A Deathiversary at The Chapel Of Our Lady of Good Voyage

Last week my acupuncturist asked "do you feel like you're still processing your brother's death?"

She was probably trying to sound nonchalant, but actually sounded surprised that this could possibly still be an issue in my life. An entire year later.

"I go to therapy," I said. "I mean, I think I've talked it out. But yeah, on some level, it was a big trauma, and it is stored in me."

"Like in your cells?" she asked.

"Yeah, that's one way to describe it. But also because a year later, my brother is still gone. My parents will never be the same again."

She is a parent. All parents think about losing a child when I talk about my brother. I watch their faces change every time as they try to imagine it. She paused "well, I suppose that is true." She is the most stoic of them all.

"I am the youngest child now, the baby of the family. There are so many things. My parents never pressured me to get married or have kids, figuring I'd be traveling all over the world and doing crazy things, and suddenly, I'm it. I'm it for grand-kids."

"It doesn't seem like it's helpful for them to put pressure on you to have kids considering the stress of everything else."

"Yeah. But the point is that things are irrevocably different. That doesn't go away. Not after a year. Maybe not ever. He doesn't get to come back. I am the baby of the family. Now."

The one-year anniversary of my brother's death was two days ago and the idea that anything could be like how it was before is the most foreign, insane idea to me. Sure, I no longer have panic attacks. But a few nights ago when I got a series of 4am texts, I bolted upright, worried someone else in my family had died. The trauma of finding out my brother shot himself as I woke up out of sleep is stored somewhere deep in my brain. I don't know how long it will be before I stop jumping when I get a text in my sleep, but it's definitely going to have to be more than a year. And it will probably be even longer before I'm willing to turn the sound off and just get some rest already.

Things like that aren't rational. They can't be talked out of you. They're traumas. The modern American myth that whatever doesn't kill you makes you stronger seems so absurd to me. I am alive. I am not stronger. I just am. Still here. Differently than before.

This mirrors the collective consciousness. Did 9/11 make us stronger? Kennedy or MLK getting shot? No.

Once you can't be sure of things you took for granted or held dear, it is easy to feel like there isn't much to hold on to.

In some religious traditions that might be the path to spiritual enlightenment, but I bet a lot of people have felt that way and didn't reach nirvana. I bet a lot of people felt that way and just call it being scared.

I think people want to hear that I've bounced back. That terrible things happen, but we overcome and we thrive and Not To Worry! If This Happens To You, You'll Be OK.

But it's all messier than that. And you probably won't be OK.

I'm sorry to tell you this. But you won't be OK. You are not supposed to be OK. It isn't supposed to make you stronger. That is not why it happened.

I tried. I really tried hard to be the girl this didn't happen to. I wanted it to roll off my back. I wanted it to all be a blip, a moment that ended, and I moved past. No big deal. I've got this. I wanted to still be funny, and fun, and happy and lighthearted and smart and successful. And I have had to cope with being none of those things for very long periods at a time. I listened as people told me they didn't want to hear about my brother one more time, and all I could think was me either. I don't want to talk about him One More Time. I wanted to go back to who I was. Desperately. Perhaps selfishly. But I couldn't. On top of losing my brother, I had to grieve losing my old self too. I watched myself become a crazy person. And I cried, because I couldn't make her leave.

And a year? A year sounds like nothing to me now. A year is barely enough time to begin to grapple with it and feel a little bit whole again. I think people who have experienced some version of this know that. But most people (thank goodness) do not. They have never had to find out. And I hope they never do.

My acupuncturist is an amazing woman and a fantastic healer. And she thought this should be all over for me. And a lot of people think that. I wanted to think that. Probably more than anyone. But grief doesn't come with an expiration date 

This is not a video game. The funeral was not a restart. My brother didn't jump back into his life. And I didn't get to pick up where we left off. Because there isn't anything to pick up. I am standing at an empty basketball court, wondering if I still know how to play. He didn't die for a good reason. I can't justify it. It wasn't meant to be. It didn't have to be. But it is.

Ten years will not change that, let alone one. Though eventually, I suppose, standing there, left holding the ball will feel like normal. Maybe not good. But normal. But until then, that's why it is so hard. You can lose yourself in it.

Grief means you don't get to be awesome for a while. You don't get to be the best version of yourself. You will probably lose a lot of the things you love, because it is just too hard to hold on to them. And a lot of people won't understand. And you will feel sad about that too. And yes, there will be moments where you feel an unbelievable, immense gratitude for the amazing people who are still in your life. You will be humbled by their generosity and light and superhero powers. But, you will have more questions than answers. You will see other people going to jobs and having fun and you will watch, knowing that one day you just woke up and couldn't do those things anymore. Not like you used to. And you will tell yourself it's not forever. But it will feel like forever. It will feel like the longest forever you have ever imagined. And yes, of course it gets better, but you don't get to go back to Before. You live in After now. And those universes are not connected. They are not connected at all, which is the most confusing part. Because in theory, you are supposed to be the same person. Or at least everyone expects you to act like it.

And somehow, you just simply are not.

That is putting on the show of your life. 

And I'm not saying all of this because life-after-death is total shit and not worth it. I'm saying all this because once you stop trying to make things be exactly like they were before, maybe you can learn how to live again with them as they are.

Yesterday was the beginning of my new year. And last night was the best I've slept in 12 months.

There was no big moment between yesterday and today. I think it was just knowing that the worst part is over. I made it through the deathiversary. The end of an enforced sabbatical. A walking out of prison into harsh sunlight. Seeing a rescue ship from the edges of an island I desperately swam to in a bad storm, but desperately wanted to leave ever since I realized I don't know how to open a coconut anyway...

This is a new year.

All of these questions are coming up: who would I be if I could choose again to be anyone in the world? If I had the energy and the fortitude and the inspiration to follow a dream: what dream would it be?

(Am I still capable of dreaming?)

It is terrifying to realize that once again, I have no freaking clue. My thirties would have probably been confusing enough without all this.

But it feels like it's time to find out. It is time to begin again. So, someone rig me up a boat. Because I'm ready.

(ish)

Namaste.