Fighting the Darkness

Everyone has bad days.

It’s part of life – the ups and the downs are regular occurrences.

But if you heard someone say “next Thursday I’m going to have a bad day” you’d think they were nuts.

I know 365 days in advance that I’m going to have a bad day on the 19th of February. I can even plan for it. No meetings, no appointments, no plans. I’m useless.

It didn’t used to be this way.

With the exception of the year I was twenty, the 19th was always a day of celebration. Two cakes, silly hats, home made pies, a special supper, singing loudly, and finding the perfect silly cards to make them smile.

It’s not been that way for some time. Nine years to be exact.

Oh, we celebrated half-heartedly for a few years after that. But he was her favourite – mine too. So, for several years the day was spent on the phone, or in person, cajoling her to get out of bed and celebrate, or at least to live a little.

Then, when we lost her and, well…the whole world changed.

I was good for the days following her death. There’s the “business” of burying the dead, the arrangements that have to be made, the checklist of things that need to be completed, and then we returned to New Brunswick.

Few people know what I went through in the weeks following our return. It was as if some part of me longed to follow them into the dark earth and never return. I stopped sleeping. For twenty-two days I did no more than catnap. Every time I closed my eyes I could see them and I wanted to go with them.

Through it all, Rick was my rock. As I slowly found my way back to myself he treated me with more kindness than I thought possible. With his support, medicinal intervention, and an extreme amount of patience and love I fought through the grief that gripped me so tightly.

In the end, in some weird way, I made a Faustian deal. I could stop mourning every day and get on with life in return for one day of sadness. Twenty-four hours of remembering everything in exchange for a “normal” life the rest of the time.

In the intervening years I’ve tried to trick myself into ignoring the calendar, into being so busy that I wouldn’t notice what day it is. But just before midnight on the 18th I wake up crying. Rick usually reaches for me in his sleep and holds me close. But this year I’m alone with the children.

And I long for his arms to encircle me.

I wake up with that morning after headache. The one where you’ve got puffy eyes, a runny nose, and a throbbing behind the left temple.

I get the kids off to school and then sit. The TV is on whatever channel Liam was watching. The radio is on in the kitchen. The dogs curl up next to me as I try to get my brain to stop - to shut off so I can shift it into neutral and coast through the day on auto-pilot.

I need to get out before the snow starts. I need to get groceries, and medicine and the list is endless. But an hour later and I’m still sitting here in my robe.

Tomorrow will be better.

Day 183