I Can Do This

I can do this. I can do this. No really, I can do "this." I can do busy that is. I can do staying out of my house and away from his stuff and away from our pictures and yes, here is the Horrible Mom of Year statement: I can be away from the kids. Do I miss them? Yes! But being around them means I have to face reality and I have to deal with their pain and I can't even deal with my own pain. The past few days I have been able to focus on me and yes, it has helped knowing that my kids are safe and having a blast and I could cry and not feel bad. But I have also been so busy that I am largely able to ignore the tears and the pain and almost pretend like it's someone else's life I am living right now. I can do that. I can pretend that this is going to go away and I'll be with him again, but then... but then I see his face either in a picture or in my mind. I see his clothes. I see his truck. I see our bed and he is not in it and he will not be in it ever again. And then? And then it starts. And then I can't stop it or IF I can hurry up and distract myself fast enough I can stop it all before I get so consumed that I just can't breathe. I don't want to breathe, not without him.

There are moments that I try to imagine my life 10 years down the road and I think, Maybe I'll be happy. Maybe my kids will have a solid "father figure" in their lives. Maybe we'll be celebrating Christmas and laugh and smile and feel joy. But then, all of a sudden 10 years from now at Christmas dinner it will hit me. Tom is not there. Tom SHOULD be there, but he's not. And whatever we will be doing in that moment is something that should Not be taking place because in that moment we will be celebrating without him. And at that moment 10 years from now, I will break down and cry in front of everyone. No one will understand. They will think "Well, it's been 10years already. She should be over it by now." But I won't be over it and in that moment I will think about what my life should be like and wonder where we would be and how we would be celebrating if our family-- our original family-- were all together. I will never know. I will never know what my life would be like in 10 years. People will look at me and see the smiles, see me laughing, and see happiness, but they will not understand that each and every day for the rest of my life I will be struggling. I will be struggling for air, for that feeling of freedom-- freedom from this misery. Freedom from torture that each and every day will hold. No, no one will understand. I may tell someone, "You know I still miss him. I still miss my Tommy." And they may seem sympathetic, but they won't get it. They won't know what this missing piece of my heart is doing to me on a daily basis. That will Never ever go away.

For now I just try to keep myself as busy as I can because the truth and reality of this is sinking in and I can't handle it. I try to ignore it as much as possible. I miss my heart and my soul and don't want to know this life without him.