Living in the Black

Navigating Grief, Anger & Acceptance

What happens to you when you go through something bad?  You get sad. You get depressed, you are forced into a survival mode. You cry, you fight, you say too much, you are too much.   What happens to you when you get angry? Do you fight?  Fighting comes with anger too. Not just sadness.  What happened when you lost a parent? Were you devasted?  Were you angry or confused, or satisfied?  What happened when your babies were born? I know I was scared, sad, angry, happy, confused, trepidatious.. that’s a big word for a very big experience. 

What happens when your child dies?  Yikes. I went there.  I know many many people could be upset by that question. As you should be. You may even stop reading.  Please don’t do that. You may be upset for the rest of the blog, but, be determined to ride it out. You are committed to supporting your friend/family member down this torturous road of grief.  But, what would you do?  Ask yourself. What would you do?  How many times have you been faced with a life or death decision?  How many times have you had to make a choice for someone you love to live or die? I have had to do it 4 times.  4 times. I have had to look at myself in the mirror and say, I made the correct choice. I have never been alone in the decision making, I have always had the blessing of never being truly alone. But, remember the very first time you saw yourself in the mirror and were accepting of your choices?

I know that I am not the only one who has buried both parents, a bio-dad whom I did not know growing up.  I am not the only mom who has lost her child.   But I am the only one that you know.  I am the guinea pig. The experiment. The One to Watch.  I know it. I see it and feel it. You know what… I have come to accept it. 

Acceptance is not possession, though.  I do have the choice to move into a brighter place. To see the world with a different point of view. But, for now, all I’ve got is the black. The dark. The quiet space that holds no answers to the many questions I have.  I live in the black now.  There may be a lighter road, with a lighter load to carry. But, I have not found it yet.

Thanks for reading.

Thanks for being here.

XOXO
BRI

PS

This won’t be easy to take in. It is not meant to be.
Grief doesn’t gently whisper, it howls, it cackles.  Loss doesn’t ask permission; it settles into your empty soul.  Survival doesn’t come wrapped in pretty lessons. Survival in our grief, uncovers and exposes, all our weakness. Survival shows up unannounced, and most of the time not wrapped up nice and neat.  
Most people turn away from stories like mine. Too sharp. Too heavy. Too much.  I have been grouped in with others as “too” everything.

I will always walk with the knowledge that I am just too everything:  too much/too sad/too mad/too happy….

This isn’t the choice I made.  It’s where I have landed. When life stripped me bare, and took everything away from me, I landed in the black.  It’s where I breathe now.  Quiet.  Heavy.  Endless.  And while I know there may be another road, lighter, kinder, softer, I have yet to come to the proverbial fork in the road. If I could make the choice to be less for everyone, I would. But I have never been given the choice.

But naming this place matters. Saying it out loud matters. Because silence is another kind of death, and I am not done living.

I am living in the black now, and I don’t wish it on anyone else. But, you will never truly be able to accept my answers in my grief as testimony, until you join me. 

My Reviews:   Living in the Black

1 Star.   I do not recommend.