[First of all, this is weird to write about, I know. But I really want it to have a a place on my little internet home. It may be triggering so proceed with caution. Also, if you’re bothered by nudity, just don’t go on]

A little more than year ago (August 14th. It was a Saturday and I remember all details) I lost my mom to cancer leading to the toughest year I have experienced ever.

Here’s the problem I have with grief, it doesn’t ask politely for space. It doesn’t knock the door before it knocks you out. Grief is a bitch that doesn’t care and she will get her time. I mean, for something humans have experienced since the beginning of time till now, how do we not have better tools and preparedness for grief? A tablet would be nice. Drink twice a day for 6 months and you’re good? Bruh!! I’d gobble up them pills.

I thought the worst of it would be immediately after and the pain would reduce as time passed by. How unprepared I was to be an even worse bawling mess many months after. I know life isn’t linear but yet somehow I expected it to be for me. I don’t know man.

My mom was a Christ follower and for better or worse, I grew up in the church. My faith is important to me and has been a pillar in my life and spirituality. I grew up knowing that God has the numbers on my hair numbered, that I am loved with an everlasting love. I knew that I was special to God. Me as me. I don’t know if i’m that special anymore.

I prayed for mom to get better, to not suffer the pain of cancer, to have her last days be filled with meaning and maybe if it isn’t too much to ask for, not have her die. You know. I wasn’t the only one praying. She died anyway. I didn’t feel like her last days were filled with meaning, at least not for me. I hoped to have conversations with her. Learn about how she grew up, what was important to her as a young woman. How she navigated the world. However, it’s hard to have meaningful conversation with someone with a tumour in her brain causing dementia, speech inhibition and more.

I feel robbed of so much. I feel like it didn't need to be this way. I was, still am angry at God.

I believe in God, a being I worship that’s mighty beyond measure. I know that I can’t acknowledge an almighty God while having the same God answerable to me. Does this mean that God knew the pain this would cause and did it either way. Despite the prayer. Despite the cries. Maybe God has a better plan. Maybe I need to trust God with all this and yet it feels impossible now. I know people die all the time, people loose their people. I am not the first, I am not special. Maybe I am a toddler throwing a tantrum.

This knowledge doesn’t make me feel better about all this. Not at all. It probably has made me angrier.

Grief is the loneliest thing I’ve ever experienced. I feel like I can’t talk to anyone about it because most people have the same 5 things to say to grief. Ranging from ‘it will be well’ to ‘she’s in a better place now’ to ‘be strong’ to ‘it’s God’s plan and what do we know’ and all i do is nod through angry tears and that lump in my throat. So, I hid, I dug a hole and stayed inside. Time passes and the hole is soo deep I can’t see any evidence of light. There’s no front or back or up or down there’s just darkness.

I can’t tell how it got this way. How the sadness became all of my life. How the smiles became the facade and the tears became the real face.

I wish I could hide in that dark hole forever, there’s comfort in that hole somehow, but I have kids that look for their father, a wife who expects me to be a husband. Real life calls and brutally pulls me out of the constant state of darkness into some semblance of light but the minute they all sleep, it’s back to the darkness and the tears.

I am no longer a son. I no longer have the undying and unquenchable love of my mom. The one person that no matter what I did and felt would always have my back. The person I have known longest in this world. I no longer have the prayers of my mother. Who’s praying for me now? I’ll never pick up her call way before it was my wake up time and hear “Hey Sonny…” again. I don’t know how to be without my mothers love. Even when it was sometimes suffocating and a bit much.

I feel alone in this pain. Not because no one cares. In fact I have experienced so much love from my friends, I don’t deserve them. I feel alone because I can’t process this pain communally. I can’t explain this pain in a way it makes sense. It’s not special this pain yet it hurts as if i’m the only one to ever feel it. How arrogant this is of me. I’m afraid that this pain will numb me from recognising other peoples pain. That it will shut me out from the world.

Sometimes grief has been guilt. Guilty for being in pain for so long. “ I know you’re grieving but how long will you be like this?” Grief doesn’t make sense. Some days I see true joy and still cry myself to sleep. Grief is being in a crowded room screaming and having no one turn. One day I was listening to a podcast in a restaurant and burst in tears like what the hell. Had to quickly situate myself before the waiters come to ask what the problem is.

I remember I used to be a fearless artist. I miss that about myself. Fighting as I loose trust in God has had me loosing a major pillar in my life. It has me not feeling like a child of God and this makes me afraid. Afraid that I may not be able to trust again. That I may not recognise the way back to God. Fear has made me not recognise myself and so I can’t create while disconnected to self. A friend pointed out that I have always felt like a conduit of creative energy and being disconnected from the source may be a reason I can’t create. Damnit she may be right.

Knowing that I’m not special has made me not interested in making art. Making art is the way I show a glimpse of my heart and mind to the world. It’s how I express myself and that takes courage. I don’t have that courage anymore. Im afraid I may not know the way back to it.

Since I wrote the above, things have changed. There’s been some pockets of sunshine shimmering through the fog.

I had a clarifying moment where it was clear to me that I need to let go of the idea that I’ll understand this and make sense of why mom had to go. Make sense of why God couldn’t save her or the feeling that somehow God owes me anything. It was clear to me that trusting that everything that happens to me, good or bad is, in the bigger picture at least, best for me.

Now starts another hard part of the journey, learning to trust again. Picking up from my house of cards and hopefully building on a house of something more solid.

But then again, I’m still afraid. Afraid that I may not be able to trust again. Afraid that I may flinch at every small pebble that flies my way and break down again. Afraid that I don’t know how to see God as my father anymore. How does one move from this fear to trust?

Notes on [my] Grief