I Haven't The Vernacular.

Death is strange. People deal with it in different ways, depending on their culture, their upbringing, their background, their emotional state, their closeness with the person who passed. In some cultures, it is seen as unacceptable and disrespectful if one does not weep at a funeral. In a lot of Western cultures, showing that kind of emotion is frowned upon, even at a funeral.

The five stages of grief and mourning are as follows:

• Denial (This can't be...)
• Anger (This is so unfair...)
• Bargaining (I would do anything to bring them back...)
• Depression (I don't want to go on without them...)
• Acceptance

Not every one goes through all of these stages, and they are in no way cut and dry. Mourning is a process, and what takes some people years to get through, it may take another only a few months to be able to accept a passing, and move on.

The loss of a loved one is the furthest thing from easy that exists. It is probably one of the hardest things that any one person has to endure. And what sucks is that we all have to go through it, at one time or another.   Personally, I've had to endure my fair share of deaths. For some reason, every year someone close to me passes away. Last year, it was a friend of mine, and one of my grandpa's foster children that I had known since he was a baby. The year before that was my great-grandmother on my father's side.

This year, it was my Uncle Terence.

You've probably heard the saying "there aren't words to describe how I'm feeling right now" more than once in your life, but even that falls flat on my tongue. At 2:38 AM on Sunday, my mom called to tell me that Uncle T wasn't doing very well, but I wasn't able to take her call. I got back to her at 2:58, and he seemed to be doing a little better. Nonetheless, I had a bad feeling, and ended up staying awake until a little after six. Around 7:40 AM on Sunday, my mom called to tell me that my uncle had passed from complications regarding a pulmonary embolism, that his heart had stopped, and that they were going to pray for the next three hours, as per his request. 

I got off the phone, unable to listen to the tears choking up my mom's throat. I called my best friend and told her what had happened. Then I called my girlfriend, relayed the message to her, and then was silent for the next fifteen minutes, unable to think of anything else to say, let alone say anything at all. I told her to go back to sleep, and we hung up.

I was alone, unless you count my cat- who was very concerned as to why I was so upset, and had curled up next to me on the couch.

So I decided to take a bath. I think I might have gone into some weird shock-amnesia thing, because the next thing I knew, I was in the bath, but the water had gone cold and it was almost an hour later. And my legs were shaved. Weird. I crawled out, and got back on the couch, deciding to watch the rest of the season of Game Of Thrones. At some point I fell asleep. When I woke up, my phone was ringing, and it was Tyler Jo calling to make sure I was okay. I assured her I was.
I had had a dream about my uncle.

He came to me in a dream, after getting off the phone with mom yesterday. In my dream, he had passed, but cane back to talk to us. He knew it was time, and was happy and laughing. He was completely okay with passing, and was trying to console us. He told me I have to learn to fish, because I promised I would do that when he got better. He told me how much he loved me and was proud of me, and that I had to be strong. I know it was him saying goodbye. This had happened to me twice before- once after my Grandma Rose had died, and once when my friend Rachel had. He seemed so happy and calm. Everyone was there. I didn't hear anything that he said to anyone else, because I woke up.

When I woke up, I thought that had really happened. When I realized it hadn't, I was sad all over again. I couldn't speak. A friend of mine came over, and got me out of the house, and watched Shark Week. 

I am still in shock. I don't know how to feel, so I am just not feeling. I'm staying at my Auntie's house with my family, and spending time with them helps more than anything else ever could. My nieces and nephews are the light of all of our lives, and Bug's birthday was yesterday. She turned four. It was the first family get together without Papi- the day after he passed. 

This is far from easy, and far from over. The family service is tomorrow, and the general service is on Thursday. I feel like I'm in the Twilight Zone. I think that when things calm down, I will be able to really process my feelings and emotions. That kind of scares me. 

I miss you, Uncle T, and I can't wait to see you soon.

Emotions, And Why I Hate Them.

Sometimes, I don’t know what to think. Or feel. Or Do. Since I’ve gotten sober, I have a lot of feeeeeeelings. Happiness, anger, sadness, rage, elation, depression, anxiety, frustration, confusion, fear… the list goes on and on. I don’t like these feelings. They are annoying, and get in the way of my every day life. I have things to do. I have two jobs. I am a sexual assault and domestic violence advocacy counselor with two paid internships. On top of that, I am also a waitress. I have a busy life. Don’t you understand that I CAN’T CRY OR BE UPSET RIGHT NOW, I AM AT WORK AND HAVE SHIT TO DO!

If I feel like it.

Okay. Calm down. I have to remind myself to let myself have feelings. That it is okay to cry. Because that is something that I don’t do. I haven't cried (really cried, like more than tearing up, more than one or two tears, like sobbing shaking curl up in a ball and hit things cried) in an exceptionally long time. Okay, I cried when D and I broke up, I’ll give you that. I cried for about a week straight. That kid made me cry a lot. But since around April 16^th, I haven’t been able to cry. This, I think, is unhealthy.

This is the dumbest thing I've ever read.

 I have also not allowed myself to get really angry. I used to get angry all the time. My anger encompassed my whole being. I would freak out on just about anyone, at any time, for anything. I hated everyone, and had no problem with letting you in on that secret. When I would drink or use, I looked for reasons to pick a fight. If I’m at a bar and a guy grabs my ass, I’ll cold cock him across the head. You yell at me from your car, I’ll scream obscenities your way and try and chase you down. I also might throw things at your car, and if I find it later, I might key it. If you looked at me funny, I would probably start yelling at you, saying something cute

like, “WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU LOOKING AT, ASSHOLE??” Yeah. I was that girl. 

Now, I don’t really get angry. I get small flashes of it, and then it goes away. I would chalk this up to serenity… except for I can feel it under my skin, boiling. I don’t know how to confront people any more. I don’t know what to do with my feelings of frustration or humiliation or resentment towards people. I just walk away from fights now, and beat myself up for it later. This is also unhealthy.

This is what my brain looks like. 

The one feeling that I am really good at is happiness. Well, it looks like I am, anyway. I am really good at my “customer service” persona- the one that I use with patrons at the restaurant I work at, or with my clients. This is because I don’t want to bother anyone. I know that sounds ridiculous, but I feel like if I unload on someone, they’re going to either A)think I’m a freak B)feel obligated to “help” me, when I don’t feel like I need help at all, just someone to listen, or C)get irritated with me. I don’t know why I feel like I am such a burden on people, but I do. I feel like I have such a sad story at this time in my life, and I don’t want to bring others down with me. So I suck it up, put on a smile, and continue with my day.

SMILE WITH YOUR WHOLE FACE.

 

So, I have come to the conclusion that I am a robot when it comes to my own feelings. Give me your problem, and I will either fix it, or get you through it. When faced with my own, I become a fish out of water. I don’t know how to talk if I’m not drunk or on something. I don’t know how to express myself, unless it’s through art- and then no one knows what I’m trying to say anyway. So. What should I do? Go to therapy. Talk to my sponsor. Talk to other women in the program. Talk to my girlfriend. Talk to SOMEONE. Maybe that will work.

Or maybe I will become the first BIONIC WOMAN!
 

I SHALL OVERCOME EMOTIONS!! FOREVER!!!

PS: Sorry this post isn't very funny, I'm having a hard time being funny lately. The next one will be better, promise.

Two to Four Weeks.

If you have seen me lately, and I seem to be acting strangely, or have talked about a family emergency, or have just not talked at all, here's what's up in a nutshell. Among other things.

Oh no, how did I get into this shell? Bugger!

Usually I can talk about the toughest things with some kind of humor or mirth, but this is one thing that I can’t. I’m only going to say this once, and I apologize for my profanity, but cancer fucking sucks. Cancer is the worst kind of hell. Really. Cancer takes everything from you without telling you and then sets up shop in your body, and begins eating anything and everything that it finds. It doesn’t pay rent or utilities. You or your loved ones end up paying tens of thousands of dollars trying to get rid of the bastard. If you’re one of the unlucky ones, you end up losing your hair, all of your weight, you turn grey, yellow, blue- the rainbow of sickness. Since the cancer is attacking every part of you that it can get its grubby little hands on, your body isn’t paying attention to other things trying to kill it, and even a common cold could end up killing you in less than a day.

I try and talk about this as matter-of-factly as I can. In all reality, cancer scares the shit out of me. My Uncle Terence was diagnosed with stage 4 terminal prostate cancer about three years ago. He was told he had 9-12 months to live, initially. Then it was 12-24, then a year, and now, they told us last week that he has 2-4 weeks. 

Probably the cutest picture depicting how much I hate cancer.

It’s hard for me to not get upset at every turn. I hear people make flippant comments, talking about how hard their lives are because of this or that silly thing. I hear “I hate my life” so often it makes me want to slap someone across the face.

At least they get to live, I think to myself. At least they haven’t been watching someone they love barely be able to move because of the pain. Someone who helped raise me, who taught me how to ski, who protected me from all twelve of my older cousins, accepted me into his home no matter what shape I was in, and who was there for me for my entire life, die in the most slow and painful way possible. At least they have a future. 

First World Problems, bitches.

My uncle is a pastor. His wife, my mom’s older sister Sherry, is also a pastor. Their love is the kind of love that people strive for all of their lives. My cousins Nadine, Eric, and Andrew are their kids. Bella, Ethan, and Anna are their grandkids. They have 11 nephews and 2 nieces, including me, with 6 grand-nieces and nephews- and all of this is only on my mom’s side. I’m trying to give you an idea of all of the people this is affecting- that this isn’t just one person getting cancer, but an entire community. There isn’t an hour that goes by while I am at work, at home, sleeping, eating, whatever, that my family doesn’t cross my mind. I have to repeatedly stop myself from going down the dark spiral of “Why him? Why us? Why do bad things happen to such good people? I don’t care if God has a plan, it’s obviously a stupid freaking plan, so he should probably figure that shit out and do some editing.” I have to not let myself get angry.

When my mom called to tell me last week that Uncle Terence’s doctors had told him that he might not make it long enough to go on our family trip back home to Hawai'i in September, I almost fell. Since then, it’s all I can think about. What happens next? We all knew this was coming, but prayed for a miracle. I don’t think I've ever prayed so hard in my life as I did for my uncle. But here we are, and it’s down to the wire. I’m not ashamed to admit, I’m scared. Scared for him, for me, for my auntie, my cousins. I just can’t imagine my life without him in it. Even as I’m writing this, I start to tear up just thinking about it. I am going down to visit them in Gig Harbor this Saturday, and I’m terrified that he won’t make it until then. I’m terrified that I won’t know what to say when I see him.

The most important people in my life are in this picture. Except Soliah. I don't know where he was. Oh, and my cat.

So much of this reads like a rant, but this is about as logical as my brain will get at this point. I have to remind myself to put my faith in my Higher Power, and that nothing I can do will change that plan-but it’s hard. It is so hard.

So I guess I’ll just keep doing what I’ve been doing- working, reading, sleeping, talking- and know that everything in the end will turn out the way it’s supposed to. Even if it’s not my way. 

I love you.