Thursday, 05/26/16, 9:59am
Grief is hard.
Yesterday I did a lot of normal things. I switched off runs in the morning with my sister, got in a shower, attended RG's presentation on the Smithsonian Museums, ran some errands with TK, talked with another mom after the bus pick up, tried to get our passports taken care of with the whole fam, went to MNO (Mom's Night Out). And yet. The grief was there every step of the way. I grieved while talking about Adam with my sister since I hadn't seen her since before we went to Chicago. I grieved as I thought of Adam on the run, alone with my music and my thoughts. I grieved when I saw RG's teacher and she gave me a few hugs, asked about us, and offered her condolences. I grieved when the cashier at the grocery store asked how I was doing, and after my long pause, and "ok... ay", I felt the need to answer that we had a death in the family. I grieved when I didn't feel like I could go to MNO because I was feeling depressed. I grieved when a friend encouraged me to come, in whatever state. Then I grieved when I had to share a bit of Adam's story with my Uber driver (because driving was out of the question given my state of being and emotion). And I grieved with my fellow mom friends. With each of their hugs and their kind words of support and their listening to me talk about it. I keep needing to talk about it and share my grief with others.
I think grieving so openly yesterday made me seek the safety of home today. And being out there, doing normal stuff, I feel like I can't hide my grief so I share it. It took a lot out of me.
I skipped an exercise class with my sister this morning. Maybe it would have helped in some ways. But being around a lot of people all day again sounded exhausting. The idea of it made me feel anxious. I'll still get my exercise in since Audra is being kind enough to come over and watch TK while I go for a bike ride. But I've got to be around people later today and that's the goal. To make it to and through that. There might be some crying again with the people, hugs and condolences do that to me, and that's ok. I'm not expecting to not have that. But the goal is to get there with just the grief, and none of the anxiety and depression.
Having grief on top of a mental illness, specifically depression, is... I don't know what to call it. Let's just say I don't know how to navigate it yet.
The closest I came to a full-blown episode was Sunday morning in Virginia. It was the morning after the wedding and I didn't get enough sleep which I'm sure didn't set me up well. But I think I'd been keeping myself so busy that the depression hadn't had a chance to catch up with me.
I said something to Nasser, in my lowest point, that I wished it was me who'd been hit by the train. That terrified him because I meant it then. I do feel guilty sometimes for being here when Adam isn't. I feel guilty that I couldn't do more to help him. I should have been able to do more, coming from a place of sharing a stigmatized mental illness. And I know rationally that I couldn't. Oftentimes the worry was of making it worse.
I never shared my blog with him. I will always feel guilty about that because I wonder if it could have helped in any way. Of course it could very well have made things worse.
It doesn't help to think of the "what ifs" but they do come and go.
This morning I feel like it's unfair for me to be functioning so badly. What right do I have to take the grief so hard when I'm not the sister or brother or father or mother and I only knew him for less than 9 years? And I didn't support him as much in his illness while others did so much more?
But then I always felt this closeness in sharing a mental illness, even though everyone was always reminding me that "yeah but they're different". They are and they aren't. I suppose I'm much more high functioning than he was. But my illness does fall into the "chronic" mental illness category of never really being "in recovery". And I know what it's like to feel stigmatized, even if my mental illness is better accepted than his is. I know what it's like to have expectations of yourself that "you should be able to handle this better" without needing help. And I know what it's like to have foreign, extreme thoughts that frighten you to uncontrolled sobs.
Although we will never know exactly what happened on the tracks the night Adam was hit by that train, most of us agree that the mental illness contributed to his death. He wouldn't have been in that place at that time, perhaps if he had his judgement would have been different and he wouldn't have been crossing the tracks. I do blame the illness. I blame the mental healthcare system in our country for failing him.
I hope that someday we have a better scientific understanding of mental illness. I had hoped that day would come in Adam's lifetime but I suppose it wasn't to be. I hope that better treatments come and I hope that the people in our world become more compassionate and more empathetic and more accepting of people with mental illness.
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