Grief is so weird

Grief is so weird ....

It has no boundaries and it has no consideration for anything going on in your life. It has the ability to make you feel incredibly strong for learning how to live with it, and then without warning it has the ability to bring you to your knees in utter pain and sorrow. I’ve said that the 2nd year has been the hardest so far without Donny, but what I didn’t share is how erratic the emotions are that have come with this part of my journey.

Don’t get me wrong, after losing him it was hard seeing pictures or videos that showed him laughing and in a full state of living, but it also brought solace and warmth. I found some small comfort in knowing he was just here with us and that if I missed him I had documented memories. I guess this might be due to being numb and in shock, how the first year you are trying to survive, trying to keep the rest of your family intact as to desperately prevent anymore casualties that might result from this one tragic event. That does make sense to me, that by year 2 the numbness has worn off, the blanket of grace that our friends and family surrounded and cloaked us in could not be permanent. Life has to move on, it’s human nature or it’s human survival (might be a better term), that keeps us going. But what I wasn’t warned about was how this year, a picture, a glimpse of his name,can send me down a spiral of sadness and emotions that I almost don’t know how to get out of. A song that starts to play on the radio and my fingers frantically try changing the station bc the tears are already forming from just a few key notes. I don’t know how to cherish those pictures anymore, I don’t know how to endure the stabbing pain that accompanies seeing his name, or hearing a story about him. I try so hard to have the answers for my kids, for Abby, even for my parents. I get it, I logically understand where Donny is and why he had to leave. I have made peace with it, and accepted it....or have I? I just don’t know anymore. What I do know is this is something I have never experienced in all my life. This kind of grief, this kind of heartache continues to surprise me, overwhelm me and I think it’s bc its considered permanent. A permanent state of sorrow tucked deep within a section of your heart, that pokes its head out randomly without warning. Like right now, I’m standing in the center of it, frozen and stuck, feeling it wash over me like a wave in the ocean. I dont know what the point of my post is today, I wasn’t planning on writing anything. But then I saw this picture, and my first thought was...he was here Jessica, he was here for so many years with you. Do you even remember those times...those photographed moments from growing up? Did I take too much for granted as a child, as a teenager and even as an adult? And while I’m racking my brain to try and remember what it felt like to be in that moment so many years ago, a small voice keeps repeating...he was here, he was real and he was your brother, and you loved him fiercely from the beginning. People use the term “ride or die” nowadays to describe a best friend or a significant other...and they think it distinguishes a close relationship from all the others. All I’m going to say to that is , your siblings are your ride or die, my brothers are and always will be my ride or die...Donny was my first ride or die. Siblings are the ones who unconditionally have your back, I believe even after death, they will always have your back. Oh and by the way. I’m not trying to stop that voice either, I’m not trying to quiet it...I want that voice to always remind me that he was here, he was real, and he was my brother...and he still is.