Thursday, April 23, 2015

A Little Venting

How's this for a dark thought? Sometimes I think "I only have to keep living until the kids are grown up with families of their own. It will still hurt, but it won't be as devastating then. Then I can let go." Sometimes, that thought is the only thing that keeps me going. As if by putting some finite amount of time that I have to keep living will make it easier to bear.

I wish that thought didn't bring me so much comfort. I wish I could feel excited for what lies ahead in my own life. But I'm not quite at that point yet. I hope that someday I will be. But right now, it feels like I've had all my innocence burned away. I know now, that the worst really can happen. And that it can happen again. I am TERRIFIED of losing anyone else. I don't think I could come back from that. I'm certainly not coming back from losing Jason, not much at all. And that is why there is a wall building ever higher within me. As much as I try to remain open to the blessings of my life, at my core I am scared and angry and so incredibly sad that most of the time I don't understand why anyone would want to be around me. I need love and I love desperately and at the same time I hold some part of myself back because how do you regrow parts of your soul that are lost?

I engage in ritualistic thinking, torturing myself and pretending that I am just being prepared for when something happens. Forcing  myself to think about my children, my family and friends dying or just no longer wanting me around. It won't make me ready. You don't get to be ready for that. It just makes me sad and paranoid and cold. Very, very cold.

I'm still smoking and I am so disgusted with myself. And yet I get irrationally angry if anyone dares to mention that I need to quit. I wake up at least a few times a week, heart pounding and imagining the day I get my own cancer diagnosis. Or the day the emphysema or COPD leaves me  unable to breath. It is SO STUPID. I hate how weak I am. I don't want to be a burden to anyone.

All I want is to protect my kids, to love them and hopefully help them to become the people they are supposed to be. And maybe, be happy. Be happy again. I will never get to be that person that I was, that trusted in the future. That felt lucky and safe and secure. There are boogeymen out there and they are real. But some day, I don't want to be so scared anymore.