier on.
