Sad People Will Say. Tragic. Beautiful. Raw. And Broken.

The Hard Human Spring

We are each born with a gift hidden in

a wound, and many years to birth it, each

given a heat to carry and rough seas to calm

it, each seeded with a worthiness, and love after

love through which to accept it, each called to

enter sorrow like an underwater cave, with the

breathless chance to break surface in the same

world with everything aglow. If we make it this

far, we can, on any given day, marvel that clouds

are clouds, and name ourselves. We can use the

gift born of our wound to find an unmarked spot

from which to live. If we settle there, giving our

all without giving ourselves away, the heart

within our heart will flower and the whole

world will eat of its nectar.

I am a couple of days from my 29th birthday. A spring chicken someone called me this week. Funny- I have never felt so old in my life but then again technically I have never been so old in my life. I didn't anticipate my birthday being a trigger but a week after my birthday- exactly one year ago from my birthday, I got pregnant. I spent the whole time I was 28 either pregnant or grieving. That whole year of my life is dedicated to that life changing event. So 29- what does 29 bring? Pain management. This year, like many years to come, maybe every year to come is about managing the heartbreak. Learning to parent a child who isn't here. Figuring out how to be born out of the ashes my child's body has become. At first I was overwhelmed with the life sentence- this heartbreak is a life sentence. Now I am more accepting of it- acknowledging the role it plays in my life. I do not fight it but I do not want it. I can't describe what it feels like to succumb to the reality that for the rest of your life there is this part of you that is missing. And nothing- and there is absolutely nothing that will fill that space. To have lost so much in that one moment. What do I have left? Time. Minutes, days, months, years, if I am lucky. Birthday after birthday with heartbreak managed in between for which I am supposed to be grateful. Thank the heavens that have my child to have lived another day without him? I wont be blowing out any birthday candles anytime soon.

My 7 week grief support group came to an end and this was the first week I did not find myself  going to it on a Thursday night. I have really learned the value of sharing in this with people who understand. For no other purpose but to be emotionally held. I do not have anyone to hold me physically. When I cry in my room, I cry alone.  There is no one to say there, there. No pat on the back, no one to cuddle me. No one should have to do this alone.  And so since I do not have that physical option, I yearn for the emotional alternative. Anyone who will listen to me. Who will let me cry and will cry with me. It is like hugging my soul when someone wants to talk about Mateo with me. I feel so completely alone. I was prepared to raise him on my own. I was not prepared to lose him on my own. 

There are days. Some of them have good moments, some of them bad. I have entire days that are bad days. There are no good days. No 24 hour period of happiness. I do not go to bed ever- ever thinking this was a great day. I think -this day had good moments but event then this is till my life and that is ever present in my consciousness. Today was a hard day. All day. Hopefully tomorrow will have some good moments. Someone reminded me that grief does not change you, it reveals you. What if all it does is reveal how broken you are? How fragmented you have become? Then after grief will have served its purpose of revealing you, you are left to find the shattered pieces in the hidden corners of your life? It is Impossible to put you back together and now revealed to the world as your own broken piece of art. Sad people will say. Tragic. Beautiful. Raw. And Broken.