Me, again.

“If you were to go back and tell that woman that it was going to be okay, she would’ve told you to fuck off.”

I laughed as tears formed behind my eyes and forced myself to swallow them down. There it was, that well of emotion—both alarming and a relief to feel that familiar sadness for her. So often now when I think back to that life I feel nothing.  There is a numbness to the tragedy of it all- the horrible news, horrible sights, sounds, watching death occur. It often feels like it never happened. Not to me. The connection to the person I was before is the most paradoxical relationship I’ve ever been in. It’s like a rope I simultaneously want to bury, burn, and cling to. It’s a relationship that both grounds me and sends me into a whirlwind of anxiety. I’ve written before about reconciling myself with myself; allowing myself to let go of the guilt of happiness and of living without that old familiar pain that comes with grief and loss. It is a very difficult truce to come to and I am relieved that I have made it to this space. But as I’ve learned to let go of guilt, I’ve also come to realize that there is more to this path of self-reconciliation and that other corners are more difficult to get around. If I am not the person I was before then who am I now? Lately I’ve been feeling this uncomfortable loss of continuity. As though, after treading water so long I’ve found myself sheltered, inland, with no recollection of the arduous and exhausting swim to the shore. And after a while I start to wonder if it ever really could have happened, because it seems impossible now, dry and warm, that I was ever struggling just to keep my head above water.

            This disassociation from the self I was in crisis and in grief is uncomfortable, and it has been difficult for me to unravel exactly why I find it so unsettling. The more I think about it the more I think it’s hopelessly complicated- the most difficult knot to try to untangle. It’s hard to feel solid in your own identity when the foundation was kicked out from under you. Like a tree without roots you feel shaky and unstable and unsure of your own strength. There are times when I reach for her in attempt to keep me grounded, but each time I do she pulls me too far down because she can’t see above the tree line where the sun comes streaming in. And even though I look for her I’m afraid to get too close, because she will forever dwell in a dark place that I worked so hard to climb out of.

            Even though I’ve decided it’s okay not to hurt anymore, it’s harder be okay with not feeling sad for her pain. I worry that I’ve numbed myself. I worry that it’s a sign that I’ve not healed in the “right way.” But I’ve been told that once you can remember something painful without feeling pain it’s become wisdom. “Think of all the things you would tell her now, or that you would tell someone else going through that.” I would tell her that it was going to be okay. And then she would tell me to fuck off.

            I don’t know if I’ll ever be entirely sure of how to be the person I was and the person I am now. I’ve said before that there is only so much space on the inside, and my head and my heart are full. So maybe there just isn’t room for the me-in-the-water. That person needed someone to tell her it would be okay. Someone who had lost but who wasn’t sad about it anymore. And she had a friend, who was full of wisdom, tell her so. Since it wasn’t me, she was much too polite to tell her to fuck off.