Shades of Horrid

I wrote some time ago to another lady trying to put down in words how you cope with multiple loss, special dates, basically the aftermath of this past year and have been reiterating this advice to myself over these last few days. Another friend lost her soulmate before Christmas and I feel her pain and was trying to think of how to explain to another the raw, heart ripping and crushing emotional disaster you go through.  I think the following is the best I can do.

Looking back at these particularly sad, not strong enough, try crippling moments I see that put into perspective that these are absolutely not the worst moments. These are the aftershocks, the wave-like reminders that you can see approach from the horizon and might have time to prepare for, they shouldn't engulf you and though they might annoy, in much the same way a healing wound itches when it heals, this reminds you that you are healing and not at risk of bleeding out.  Not sure how many metaphors I can get down here but in basic words you start rating your life on a scale.

The scientific name I have given this scale is 'Shades of Crap' (SoC) and when I think about the colour I rating them they come in shades of grey. 

For me, by far the worse colour on the SoC scale was finding out that my sons had died, each time this happened it was the black hole of black that literally sucked the light out of life.  Of course the other end of SoC is the colour of a winter sky in the UK, that day when the drizzle is so light but soaks you nonetheless, what my Grandfather calls 'lazy rain'.  

So now that we have the scale set up I can place any subsequent  events in a sliding fashion meaning that everything and anything that comes before, or after, this exact moment is never as black as the day my children died, therefore must rate somewhere else on the scale, no matter how much these events hurt me they are just a buzzing noise compared to the initial sonic boom, mushroom cloud, atomic fallout. 

I took Christmas a bit like that and will be taking the twins' birthdays the same way.  I have decided not to dwell on spending money and on how sad it is that I can't hug my sons on their birthday (that will not happen in this life), instead I have taken a fraction of what I would be spending on them and sponsoring a children through SOS Children's Villages in return I get thanks from a little child in Costa Rica who lives in an orphanage, for whatever reason.  I write to her, I can send her presents and most of all I get to meet her, she will (hopefully) smile at me and that will remind me of how important and precious life is and why it is absolutely worth living. So I will let you know how this goes when I fly out on my boys' Birthday, all going to plan this whole experience should not even make it onto the SoC scale......

I know I still get those days when I simply do not won't want to function but that damn sun is going to keep rising everyday and trying to resist the impossible does nothing but exhaust me.  I need that strength to deal with the devils that will be going round my head.  So 2012 is 'go easy on myself and let myself off the hook year'.

Oneday I will scrap the SoC scale and everything will be shades of blue. 

Sydney, Australia Nov 2011

 Australia Nov 2011

So to my friend: Time will march on yet all is not lost.  Believe. Above all, breathe