Writing

Last week as I was trying to fall asleep I had a perfect memory of Jonah.  The kind of memory that I have often hoped for.  A memory where I see Jonah fluidly, instead of as a jumble of frozen moments and fractured images.  I closed my eyes and I saw him...climbing up on a chair, wearing his red and black moose shirt and denim overalls, waiting for a doctor to arrive.  He moved around the room opening drawers, and checking cupboards, and for a moment I felt the physical sensation of being his mother again.

It was so vivid and instantly shattering.  It made me angry instead of whole.  It brought me back to the pain that I have tried to set aside, or subdue, or maybe repress.

Tears began to fill the crease between my pillow and cheek.  My shoulders shuddered with each sob.  And then things fell apart.  My strength disappeared and I tumbled into a free-flowing question-filled rant about life.  Here are some of the highlights:

"Why is life so hard?"
"Why can't we just get a break?"
"Why do other people get to just have healthy babies whenever they want?"
"Haven't we experienced enough heartache?"
"Why did Jonah have to die?"
"Why does insurance dictate our life?

Followed by...

"I'm done with this"
"I hate this"
"I can't take it anymore"
"I'm so angry"

Poor Jordan didn't know what to make of me.  Our day had been normal and productive.  Our evening was pleasant and ordinary.  There were no signs of an imminent breakdown.  And suddenly he was at ground zero.  Ground zero looks like me angrily throwing snot-filled tissues across the room while I ask incoherent questions and sob uncontrollably.  What's a boy to do?

What are any of us supposed to do when the world feels overwhelming?

I felt a little crazy that night, and in the morning I wondered why my reaction was so intense.

Obviously I'm still grieving.  Even when everything around me seems to move on, the most important parts of me are still with Jonah.  Life is still hard.  Jordan and I are dealing with incredibly difficult challenges and sometimes optimism and faith and hope seem like a poor substitute for a full-blown cathartic breakdown. 

It feels unnatural to discuss topics like death, and grief, and infertility, while you talk about your weekend at work, or stumble on a friend at the grocery store.  It becomes harder with each passing day.

I haven't been allowing myself to grieve like I used to.  I'm keeping it to myself, and that's not working.  I need to write.  I stopped writing on this blog because I thought I was past the pain, and ready to move forward.  But apparently I'm not.  I'm still knee deep in the struggle. 

I have also stopped writing out of fear.  What if people are tired of my breakdowns?  What if I get stuck in the past, and can't move on?  What if it is too personal?  What if more heartache and disappointment is ahead?

I have to remind myself that I started this blog with a promise to myself: to be truthful, to be authentic, and to write it for no one but myself.  So I will try to write again, for Jordan's sake, and most importantly my own.


There is something about the process of writing— perhaps because it usually takes place in the privacy of one’s own room— that allows and indeed encourages the expression of thoughts one would never say aloud.

—	Elizabeth Forsythe Hailey, A Woman of Independent Means