Grief, redux

I'm so tired this week. I'm also very tearful. The tiredness and weepiness are certainly related. I know I'm more likely to cry when I'm tired, but it's also true that I'm not sleeping well because I'm crying because I miss John so much.

Between losing the cat, dealing with Father's Day, and planning the babies' party, this week has been filled with stark reminders of John's absence. The impact of the loss of Dinner is pretty obvious. The last thing I needed was more loss in my life. Father's Day was something I'd been dreading and my coping mechanism turned out to be avoidance. My mom and stepdad arrived that day, and I focused on the joy of their arrival because I could not deal with the reality of John not being around. I didn't get my stepdad (or my bio dad) a card, didn't plan any special Father's Day meal, didn't even really acknowledge that it was a special day at all. I seriously didn't have it in me. I actually managed to forget that it was Father's Day at all, only remembering on Monday and then feeling somewhat bad that I didn't light a candle for John or write him a letter or anything. I think about and feel his absence all the time, but somehow I just couldn't talk about it on Sunday.

Planning the babies' party has been very emotional. I never thought that John wouldn't be here for their first birthday. I knew his days were numbered, but the twins' first birthday was my mental letting go date. He had to make it to that point. Of course, if he were still alive, I would have reset that date once the twins' birthday passed; then it would have been that he had to make it to our anniversary. But in any case, June 22 was my next date on the horizon, and I truly believed (at least until the last few weeks of his life) that John would be with us.

John was a wonderful father, as involved as a person with a terminal illness can be. He was at every middle-of-the-night feeding with me. He walked with fussy people and changed diapers. No one could make Madeleine smile or Riley laugh like John. At the same time, the months he experienced with the twins were hard ones. Really hard ones. In the past month, the twins have gotten so much more independent and their personalities have blossomed. The joys of parenting are starting to outweigh the burdens of those early months. I know that there will always be hard times, but there is a routine and steadiness to our days that is a comfort and pleasure. John never got to experience that. He got cheated out of so much. I'm grateful that he knew the twins at all, but so sad about all that he will not see.

I just miss him. I feel listless. Work is a drag. I'm tired and unmotivated.

I'm grieving. I know it's all normal, but that doesn't make it pleasant, and it doesn't make me miss John any less.