03 Feb A very convincing disguise!!

February 2022

It’s now over three years since our world fell apart. 39 months since our darling boy happily walked out through the front door and never came home. 1213 days of barely functioning under the weight of the worst pain I have ever known – living with an emptiness more terrible than anything I could have imagined.

Ben was one of those beautiful happy people that everyone wanted to be with. He brought a ray of golden light into our world. It became darker when he tragically died from sudden cardiac arrest (SADS) in 2018. He was twenty five.

The unexpected loss of our precious youngest child has left us broken and changed. We will simply never be the same without him.

I often wonder if the pain will ever get easier.

So I’m still writing because it’s still hurting.

Back in those horrific early days I found myself wallowing in a selfish little bubble of excruciating pain. I thought I must be the only person in the world to have known such agony. Of course I soon found out there are actually hundreds and thousands of us struggling along this same wretched path – tentatively hanging on by a thread.

Yet often we don’t recognise each other because we look too normal. We smile. We laugh. We work. We function – just like everyone else!

But we’re all battling the same debilitating tangled mess of agonising grief, inexplicably woven into the most beautiful unconditional love.

Trying to be strong…

Trying to keep busy…

Trying to accept…

Trying to find purpose…

…day after day after day!

FACT – Losing a child is brutal. It changes everything!! It’s like you’re living two lives – one that is real and one that isn’t. You feel like you’re walking around with a notice pinned to your back saying ‘grieving’ – but no one notices. You assume you must look different yet know you don’t – you just blend in with the crowd.

You become – the me that’s not me!!

A very convincing disguise.

I hate that I look normal but don’t feel normal – in fact I think I’ve forgotten what normal is. I hate that I feel the need to pretend in order to be accepted. I hate that people seem to feel awkward when I’m sad – though I totally understand that no one really wants to hang out with a misery guts!!

So I watch myself laughing and chatting seemingly without a care in the world and hate myself for it. I question if it’s the ultimate betrayal of my darling boy or if I’m doing what he would expect me to do? Then I wonder if I’m sending out the wrong message on behalf of all of us by giving the impression that I’m over it (healed) – that losing a child is fixable?

That I’m ok when you I’m absolutely not!

I think I’ve mastered the ability to lock my sadness up until I’m in the privacy of my car or the house when I’m on my own or his little patch of ground in the meadow where he lies. Yet there are times when in the company of others the sick feeling in the pit of my stomach actually makes it hard to breathe and I find myself withdrawing. I don’t know if anyone notices. They don’t tell me.

I listen to conversations about what their children are doing – careers, marriage, babies, travel… I’m genuinely interested and try to join in but boy it hurts! Ben will never do those things. He had so many plans. So much living still to do!

“IT’S THE neverness that is so painful. Never again to be here with us—never to sit with us at table, never to travel with us, never to laugh with us, never to cry with us, never to embrace us… All the rest of our lives we must live without him. Only our death can stop the pain of his death.”

Nicholas Wolterstorff, Lament for a Son

I wonder if people can see the pain in my eyes, hear my silent scream or feel the brokenness of my heart. I wonder if my body language dictates the state of my mind. Then I wonder if those closest to me even like the person I have become or if they just put up with me because they love me or feel sorry for me.

Grief is confusing and complicated – I go round and round in circles! In some ways I guess I must be stronger. I know I’m kinder and more empathetic but I’m also more distracted, irrational and emotionally messy.

Three long years of sleepless nights have taken their toll. I’ve attended numerous rounds of counselling, therapy and support groups and read book after book – hoping that someone will say something to help ease the pain. It all helps but the pain is still there! I’ve spent three years tying to reconstruct and rebuild my faith and three years not really wanting to be here because part of me went with Ben.

It sounds like a cliche but I see everything though a different lens. I think differently. My understanding of life is different. My relationships are different. I am physically emotionally and spiritually drained. I long for my old life – to be a normal person again. But it can’t happen – because grief changes you!

I long to hear Bens voice – to touch him, to know where he is, if he’s happy, what he’s doing… I believe he’s in heaven and I know I’ll see him again one day but it’s doesn’t fill the huge gap he’s left. It’s doesn’t take the pain away. I want him here. Now. I long for the wonderful normal life we used to have.

Death is just brutal and cruel.

So I stand in front of the mirror and take a long hard look at myself. Not the usual cursory glance to check if my clothes look ok or to fix my hair; but a long hard analytical look. I want to see how much I’ve changed – to see if I still look like the person I used to be. I want to see if the pain on the inside is visible on the outside.

I want to know what others see. I want to check how much the mess inside my head affects my outward visage.

I’m surprised to find that I still look relatively normal. I don’t think people would look at me and automatically assume my child has died. I’m obviously three years older and a bit greyer (though the magic of hair dye deals with that). My skin’s not as wrinkly as it could be for a sixty+ grandmother. Overall I guess I still look like me.

My smile (which has always been crooked) doesn’t quite reach my eyes – though a fake smile isn’t really a good test! I’ve definitely put on weight which is probably down to age, comfort eating and drinking more wine than I’d care to admit!

I look deep into my eyes, expecting to see pain but apart from being a bit expressionless, they look fairly normal – not even as puffy as I expected despite the never ending abundance of tears that switch on and off at the drop of a hat. I thought that agony would be etched deep into my face but even though I know it’s there – I can’t see it.

I hate that I look unremarkable.

Normal.

Ordinary.

I find it shocking that so much pain can be invisible! How can we look the same when we’re not? And how many broken people (for so many reasons) do we rub shoulders with every day?

We must remember to be kind to each other.

There’s no doubt the death of a child will change you – in more ways than you could ever have anticipated. But you will survive because somehow we do. I honestly don’t know how. I guess it’s just a day at a time – then suddenly we look back and wonder how another year could possibly have passed!

We definitely don’t do it because we’re strong. We certainly weren’t chosen because we’re special or because God has a plan! I don’t believe ‘God doesn’t give you more than you can bear!’ – not sure who even made that up because I’ve never found it in the Bible – and anyway ‘I can’t bear it!! ‘ But I do believe God carries me when I think I can’t go on and sends beautiful people into my life to help.

We do it because we have no choice!

So I haven’t come up with any earth shattering conclusion or wise words. I wish I had. But I know without a shadow of doubt there is a heaviness and a brokenness in my heart that will never heal or go away. It’s often described as having your leg amputated. You just have to learn to live with it.

The one thing I can say is that my love for Ben keeps growing. I love him more not less as the years go by. It doesn’t negate or detract from the love I feel for every single person in my adorable family. I am blessed by each and every one.

But Ben subconsciously influences everything I do. I see him and feel him in all that is beautiful – from sunsets to robins. His smile, his positivity and his zest for life inspires me every day not to give up! He is still my darling precious child and I am so proud of him. When asked, I will always say I have four children not three!! He will always be my child and he will never ever be forgotten.

I read somewhere…

‘Not until you have lost a child do you know how it feels to be sad every single day… even when you experience joy!’

As I was writing this blog someone posted a poignant little poem on one of my Facebook support groups. Have a read – it sums up everything I’ve been trying to say in just a few simple lines…