I Had No Clue

I was warned about how difficult this first year would be. I was warned about how difficult holidays and anniversaries of special dates would be. I still had no clue. That's precisely what is so upending about this grief.

This beautiful photo from Ray, the following week you no longer went outside.

When we were first told that you had Stage 4 colorectal cancer, I went immediately into shock and anticipatory grief. At first I reached out to the therapists in oncology but found I would meet with the counselor and then cry for three days straight. That was not working for me. Fortunately I ran into Melissa Hersh, a former colleague who had become a leadership coach. We began working together and from that I was able to move from week to week, day to day, fully love you, reach out to folks that could support us, embrace the now, meditate, exercise, walk, ski, travel, garden, write, create the tiny paintings, run interference on treatments, side effects, and the disarming impacts of cancer, prepare for your death, and give us both the gift of your dying enfolded in love at home—despite during the early days of Covid.

Three months before your cancer diagnosis.

Working with Ezra from hospice also began preparing me for your leaving. Though at the time you weren't sure why we needed hospice, Ezra was one of the many reasons we did. He and the hospice team held my hand and taught me how to care for you, giving us the gifts of your last Covid conversations which we recorded. Those last few months as I witnessed you rapidly deteriorating, I was grieving for what you were going through, for how our life had changed, for your loving acceptance, and for what I began to realize we would never have—the dreams, the plans, and the time spent together as grandparents. In your final week, when the constant care-taking and exhaustion set-in, as you took to bed and could no longer talk, when you began to develop bed sores and I felt I couldn't properly care for you—I couldn't stop the bedsores, I tired from lack of sleep, I was anxious about getting the meds correct, I realized we couldn't turn cancer around—then I wished for you to find peace. I'd whisper to you what I knew about God and admit that even with that belief, I still had no clue about an afterlife. I did know that you would see light—and you did—many lights though at first we were both confused because only you could see them.

How could I not fall in love with your silliness and joy in living?

This morning, I woke up just wanting to die and join you. It's pretty selfish of me because there is Tegan, Pat, Em, Satori, Enzo, our families, all of my friends that have been holding me up, and of course Addie, Bella and Charlie (what would happen to them?). I'd never wish this grief on anyone. However today marks two things: five months since you died in my arms and 16 years since you first leapt over all our friends to sit besides me at Cathy's birthday party. I wrote in my diary then "I was sitting on the floor by Jim Oberlin when Jim Reda returned home his eyes visibly widened when he saw me and maybe vice versa. We talked and then I mentioned his collections (cameras and calculators). We went to look. Very soon it was time to go. He seemed not to want me to..." That was the start of our whirlwind romance and in a month we would be engaged.

Our wedding rehearsal

I do know, honey, that I am getting stronger. Lately I've begun to realize that for the past 4 months, I have been in shock—one of the surprises of grief—we both knew I'd grieve, but again I had no idea what this grief would be like. At first I couldn't even leave the house, feed myself, or sleep. Since then I've come so far with so much help from those who love us. My grief counselor from hospice, Ally, says that the shock protects us from what is too difficult for the mind to process all at once. I believe her. She gives me hope.

Through our love, we gave fully of ourselves to others. This is during the Governor's Institute for Teens

Now I can see my mind struggling to put together the world again. There are so many questions. I see at the same time the handsome, fit, energetic you—more fit then most men of our age we knew—and then you when cancer fully consumed you, and I just simply do not understand why. In the same breath, I don't understand why when we both finally found the deepest, truest of loves, and that deep, abiding joy allowed us to carry that love outward to others, why was that taken away? Will I ever be strong enough or find the joy to once again give to those around me? On top of it all, damn Covid keeps me isolated much of the time and unable to receive hugs, inside company, and deep conversations full of embraces—and I'm an extravert. This sucks. It's incredibly lonely. It's painful. Why now when everything I read about grief talks about the importance of surrounding oneself with others? At my worse, and I know this is crazy but so is everything about grief, I feel like I'm being punished for something that I do not comprehend. I lose faith in life.

The last picture Cathy took of us before you died.

Honey, I miss you so much. You are always in my heart and my mind. As we always promised I love you forever plus seventy and around again.

And this, I found on your desktop. I miss this. I mss you.