This is a raw, mostly unedited post that just gets some thoughts that Facebook isn't the place for, and may be tired of seeing about losing My Best Person, Penny Starr; and a recent loss of someone I cherished, though we didn't spend lots of time together, and weren't close friends... I still really cherished Jordan Liddle.
I started 3 separate blog posts with the titles I have for this post... The Grief draft was started on 11/18/18 - almost a year ago. I was going to try and write about the death of my best friend, my person, my Penny.
I only got as far as 3 different but the same subject lines, a year ago. That in and of itself speaks volumes in that I wasn't ready to put words to feelings. I don't know that I'm ready now, but have the irresistible urge to write.
I'm not over anything, not really. Grief is not anything you get over, as Nora McInerny said, it is chronic. I believe I understand that now. And grief, unfortunately is a club that, until you experience it for yourself, you just can't really understand it, or empathize with. Yes, you can sympathize, and you can try and imagine... but sadly, we have to go through it before we really get it.
You can move through it as time moves forward. But, as a recent Ted Talk I watched stated - we can move forward, but no one who has lost someone, at least, I don't think, no one wants to move on without the person they lost. We'll move forward with them.
Another really great article by John Pavlovitz, spoke about the person we were when we were with that person, that part of us that dies with the person.
Death of our loved ones is something you learn to live around. It doesn't go away, it doesn't hurt less. It changes... it becomes less sharp, less intense... perhaps? And everyone is going to experience it differently for a different length of time. For a long time all I could think was, "I miss you. I'm so sad. I'm so so so sad. Penny, I miss you so much. I'm so sad. I'm so so so sad. I'm glad you're out of pain, but this isn't about you anymore (she'd laugh), it's all about me, and I'm so sad." I couldn't think of anything outside the overwhelming pain of "no more." The finality of no more memories she and I would create.
If I think that thought for more than a passing moment, I start to cry again.
I felt like I belonged with Penny. I felt completely accepted and loved by her when I was with her, and that was an immediate feeling from the time I met her. I don't feel like that with anyone else except my parents and siblings. I don't know how else to say it. Under most circumstances, for the first 45 years of my life, I would feel like I don't belong, that I'm just tolerated. When I ask myself if that is really true, I know the answer is no... those feelings are not reality. And yet, that has been my normal for so many years, changing that subconscious (often unconscious) tape will take some serious focus.
It's a little over a year later (she died on September 3, 2018) and I'm still missing her so very much. I'm still generally sad, all the time. But the sadness isn't just about Penny (and the other deaths over the last 13 months, which I'll get to). The sadness is just me. Penny helped me keep the anxiety and sad at bay... she helped me in ways I'm sure she wasn't even aware of... I hide it extremely well to most people. I understand that it is depression - and I had a counselor once tell me I was on the bi-polar spectrum and suggested drugs - but I looked up the drugs she'd suggested and they were some heavy duty (like schizophrenia heavy) chemicals, and whether it is right or wrong, and by no means am I judging anyone who takes drugs for depression, I just don't want to take them for me. (When I read the side effects can be suicidal thoughts... I don't think having a side effect that is worse than the depression itself is healthy, call me crazy...)
I believe that we are purposefully created as we are by God and we struggle so we can be a help to others because we are facing, or have faced, the same challenges, hurts etc. in our own lives. That said, no, I don't think abuse and trauma humans inflict on one another is God's plan - that is evil and not of God. Reading The Shack and seeing the movie (this Wisdom scene, especially) helped me understand suffering, grace and love just a little.
I think, looking back over history and the amount of hurt souls who were incredible artists who created music, art, the written word, and dance for the rest of us because they were just trying to self-soothe, self-medicate and express their pain through personal, often painful art... well, had they been on medication we would have missed out on their talent. But that isn't the point of why I'm writing.
Ha, maybe I think I have something extraordinary to offer the world and don't want it stifled. Is that arrogant or hopeful?
I'm able to finally get around to writing about this pain of loss, weirdly, because of another death; last Saturday, a friend of mine from college took his life. In the days before his letter to us all was publicly posted on Facebook, some of our college theatre group came together and shared how we all were absolutely gutted. Shocked. Devastated. Dumbfounded and in so much guilt and pain I suspect because we felt and believed that we didn't do enough. We didn't take advantage of those 'nudges' we all feel to reach out to our people when we think of them... one friend posted that this was a Friendship Test and she'd failed. The depth of our feelings after hearing about Jordan, well, really, words fail.
After reading his letter to us, many of our questions are answered, our guilt is almost (?) gone - for in the end Jordan was still a good guy and told us there was nothing we could have done, or said. He'd been living in hell for over 10 years and had tried everything, but just couldn't live with the pain and hopelessness and the complete lack of joy and light anymore. Again, his death isn't about us, its about him - and I believe he is safe, and loved, and at peace. Like so many 'funny people' in the world, he was using humor to mask his profound pain.
Our group knew him in college, before life had had its way with him. We remember him mostly from those days... and while we knew he'd had a tragic accident that caused the death of someone in his care and that had affected him deeply - he wasn't willing to fully reveal the depth of the agony he was living in. A couple years after this accident, we had a reunion of the cast and crew of one of our shows, and I hadn't seen him IRL since college - of course we were friends on facebook - but to hang out with him and our college friends was such a joy. I think, with us, in the life he lived before the accident, he was his old Jordan self again... he was able to forget for a little while and be the carefree all-is-funny-or-to-be-made-fun-of hysterical guy again. I saw and connected with him (staying at his apartment) a couple years ago, and felt that undercurrent of isolation. I could feel the change in him much more than when I'd seen him in 2010 - my heart hurt, but I wasn't able to take a day just to hang out with him. I don't think anything would be different today if I'd been able to spend more time, but I still wish things a couple years ago could have been different.
Well, his death has kind of sent me over the edge of grief. I've been crying a lot, and relying on Facebook posts from our mutual friends to help make sense of this and process this loss. And that has helped, actually... having the Facebook connection to help all of us who are spread across the country, to share in our profound sadness and grief over the loss of our friend.
I've been saying for a long time I want to be in relationship and connect with people... I want more space and margin in my world so I can be there for my friends and family, and also so they can be there for me - in that I am making time to be with them. Those friends and family who are healing and loving, and help me maintain my hope and optimism. I firmly believe our purpose (or one of our purposes) in life is to ease one another's pain and burdens in the ways we can, using our gifts and natural abilities. I know singing and bringing song and harmony to others (whether in performance or in rehearsal and practice) is my blessing, my gift to share. I don't think I've used it as much as God wants me to, and that's fear holding me back. But that's another blog post.
This will be published on the 15th of March ~ long after I started it. We're in the middle of the Corona Virus Pandemic (so declared on 11th of March, 2020) and to say it's an interesting time is an understatement.
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