She sat on the couch day after day. Wondering how she got here.
She would stare at the ceiling or floor. Moving from sitting to lying.
Days turned to weeks and weeks to months.
She had no idea that grief would feel like this.
Like nothing and everything.
She doesn’t know who she is or how to act.
Her world was upside down.
Making her nauseous and offering a drab view.
She does not recall ever seeing anyone go through this.
Or had she?
Did they make it look easy by hiding it well?
Did they cover it with busyness?
Does the busy help with grief or just push it down?
Hard to say.
She knew her grief was controlling and had her feeling in ways that cannot be described.
Her pain hurt worse than labor. At least then a baby comes after. There is no joy and no after with this pain.
She stares and stares. Hours go by.
Most of the time she has no idea what time it is.
She is lost in the darkness even during the day.
Sometimes she could run an errand or grab lunch with a friend.
But it was a temporary feel-good or she faked feeling ok.
She never wanted to be a burden to anyone but sometimes the tears would just fall.
Some friends understood some disappeared.
She got it. It was a lot.
After a while, her grief was her own.
They stared at each other.
They hung out side by side.
She couldn’t shake it.
So the couch and floor had become her only friends.
And maybe wine and the TV.
But mostly any resting place to support her stares.
She had to accept.
Let it be.
Be in the here and now.
Because she had no other way out.