12 days of Grief
By: Kl Smith
Tags: Grief And Loss, Mental Health, Grief, Bereavement

12 days of Grief

Part I

Day 1 – After he dies I drive home and have one glass of wine, feel sick to my stomach, then quickly feel very very pissed - then guilty at being pissed – then pass out on the bed. I haven’t eaten or slept properly since he was diagnosed and must be exhausted but hadn’t noticed.

Day 2 – I wake up mid-morning fully clothed under the duvet. I feel so guilty for having been able to sleep when he’s died. I feel panic like I’ve never felt before but I don’t move, feel unable to move, until the urge to pee is so strong about 3pm that I think I might wet the bed if I don’t move. My immediate thought is ‘so what if I do’. But I get up and pee anyway. I want a glass of water but then I feel fear like I’ve never felt before when I think about going into the kitchen to get a glass. I can’t face seeing his stuff or photos and I know I can’t fill that bigger space on my own. I just drink from the bathroom tap as though I’m a cat. I’ve never done that in my life.

I don’t sleep, just lie there staring at the wall replaying his actual death over and over. I hate horror movies and I feel like I’m trapped in one. I saw him die. At some point during the night I fall asleep.

Day 3 – see Day 2.

Day 4 – I wake and feel slightly different, like I want to get up. I think it’s because I am still in the same knickers, bra, leggings and top as the day he died. Also my scalp is so itchy as I’ve now not washed my hair for over a week. I get up and get straight into the shower but I can only be in there for a couple of minutes as I’m panicking again. The emotions and racing thoughts I’m having constantly are overwhelming me. I realise the bedroom or more specifically the bed is the only place I can be. Before I shower I neatly fold up the white top I was wearing and put it on the side. He leant his face on my top as he took his last breath and I know I can never wash it or wear it but need to keep it.

As I come out of the bathroom I hear the post being delivered and I go to the door to pick it up but as I move toward the door I start to feel strange. Instead I walk quickly into the kitchen to get a couple of crackers and a glass of water without looking around and head straight back to the bathroom. My scalp is still so itchy as a two minute shower wasn’t long enough for me to wash it but maybe if I leave it even longer it will start to get greasy and that will stop it itching. Is self-cleaning hair an urban myth? Why am I thinking about this shit at a time like this I tell myself. Washing my hair would seem too normal a thing to do. Like a form of betrayal. I stare at the wall going over it all again before I fall asleep in the early hours.

Day 5 – I wake up and have that classic experience of not remembering for an instant and then reality crashing in like he had just that minute died. Actually what happened was that I reached for him (in that way that you see in movies and think that’s bollocks, no one does that in real life (but I had done that once before with an ex)) and then ‘see’ a swirling mass of grey cloud that I hold in my hands before it flies into my stomach. Yep, no idea either.

I need to distract myself from mentally rehashing the moment of his death. I pay for and download the first Harry Potter movie. It’s long, I’ve seen it many times and it deals with loss in a way I can manage right now. I download the next, then the next. I’m marking time through the inner workings of JK Rowling’s mind but it works and I’m sleepy.

Or I was but now I’m awake and in bits as I can’t think of an ‘expecto patronum’ quality memory of him, I can only remember him as being ill. I know I’ll never sleep again if I can’t think of one but equally I know if I chase a memory I’ll be forcing it. But I do think of one, an amazing one, which makes me cry but calms my racing pulse. I’m scared of forgetting so I write it as a note on my phone then fall asleep.

Day 6 – I’m now getting scared I’ll never leave the house as I try to take the bins out as they’re starting to smell but I get near the door and then back away. I can’t do it today. I think it’s a mix of not wanting to leave so I don’t have to come back to an empty house; not wanting to see any neighbours as I might get hysterical; and feeling that once I walk out of the front door to do something ‘normal’ that’s when it will all be true. I’m wondering if this is how quickly agoraphobia can kick in.

I make a promise to myself I’ll go to the supermarket tomorrow. I’ve been living on crackers and water so I do need to go. Probably. I never really keep promises to myself though.