Another Friday & Grief Conference

Well, today is Friday. Again. Do you know how very much we dislike every Friday around this house now? We actually really dislike them. Every Friday marks another week to the day, without our sweet Carly. Today is our 25th week of "Walking Thru the Gates of HELL".

As time passes so quickly, our hurt deepens. I never expected that would happen. We've all heard the saying, "time heals all wounds." Well, I'm here to tell you all, that saying couldn't be further from the truth. Time isn't healing our wound. In fact, time is making it worse. Each passing day gets harder for us. Granted, we have only been on this horrible roller coaster ride with grief for 6 months. But I can tell you that within those 6 months, life has not gotten easier.

On October 6, we attended a grief conference with the speaker Alan D. Wolfelt, Ph.D., C.T. . He is a very good speaker. I would highly recommend his conference. This man knows his stuff! He spoke of the various myths about grief and I thought I'd share with you today, the 5 myths that he speaks of.

Myth 1: ~ Grief and mourning are the same experience.

Truth: ~ There is an important distinction between the two.
Grief; is the internal thoughts & feelings we experience when someone we love dies.
Mourning; is expressing those thoughts & feelings outwardly.

Myth 2: ~ There is a predictable & orderly progression with the experience of grief.

Truth: ~ Each person's grief is unique for him or her.
Grief is NOT predictable and can NOT be categorized.

Myth 3: ~ Move away from grief & mourning instead of toward it. Overcome it, instead of experience it.

Truth: ~ In order to heal, people must move toward their grief through continued mourning, not away from it, through repression & denial.

Myth 4: ~ Tears expressing grief are a sign of weakness.

Truth: ~ Crying is nature's way of releasing internal tension in the body and allows the mourner to communicate a need to be comforted. Crying makes a person feel better, emotionally and physically. Tears are NOT a sign of weakness. In fact, crying is an indication of the griever's willingness to do the "work of mourning."

Myth 5: ~ The goal; to "get over" your grief.

Truth: ~ One never "gets over" grief. That would mean we resolve or recover from grief. It also suggests a return to "normalcy" when the fact is life does NOT return to "normal". People who believe this are potentially harmful to the one who is grieving.

As I said, this man is a great speaker. Paul said he could listen to him every day. He draws you in very quickly. I was in tears within 30 seconds of the conference. It was very emotional for us. But he spoke of things that made us realize we aren't going crazy. And that each one of us is going through this process in our own way. Some people many not like it, they may disagree with our way, but we learned that we have to do it our way. And we have to go through it, we can not go around it.

My way of grieving for Carly is different than Paul's. For example; Paul feels closer to Carly by sleeping in our bed. (Carly slept with us every night. Right smack dab in the middle of us) I can't bring myself to lay down in that bed. I sleep in the living room every night. The last night I slept in our bed was April 22. Believe me, I'm trying to work through this. I don't even understand it. No one understands it. Except for my counselor. She told me it didn't surprise her. Because our bed, which Carly shared with us, was where I nursed her back to health on many separate occasions. Through many illness. Through chemo, 8 different IV antibiotics that went on for 8 weeks around the clock. Our bed is where I would place her with a portable DVD player while she was on her 30 day steroid phase of chemo. If I didn't place her between us with a movie on, I did not get one single minute of sleep; steroids don't allow a person to sleep, especially when they are taking multiple pills each day for 30 straight days. I even have a hard time just going into our bedroom. But, I'm working on it. Trying to build myself up to the point that I can at least get in our room and get it cleaned. 6 months of avoiding a room wreaks havoc on it. Trust me.

Medication

This is what you're left with after the sudden unexpected loss of your child.

I hate the fact that I have to take these med's.

I hate the fact that I need them to get through the day.

Depending

On

Medication

To

Get

Through

The

Loss

Of

Your

Child

SUCKS!

Personally, I'd like to throw them all away, but my doctor says
"you HAVE to be on these med's."
Truthfully, I HAVE to have them.
Can't get through my days without the stupid med's.
Like I said.
It SUCKS!

What is there left to say?

I come to my blog quite often, but can't bring myself to sit and actually type. What is there left to say? This blog was created and focused mostly on and for Carly. Our life with her. Our struggles with her. Her never ending school issues. The constant doctor appointments. I wrote of her accomplishments and her milestones. Quite a bit of bragging has gone on here too. So now what? What is there left to say?

About the only thing on my mind now is how much I miss her. I never knew the ache inside that I know now. It's a physical ache. Unless you've shared in the loss of a child, you'll never understand it. Paul and I talk quite often of this ache, and how we never knew a person could actually ache and hurt so badly, from the inside out.

As for Paul, well,,he isn't doing good at all. He is extremely depressed and crying all the time. Sometimes, I get angry that he is crying so much. Why am I not crying that much? Don't get me wrong, I do cry and I cry often, but Paul will cry for hours upon hours. I told him yesterday that he is going to have to get back to the doctor and ask for a different antidepressant or an additional one.

Ashleigh, she feels pretty much the same way Paul and I feel. An unbelievable ache inside. She is a very strong girl. Keeps a pretty even keel on things. But the loss of her little sister is killing her. As you all know, those two girls were extremely close to each other. Ashleigh fights to remember the last weekend they had together. They had so much fun. It was 2 weeks before we lost Carly. Ashleigh is very angry that she couldn't get to the hospital that god awful day in April. There was just no way, she lived 1 1/2 hrs away. She is angry that the first time in two weeks that she saw Carly, was lying in that damn funeral home. Our girls were something else. Ashleigh was more like a second mom to Carly. Even though distance kept them apart for weeks on end. Their bond was one of a very special kind.

Brad, well what can I say about Brad? He's Brad. Holds things in as he always has. He misses Carly too, although he doesn't want to talk about it. Which worries us to no end.. Carly and Brad had a very unique relationship. He was her "Bubba"! Every single day, often times multiple times a day, Brad and Carly did the 'high five's'. That was their thing. Due to Carly's left arm/hand issues, she had a harder time giving a high five with her left hand. But, big brother wouldn't let her slide. He made her high five him with both hands. She would do it every time. But, sometimes Carly would be so mad at him...because she would just as soon NOT have used her left arm/hand.... after Brad would walk away, she'd flip him the bird!

I've had such a hard time with school starting. I should have been able to go school clothes shopping for my girl. I missed taking that first day of school picture this year. Of course having the school bus stop at my driveway every afternoon for 2 straight weeks didn't help me either. In fact, it just about pushed me over the edge. Why on earth would that damn bus stop at my driveway? That entire school knew of Carly's passing. I told Ashleigh, "if that damn bus doesn't quit stopping at our driveway, I'm going postal on someone". Well, they finally did stop. Nothing like sticking a dagger straight into my heart and giving it a good twist.

We have knew neighbors now. After the house sat empty for over a year..You might know, they have 2 little girls. We haven't had neighbors with kids in about 16 years. One girl is Carly's age and in the 2nd grade, just as Carly would be. The other is 5 and in kindergarten. You can't imagine how it kills me hearing those little girls playing outside every afternoon. Oh how Carly would have loved these little girls. Playmates. Something she never had. Her only playmates were her school friends.

Night time is terrible for me. Well, so are mornings and afternoons too. But at night, as I lay down, my mind goes into a mode that I can only describe as a "life before my eyes" type of thing, only it's on fast forward and it's all about Carly. Her entire life goes spinning around in my brain. I sleep with one of her blankets and one of her pillows. When I actually do fall asleep that is.

Every time I would rock Carly, and we rocked every day... I would breathe her in. Probably sounds corny, but that's what I did. I loved her scent. Except when chemo was going on... that was all I could smell at that time...all those nasty toxic drugs! But I swear I couldn't breathe in enough of her. I miss that. I don't want to forget Carly's scent. I pick things up and smell them now, just trying to pick up her scent.

This house is definitely not the same. Some people think we should sell it and move away. But where would we go? We've thought about it, for a brief second, but then again, we don't want to. Home is where Carly was the happiest. Home was her favorite place to be. Don't get me wrong, she loved to be on the go, but when she wanted to go home, she let us know it. And we'd best be quick about it. As we sit and look around our home, it's still filled with all of Carly's things. With the exception of her kitchen set and art easel, we took those out when Ashleigh moved back home over the summer. Our house is just so small, that we HAD to get those big items out of here. But, I didn't part with them, they are at my parents house. Actually, I wanted to donate them to Mott Children's Hospital, but they wouldn't take them because they were used. Makes me angry, because they are like brand knew! Regardless of those things being gone, our house is still full of her toys, clothing, bazillion books and color books, etc.. Some people think we should box her stuff up. But I can't do that yet. I know that it bothers Ashleigh seeing all of Carly's things. But I'm not ready. I don't want to erase Carly from this house.

So, bear with me as I try to get through this horrible time in my life. I have been checking several blogs that I follow. Trying to get back into the lives of all my online friends who have given me so much support. Dare I say, more than most of my in real life friends have given me. Which is very sad too. Guess I'll end on that note, because really, what is there left to say?

Sunday morning breakfast

Who would have ever imagined that making a Sunday morning breakfast would be so difficult? Today, Paul asked me to make breakfast. His request was quite simple; eggs-over easy, bacon, sliced tomatoes and toast. So, of course I made breakfast.

Man was it hard to to. We quite often had Sunday morning breakfast with our sweet Carly. Boy did she LOVE her eggs over easy. Not scrambled and not just plain fried, they had to be over easy for her. She loved to dip her toast in her "dippy eggs"!

Paul and I sat eating breakfast glancing over at Carly's place at the table. Wow..the memories came flooding back full force. This was the breakfast she loved the most. "dippy eggs, toast and bacon". Many tears filled our house this morning. Who would have ever thought that making a simple Sunday morning breakfast would stir up so many emotions? I sure didn't.

We sat through breakfast, not saying much. Of course we knew just what each of us had on our minds. How much Carly would have loved this breakfast. Her very favorite. Finally Paul said, "this is the first time you've made breakfast in a very long time isn't it"? My response,, I just looked at him and said, "yeah, it's been about 5 months.

Sunday morning breakfasts will never again be as they once were.

Still around.

Yes, I'm still around. Been on facebook mostly. Playing some games and chatting with some friends. Yeah, I'm playing those dumb games. Silly as it sounds, those games help get me out of this horrible daily nightmare, even if it's only for a short time.

If you're my facebook friend, you've seen that I have had a MAJOR attitude problem, but given the circumstances surrounding me... I think I'M ENTITLED to be pissed off at the whole wide world for as long as I want to be. Altho., I'd hate for it to be too long. I really do not like these feelings. The feelings ANGER, HATE and PAIN. And yes, like I said above, I think I'm entitled to feeling like this.

Lot of things going on right now. My health has gone to Hell in a hand basket. Thanks to all this stress. Guess I never realized how much stress impacts a person, physically and mentally. It's been a roller coaster that's for sure.

Tonight Paul and I start our first grief counseling session. We opted out of group therapy. I didn't do so well with that. Maybe it was just the "group" mom and I attended. Maybe I just wasn't ready...but then, is anyone really ready for grief counseling of any sort? Especially for their 8 year old child. I doubt it. I know for a fact that Paul would not do well at all in a group therapy session. So, Paul and I will meet with a counselor together later this evening. Then, per the counselor's suggestion, she will meet with us separately. The counselor, I'll call her M., says that men and women grief so differently, that she feels it's best to see husband and wife at separate times. I guess that makes sense. Maybe that way 'M' can help Paul and I 'see' how and why we grieve over different things that have taken place over the course of this horrific 4 1/2 months.

Please, don't be offended if I don't visit your blog often in the next few weeks. I can't handle all the back to school excitement. It's just all too much for me right now. I so want to be doing that back to school thing with my girl. This really just plain sucks.

I'll be back soon. I think writing on this blog really does help me. Not sure why, but it does.
**I'm still working on that post about going to Carly's school just before the summer break started. It's just a little hard to get through it. And I want to make sure I leave nothing out.**