Three Years....and then some

The blank screen has been mocking me. I feel like I have a million words just aching to pour out of my fingers, but I'm just not sure where to start anymore. Even writing in a journal, pen to paper, writing with the freedom of knowing that no one else will read those words.... the words still don't come. Words used to be my solace, my way of coping, my outlet. And now? It's an emptiness. I want to write, but I don't know who I am writing for anymore. My thoughts are disjointed, and so are my sentences, and when I re-read what I've written, it falls flat and empty. And when I can't say what I want to say perfectly, I'm too embarrassed to post it. Heaven forbid I write something that is less than stellar. There aren't many things that I am good at... so the few things that I am relatively talented at, I'm pridefully snobbish about.

And perhaps therein lies the reason for my writing block. Maybe the flight of my Muse is nothing more than a much-needed dose of humility to remind me that I write to release, not to impress. Maybe I need to write without thinking, without wondering what people will think, and eventually I'll come back to where writing was healing, not hindering.


I don't know what to say that hasn't already been said. Another year has come and gone. Another milestone, another empty day. On the first of April, I started to post something on facebook about missing Emily. But I didn't.... because I wasn't sure if I really wanted to read the plethora of "thinking of you's", "I'm sorry's", or whatever else's people say. And I don't mean that in an ungrateful way... because the comments and notes from people who remembered meant the world to me, they really did. The problem was within my own self. I did some soul searching and realized that I was searching for something, ANYTHING, to fill the emptiness, and I was looking for sympathy. I would have found it on Facebook... but then I was more afraid that the consolation I thought I was searching for would instead make that emptiness all the more real. That instead of filling the ache, it would echo more resoundingly. And I'm not sure if I could have handled that. I feel like I am warring against myself- the self that wants to be reassured, comforted, and made a fuss over... and the self that is longing desperately to finally FORGET. Sometimes I hate myself for feeling that way, but I do. I'm mad, I'm angry, I'm sad, I'm lost, I'm lonely, I'm furious at her, and I'm mad at myself.


And that seems to be the cycle of my life right now. The simple fact of the matter is that I am 28 years old and have absolutely no freakin' idea of who I am. I go back to a line from my favorite movie, In Her Shoes- "without her, I don't make sense".


But I should make sense. I am more than my sister's sister. I am more than my parent's daughter. I am more than so-and so's friend, family, employee, or co-worker. I am those things, but not defined by those labels. The loss of one shouldn't make me lose my sense of self.

Losing Emily made me lose my balance. I used to think I lost my sense of self, but I'm realizing that I never really had the core sense of who I am to begin with. And I don't know where to find it.

I've been going to counseling again. And this time around, I'm actually seeing a licensed therapist. Nothing against counselors, but I think last time left me with more questions than answers. Or to put it bluntly- I was more screwed up than I thought and needed more than band-aid therapy. This is the "I'm going to ask you tough questions and tell you things that aren't necessarily nice to hear, and make you re-hash buried and unpleasant memories, make you feel lousy sometimes, and this isn't going to be butterflies, kittens and lady-bugs, but we are going to deal with this CRAP, and even though it doesn't seem like it now, you will get through this mess" kind of therapy. My therapist asks the hard questions, and doesn't let me get by with a non-answer. Sometimes I don't like her. But I respect her for not giving up on me. I think she won my everlasting respect when in answer to one of my typical self-depreciating humor jabs at myself about being beyond help, she said "Melissa, I like you, but get over yourself. If I thought you were beyond help, I wouldn't waste my time or yours." Talk about putting it in black and white terms. In some ways, I am very much a black or white thinker. Other times I like to think I try to see in color, but really most of the time I am a misplaced free-spirit who wants to see in color, but is too afraid to peek beyond the shades of black and white.

All that to say, she sees through my B.S. and I respect her, and also like her, for that.



I keep thinking that by now I should have moved on. From the outside, I have. I get up every morning, I work, I have friends, I laugh, I brush my teeth, bathe on a regular basis, and only occasionally catch myself having deep philosophical conversations with the cats... I function. I live. But it's that shadow that follows me that I can't quite shake that reminds me in some ways I'm still stuck in a rut. That shadow of Unfair. Sadness. Loss. Death. Reminders. Memories.

I know that death is a part of life. I know that bad things happen for inexplicable reasons. I know that my loss is on some levels a tragedy, and yet on other levels is nothing compared to what some people have suffered. I am not special or alone in my sorrow, but yet I'm still marked by that shadow of "One who has suffered". I'm a card-carrying member of the Grief Bites club, but I don't want the perks of membership.

What I want most is what I can't have....

.....the end of the story. To see how it all turns out in the end.