GRIEF, ONE YEAR PASSED.

JUNE 15, 2020

A full year without my friend has come and gone.

I’m not sure what I expected to feel, and obviously I know with grief to never anticipate any one type of emotion.

The actual day was not as hard as I thought it would go, so I feel that was a blessing. Now that it’s come and gone, I guess I just feel that empty feeling. Much like after all those major first milestones in the winter that came and went, and there wasn’t anything of much significance to fight against until the one year mark. Though, really in grief, there are always things to fight against regardless of important dates on a calendar. I remember how emotional I felt on Pancake Tuesday at work, all because my friend loved Pancake Tuesday. I wasn’t anticipating that grief, but walking into the office kitchen where they were making pancakes hit me so hard. I just spent the rest of the day trying not to cry at my desk. So, there’s always something, even if those “milestones” are not on our radar.

My emptiness is also met with the feelings of “now what?” I survived the year, so now what happens?

In talking with my small circle of friends that have been dealing with this loss as well, one who had lost her dad prior to our friend said “year two almost feels harder than year one”, and I totally get that. I think the two distinct reasons for that are, one the memories of that person become further away. Next year on my birthday I won’t have the memory of her here for my last birthday, this time next year it will be two years since I last spent my birthday with her. I understand the need to move on with life, but it is truly hard to feel like you have one foot in both worlds. The one where you are desperately holding onto that person and not wanting to leave them behind, and the other foot is in the present/future trying to find the new normal and a balance to healing.

The second reason, even without knowing it, the people around are you are expecting you to be ok. I mean it’s year two right? So, things should start getting back to normal. They should start seeing the signs of the person you were before all this happened come back. The thing is, you will never be the person you were before. You were someone before your loss, and now you are someone after that loss, and that’s completely ok. If you aren’t growing and changing from losing a loved one I’d be concerned by that.

I can’t begin to understand how this feels for the people around me, but anyone helping someone through grief I need you to know that person is not ever going to be the same. You, as their loved one, need to adapt. But, also know it’s ok if you can’t adapt and relationships fall apart. That’s life. People change, people grow apart. There doesn’t have to be hard feelings for that.

I’m starting to think year two is when the grief work really starts…

I think year one is just about surviving. Year two is when you start to answer those questions that have been floating through your head. Year two is when you start taking action, start facing some of the thoughts you’ve been ignoring.

Maybe year two is the start of the actual healing process…