Diminishing

Years ago and just a few months into my grieving I was crying on a girlfriend's shoulder telling her how awful it was that he was going to become less and less in my life, that I would forget him. That he would not be a part of each day. I was right, as I am about many bad things it seems. I remember that horror terrible feeling that was so overwhelming. I felt if I just said it over and over and hung on to her and cried it wouldn't happen it would somehow prevent the diminishing. At that time it was wrapped up in feelings that were laden with grief and longing and angst, a real anxiety and palpable panic that I would forget him totally, that he wouldn't matter or be in my life therefore that equals forgetting him.  It doesn't work that way, happily I never forgot, nor will I ever.  I'm sure of that now.

But no one can be in our lives physically forever. No one. It's a sad reality and a big part of the death anxiety. We just can't imagine it when we are happy and see a person who means everything to us each and every day. But they do diminish, everything diminishes. The way he looked, sounded, smelled, the things he said, the way he made me feel. It's all diminished right along with the acute grief and longing and angst.

Monday July 23rd is our wedding anniversary and if Terry had lived we would be married ----- years. I can't remember how many, it's in the mid 30's but I don't want to figure out the math for some reason. I don't want to concretely know how many years married it would have been on Monday. What anniversary would it be we'd be celebrating? This is what I meant back then clutching onto her. If he had not died I would automatically know, it would be an ever-knowing complete part of my daily consciousness. It is not anymore. What was once so important is not now because he is not here to celebrate it, because I no longer have a wedding anniversary to celebrate, because (and this is a new thought) I am no longer married. Rather it is just a day to mark something that once was and is no more. Cruel huh?  But as John Lennon sang  "that's reality".

Maybe it works this way, this grief thing. Maybe other things and people and happiness come into the space and life that your lost person once filled, and they fill up those sad places. Maybe all the sadness and grief was taking up the space and now that it isn't there 24-7 life rushes in instead. This displaces the need to do the math on anniversaries. It doesn't mean I'll forget him or I'll forget I was married to him. It doesn't mean I can't quickly calculate, acknowledge and grieve the day, it just means I don't have to if I don't wish to. Life replaces death, that whole circle life thing.