When numbness slows my typing hands

So I've just got in from my shift at our church's community coffee bar, The Loft. It's almost 1am. It's silent. And I know I just have to write.

My attempt to break the ice in my last post didn't really work. I have a great desire to write, a great sense of purpose in my writing, I thank God that I have the ability to write, but despite all these things I've been struggling to sit down and do just that; to write. Really really struggling. I've been frustrated with myself. I've let others waiting on me down. And still, nothing. Why don’t the words come out?

It's not just blog entries that have decreased. Diary entries, notebook musings, emails to friends - they've all been in short supply. My writing has consisted of 140 character tweets and Facebook status updates. Snippets can be thought provoking but there is great need too for the bigger picture; quotes can easily be twisted when isolated from their context. My life sometimes feels like those short quotes, those tweets - made up of lone moments where all appears to be 'fine', only for the cracks to show when I'm away from the public eye. It took me a long time to let those moments come, to write little quotes, to face people with a smile, for fear of people thinking that I'm ok, that I'm normal, equipped to face life on my own, all the time.

The inability to get my words out on screen doesn't come alone. Numbness, a state of being I cannot stand, has plagued me of late. And as I feel that numbness wallow over me, it seems natural that a writing inspired by such intensity of grief and emotion, should suffer. The numbness doesn't kill the love. The love still bursts inside; it just kills its expression and influence for good.

Tonight though, as I soon as I closed the car door after my shift, the tears began to flow. He wasn't there in the passenger seat beside me. He hasn't been for over 14 months now but still at times it hits me. It did tonight. I wanted him there, his company, his conversation, his companionship, his taking me home. With numbness you don't feel the hits. But you miss them. You need them. They bring such release. Suddenly in all the grief and tears is all the love and beauty that you miss so much.

I've always been aware of the isolation, the separation that comes with widowhood. If we were only friends with people at the same 'life stage' as us then I'd have none right now. Fortunately it doesn't work like that and I have some amazing friends who I am eternally grateful for (that sentence doesn't give justice to just how grateful I am - there just aren't words my dear friends). But there's an isolation which is far stronger than simply not having friends; even surrounded by people, you cannot escape it. You are isolated from your other half, a part of your very being, and that void becomes all too clear at times.

Looking for advice or opinions on big decisions or simply sharing the mundane details of the day. I wonder if people think it's strange that I've shared certain things with them, like it's not their place to know. But the person whose place it is to 'know' is too far away to share these things with, & in his absence, I share things with others that I wouldn't normally, just like I share this blog with you all. I want to be able to talk through decisions with Ems, to tell him about the silly mundane things of the day, but I can't. And the silence, his silence, is deafening, made louder by still, by naturally non-committal responses from others to questions they should never have been asked, to mundane details that only the most intimate of lovers takes interest in; the way he takes interest in everything that you are. Some things are now solely my decision to make and others can't possibly enter in to that loneliness.

Ems and I bought a 'project' of a house. A beautiful old house with character, light and space; we both loved it immediately. You could walk around and see the 1970s wallpaper and crumbling plaster in places, or you could see what the house would become. We knew it would take ten, maybe twenty years to get the house how we knew it could be, yet we didn't mind. It was to be a labour of love, and it was already full of love; already 'home'. In many ways, despite what other eyes might see, Ems and I lived in the finished article despite having only owned the house for 6 months. With every morning's wake and every walk through the door we saw what it was going to be, not what it was. Our mattress on the floor might as well have been a four poster bed, the ageing paint work the most luxurious wallpaper, as far as we saw it.

In the last few weeks the builders have started work on the house which I haven't lived in since Ems passed. It was time, and as they commence what will be months of work, I continue the build up to living there again, this time alone. This isn't the way I wanted it to be but it's the way I want it to be. It currently stands with its guts taken out, walls knocked down, floors churned up (two words - damp proofing!). Yet as it stands as a shell it still feels every bit our home. It always will.

Massive decisions need to be made on what to do with the layout of the house and again I find myself lost. I am presented with options and ideas and I shelve them to discuss later, yet the person I am shelving them to discuss with is not around to discuss anything. These decisions are now mine to make yet with every one of them, I still think of we. This is not my house but our house. I am suddenly carrying out our plans.

Many have and will be asked for their opinion but the resounding cry of 'it's whatever you want to do' will remain. Yet what I want to do is by the by now. None of this is what I want to do and I long for my sweet darling boy to come and decide with me.

Yet, even as I write I know that the focus was never and will never be the bricks and mortar of the house. The focus was our love which made it home. And I am aptly reminded not to worry about big decisions I have to make or little details I cannot share, because all this we see is temporary. Everything we see is in a state of decay, yet the things beyond vision continue forever. There is nothing and no one visible who won't one day not be here. But the faith despite the circumstance, the hope in the despair, the love in the darkness; those things will continue to grow. The numbness must fade, and the release of it will bring pain, yet forever I know it will be worth it for the purpose and love which has brought me this far and which will ever lead me home. Oh God I hope I write as this journey goes on.

[Memory #25: The ‘would you like your order now’ episode
It was my first birthday since we’d started going out and Ems took me to really nice local restaurant, Y Polyn. I’d been starving myself all day to fully appreciate the tasty delights we were anticipating that evening. We’d both wanted to go to the restaurant for ages and he’d decided to treat me for my birthday as a surprise (having already tried to on Valentines day too – not that I knew at the time – but without success due to it being booked out). We arrived and were asked if we wanted to sit down with a drink or go straight through, I didn’t mind, and Ems took the decision to go straight through. The waiter then came to ask if we were ready to place our order and Ems decisively asked if we could wait a while before placing it. I can clearly remember him being so decisive on both counts (very unlike him at times!) and thinking it was because he hadn’t yet decided on his choice of food. After the waiter had left though he confessed to having eaten a pasty when he’d got in from work and ‘wasn’t really hungry’! He’d done too good a job of starving himself through the day and couldn’t wait any longer. He regretted that decision, particularly in realising I’d been successful in holding out and was resultantly famished. Fortunately, another of Ems strengths was his hearty appetite and as soon as the delicious goodies appeared in front of us, the pasty was quickly forgotten and a hearty helping was much enjoyed by my boy who loved his food.]

The reality of it all

Not that I’ve ever faltered from it but I’m warning you that you’re about to hear the honesty I’ve promised you all along. I wish I could have a warning for the different depths of this journey, the different hurts that lay ahead. When I wrote last week about the dawn of November and the grief and fears it presented, I had no idea how raw, how fresh, how agonisingly all-consuming the pain could be again.

There is no other word for it than agony. It isn’t any better than just under a year ago when it was new. It isn’t any better than a few months in when the shock started to wear off. It isn’t like a medical condition that improves with time. Perhaps because I’m young there are different expectations because of all that I’m physically still able to do, but like the old widows with whom I’ve shared many conversations confirm, it doesn’t get better – it gets worse. It’s just different.

Car journeys have never been the same since Ems died. It’s not just his absence because I was often in the car without him; it’s that rather than simply be a mindless journey from one place to another, they’re now burdened with emotional heaviness as I have no escape from my own thoughtful company. Lately I find I rarely take a journey alone, long or short, without crying at some point if not all the way. I’d thought those days were behind me, saved now for the odd ‘special’ occasion, but no.

I’m unable to work out where on my face the burning pain is worse because both eyes and cheeks sting ferociously from relentless tears. Yet they both pale into insignificance compared to the weighty, excruciating throbbing of my shattered heart.

Tears spill into day time, into ordinary moments while daylight is upon us, rather than reserving themselves for the loneliness of nights without sweet Ems at my side. For a while I thought I had mastered control of my tears in public, grasped the ability to play it cool and not upset anyone, to make it easier for others. Now I once more find myself being asked by my boss if I’m 'ok' and without warning rivers flow; Now I stand in church singing and open my eyes to see the droplets of tears on the floor below me; Now I just can’t always promise to keep back the tears, hard as I try at times.

There is no monopoly on hurt. Many hurt around me and I hate it. I often wish that I had the monopoly on pain; that I wouldn’t have to see others suffer too. The one advantage of a broken heart is that it makes you far more sensitive to other’s pain. I've realised that God doesn’t just use us in spite of our brokenness; He actually uses our brokenness to reach out to others. There really needs to be some re-shift in our thinking that the most useful and effective people are the ones with no worries, no hurts, no pain, with the hard exteriors and perfect faces. When we let it, pain will fix our minds on something far greater because the only alternative is to focus on our pain and its harrowing affect on our lives, and that only ever leaves us in despair.

I scream ‘why me’ but I know I have no more rights than the next person. I have no right over anyone else to a long marriage. None of us do. I had no right over anyone else to the beauty of being in love with a man who was as equally and beautifully in love with me. I still don’t hold that right but I’m blessed with it.

I don’t love Ems any less than anyone who loves the husband right next to them. I don’t desire or need him any less. I don’t want to share the little details of the day with him any less. The love, the wants, the needs - they remain. The difference is solely that he’s not here. The wants and the needs remain frustrated; the love it continues to grow. Until you experience it you can’t possibly imagine it but though the days apart grow longer, the love grows deeper and the heart misses more; the love does not switch off – it is stronger than death and doesn’t change. You just begin to learn to live with only memories of whispers coming back your way; of his arms to hold you after the tough days; of him, your confidant, sharing your deepest fears and desires and fighting for them alongside you.

You begin to learn to live with it; but you still hate it.

I refuse to wallow in self pity. I have never demanded special treatment because of the pain I relentlessly carry. Though I cannot control my feelings, I can control what I choose to do or say, what passions I choose to run with, what purpose I’ll seek to fulfil. We can all choose that.

And so it goes, in the brutal honesty I have promised you; be encouraged that I still believe there is purpose in pain, but don’t think that the pain goes away. I run not because I am pain free, but in spite of it, because of it, knowing that the final destination will make all this worthwhile.

I remember when Ems died not just wishing I had the monopoly on hurt, that no one else would have to feel like I did, but also naively thinking that nothing else could hurt me now. How I wish we all had a quota so that once it was full we could feel no more hurt. But alas, even though my love and grief infiltrate every second and action of my waking day, and I start to believe I couldn’t possibly feel greater loss, more pain, there it is. And just as the grief surprises you with increased vigour, so other hurts are magnified in the light of your open wound. There is no hard shell for hurts to bounce off; it’s all absorbed, deeper and deeper into the gashes that one sweet day will be but memories themselves.

Running with an injury can make the injury flair up at times. But this isn’t a broken leg which can be rested before training resumes. Waiting for my broken-heart to heal is as little an option as waiting for Ems to walk back through the door. So do I stop? There are moments when desperation comes over me to run away from it all; but there is no escape route, there’s nowhere to run to, this isn’t a choice. I can choose to stop but I won’t; I’ll keep running. The stitch will pound and the knees will buckle, there’ll be dehydration, and long, slow hills, but I will run; not in spite of it all, but because of it all, and one day I’ll win.

[Memory #23 The "running" episode
Ems was a man who could teach us all a thing or two about perseverance. As you'll have read in earlier blogs he suffered with Seasonal Affective Disorder in these winter months and yet never let it conquer him. It would reduce the amount he could do, yes, but he never caved into bitterness, never took it out on others, never stopped being grateful for the things he did have, never took his eyes off the main thing, he always always loved. One day, lacking energy as he did, he decided that in spite of it, he was going to start running that night in order to increase his (already fairly high) fitness levels.
As I watched the rain begin, then start to pour, outside my office window I expected his resolve to be postponed to another day. But not Ems, he was determined. As soon as we were in through the door, he was up the stairs, changed, then back down, asking me how long dinner would take, before setting out for his 'first' run in the pouring rain. He ran hard despite the elements and got back just in time for dinner!]

Love and / or grief

I'm hurting. It's no worse than yesterday. It'll be no different to tomorrow.

I do wonder sometimes, I ask myself when it'll all go away. I think of Ems and wonder when it will stop feeling so crazy that he's not here. I wonder, and then I know.

The truth is it won't ever go away. It won't ever feel crazy that he's not here. There won't be a morning when I wake up and the pain is gone, when I don't miss him anymore, when everything is 'normal' and uncomplicated again.

My perspective, my life, has been well and truly shifted.

I hate life without Ems. I hate that he's not around to make decisions with, big and small. I hate that he's not here to share those little details that you only care about sharing with the one you really love. I hate that I so often find myself in those moments where you're 'killing time' waiting, only to realise that the person I'm subconsciously 'waiting' to hang out with isn't around anymore. I hate being in a situation that no one else is in.

I still have every desire for Ems that I ever had. It's still him that I want to hang out with. It's still him that I want to live out my dreams, frustrations, good days and bad days with. When I have something I want to share, it is still him that I want to share it with, that I want to share everything with.

Life since Ems died is not life without Ems. Ems is no longer here, I am in no denial of that, but the love I have for Ems is as great as the day he died. My desire to be with him, to please him, to serve him, to love him is still as strong as when he was right here next to me. I still think about him all the time and consider him as I'm making decisions. I'm grateful that we were so close, that we knew each other so well. It means that I often know what he'd have wanted or thought about decisions that I make. It's also excrutiating when I don't know, and I can't ask.

The new struggles, struggles that Ems and I would never have come across when he was alive. The new achievements, things that would never have looked like achievements with him here. These things I want to share with him.

Life goes on and the number of days where I've been void of his company increases but the power of the love, the memories - they remain strong.

People ask if it's easier now but it isn't. It is certainly different to the horror and shock of the initial weeks. I feel like I'm still living for two yet with the strength of just one. I guess, more accurately, where I was part of a whole, I am now half. Being a half hurts. Being a half in a world which is so different to what it was before - I'm lost.

I cling on to God with everything that I am and He remains the only thing that brings purpose to my days and peace where everything is in turmoil. But faith doesn't mean an absence of pain. It doesn't mean all of this hurt will just disappear; It is far bigger than that.

I remain indebted to the family, friends and colleagues who have shown me so much love. I am grateful for the words they have encouraged me with even when they feel so helpless. I am grateful for the time they have given to me even when they're not sure what to do with it. I am grateful for the way they have tenderly cared for my breaking heart even though it hurts them to do so.

No the pain doesn't go away and it won't. There are all sorts of phrases about 'grief being the price you pay for loving someone', about it being 'better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all'. As easy as they are to say and not mean, I actually agree with them.

I truly am experiencing this deep, unquenchable agony because of the inextinguishable, lifechanging love that was (is) Ems and mine. I don't have the option of switching off such feelings - neither the pain, nor the love. And I have to ask whether I'd want to?

The truth is, I have to live with this pain. For with this pain comes the immense memory of the truest love two flawed human beings could have hoped to experience - not just memories of days or acts or words, but memories of feelings. Memories of the excitement, hope, comfort, joy that rises when you hear your loved one's name, see their car approaching, hear those 'sweet everythings'. The anticipation of seeing Ems still rises in me only to be quashed by the repeated realisation that he isn't coming. But would I choose to deny that repeated agony and with it lose the memory of the love? Not a chance.

There is loss because there was once something so beautiful in my posession.

There is pain because there was once such comfort.

There is grief because there was once great love.

The grief has overcome me just like the love did and there is no way to lose one and not the other.

Would I do it all again? Every time.

In giving everything you face losing everything but in losing everything, you seek to gain everything. And as this is true in love, so it is true in life. I'm still going to give everything.

Something to think about

I've just spent the evening with a group of friends from church. These friends were people Ems and I would regularly hang out with together on a Friday night (usually at our house). It is strange to spend time with them and not have Ems there. Everything is strange without Ems here.

We got onto the subject of the first cassette or CD we'd ever bought, the first video or DVD, etc, and I know Ems would have had plenty to say on the subject of music, his first love (before I came along!).

The subject flowed on to music and films in general and the film 'The Matrix' was brought up. I commented on the fact that I couldn't remember what happened at the end of the last film in the trilogy and one of the guys summed it up. What he said, unknowingly to him, has given me something to think about...

He said that at the end of the last film the lead female dies, gets resurrected, then dies again. This makes the lead male realise that he can now go out and save the rest of them, something he wouldn't have done when his focus was on saving her, but now he's got nothing to lose.

I'm certainly not the lead female in a film but I'm the leading character in my life, just as you are in yours.

I have nothing to lose. I have lost the person that was most dear to me.
My greatest fear in life has been realised. My greatest fear was losing Ems. I have lost him.

Like the Matrix, there is still so much I don't understand, and much I don't need to.
People may misunderstand me, which can be painful, but nothing can hurt me like the hurt I am already feeling.

Pain and grief are constant companions right now (thankfully so are grace and peace) and I'm under no illusion that I'm going to go out there and save the world. I can though, like you, choose to make a difference to those I can, when I can.

Believe me, I am not trying to say that my greatest fear being realised is a positive thing. I am living through every reason that I feared losing Ems and it is worse than I could ever have imagined. What I'm realising is, with Ems gone, there isn't anything I'm clinging on to. My life on earth isn't precious to me anymore.

I can give everything, and know that nothing can hit me harder than the loss and pain I already know.

'He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose' Jim Elliot (a man who gave his life for his faith)

[Memory #9 The "love songs" episode
Ems had countless CDs, mini disks, cassettes, etc. He was the music man. The number of people who've told me it was him who introduced them to new bands, styles, genres, etc of music, is unbelievable. Ems didn't mind what genre so long as the music had something to it. Music was his passion and he loved to share it with others. With all that music you'd think he'd have every eventuality covered.
February 14th, 2008. Our first Valentines day as a couple. I remember it clearly. The moments, the gifts, the food, the wonderful company, the excitement about everything ahead.
We'd had a nice meal and Ems said what he'd really like to do is chill out together to some love songs. "The only thing is..." he began to explain, "...I don't actually own any"!
I guess that was one style of music that had escaped him up to then. It's funny what true love awakens in you.
Needless to say he didn't become a Celine Dion man but the Beach Boys' 'I love you' album certainly got played from time to time and I remember him grinning while belting out Sting's "Every little thing she does is magic" one precious car journey home.]