The Honesty In It All....

Its the only way to truly heal...

I suppose the idea of sharing the down right brutal honesty about pain and the recovery of it is more than most are willing to do. However I alway hope that in sharing what I have gone through, there might just be a widow out there who reads it and says "Oh my that is so me and thank god Im not alone" so with that thought in my brain and computer in hand, I will blog today about my first two years on my grief journey and the "abuse" that surrounded that time, simply in hopes to help someone else come to terms with their own. 


When Chris died, there was no simple way to face it as so many think. There was no easy way to "get over it" or "deal with it", better yet there was no handbook or manual; trust me I tore this house upside down looking for it. Begging to find something that would give me even a simple outline to follow. But alas, much to my teary decent onto the cold floor of despair there was nothing. No help, no book, no manual, no nothing. Just me and my overwhelming grief and pain. How was that supposed to help me? I couldn't for the best part of the day see what I was doing from the swollen, red puffy eyes that I was constantly struggling to look through. Not to mention the cloudy, fuzzy and mostly hazy brian I was left to function with.  Something happened to me, and Im not sure if its all widows that experience this but for me, the best way to explain this is to compare it to a stroke. My brain was firing off at will making no sense, and then there are the connections that have been lost for good, memory is a huge one....wait what was a saying again?  Oh yes, memory; see?  :)  Things that never bothered me before now are huge issues and those things that I hated seem to just be so insignificant. So all the while I was trying to cope and deal with the death of Chris, I had two small boys to contend with, their pain and grief, and then to add to it all myself along with my grief. How much can one person deal with? And because I thought it was my job to protect had help all those who were there with him I took on his guys and their pain as well, not to mention the idiotic asses in my family. Too much!


I moved to Florida four months after Chris was killed. For me I had to get out of where I was in order to heal, or so my misfiring brain thought.  The problem came after I moved and found myself to be lost in an abyss of loneliness and depression. Yes I said the big "D" word, depression and finally I can OWN that damn word. I had no idea how hard being in a new place with no one I knew and no help would be. But again alas there I was. I was also unpacking the house...alone, taking care of the boys.....alone (Owen was 9 months by this time), cleaning.....alone, cooking.....alone, grocery shopping.....alone, paying bills.......alone (not sure how that was even done on time)  and there was no relief is sight. Somehow in the fog and haze I managed the first year to struggle and stumble through it. It was the second year, the wake up call year, the fog is all gone year, the pain is too much to handle year that got to me and caused me to lean and become way too familiar with an old college friend known fondly as VODKA!


Now, lets put this out there; I was offered by two doctors any Rx that I wanted in those first two years and not once did I ever even entertain the thought of taking them up on the offer. I mean really if I was drugged out on even legal stuff who the heck was going to take care of my kids? Hell I was doing the minimal just to get by each day, what would drugs add to that? Besides that, I had taken Ambien and to be honest I know some swear by that stuff, but for me it caused me to hallucinate big time...Im talking little purple wizards hallucinations.  The door to drug abuse was wide open and for some reason in my again, misfiring brain that was much worse than my old friend Vodka could be, after all I was familiar with Vodka and had been friends but not good friends for many years.  


In my second year on this journey of widowhood, the pain was unreal! It was like when a boo boo is still oozing but its been a week so your mom RIPS that bandaid of pulling all the ooey gooey raw crud right off the top, exposing the very core of the pain.  It hurt worse than anything I had ever been through, and for gods sake WHY didn't someone warn me? I felt more alone than I ever had, how in the hell was I going to raise two little boys to be confident, happy men if I cant even see through all this to make myself feel that way??? Would there ever be a time when I would feel all those wonderful and amazing feelings I had before he died? Would I ever enjoy being a Mom to these two amazing little boys or would I just feel nothing and hope for the best?  And I know there are many that are in denial and would never admit any of this to anyone, but I don't see how that helps and I believe in that they are still doing damage to themselves and those around them.  So I admit and own those feelings and pain.


The days, to be honest were just filled with a numbness but I could deal with that. It was at night when the house was quiet and I was alone, in the light of the TV or simply in the dark because I couldn't muster the energy to turn it on; that I found out how intense the pain and loneliness really was. It seemed at that point is when I started to think of ways to numb the nights away too. To me that just made perfect sense. The boys were in bed and asleep and that left me to ponder and over analyze every last detail of the last moments with Chris....I was awake and in pain with no idea how to get way from it. Its a pain that no one understands but someone who has been through it and its the deepest pain I believe there is other than losing one of my kids, which I am sure would kill me. 


I believe the decision to "drown my sorrows" was not a conscious one at all. I cant even pin point when it really began, as I cant remember a lot from that time. So much was pushed away at that time that are still showing up even today. But I do remember going to the store and buying that over sized bottle of Vodka, you know that one that should take a normal human being that is not grief stricken about a year to drink? :) Yea that one! The one that if Costco sold it I would have become a member earlier...  I just know that when I saw it, it was a huge comfort to think I might be numb enough at night to not have to feel that intense pain that crept in every damn night and haunted me till my eyes were soaked, bloodshot and swollen. So I drank from the time the boys went to bed till about midnight. It wasn't straight and it wasn't shots but it was enough to drown and numb those demons and then some.  


This went on for a long while. For me anything past six months is a long while, especially in that time frame when all else seemed to drag on for a lifetime. I wanted it to go fast, the pain to leave as fast as it came and never show its face again. So I drank and I drank a lot. That bottle lasted maybe a month but Im not 100% sure since I was not paying attention to anything but getting through my days so I could get through my nights and start over.  I do know that that summer I would sweat Vodka and Im not kidding because I could smell it. And to those who say Vodka has no smell, it does and its pungent to me now.   Im pretty sure my blood was clear for those six months to a year.  I never got sick, never had a hangover and never wanted it during the day.  I will be the first to admit that I am not sure at all how I functioned during the day except to say that I was a functioning temporary alcoholic. And I say temporary because that is what it was. A moment in a lifetime that I lost control and my way and chose the more destructive way of handling things. 


I woke up one day soon after New Years 2008 and realized that I was not living. I have no idea what it was that did it but I knew what I was doing was not working at all.  As I lay there in bed, listening to the quiet house, all I could think about is how utterly disappointed Chris must be in me, how ashamed and how I had let him down. I am sure I cried in that moment more than I did when he died for the sheer fact that I never wanted to dishonor him or let him down. I curled up and cried for hours until I heard the boys watching cartoons. I got up, washed my face, which did nothing to hide the swollen red eyes but luckily they were young enough that they didn't really notice. I walked into the kitchen, got the bottle that I realized it had multiplied like a little frozen bunny in my freezer by three and poured them all out one by one in a ceremonial manner that lifted a HUGE burden and weight off my shoulders.  I threw the bottles away and decided at that moment there would be no more drinking for a long time if ever, as I was unsure how deep this had gone. 


For six months I did not touch any alcohol at all. After that I took it one day at a time, one situation at a time and for a long time only drank beer. I have found now that I really don't want to drink and if I have a glass of wine that is all I have. If I have a mixed drink then its one and a beer or two but I know the feeling and I don't like it. So I enjoy watching others makes asses out of themselves knowing I am not. Drinking is no longer a crutch, an escape, or a numbing agent. I can socially and with confidence that it will not take over my life again.


Lesson learned is that no matter what you have been through, the pain and need to heal from it is not something you can hide from, drown in a bottle of Vodka or make go away. You have to face it and once you do that healing process begins and you don't need the crutch and it becomes a non issue.  Good lesson learned.