This week we celebrate National Grief Awareness Day. So today I would like to try to describe what grief feels like to me. Grief is like living in a bubble. A clear bubble where you can see the rest of the world. As I sit and look through this bubble I see how the world keeps moving and how my life stays in the same place. I see all my loved ones lives continue to go on, filled with laughter joy and happiness (as it should be) and I sit frozen in place inside my bubble. Some friends and family come into the bubble to visit me. They spend time with me in my frozen world but I also know they have to leave it because it is too dark to stay in all the time. Some days the bubble is filled with so much sadness, anxiety, loneliness and pain. However, other days it is like a big warm blanket keeping me warm on a cold night.
As long as I stay in the bubble my life has not moved on without Pat. However, in reality my life has already moved on – just shy of 10 months I go to work, I have traveled, gone to parties and concerts. Even though I get up each day and do all these things I still feel like there is a thin line of that bubble that keeps me from the rest of the world and moving on. Most days it feels like I am watching a movie as I see everyone’s lives going on and how I don’t feel a part of it at all.
As my grief journey continues, I don’t know if the bubble gets bigger to encompass the whole world or if it just bursts to let me be back out into the rest of the world. I just know that on the days that I spend remembering the love we had and the beautiful life we built, those are the days that the bubble feels like a big warm blanket. I hope whatever happens with this bubble in the future that I am able to bring the big warm blanket with me. As my journey continues and until that bubble is big enough to allow me back into the real world I am grateful for the visitors I have and for the memories that blanket me with warmth.
About Eileen Clarke
Eileen Clarke is an average everyday woman whose life was torn apart on November 2, 2017 with the sudden loss of her husband Patrick (Pat).
She is now in the process of taking a journey that she never asked for but must take nonetheless. Her hope that in sharing her journey she may be able to help other woman as she embarks on her own unplanned journey of grief and rebuilding.