One of the worst aspects of missing someone for me is knowing that other people are in the same position. I wish I were the only one. Not for notoriety or exclusivity but because the feelings that I have should never be felt. Not by me or anyone else. Not to say that everyone will feel the same way because obviously they won’t. But the basic feeling of yearning for a person that you love who has passed for any reason is universal. Missing someone is so very painful; physically, mentally, spiritually painful. The gut wrenching pain that starts in your chest and moves to your stomach and up into your head and just won’t let go. No matter what you do you cannot escape that awful nagging feeling that takes over your body; the feeling that nothing will ever be the same again.
Nothing will ever be the same again. Making that realization is very difficult but very necessary. Getting past the constant pain to get back to life doesn’t mean that life will go back to normal. For one thing, what is normal? Second, the normal you knew included someone that is no longer there. So, if they can never return how can normal return? It seems so simple but yet it is an elusive conclusion that most people cannot seem to come to.
It was at the 25 year mark that I really lost it. It was June of 2001. I was just starting a new job; our daughter was 20 months old. Pasith had just started school. Our lives were pretty intense. I don’t know what it was that set me off. I don’t know if it was my daughter or the big “25” that seems to be a marker for anniversaries.
Whatever the trigger was it hit harder than it ever had. When I went for my first interview for this new job the head of Human Resources at the time was wonderful. She made you feel comfortable and relaxed. During my first interview I felt fine. But the second time I met with her I was depressed and sad. I couldn’t muster up a smile. I was a different person. I was in a fog like I had never experienced. The pain was overwhelming. I could hardly remember driving to the office. It was June 12th, 2001. 25 years to the day. I tried to hide it. I tried so hard to smile, to bolster the energy to at least sound cheerful or even human. I just couldn’t do it. Finally, she asked me if I was ok. I had to be honest and said, “No.” I explained what day it was and how it had never affected me this way before; that I was lost in the fog. She was understanding and wonderful. She wasn’t falling over herself to be sympathetic, didn’t ask a million questions. She just let me say what I needed to on the subject and left it at that. I was in so deep I didn’t care if she believed me or not or if I got the job at that point or not. But, she did hire me – in spite of me.
I was like that for a month. I could not come out of it. I went through my 2 weeks of job training around my birthday, June 25th and couldn’t focus. I still didn’t really know what the real issue was. I mean I had always had nightmares during the month of June and sometimes I was a little sad for a day or two. And some years I forgot about it until my birthday and then I felt bad that I hadn’t been sad. But, this was different. I couldn’t shake this horrible feeling of dreading getting out of bed in the morning. It took till almost the end of the fog for me to realize what was happening.
Well, this realization was that I suddenly knew that the pain didn’t stop with me. Maybe that year was when I finally grew up and realized that the earth didn’t revolve around me. Not sure but I’d prefer that my big realizations in life come a little more gently. The pain of not knowing or having my father did not and does not stop with me. My daughter will not know her grandfather or have a ride on the farm tractor. She would never run around the farm chasing the chickens while my Dad looked on. She would never feel his hugs and hear his “I love you’s”. She would suffer the same fate as I had. My then future son would never know him. But it didn’t stop with my children either. My niece and future niece would never know their grandfather either; and all the grandnieces and nephews. The pain didn’t end with me and my sister. The pain would continue to spread to the people around us. And there was nothing I could do to stop it. I felt so helpless. And the special life moments would continue to have one person missing. Aside from all of the moments that he had already missed, there were my children being born, their birthdays, their Christmas’s, their recitals and concerts. Why does the victimization have to continue through generations? Isn’t one generation of suffering enough? I was innocent and surely my children are and they deserve a grandfather. It’s called the ripple effect and I hate it.
When I finally came to the conclusion that there would be other people in their lives that would fill that space to some extent the same way that many people had done for me I was able to let it go – or let it go enough to move on with my life. Sidney had another Grandpa that she loved very much and she has uncles close by that love her very much. God puts the people in our lives that we need. And I now have to trust that he will do the same for my children and nieces that he did for me. Trust is hard. All I can do is to make sure that they know who he was and that he really did exist and hope that the memories will lessen the pain for all of us.