I have survived another day, if you call it surviving.
Each day is not getting easier. I am not learning to live with my pain. I am not learning to live in a world WITHOUT My ASHLEY. I do not know how someone can learn to live without their Daughter, Their Son, Their CHILD. I Will NEVER be able to function like a normal human being again. Not Without My Daughter Here. It is just not going to happen.
So, you saw me smile in a picture. It made you happy to see me smile. But what you don’t know, is that it took a Long Island Ice Tea to help me smile that phony smile. So, Unless you want me to become an Alcoholic, my smiles will be rare. Sometimes I can muster up a phony smile. I fight the pull my lips make to move downward. They shake ever so lightly in the opposite direction as I am pulling them upward to form a smile. But it is not real, not genuine. That is something I have learned to do, Put on a phony smile, laugh a phony laugh. I have gotten good at that.
Last night we went out with some friends a “See You Later” to a friend who is moving away. When we got to where we were meeting them, I was doing everything I could to hold the tears back. But they were coming and I couldn’t stop them, so I went to the bathroom to let them flow and to wipe the tears from my eyes. I didn’t want to ruin the evening.
The restaurant we were at, was the one we went to the last time we were out with family & Friends with Ashley. It was hard being there. After grabbing some tissue, I turned to walk out of the stall and I could see Ashley standing there washing her hands and talking to me. I don’t mean really see her, I mean like a vivid memory. That happens a lot, these vivid memories. It happens almost everywhere I go, with everything I do. That is because Ashley Was almost always with me. So, you are thinking, that is great, a memory of Ashley. But it is not great because it is a memory. I don’t want memories of my daughter. I WANT MY DAUGHTER, HERE, WITH ME.
So, I had to compose myself and stop the tears. I had to put myself in pretend mode. Pretend mode is where I convince myself that I am out with friends and Ashley is at home. Home with Jake, watching TV, Playing a Game. Just home. I do that a lot to try to get through a moment without completely losing my mind. I did it last night so that I didn’t ruin the evening for our Amazing Friend. But then that time ends and it is back to reality. Back to the fact that Ashley is not really at home waiting for me to come home. Back to the reality that MY ASHLEY IS GONE & All I WANT IS HER BACK HERE WITH ME.
Everyone wants me to find a way to move forward without My Ashley. Talk to someone. Talk to people who have gone through what I have gone through. People who understand. UNDERSTAND? Who the Hell Can UNDERSTAND, what I, Me, the person actually going through it, doesn't even understand. I don’t understand because this is not normal. We are not supposed to bury our CHILDREN. So if I don’t understand and I am living it, how the hell is someone else, who hasn’t walked my exact path, going to understand what I am going through?
Just because someone else lost their child, doesn’t mean they are going through the exact same emotions as me. We are all different. We all handle things differently. Feel things differently. Not even parents who have lost a child to cancer can fully understand my pain, as I can’t theirs. Everyone’s journey is different.
I am part of multiple bereaved parents Facebook pages. I thought it might help, but I think it makes it worse. Worse because now I am not only feeling my pain, but I am feeling their pain. I have always been one to feel other peoples pain very deeply. So those pages are increasing my pain to not only mine, but the pain of others.
People keep telling me I will learn to live without My Beautiful Ashley. That I will learn to function. Well if you call being in constant unbearable pain, LIVING, FUNCTIONING, well then I guess I am. But I have not, nor will I ever learn to LIVE WITHOUT MY ASHLEY. This is not living. It is Hell. It is Torture. It is, as I have said before, “THE LIVING DEAD”, “WALKING DEAD”. Whatever you want to call it. But it is not LIVING. It is a cruel form of punishment.
I want to know what Ashley did to deserve this? That is the big question, the most important question. Then I want to know what I did, to deserve being forced to live in a world without My Ashley. What did my Sweet, Kind, Generous, Selfless, Hero of a Daughter, do to deserve to have her life cut short. A life she so badly wanted to live. She never asked for anything in return. But all she wanted from this life was the chance to live. I am not perfect, but I have done my best to live this life as a kind, caring human being. I have spent a great deal of my life volunteering for many different things. All of us have spent the last 8 years running the foundation, volunteering with the help of family and friends. Wanting nothing in return. But you think at the very least, we would have been able to keep our Ashley here with us. No, instead, Ashley’s good will was punished with death and our good will, Mine, Mike’s, Michael’s, Jake’s, was punished by having to live in a world WITHOUT OUR ASHLEY. So Much for, “It is in giving that we receive.”
We can live without an arm, a leg. Without vision or hearing. We can even live without part of our lungs, with one kidney, etc.. But one very important thing we cannot live without, is our heart. Or even without part of our heart. Part of my heart died with Ashley. A BIG PART. So I cannot live WITHOUT PART OF MY HEART. So for those who say I will learn to live in this world without my Ashley, Will I? Will I truly be living? Is this called living? My Daughter, My Everything, She Is Gone. I yearn for her every single second of every day. That yearning never goes away. It is a pain that doesn’t stop. I want My Ashley Back. That is the only way to stop the pain. To Stop the yearning. To be ALIVE again. So since that can’t happen, I will suffer with excruciating, unbearable pain. I will spend my days crying and yearning for My Ashley. I Will Do All This Till The Day I Die.
So, to say I will learn to live with it is not true. Maybe some people, “Learn to LIVE with it.” But me, I don’t call that living. I CALL IT AN ETERNAL HELL
No comments:
Post a Comment